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Usability Testing
How a Green, Bewildered UX Researcher Uncovered Loads of Valuable Data
Diane Bowen
User Experience Practitioner
@UXDiane
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Usability Testing
Testing with one user is 100% better than testing with none.
Krug’s first law of usability
@UXDiane
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Usability Testing
The interview is a powerful method to understand human behavior.
@UXDiane
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Usability Testing
The interview is a powerful method to understand human behavior.
I had no idea what I was doing.
@UXDiane
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Usability Testing vs User Testing
Usability testing: “Is this product or service easy to learn and use?”
Participants are users.
User Testing: Finds bugs before the product or service is released.
Participants are QA or Developers
@UXDiane
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Usability Testing
Usability testing: “Is this product or service easy to learn and use?”
Participants are users.
Discovers the goals, motivations, and behaviors of users.
@UXDiane
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Interviewing Users by Portigal
•Leave your worldview at thedoor.
•The user is the expert.
•Build Rapport.
@UXDiane
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Nielsen Norman Group
The best results come
from testing no more
than 5 users and
running as many
small tests as you
can afford.
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My First Study
• Interviewed Participants
• Wrote up observations
• Scheduled a meeting
• Made recommendations
@UXDiane
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My First Study
• Interviewed Participants
• Wrote up observations
• Scheduled a meeting
• Made recommendations
This wasn’t very effective
@UXDiane
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A Better Way
Ask questions
• Who wants this research?
• Why are we testing this?
• Why is this a business goal?
• What answers would inform the development team?
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A Better Way
Ask questions
• What are the key parts to test?
• What does the perfect participant look like?
• When does the Product Owner need results?
@UXDiane
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A Better Way
• Enlist participants
• Write jargon-free and non-leading interview questions
• Minimize interview questions that have high cognitive load
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Observing the User Experience by Kuniavsky
Six phases of an interview:
• Introduction
• Warm-up
• General Issues
• Deep Focus
• Retrospective
• Wrap-up
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A Better Way
• Pilot test before holding interviews.
• Schedule interviews and invite the Product Team.
• Schedule debriefing meetings directly following the interview.
• Email the findings to the Product Team.
@UXDiane
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A Better Way
Webster’s definition of Synthesis:
“The composition or combination of parts or elements to as to form a whole.”
Synthesis is insight from analysis
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A Recent Example
@UXDiane
• Take notes during the
interview
• Debrief with the team
immediately after the
interview
• Transcribe notes, one
thought per sticky note.
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Usability and Synthesis Workshop
@UXDiane
• Place the sticky notes
into a task analysis.
• Identify trouble spots.
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Sources
• Portigal, Steve. Interviewing Users. Brooklyn. Rosenfeld Media. 2013. Print
• Nielsen, Jakob. “Why You Only Need to Test With Five Users.” Nielsen Norman Group. http://www.nngroup.com/articles/why-you-only-need-to-test-with-5-users/, Accessed 8-26-2015
• Kuniavsky, Mike. Observing the User Experience: A practitioner’s guide to user research. San Francisco. Elsevier. 2003. Print.
@UXDiane
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Uncover User Insights and Deliver Value
@UXDiane
• Talk with users.
• Invite the Product Team to observe
the interviews.
• Debrief with the Team. Include
everyone’s thoughts.
• Send a synthesized findings doc to
the team to remind them of
their discoveries. Diane BowenUX Practitioner, Covenant Eyes@UXDiane 20