Google has recently made some pretty comprehensive changes to their Gmail interface. One change that I found interesting is what Google are calling ‘Display Density’, which automatically adjusts the layout of the page based on the size of the browser window. Google have also provided three settings that can be used to adjust the density of information on the page and afford users a level of control over how the page looks. While I don’t think the implementation is quite right, it is an interesting way to solve the problem of designing interfaces that will be used on devices with screens of all shapes and sizes.

Gmail Display Density Settings (https://mail.google.com/mail/help/newlook_sizes.html)

The issue of what resolution to assume for a user group is one that we come up against regularly and will become more of an issue as the use of multiple devices to access the same interface by the same user becomes more common. Imagine accessing Gmail from a 21 inch widescreen in work, a 13 inch notebook in the home office and on an iPad on the train.

I feel that this type of functionality is a really positive step and will help to preserve the integrity of the overall experience across devices while optimizing it for the screen size being used at any one time and I hope to see more of this type of functionality.

After spending a day performing about 500 Google searches of various businesses for a recent project, we made the observation that many organisations are not optimizing the metadata tags in their websites for their users; namely neglecting to use metadata to communicate the nature and content of the website and to encourage people to click on their link.

Example of Metadata

(Note: don’t know what metadata is? It’s essentially ‘data about data’, and is entered into the head tags of your HTML content. It is made up of a number of tags, including “description”, “keywords” and “language”. Search engines essentially read metadata to ‘understand’ what a page is about).

Our observation about metadata was inspired by the search results of a large business, who had not edited the descriptive metadata tags in their website after it was created with a template, leaving the ‘lorem ipsum’ filler text to display in their search results. Metadata is the foundation of all information retrieval processes and its importance in good user experience should not be taken lightly. It is possible that certain metadata tags have been both neglected or abused over the years, due to aggressive black-hat SEO tactics, or theories about SEO and the relevance of the metadata tags. Despite the rumours and the SEO myths, metadata is still a critical step in correctly identifying and defining the content and structure of a website.

Descriptive metadata entered in a website source code is important because it is the first port of call for users to gain an understanding of a website (this is the metadata entered in the meta “description” tag of your website code). It is the text that is displayed in search results and is generally all a user will refer to when they determine if they want to click on that link. If the metadata gives the users false expectations of the content of a website, than user dissatisfaction can occur. Users do not want to have to click around to find information they expected to see elsewhere, or be taken to a dead end. Descriptive metadata needs to be a brief, accurate and keyword rich description of the site’s content. No more than 250 characters will be displayed in search engine results, so keep it short and to the point so users don’t miss out on vital content.

Metadata within a website should also be consistent; a unified metadata structure also indicates a clean and intuitive taxonomy within your website. Using a metadata vocabulary such as Dublin Core can ensure your website’s metadata is thorough and aids in content retrieval and management. When evaluating the information architecture of your website, look beyond your navigational structure and ensure your metadata is also intuitive, relevant and matches your target audience’s expectations of content and classification. Good information architecture structure encompasses all elements of the page, including those the users don’t necessarily see.

We are often asked by our clients to find out whether their customers would use or need a Smartphone or tablet app to access their functionality or content. Of course the answer depends on the business and the target user group but it often raises the question of whether a native app, web app, or mobile optimized website is the most appropriate approach where the business wants to facilitate use of mobile devices.

Gmail Web App

The pros and cons of each approach are too numerous to list here, however, in depth understand the context in which their users need to interact with them on mobile devices is often an overlooked consideration. Native apps are great for providing a slick, rich and integrated experience. However, if your customers access your content from mobile devices rarely or are more likely to use web search to find you, developing a native app may not represent the most cost effective solution and choosing instead to develop a mobile-optimised website would be more appropriate. Simply having a native app will not enhance the overall experience if users are not likely to download it in the first place. Companies like Amazon take the approach of catering for all eventualities but most online businesses do not have Amazon’s user base or deep pockets and must choose what to implement.

We believe that establishing context of use and the needs of users with respect to mobile device access is an essential when planning how to facilitate mobile device user interaction. This will make sure that the business understand when, where and what users access on their mobile devices and ensure that the most appropriate, and cost effective, implementation is used.

An increasing number of the websites that we test, particularly redesigned websites, contain some level of social media integration. Social media integration can be very powerful and if implemented in the right way, on the right website can provide an excellent means for a business to communicate with their customers.

Examples of social media bookmark buttons

One aspect of social media integration on websites that interests me is the almost ubiquitous inclusion of social media bookmarking buttons. The most common of these is the Facebook ‘like’ button; however, many websites provide access to a very broad range of similar functions for other social media websites.

In our experience, users tend not to attend to these links during general use of websites. It must be conceded that users may not be in the mindset to spontaneously share information about their usage of social media in the context of a usability session that is not explicitly testing this functionality. Based on our observations so far, it is somewhat  unclear whether the  lack of spontaneous use is due to a lack of prominence, a lack of interest or the test environment, however, when we explicitly test social media bookmarking, we see that a proportion of participants like and use it.

Social media bookmarking has the potential to be a powerful tool in reaching your audience through recommendations, however, when deciding whether to include this functionality it is important to ask the following questions:

1. Does the website audience use social media?
2. Does the audience use social media simply as a means to communicate with friends or also as a means to broadcast information about themselves?
3. Is my content something that users would want to share using social media?
4. How can I use the connections that are made to my audience using social media once they are established?

We love when our clients give us exciting and innovative designs to test and often we agree that an interface that is not immediately intuitive is learnable and so can be considered to be usable for the target audience. Several factors affect whether an interface that requires learning time is usable.

1. Does the effort outweigh the benefits? The effort required to learn the interface sometimes outweighs the benefits of presenting that content in a complex interface. We feel that innovation is essential, however, sometimes the user is required to do a little too much to access content and they quickly lose interest in the content and the interface as a whole.
2. Will the initial effort required to come to grips with an interface put the user off? It is essential that the interface provides very simple and intuitive core functionality to ensure that users are not discouraged during initial use. This will allow users to use core functionality and learn more advanced nuances of the interface over time.
3. Does the interface hide the purpose of the website? When the interface is too complex or excessively visually based the purpose of the content it provides can get lost.
4. How often will the user visit the interface? Some interfaces will be heavily used and re-visited regularly. In this instance the user has the opportunity to learn the interface and become familiar with its features and nuances, however, where a user visits the interface irregularly or perhaps only once, the opportunity to learn a complex interface does not exist.
5. Who will use the interface? Different user groups are more willing to learn and explore than others. While it is true that younger and more technically savvy users will get used to an interface more quickly, these are often the ones that give up fastest. In comparison to older users who are often more cautious and systematic in their approach, more proficient users assume knowledge and are typically less forgiving of an interface that requires learning.

As web technologies advance we hope that this will enable designers to create increasingly interesting and innovative interfaces, however, we hope that the users don’t get lost in the process.

Back in the early 1990s I began exploring how task models could be used to support usability evaluation.  Twenty years on, and I’ve found a potential contender in the business world. But first, let’s explore what I mean by task model.

A task model is anything that enables you to graphically represent a task, its components, and the logical and temporal relationships between those components.

In the mid 90s the software engineering community adopted UML (User Modelling Language), along with tools such as Rational Rose transforming UML models into source code. But, what’s available in the User Experience community?

Many task models have been developed by Human-Computer Interaction researchers to support the representation of user interaction with systems. GOMS (Goals, Operators, Methods and Selections rules) and its extensions (Keystroke Level Model or Cognitive Perceptual Model) being the most popular. These models remained mostly in the academic world – complexity being their worst enemy. Other popular models are flow charts or mind maps.

However, you may ask, “What models are there to help us, usability practitioners, represent the interaction between users and systems?”

The potential answer is BPMN (Business Process Modelling Notation – http://www.bpmn.org/). It is a notation gaining adoption through the industry world. Its strength is its simplicity. With little explanation, the notation is readily understandable by all stakeholders. Although BPMN’s aim is to represent business processes, it can easily be adapted to represent user interaction with systems and processes.

The figure above presents an illustration of a recruitment process (from http://www.rickgeneva.com/wp/posts/swimlane-lane-or-pool-learn-to-swim-first/). The circles with envelopes represent events that trigger a task to start (the event is the email being sent or received), while the empty circles represent the start and end of the task.

So, why do I use models? I use them to communicate and validate user interactions or processes, to support usability evaluation, to help define the language to be used and/or to create training material.

Twenty years later, and I am still puzzled why models are not more widely used amongst the various members involved in the design and development of digital solutions.

As a new year begins we often reflect on the changes we have observed over the last 12 months. One of the more interesting changes that we have noted, is how people view the online world and the role it plays in their lives.

We have a set of introductory questions we use on most projects across numerous methodologies (interviews, focus groups, one-on-one user tests and card sorts) that break the ice and provide us with some background for each of our participants. These cover things like, common activities online, amount of time online each week, where they access the web and years using the web.

In 2010 we had to change these questions because the web is now so ingrained in people’s lives that our old questions had become difficult to answer.

In the past, people had a clear model of their online lives and were very conscious of being online. Today, being online takes many more forms and is often more subtle. For example, many people are either unaware or confused about whether they are online when using an app on their phone. Further, if we compare the experience of using an app to check your bank balance to logging into internet banking via your desktop the former is a much less involved process which at week’s ends you may have forgotten.

This shift began to hit home in the last 12 months when asking people about what they do online. Some really struggled with the question and responded by saying “well, everything really” . Often, we now have to prompt people to find out about online behaviours such as doing research, banking, buying tickets and booking holidays. In some ways asking about the web is like asking about how electricity impacts your life, it is there but we tend to take it for granted.

Possibly the most telling feedback is that we often hear people say “I don’t really surf the web, anymore”. I always have a chuckle when I hear this. Firstly, the term ‘surf the web’ takes me back to the 90s and secondly it is a term that the digital industry has long forgotten. The statement does emphasise the fact that (mostly) people go online to get things done.

So if online is just another, not too salient, aspect of people’s lives, how does this impact user research? We need to stop thinking of online as a thing (particularly as a mystical and magical land). And start focussing on the various topic areas such as banking or paying bills.

Do you think this is accurate and what trends have you seen?

As we are well aware, the internet has changed the way we do things. The way in which retailers ask us to sign up for loyalty programs or clubs is one of those things that has changed. It was not long ago that you would stand in the store and fill out a paper-based application in order to join a loyalty program. Now you are handed a card and asked to complete the application online in your own time. A recent experience highlighted the importance of a smooth integration between the off-line and on-line elements of the application process.

During a recent visit to Borders bookshop, at the checkout I decided to sign up for their new VIP loyalty program. I was handed the membership card and told to complete my application online. When I arrived home and logged onto the website for the life of me I could not find how to complete my membership application. Despite my expertise and experience in user interfaces, this task proved difficult. I became frustrated not being able to locate the call to action from the homepage, referencing both the instruction pamphlet and the membership card in search for further assistance. Finally I found the text link labelled ‘Join Boarders v.i.p’ in the top right of the screen.

If your company requires users to finalise what begins as an offline process via your website keep the following in mind:

Highlight promotional features prominently on the homepage: As I was coming to the site with the sole purpose of completing a process I had begun offline, I wanted the process to be as quick and seamless as possible. I was looking for a prominent call to action, something that grabbed my attention straight away. I was looking for a large advertisement, particularly as this loyalty program was a new feature.

User workflows differ when the task begins offline: In my example above, when I arrived on the website I was not thinking in terms of ‘joining’ as the link suggested, I thought I had already joined due to having received the card in-store. Instead I was looking for a way to finalise the process, looking for key words such as ‘Register your VIP card’. An additional call out box on the homepage which referenced my offline step (receiving the card) would have been extremely helpful.

Know your audience: Joining a bookstore’s loyalty program does not necessarily require users to interact with the company online. Many customers may join the loyalty program only to use the benefits in the physical store. You are therefore likely to attract more customers that may not be so familiar with the internet than if it was an online bookstore for example. Providing clear calls to action as mentioned above, would greatly assist these users.

While at the v21 conference earlier this year, I was reminded of how the NBN roll-out will enable downloads of 1GB per second over the internet, almost ten times faster than it is today.  What does this mean for the everyday user?  It means you will be able to browse your favourite website, whilst downloading a movie or your favourite album and uploading your holiday pictures to Facebook without any delay.  Exciting?

However, in the words of Spiderman and Barack Obama said, ‘with great power, comes great responsibility’.

With an increase in power usage across our broadband network it means we need to use more energy to operate it.  This in turn leads to much greater carbon omissions which need to be offset.  Has this been taken into account?

Just because we will have the capability to reach this kind of power, does it mean we should? Your thoughts?

iPad meets user: UsabilityOne tests the iPad

The iPad has finally landed in Australia. Here at UsabilityOne, we’ve been following the commentary on the iPad from afar, and decided to get our hands on one so we could make up our own minds.

iPad – user testing:

So just how usable is the iPad? To find out, we conducted some usability research of our own. We asked users to complete a number of tasks that use the native apps, as well as some browsing activities.

Our preliminary findings indicate that the iPad is inherently usable. The average score attained by iPad users on our UsabilityOne Task Completion Index (TCI) compares extremely favourably with the average score for the hundreds of interfaces we have tested here at UsabilityOne.

The reaction to the iPad amongst our testing participants, which include a mix of iPhone and non-iPhone users, has been overwhelmingly positive. Users thought the device looks very slick, providing a good overall experience. The web browsing experience was particularly positive, as it feels more immersive due to the touch interaction.

Downside? People are struggling to see exactly how it will fit into their lives. It clearly is not a replacement for a desktop or laptop computer. In fact, you require one of these devices to transfer and manage content on the iPad. Mostly, the iPad has been perceived as a luxury device rather than a must-have. The most common use-cases our participants have put forward include: web browsing while sitting on the couch or using it to watch video content, things that you can already do with a laptop or netbook. Other scenarios suggested include use of the iPad in the kitchen as a recipe book or as an electronic photo frame. The touch QWERTY keyboard is seen as reasonable for typing in search phrases, URLs and short emails, but no more than that. Nobody could conceive of using the iPad to create or edit documents.

We also observed that the way in which people held the iPad is likely to impact on how they use it. Users commented that it is actually much heavier than it looks. In order to use it to watch video or read e-books for a long period of time means that – unless you have forearms like Popeye – you will need to put it down or prop it up in some way. Obviously this will impact on the most common usage scenario suggested by our test participants (i.e. sitting on the couch).

UsabilityOne’s take on the iPad

So what do we think of the iPad? Whilst a nice piece of kit, the iPad has several obvious limitations.

The keyboard limits the iPad’s potential as a business tool, and the inability of the iPad’s Safari browser to display Flash content clearly impacts on its utility. Whilst it is great as a video device, the continued decision by Apple not to support Flash means the iPad is not compatible with catch-up TV services such as the ABC’s iView. The same goes for all of the other free-to-air broadcasters’ catch-up TV services. In the UK, the BBC created a version of their iPlayer which is compatible with iPhones, and it is interesting to see that the ABC has just announced the release of an app for the iPad that will allow users to access ABC content such as iView.

Given the boom in mobile browsing, many websites are now presented in a format which is compatible with mobile phone browsers, providing an optimal experience on those devices. Our experience thus far with the iPad indicates that websites presented on its Safari browser are not modified in any way; they are the same as you would see when accessing them on a laptop or desktop computer. As touch provides the only means of interaction with websites on the iPad, there are some question marks over the compatibility of traditional website design and the iPad. Just as with the iPhone, target areas (i.e. text links, navigation) can be difficult to hit on the iPad without first zooming in. However, a consequence of zooming in is that some content drops out of view, which suggests that it is important to be even more conscious of ensuring proximity between related controls and content. Perhaps there is even an argument for creating iPad versions of websites.

Like our participants, we think the iPad would be nice to have but the fact that it does not replace your desktop or laptop computer makes it hard to justify outlaying the cash to buy one.

So, is the iPad a game changer? Its immediate success, and the fact that competitors such as Microsoft, Dell, Sony and HP are preparing their own releases into the tablet market suggests it may well be. There are great hopes that the iPad can save the newspaper industry and that it will find a niche in education as a replacement for traditional text books. It is a lot of expectation for one little tablet device. The true success of the iPad, as with the iPhone, will lie in the development of apps that exploit its capabilities and fit into people’s lifestyles. We will be eagerly watching this space.

Want more info on the usability of the iPad? Keep an eye out here for some detailed findings on this research in the near future.