User Research: Methods and Best Practices Flashcards
Aim of User Research
Place people – users – at the center of the design of your product (tangible or not tangible).
—To drive your design
—To assess the value of your solutions
—To assess the impact of your product
What is User Research?
Covers a wide range of methods!
—Ethnographic interviews with target group
—Classical usability studies
—Quantitative measurements of return on investment (ROI) on UX design
User Research Methods - Quantitative Research
—Surveys
—Formal Experiments
—Systematic Observation
Provide measures of user behaviour, in the form of statistics which can be analysed.
User Research Methods - Qualitative Research
—Diary accounts
—In-depth interview
—Focus groups
—Ethnography
—Usability tests (to some degree)
Provide deep understanding of the experiences and daily routines of the users.
Which Research Methods to choose?
- Identify your goal
- What are you trying to identify?
- What is the nature of your project?
- What is your budget?
- What is your time span?
Meaningful Designs
Get to know who will be using your design
Design Thinking first rule is to empathise with your user
* Identify several users and conduct interviews and observations in their natural contexts
* In the beginning of the design… and validate ideas throughout project’s lifetime
Easy and Enjoyable Designs
High Level of Usability
* Users have to LOVE to experience your design… otherwise they will love others’ product
* How…? User Tests
What is the ROI of your design?
Invisible effort until product is finished!
* Invest on user studies to show that the iterations with users returned on more sales!
* User studies: A/B testing or user patterns
Timeline for Design (6)
Research - Research to develop understanding about your users
Define - Compile research and observe where user’s problems exist
Ideate - Generate wide range of ideas
Prototype - Build real tactile representation of ideas
Test - Return to users for feedback
Implement - Launch product and go back to step 1 for next release
Design Development process
Project start
Define user requirements
Concept design
User testing of prototypes
Detailed design
Field trials (ROI)
Project launch
If there is no user? (new app?)
Integrate user research:
—As soon as possible
—Schedule enough time
—If there is not enough resources prioritise the things that you can apply user research
—Start with paper prototype!
Searching for Users
- Choose users that have the same characteristics that your aimed user
- Target at all age groups involved
- Recruit participants who represent your target group/end users
- Be aware that recurring to colleagues to perform tests may come with some bias
- Promote the inclusion of people with disabilities
User requirements and how to look for
Requirements
* Age
* Location
* Experience
How to look for?
* In your network
* Posting on social media
* In specialized forums
Research Plan
- Purpose: what you want to find out and how you are going to get it?
- Method: Depends on time and budget constraints. For example, Direct observations with a user; online survey; qualitative interviews, etc.
- Participants
- Location
- Script
- Consent: What type of data is going to be collected; Who is going to have access to data; Participation is completely voluntary
- Communication
- Timeplan
Movie streaming App - 1. Purpose
The purpose of this study is to find out how/when our target group watches movies. When, where and how does watching movies interleave with the other daily routines? There is the need to understand these issues in order to develop features that are most relevant to our group.
Movie streaming App - 2. Method
We will do 8-10 interviews to understand how and when they watch streamed movies
Movie streaming App - 3. Participants
People aged 18-35, who use movies on-demand app and watch at least 1 movie per week. Due to time constraints we will recruit in the proximity through our network and social media.
Movie streaming App - Questions
How often do you watch a movie per week?
In what circumstances do you watch such movie?
Where do you watch?
Can you describe a typical situation?
Movie streaming App - Data and Analysis
Interviews will be video recorded, using two cameras.
A thematic analysis to discover the main themes.
Movie streaming App - 4. Location
Interview participations at home or in the park because they are places where watching movies occur.
Have the opportunity to see the kind of equipment used
Movie streaming App - 5. Script
Introduce yourself and the study – make sure that every participant has the same information.
Ask permission to video record and establish privacy issues.
Questions may be posed in different order to engage the participants.
Possible tasks that participants have to perform.
Movie streaming App - 6. Consent
Send an email with the explanation of the study and the on the day explain it again!
Movie streaming App - 7. Communication
We plan to bring a designer to be present during the interview. A the end of the research we plan to do a workshop to brainstorm some ideas from the results. A document with all the research will be written.
Movie streaming App - 8. Time plan
The recruit of participations occur on week X. The interviews on week X+2, followed by the analysis and the workshop should occur at week X+4.
