The Enemies of User Experience (Camp Digital, Manchester)

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Enemies of UX

Lee DuddellCamp Digital Manchester

27 March 2014

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Enemies of UX & how to defeat them

• 2 slides to keep Marketing happy• 3 reasons why me?• 1 competition• Top 10 Enemies Chart• 10 minute scoring workshop• 5 things to do. Next week.

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UX Research platform

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You

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Why me?

• 20+ years digital UX• Founder of WhatUsersDo• Somebody else dropped out LinkedIn

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Competition*

• Join User Experience Insights on LinkedIn• Comment or start a discussion• Entered into a £2k Managed Service draw

*If you are watching on iPlayer competition will be closed.

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UX Enemies

• Countdown chart based on severity• From clients, research & experts

– Case Studies– Anecdotal evidence– What the best do

• Score yourself/your neighbour

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#10 Analytics & Data = UX insight

• Only What and How Many not Why• At best indicate where there is a problem

– not Why• You only have Analytics for your site

– Most users don’t convert on your site• The Best gather UX insight to understand Why

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#9 Best practice & 3rd party research

• What exactly is best practice?– Especially in mobile?

• Relying on 3rd party research does not answer Why?

• X% of users say they would “do this or not do that”

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Why?• Because it’s hard to checkout• Because they think they are missing something

67%of users start on a SmartPhone& finish on a computer (Google Research)

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Fashion Brand Case Study

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#8 Website refresh will fix it

• 20% of incoming sales calls are from failed re-designs

• Bad: we re-designed because we thought we needed to

• Worse: because we re-platformed• The Best make smaller changes based on

evidence

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#7 Occasional Usability Labs

• Not often enough• Too remote (yes, that’s right)• Not socialised• Hammer to crack a nut

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Example video on the next slide shows how remote UX can reveal issues. Without the need for a Lab.

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#6 UX Imposters

• MVT ≠ UX• Session recording ≠ UX• Hypothesis based on hunches• Incremental improvements• The Best use UX insight to make these tools

work harder

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#5 Your Design Agency

• An enemy of UX• Yes, they are• The Best test their Agency deliverables with

users• Checklist later on in this deck

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Video on the next slide shows what happens if you let your designers over-design!

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#4 Focus Groups/Surveys

• Not fit for UX purpose

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#3 Aspirational design

• Your competitors have not got it right• The Best see competitors through users’ eyes

– Observing users starting at Google– Or user benchmarking

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#2 Process will fix it

• Agile does not = good UX• Culture is more important• The Best are creating Satellite teams

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#1 Guessing

• Not finding out Why?• Hunches, instinct and opinion• HiPPOs

– Worse HiPPPOs! (the extra “P” means Partner i.e. “High Paid Person’s Partner’s Opinion”

62% base design decisions on hunches and guesswork

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UX Enemies Chart#1 Guessing#2 Process is a panacea that will fix it#3 Aspirational Design#4 Focus Groups & Surveys#5 Your Design Agency#6 Thinking it’s done with Imposters (e.g. MVT)#7 Occasional Usability Labs#8 Website re-fresh or re-design#9 Relying on best practice & 3rd party research#10 Relying on analytics & data

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New Chart entrants discussed during the workshop

• It’s qualitative, how can it be so good?• That’s all fine, but the CEO over-ruled the

insight!

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Enemies are caused by wrong inputs Inputs you have: Inputs you need:

• Data• Opinion• Hunches• HiPPOs• Surveys• Focus Groups• Best practice

• Insight from User Observation

• Backed up by Data

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5 things you can do next week

You can’t change culture, but you can chip away at it… otherwise you may become a UX Martyr!

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1 Read

• Why most UX is shite by Leisa Reichelt• This CRE article with a long title: We have designed pages for more top-500 websites than any other company. Here’s why they are winning.

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2 Introduce “Why?” into meetings

• What if we knew Why?• Rather than guess, shouldn’t we find out

Why?• [Boss level] It’s worth validating with

customers to see how right you are!

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3 User Exposure

• Guerrilla testing• WhatUsersDo• “Just try and order something or get your

husband to!”• Closest thing UX has to Silver Bullet

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4 Use Case Studies

• From this presentation• We have many – just ask or tweet us• Mobile Moves On Event & Report

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Conversions Up 9.5%

By observing users

Ripped up their dev plan

We deliver incredible results

Contact Us:WhatUsersDo, United House, London, N7 9DP P. +44 (0)207 036 1950, [email protected]

AO.com Case Study

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5 Choosing “UX” Designers

• Emphasis on User Insight– Professional in-house User Researchers– How do you deliver a great UX?– Plan that includes UX Testing & users

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5 things to do next week

1 Read2 Start asking Why?3 User Exposure4 Case Studies5 Filter UX Designers

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Next…

• Tweet a link to this deck– Follow @whatusersdo

• Fri 4th April announce the competition winner on Twitter– LinkedIn Group

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Thank youQ & A