Killer UX Design Chapter 3 - Understand the User Context
Choosing Your UX Method
Formulate Your Questions
- 5 Whys technique
helps you map the relationship between root causes of a problem.
Example: Let’s take a look at it, using the recipe app as an example. Specifically, let’s say the user wants to be able to locate and preserve recipes from family members:
1. Why?
Otherwise they’ll be lost forever.
2. Why does this matter?
Because some of the recipes I loved as a kid have been lost over the years.
3. Why does this matter?
Because it is like losing a little piece of your family’s history.
4. Why does this matter?
Because I love to cook and want to pass on the recipes I cook to my family when they grow up and leave home, so that they have a record of the food we ate and shared together.
5. Why?
Because it would be great to have a permanent personal record of recipes and family photos of us enjoying the food we shared together. Future generations could see it, and could share and enjoy the food we cooked.
User Interview
Tips for a user interview:
■ Have users complete a pre-session homework activity
■ Ideally, conduct the interview at the users’ places, where they are “within context” of the topics you might be discussing.
■ Have a plan for the results you want to gain from the interviews and a page of prompts
■ Use your 5 Whys to assist with your questioning; encourage open conversation.
■ Be flexible with your structure if it means achieving the outcomes you need.
■ Choose questions that probe thoughts, feelings, beliefs, reactions, and tasks that people complete.
■ Ask users about a time when they experienced difficulty (pain point) in completing tasks, as well as a time when it all went well.
■ Home in on any useful shortcuts or workarounds that users mention.
■ Try to keep the interview to one hour, as attention spans wane after this time.
Contextual Inquiry
an unstructured interview that occurs in the context in which your product or service will be used. It is often used to uncover unmet needs or hidden desires.
■ Clarify what is the most important context of use (work or home) for your project.
■ Treat people with respect and avoid passing judgment on the way users perform tasks.
■ It’s fine to be curious and probe for more information. Your 5 Whys are always good fallbacks for questioning.
■ Learn to follow the natural flow of the situation; it’s okay to abandon the script.
■ Remember, random tangents can provide the best insights into users’ private worlds. Let them go off on these tangents—you might find gold!
Diary Studies
■ Diary studies should be combined with a pre- and post-interview briefs
■ Any user output—such as comments or sketches, for instance—are handy to refer to in later design and development processes, as they represent a strong user voice.
Priming Activity
Essentially a homework activity for research participants to complete before we meet with them. Example: a collage of words and images on a poster, where it allows participants to create links with information to reflect the way they think; moreover, it often uncovers aspects they might think to discuss, or are even consciously aware of.
Usability Testing
for evaluating how easy a product or service is to use by having end-users complete a set of typical tasks. It can be used in your initial research stages, as shown in Figure3.8, to evaluate how an existing product usually performs (known as benchmarking)
Consider Edge cases (Extreme Cases)
Extreme user-types that operate a bit differently to the norm. This uncovers new or unexpected insights and helps to clarify our product boundaries; for instance, an age range, or a certain level of proficiency. Example: early adopters.
Personas are fictional characters that are created to represent the various user types of a certain product. These characters come alive with given names, photos, and details relevant to the task at hand, ensuring that all consumer segments of the product or brand are given a voice.
Formulate Your Questions
- 5 Whys technique
helps you map the relationship between root causes of a problem.
Example: Let’s take a look at it, using the recipe app as an example. Specifically, let’s say the user wants to be able to locate and preserve recipes from family members:
1. Why?
Otherwise they’ll be lost forever.
2. Why does this matter?
Because some of the recipes I loved as a kid have been lost over the years.
3. Why does this matter?
Because it is like losing a little piece of your family’s history.
4. Why does this matter?
Because I love to cook and want to pass on the recipes I cook to my family when they grow up and leave home, so that they have a record of the food we ate and shared together.
5. Why?
Because it would be great to have a permanent personal record of recipes and family photos of us enjoying the food we shared together. Future generations could see it, and could share and enjoy the food we cooked.
User Interview
Tips for a user interview:
■ Have users complete a pre-session homework activity
■ Ideally, conduct the interview at the users’ places, where they are “within context” of the topics you might be discussing.
■ Have a plan for the results you want to gain from the interviews and a page of prompts
■ Use your 5 Whys to assist with your questioning; encourage open conversation.
■ Be flexible with your structure if it means achieving the outcomes you need.
■ Choose questions that probe thoughts, feelings, beliefs, reactions, and tasks that people complete.
■ Ask users about a time when they experienced difficulty (pain point) in completing tasks, as well as a time when it all went well.
■ Home in on any useful shortcuts or workarounds that users mention.
■ Try to keep the interview to one hour, as attention spans wane after this time.
Contextual Inquiry
an unstructured interview that occurs in the context in which your product or service will be used. It is often used to uncover unmet needs or hidden desires.
■ Clarify what is the most important context of use (work or home) for your project.
■ Treat people with respect and avoid passing judgment on the way users perform tasks.
■ It’s fine to be curious and probe for more information. Your 5 Whys are always good fallbacks for questioning.
■ Learn to follow the natural flow of the situation; it’s okay to abandon the script.
■ Remember, random tangents can provide the best insights into users’ private worlds. Let them go off on these tangents—you might find gold!
Diary Studies
■ Diary studies should be combined with a pre- and post-interview briefs
■ Any user output—such as comments or sketches, for instance—are handy to refer to in later design and development processes, as they represent a strong user voice.
Priming Activity
Essentially a homework activity for research participants to complete before we meet with them. Example: a collage of words and images on a poster, where it allows participants to create links with information to reflect the way they think; moreover, it often uncovers aspects they might think to discuss, or are even consciously aware of.
Usability Testing
for evaluating how easy a product or service is to use by having end-users complete a set of typical tasks. It can be used in your initial research stages, as shown in Figure3.8, to evaluate how an existing product usually performs (known as benchmarking)
Consider Edge cases (Extreme Cases)
Extreme user-types that operate a bit differently to the norm. This uncovers new or unexpected insights and helps to clarify our product boundaries; for instance, an age range, or a certain level of proficiency. Example: early adopters.
Personas are fictional characters that are created to represent the various user types of a certain product. These characters come alive with given names, photos, and details relevant to the task at hand, ensuring that all consumer segments of the product or brand are given a voice.
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