Lead from the fields: who and how applied qualitative methods in UX Research to develop IT products. Part 2 of 6
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So far, we have considered situations when you need to make a product for a specific group of users. Now let's complicate the situation by adding a new variable, or rather, one or several other user groups. To a certain extent, we have already approached this in the case study of the site for the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, but now we’ll “sharpen” the problems that arise in such conditions.
Well, when you clearly represent your target audience. It is very good if it is a truly homogeneous group and you are 100% sure in this. And if you need to make a product that will be used by different user groups? And each of them has its own needs, problems and expectations from your product. That awkward situation, when you really want to create, for example, two different sites, but it is impossible - either there are not enough funds, or the structure is one (university, company). So, the project team has to wrestle with how to make sure that nobody leaves offended, and the bounce rate does not go off scale.
Where and how can qualitative methodology help? Provide food for the team to think about - the needs, expectations and concerns of each user group. We look at how this happened to our foreign colleagues.
Without the use of qualitative methodology this would not be achieved. In both cases, the beginning of the story is almost the same: the site is trying to meet the needs of several user groups, and this creates a lot of problems. The site becomes bulky and inconvenient, and no group can find the necessary information. Both in the first and in the second case, customers turn to a third-party organization in order to use it to change the structure of the site.
What exactly did the involved experts do? Just reworked the structure of the site, taking into account the real life situations of users and their needs. This user information was collected using qualitative methods. And this is a very important point - an effective site structure for several groups of users can be created only on the basis of a deep analysis of their needs and life situations. This is where the qualitative methodology comes in handy.
The practical application of qualitative methodology here is almost the same as the situations discussed above: researchers also use interviews to study user needs. The only difference is that we now have several user groups. At the design stage of the study design, it is necessary to take into account all groups of users of the IT product. In the examples given, it was easy enough to do this, but this is not always the case, and you need to be ready for it. Consider two more cases.
These two cases differ from those considered earlier primarily by the fact that initially the researchers could not rigidly identify all user groups — they were denoted by “broad strokes” (for example, educational service providers, users of the NSS site). A clearer picture of user groups was already formed at the stage of analysis of material collected through interviews. This is an important point, since it is not always possible to define user groups at the design stage of a research design; sometimes all categories of users can be identified only at later stages. The basis for their selection may be a commonality of tasks, information needs, problems. Qualitative methods make it possible to obtain the necessary information for grouping users, which is necessary for developing a high-quality site structure. In this aspect, the AFCE case is very curious, where users were so different that the optimal solution was actually their individual support by the site and the webmaster team.
Let us summarize the analysis of the experience of using a qualitative methodology for developing a product for several groups of users.
All parts of the article: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6
“They all wanted to be on the main page”: development of a common platform for several user groups
So far, we have considered situations when you need to make a product for a specific group of users. Now let's complicate the situation by adding a new variable, or rather, one or several other user groups. To a certain extent, we have already approached this in the case study of the site for the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, but now we’ll “sharpen” the problems that arise in such conditions.
Well, when you clearly represent your target audience. It is very good if it is a truly homogeneous group and you are 100% sure in this. And if you need to make a product that will be used by different user groups? And each of them has its own needs, problems and expectations from your product. That awkward situation, when you really want to create, for example, two different sites, but it is impossible - either there are not enough funds, or the structure is one (university, company). So, the project team has to wrestle with how to make sure that nobody leaves offended, and the bounce rate does not go off scale.
Where and how can qualitative methodology help? Provide food for the team to think about - the needs, expectations and concerns of each user group. We look at how this happened to our foreign colleagues.
Case 6. The Understanding Group: site for the American Concrete Institute
The American Concrete Institute brings together about 20 thousand people: engineers, contractors, teachers and students. Such a large organization can not do without your site. The same big, but, unfortunately, difficult and inconvenient. Users complain, are nervous - you need to do something. The problem is obvious: the site is used by different groups of employees with different needs. Attempts to help everyone and immediately led to the fact that the site began to pop at the seams. The management of the institute turned to The Understanding Group. The task is to study the needs of all employees and try to satisfy them on one resource.
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First of all, the team interviewed representatives of the customer to clarify business goals, and then began to work for the staff of the institute.
Having finished with the interview, we began to categorize. Identified four user groups - each with their own key needs.
Then they introduced an additional criterion - the attitude of users to the American Concrete Institute: those involved vs. jet, researchers and scientists vs. industry practices. Based on the interview results, characters were created and key scenarios were written:
Characters and scripts helped to map the site and provide easy navigation when performing basic tasks. Checked site statistics: 15% of visits - from mobile devices. Provided the customer with the specification for the site with different width of the viewing area.
The result was a user-friendly site. The time spent on the site (+40 s) and the number of pages viewed (+ 15%) increased. Conversion and the average cost of orders (+ 38%) increased. The problem of helping everyone on one site has been solved.
Case 6. The Understanding Group: site for the American Concrete Institute
The American Concrete Institute brings together about 20 thousand people: engineers, contractors, teachers and students. Such a large organization can not do without your site. The same big, but, unfortunately, difficult and inconvenient. Users complain, are nervous - you need to do something. The problem is obvious: the site is used by different groups of employees with different needs. Attempts to help everyone and immediately led to the fact that the site began to pop at the seams. The management of the institute turned to The Understanding Group. The task is to study the needs of all employees and try to satisfy them on one resource.
')
First of all, the team interviewed representatives of the customer to clarify business goals, and then began to work for the staff of the institute.
Having finished with the interview, we began to categorize. Identified four user groups - each with their own key needs.
- Engineers. Look for information on standards and events for professional development (for example, conferences).
- Suppliers. They want to regularly update materials on standards and certificates, as well as looking for ways to improve their skills at local events.
- Lecturers. They strive to publish their research, participate in committees and commissions, and promote student competitions.
- Students Seek information about courses and competitions for students.
Then they introduced an additional criterion - the attitude of users to the American Concrete Institute: those involved vs. jet, researchers and scientists vs. industry practices. Based on the interview results, characters were created and key scenarios were written:
- find a technical article;
- find guidance for professional committees;
- get the standard.
Characters and scripts helped to map the site and provide easy navigation when performing basic tasks. Checked site statistics: 15% of visits - from mobile devices. Provided the customer with the specification for the site with different width of the viewing area.
The result was a user-friendly site. The time spent on the site (+40 s) and the number of pages viewed (+ 15%) increased. Conversion and the average cost of orders (+ 38%) increased. The problem of helping everyone on one site has been solved.
Case 7. The Understanding Group: Ann Arbor site
The Ann Arbor campus had a website through which different departments solved their tasks. Everyone has different goals, many tasks. The site has grown large and completely unfriendly to the user. The campus IT team understood this: web analytics data and customer support calls indicated that the site clearly needs reorganization. It was inconvenient to use it, even by IT-specialists. To solve the problem, turned to The Understanding Group. They were given the task: to change the home page and page of the department of parks and recreation so that it became a model for other urban structures.
The Understanding Group team first looked at the web analytics data, and then began the interview. We started with customer representatives, and then went to other users:
There were a lot of user groups, but this was not about a small company, but about the whole town. Dissatisfaction with the site was a red thread through the entire interview. Users were annoyed - the site was inconvenient and cluttered with unnecessary information. The data structure was based on a hierarchy of city authorities, and not on user needs. People would not mind to engage in self-service, but to find the necessary information on their own was unrealistic. Web analytics data confirmed this - users continually returned to the main or previous page to try again to solve their problem.
It was decided to alter the structure of the site based on the data collected during the interview. The site layouts were tested on users and to simplify navigation on the site they made three entry points:
Do not forget about the request for self-service: all city services and departments moved to the top level of the site. Made a separation for different user groups:
The converted parks and recreation department page has now been structured around the real needs of users (for example, register for the program). Conducted testing with the participation of users: now it is easier for them to navigate the site.
Web analytics data showed that after the launch of the main page and the parks and recreation department page, the number of failures decreased by 8%. The support service began to receive less complaints from people who could not find the necessary information. In addition, competition for a place on the main page among departments has decreased. Division employees were now confident that users would be able to find the information they needed.
Case 7. The Understanding Group: Ann Arbor site
The Ann Arbor campus had a website through which different departments solved their tasks. Everyone has different goals, many tasks. The site has grown large and completely unfriendly to the user. The campus IT team understood this: web analytics data and customer support calls indicated that the site clearly needs reorganization. It was inconvenient to use it, even by IT-specialists. To solve the problem, turned to The Understanding Group. They were given the task: to change the home page and page of the department of parks and recreation so that it became a model for other urban structures.
The Understanding Group team first looked at the web analytics data, and then began the interview. We started with customer representatives, and then went to other users:
- to city authorities;
- to web editors of city departments;
- to the heads of IT-departments and their subordinates;
- to residents;
- to local business owners;
- to tourists.
There were a lot of user groups, but this was not about a small company, but about the whole town. Dissatisfaction with the site was a red thread through the entire interview. Users were annoyed - the site was inconvenient and cluttered with unnecessary information. The data structure was based on a hierarchy of city authorities, and not on user needs. People would not mind to engage in self-service, but to find the necessary information on their own was unrealistic. Web analytics data confirmed this - users continually returned to the main or previous page to try again to solve their problem.
It was decided to alter the structure of the site based on the data collected during the interview. The site layouts were tested on users and to simplify navigation on the site they made three entry points:
- entertainment in Ann Arbor;
- business in Ann Arbor,
- democracy in Ann Arbor.
Do not forget about the request for self-service: all city services and departments moved to the top level of the site. Made a separation for different user groups:
- services - for those who are not familiar with urban structures and are looking for a specific type of service;
- departments - for those who are focused on the site and know where to find the necessary information.
The converted parks and recreation department page has now been structured around the real needs of users (for example, register for the program). Conducted testing with the participation of users: now it is easier for them to navigate the site.
Web analytics data showed that after the launch of the main page and the parks and recreation department page, the number of failures decreased by 8%. The support service began to receive less complaints from people who could not find the necessary information. In addition, competition for a place on the main page among departments has decreased. Division employees were now confident that users would be able to find the information they needed.
* * *
Without the use of qualitative methodology this would not be achieved. In both cases, the beginning of the story is almost the same: the site is trying to meet the needs of several user groups, and this creates a lot of problems. The site becomes bulky and inconvenient, and no group can find the necessary information. Both in the first and in the second case, customers turn to a third-party organization in order to use it to change the structure of the site.
What exactly did the involved experts do? Just reworked the structure of the site, taking into account the real life situations of users and their needs. This user information was collected using qualitative methods. And this is a very important point - an effective site structure for several groups of users can be created only on the basis of a deep analysis of their needs and life situations. This is where the qualitative methodology comes in handy.
The practical application of qualitative methodology here is almost the same as the situations discussed above: researchers also use interviews to study user needs. The only difference is that we now have several user groups. At the design stage of the study design, it is necessary to take into account all groups of users of the IT product. In the examples given, it was easy enough to do this, but this is not always the case, and you need to be ready for it. Consider two more cases.
Case 8. U1: site for Adult Community and Further Education Board (AFCE)
AFCE, the Committee for Municipal, Out-of-School and Additional Education, is a government department that offers educational services through various local providers under the motto Learn Local . The initiative is good, but, like any other, it needs to be effectively promoted. How can I do that? AFCE had two options. Some employees wanted a “fancy” site with various interesting “tricks”. Others believed that it was quite active to work with the Facebook page. Cheap and angry. It was not possible to come to a consensus, so we decided to turn for help to a third-party organization - the U1 Group. It was necessary to find a way to advance, which takes into account the specifics of the work of the department - a large number of local providers of educational services.
Team U1 had to answer a few important questions.
To answer these questions, the project team organized a series of interviews with customer representatives and educational service providers. Additionally, we studied the materials of user research collected by the customer. All this made it possible to obtain valuable data necessary for the development of a site development strategy. And to answer the question: “What shall we do?”
AFCE ambitions were not to occupy. This organization wanted to become a leader in the market of educational services, but found that this is not so easy. The market was very diverse. To take a leading position, it takes a lot of very different competencies. It became clear that the common "heaped up" site is not a panacea. The best strategy is to create a simple Learn Local brand site to support and ensure the development of the education sector. The site only directs students to local educational service providers, and they themselves already talk about the pros and cons of their curricula.
U1 team recommendations included:
To ensure the greatest effect, U1 recommended creating a resource management system supported by a team of web managers. Currently the site is under construction.
Case 8. U1: site for Adult Community and Further Education Board (AFCE)
AFCE, the Committee for Municipal, Out-of-School and Additional Education, is a government department that offers educational services through various local providers under the motto Learn Local . The initiative is good, but, like any other, it needs to be effectively promoted. How can I do that? AFCE had two options. Some employees wanted a “fancy” site with various interesting “tricks”. Others believed that it was quite active to work with the Facebook page. Cheap and angry. It was not possible to come to a consensus, so we decided to turn for help to a third-party organization - the U1 Group. It was necessary to find a way to advance, which takes into account the specifics of the work of the department - a large number of local providers of educational services.
Team U1 had to answer a few important questions.
- What works or does not work as a whole in the educational services sector?
- How do educational providers contact current and potential students?
- Do they consider the site a convenient means of communication?
- How do students interact with the brand Local?
To answer these questions, the project team organized a series of interviews with customer representatives and educational service providers. Additionally, we studied the materials of user research collected by the customer. All this made it possible to obtain valuable data necessary for the development of a site development strategy. And to answer the question: “What shall we do?”
AFCE ambitions were not to occupy. This organization wanted to become a leader in the market of educational services, but found that this is not so easy. The market was very diverse. To take a leading position, it takes a lot of very different competencies. It became clear that the common "heaped up" site is not a panacea. The best strategy is to create a simple Learn Local brand site to support and ensure the development of the education sector. The site only directs students to local educational service providers, and they themselves already talk about the pros and cons of their curricula.
U1 team recommendations included:
- encourage best suppliers to distribute best practices to their peers;
- encourage the use of social networks and create guidelines for working with them;
- implement management mechanisms that will allow the sector to develop dynamically without active intervention from the ACFE.
To ensure the greatest effect, U1 recommended creating a resource management system supported by a team of web managers. Currently the site is under construction.
Case 9. The Understanding Group: website for the National Safety Council of the United States (National Safety Council)
The National Safety Council has a clear, but very difficult mission - to save lives, preventing injuries and death at work, at home and in public places. For over a hundred years, the NSS has conducted safety research, promoted best practices, and trained in safety techniques. Its educational resources help businesses, the state and consumers to prevent accidents in their daily activities.
To achieve its goals, NSS maintains several sites and portals with a huge amount of information. The large amount of data gave rise to a serious problem: useful content that could save human lives was difficult to find and use. Another problem was the lack of balance between educational, propaganda goals and commercial activities. NBC wanted to expand the capabilities of its marketing team in placing content: they should not have been dependent on the IT team. There was a need for a new multi-purpose platform that supports education, propaganda, and commercial activity, while at the same time providing convenient communication with the NRC. The task was not easy, and the representatives of the NRC decided to turn to professionals from The Understanding Group.
At the first stage, The Understanding Group team had two serious tasks:
To study commercial and educational activities, as well as the history of the NIB, the project team conducted interviews with the leaders of the organization. Then we talked with site users. In total, more than 30 interviews were conducted with customer representatives and site users. The obtained data allowed to clarify the goals and objectives of the project.
Based on these data, a high-level information ecosystem model was created, describing information flows and their interconnection. The new structure of the site clearly showed what different departments are responsible for and what events they supervise.
The NSB and The Understanding Group team identified the main objectives of the project: to involve new members in the organization, to encourage participation in educational activities, and to implement and adhere to safety standards. Previously, an excess of content on the site prevented users from finding answers to their questions. In the course of the study, it was found that some users are interested mainly in training programs, and some are focused on the commercial component. Data about them was processed and transferred to the customer in the format of characters.
It was decided to simplify the site structure - now it consisted of five key blocks: joining the NRC, training, safety assessment (for example, at the enterprise), actions (for example, becoming a volunteer, donating money, taking part in the event) and feedback. In order to balance the educational and commercial components, thematic content in both areas was placed on the same pages, rather than in separate tabs. The Understanding Group team defined the basic principles of content strategy and developed 12 templates that simplified the placement of content on the site.
The result of the work was the site, which launched in 2014. For its evaluation, a user survey was conducted, in which 800 people took part. 75% of respondents said that the new site was better than they expected. The main advantage was the ease of navigation. Previously, due to problems with navigation, the NSS units competed for a place at the first level of the site. Now this competition has declined.
Case 9. The Understanding Group: website for the National Safety Council of the United States (National Safety Council)
The National Safety Council has a clear, but very difficult mission - to save lives, preventing injuries and death at work, at home and in public places. For over a hundred years, the NSS has conducted safety research, promoted best practices, and trained in safety techniques. Its educational resources help businesses, the state and consumers to prevent accidents in their daily activities.
To achieve its goals, NSS maintains several sites and portals with a huge amount of information. The large amount of data gave rise to a serious problem: useful content that could save human lives was difficult to find and use. Another problem was the lack of balance between educational, propaganda goals and commercial activities. NBC wanted to expand the capabilities of its marketing team in placing content: they should not have been dependent on the IT team. There was a need for a new multi-purpose platform that supports education, propaganda, and commercial activity, while at the same time providing convenient communication with the NRC. The task was not easy, and the representatives of the NRC decided to turn to professionals from The Understanding Group.
At the first stage, The Understanding Group team had two serious tasks:
- get an idea of the customer's business;
- to conduct an audit - an analysis of existing digital resources of NSS, company analytics, marketing, CRM and business processes.
To study commercial and educational activities, as well as the history of the NIB, the project team conducted interviews with the leaders of the organization. Then we talked with site users. In total, more than 30 interviews were conducted with customer representatives and site users. The obtained data allowed to clarify the goals and objectives of the project.
Based on these data, a high-level information ecosystem model was created, describing information flows and their interconnection. The new structure of the site clearly showed what different departments are responsible for and what events they supervise.
The NSB and The Understanding Group team identified the main objectives of the project: to involve new members in the organization, to encourage participation in educational activities, and to implement and adhere to safety standards. Previously, an excess of content on the site prevented users from finding answers to their questions. In the course of the study, it was found that some users are interested mainly in training programs, and some are focused on the commercial component. Data about them was processed and transferred to the customer in the format of characters.
It was decided to simplify the site structure - now it consisted of five key blocks: joining the NRC, training, safety assessment (for example, at the enterprise), actions (for example, becoming a volunteer, donating money, taking part in the event) and feedback. In order to balance the educational and commercial components, thematic content in both areas was placed on the same pages, rather than in separate tabs. The Understanding Group team defined the basic principles of content strategy and developed 12 templates that simplified the placement of content on the site.
The result of the work was the site, which launched in 2014. For its evaluation, a user survey was conducted, in which 800 people took part. 75% of respondents said that the new site was better than they expected. The main advantage was the ease of navigation. Previously, due to problems with navigation, the NSS units competed for a place at the first level of the site. Now this competition has declined.
* * *
These two cases differ from those considered earlier primarily by the fact that initially the researchers could not rigidly identify all user groups — they were denoted by “broad strokes” (for example, educational service providers, users of the NSS site). A clearer picture of user groups was already formed at the stage of analysis of material collected through interviews. This is an important point, since it is not always possible to define user groups at the design stage of a research design; sometimes all categories of users can be identified only at later stages. The basis for their selection may be a commonality of tasks, information needs, problems. Qualitative methods make it possible to obtain the necessary information for grouping users, which is necessary for developing a high-quality site structure. In this aspect, the AFCE case is very curious, where users were so different that the optimal solution was actually their individual support by the site and the webmaster team.
Let us summarize the analysis of the experience of using a qualitative methodology for developing a product for several groups of users.
- Qualitative methodology helps to solve the main problems of IT products (in this case sites) developed for several groups of users: too cumbersome structure, excess information and difficult navigation. A consistent analysis of the needs, problems and expectations of each group of users allows us to create a convenient structure taking into account real life situations.
- In some cases, it is possible to define user groups at the design stage of a study. The task of researchers is to consistently examine the needs and problems of each group of users.
- There are situations when it is impossible to clearly define user groups at the design stage of a research design. In this case, the composition and characteristics of the groups are specified at the data processing stage.
All parts of the article: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/307192/
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