Usability

Not one to follow the hype or emerging trend, I was still intrigued by why anyone would queue from 5.30am to buy something, namely the new iPhone which launched last week in the UK. On catching up with my brother-in-law last weekend, an avid iPhone user (and essentially all things Apple), I wanted to know what all the fuss was about. He proudly pulled out his phone and handed it to me, initially I was amazed he would trust his new prised possession in my hands, what if I ‘broke’ something by pressing the wrong button? It would seem that it’s not possible.

I initially went and tried out what is usually the first thing I use a mobile for, sending a text, upon realising how simple that was, I wanted to know how useful some of the applications really are - this is where it got exciting, I could fill a page on the 30 minutes spent ‘playing’ on the phone, the most useful apps for me are anything to do with travel, getting from A to B with minimum fuss - the routes can be displayed in different formats, map, satellite, text with built in compass, and the ease of use is paramount, as someone who uses the internet frequently to plan my journey, I was amazed that it was so much better on the iPhone. Not one normally for games, I spent a good ten minutes ‘driving’ (the phone acts as the steering wheel and it moves extremely well) as for playing the synthsiser, who knew I was so musical?! We even shot a short video, did a quick edit and uploaded it to You Tube within minutes.

Basically I was hugely impressed with the iPhone, it’s slick, sleek style which fits comfortably in the hand, the large clear screen, sound quality, sheer speed and the most useful applications that simply provide a cleaned up version of the internet! A great customer experience and for the first time I can see where the cost of an item like this actually holds it’s value. The iPhone is not only pretty and fun, but useful too.

I recently downloaded a free trial of Axure. After hearing so many good things about it from colleagues I decided I must try it. After entering my email address as requested I unticked the e-marketing box out of pure habit just as I was scanning the text. After unticking it my eyes reached the last few words ‘about one email a month’. This was enough to make me stop and reconsider. While part of me would like to know about updates and news what I didn’t want was to be inundated with emails and my natural instinct in all these situations is to opt out. But once a month or thereabouts I can cope with. So I reticked the box. Including that little piece of extra information has meant that Axure has the means for ongoing communication with me. Clever work.

I signed up to Waterstone’s card a couple of months ago (I was caught off guard at the counter when asked if I wanted to sign up.) I said ‘Yes’, instantly regretting it as I knew I would never use it. If you use the card when you buy books, you get points; on top of that, you get subscribed to their newsletter when you sign up - all pretty standard stuff. After a couple of months of receiving these emails, I decided that I wasn’t particularly interested in receiving them anymore. And this is when this ordinary experience started to go astray. After clicking on the link to unsubscribe, I was presented with a page that allows you to ‘manage everything to do with your email subscriptions’ – their words. However, in truth, this page only lets you sign up to receive more emails or change the email address to which you receive the mail – not exactly enabling you to manage everything to do with your email subscriptions.
After spending a couple of minutes looking for the unsubscribe option, I gave up, instead opting to mark the newsletter as junk mail and let the spam checker take care of it for me. I have since come across another mailing list which gave me food for thought. It employs a different tact - it gives the user a choice whether they want to unsubscribe or try the emails for another couple of emails – the number determined by the user. Empowering the user in this way is more likely to keep customers happy and in doing so, retain them. In addition to the Waterstone’s loyalty card that I do not use, their emails are now going straight in to my junk mail - which effectively closes the door on any future correspondence from them. And although this experience hasn’t put me off Waterstone’s completely, I believe that as important as it is to get the user experience right when opting in, it is equally important to get it right when you are opting out, otherwise you risk annoying customers and shutting them out for good.

I recently received a DVD featuring video and photographical highlights from a friend’s wedding day. As much fun was experienced by all during the celebrations, I eagerly loaded my DVD player in the anticipation of spotting myself and my friends amongst the crowd. However, it was not to be as I was defeated at the first hurdle; I couldn’t understand how to navigate around the media. The top level menus were faint images of roses (I think!) and featured against a moving blurry background of rotating flower bouquets, in addition, the feedback for selection was non-existent and the labelling incomprehensible.

The poor usability of my friend’s wedding DVD could be forgiven as the DVD was compiled by the groom as a cost saving exercise using free software, however commercial DVD manufacturers can not use the same excuse. This experience led me to review various DVDs in my collection.

From exploring the first few, it was obvious that from a usability point of view DVD menus are generally poor - commonly a case of placing aesthetics over function. In other words, designers appear to view this medium as a creative arena where no rules apply.

In many cases, navigating menu options from simply playing the film to selecting individual chapters was frequently difficult and often frustrating. On one DVD, I drilled down within the special features section and the only way I could return to a start point was to reject the disk and reload the DVD!

As a result of these experiences, here are some suggestions for better presented and usable DVD menus:

• Keep the animations and menus within their own distinct regions on the screen. (Nothing is more frustrating than trying to assess feedback after making a selection against a rolling or busy background.)
• Ensure feedback is obvious e.g. highlight the current selection.
• Clearly label menu items; ensure the labels are intuitive. ‘Chapters’ are chapters, don’t reinvent the wheel - people just want to watch the film and the extras (not spend value leisure time working out the meaning of a label or a new way of navigating around a DVD.)
• Remember that users will be using one of the most frustrating selection devices invented by man, the remote. So don’t hide options and require the equivalent of a mouse over movement to highlight menu options.
• Always provide an escape route; there should be no dead ends when navigation down ‘levels’ within a DVD menu. For example, there should be direct mapping between the remote control’s rocker buttons and target operations, i.e. the up/down/left/right movement, should be direct and immediate.
• A user should always be able to return to a logical start point. (Nothing is more frustrating than having to eject a DVD and start the loading process all over again.)

Ask yourself this question, how many times do you want to watch the opening credits of a movie when exploring a DVD?

Chris Lake of Econsultancy recently published a blog called 50 swinish ways to annoy web users. It’s an amusing read, but what struck me is that the first 7 items related to forms of advertising on the web (Auto-play, interstitials, death by Adsense, death by banners, pop-ups, etc.)Advertising on web sites is an interesting conundrum. The participants in our studies are often quite vocal in their annoyance of them, yet online advertising generates big money for companies so we must be clicking on them. In fact, the IAB have recently released a press release stating that in the US Internet advertising revenues surpassed $23 Billion in 2008, reaching a record high. So like them or loathe them, adverts are a big part of our online world.

Our clients often ask how best to approach advertising on their site. Is brighter and bolder better? Should adverts be contextual and personalised? Should they wait until the end of a customer journey to upsell or is that too late? How can they create a design that provides the best balance between increasing their revenue without infuriating their customers at the risk of damaging their revenue?

I recently tested a high-fidelity black and white prototype for a financial client that contained placeholders for adverts. On pages containing non-personal content, the advertising wasn’t questioned by the participants as it appeared relevant to the main content, and also offered potential savings and discounts to the users. The participants were less keen to see similar material on pages where the main content was personal to them; however, their attitude was that as long as they weren’t distracted from their tasks they weren’t too bothered. But, as soon as the same participants saw the same pages but with the graphic design overlaid their attitude immediately changed; they were enraged to see ‘advertising’ amongst their personal account information despite the savings promoted. The graphic design had made the adverts far more prominent and as far as the participants were concerned they were intrusive and out of place.

So what can organisations do?

Firstly, organisations should see how their competitors are doing it and determine what works and what doesn’t. Online banking, for example, is an area where adverts are becoming ubiquitous and I think some banks have got their placement right, while others rudely interrupt the users journey.

Secondly, they should look for innovative new ways to advertise while keeping the users goals and needs in mind. Pixazza, a company in the States, have developed a means of converting photos on web sites into interactive advertisements. James Everingham, who is behind the concept, says that many adverts are an “obnoxious intrusion” and that “ads work best when they don’t resemble ads but rather a feature that helps shoppers find items they may already be interested in buying”.

Lastly, it’s crucial to test any designs with users and to test iteratively. Testing with early prototypes can catch key issues before it gets expensive to make changes, and testing once the final design has been overlaid can ensure that with the graphic design the site still meets the users needs and expectations. The graphic design can have a major impact on both on the usability of the site and the user experience; and satisfaction levels for the overall customer experience.

One of the biggest barriers to acceptance of a digital web based product for children under 12 years is language, or labelling. Just like adults, children are quick to scan and dismiss text. This is exaggerated when it comes to children who are just learning to read.

To turn this around, offering information via meaningful and useful graphics and icons can increase the usability of a product aimed at children. A site I found recently that successfully combines words with images and appeals to both those who read and those who may not, is the Lego website.

The key here is to ensure icons or graphics chosen convey meaning to as many children as possible.
For example, if 7 year olds were asked to ’save’ a document in Microsoft Word, would the floppy disk icon mean anything to them?     Perhaps offering a default icon of a DVD, a memory stick or even a piggy bank (one of the alternative icons you can choose in Word) would surely convey the meaning to children more easily. Adult conventions are learnt, yes, but this shouldn’t kerb designing for a specific age group.

Since the advent of the mobile phone we have seen them move from being a large device used by a very select few to their current ubiquity, with some people owning two or more phones. How did we manage before we had them? However we did it is unimportant; the mobile phone is here to stay. This mobile evolution happened fairly rapidly and over a short space of time, which is due in no small part to the efforts of Nokia, who conquered the market in the late 90s and has seen off growing competition from other mobile manufacturers in the last couple of years. The legend of Nokia lives on and it has managed to keep hold of a sizeable share of the market, although the credit crunch seems to be loosening its grip, albeit marginally - Nokia’s Q4 market share figures for 2008 are down 3% from the previous year’s Q4 share of 40%. That said they are still leagues ahead of their nearest rival. I think the key to their success story can be linked to their heavy investment in user testing and focus on easy to use products. Nokia users are known to be steadfastly loyal and shriek at the thought of using another type of handset.

We face a number of challenges for designing usable interfaces on these shrinking devices. For one we need to contend with the increase in the number of applications and games that are freely available, mobiles are being used in many new and varying ways. Addressing how to make this interaction easy and engaging while on the move is a formidable task. The change from testing in labs to testing in the field will be an important one. Testing in lab conditions will highlight a high proportion of the issues but many more will be missed. Things like mid-day sun can be simulated to a certain extent but not walking and texting at the same time or looking after a child and trying to find someone’s contact details simultaneously. By using small cameras which can be attached to the handset which records participants’ interaction is one way. Another is to make use of embedded software which records users’ interactions, relaying the keystrokes and menu selections back to usability specialists to be analysed. However it is done, mobile testing is going alfresco. Far from being left out in the cold mobile manufacturers should take to the streets.

Recently I decided that it was time to move house, a change is as good as a rest, or so they say… It is also the first time that I have moved house since I moved to London, nearly two years ago. The first time was a less than pleasant experience; I was unfamiliar with the city and ended up traipsing from east to west swallowing hours of my time, only to find houses that looked like something out of the Young Ones.

This time it would be different. I knew the areas that I wanted to live in and the kind of place I wanted, so if I stuck to that, what could be simpler? Well… after viewing the first couple of places I realised that it was not going to be the straightforward task that I had hoped for. The descriptions of some of the rooms promised a lot, but, sadly, failed to deliver. I had resigned myself to more traipsing. This was until I spotted an ad that provided a link to a Youtube video of the available room. The video showed the room and the rest of house, which I thought was very clever. What it did was give potential tenants an insight into what was being offered and did it in a clear and concise way. Not only do you get to see the room without having to make the trip over there, but you also get the impression that there might be interesting people who approach things a little differently living there.

I didn’t get a chance to view the room, or meet the people, it was gone by the time I got round to calling them (which probably tells its own story). So the search goes on… but it did leave me thinking - How can we communicate the benefits of investing in usability studies as clearly as the video on Youtube showed the room? And what tools have we got in our kitbag that help us to do that? Research into emotional engagement is forging the way. By using tools like EEG and fMRI, we can paint a clearer picture of what keeps a customer engaged and on the website, while also placing a spotlight on the areas that are causing confusion. These objective measures provide a more reliable indicator than their subjective counterparts - interviews and surveys - which are useful tools but in some instances can be unreliable, with participants over reporting successes and under reporting failures. This type of data is pretty powerful stuff and will help convince even the most ardent sceptics of the importance of investing in usability.

Making use of this sort of technology can only lead to an increase in the customer’s user experience and may lead to products getting snapped up as quickly as the room did…