User Experience 2004 User Experience Conference 2004 Las Vegas Oct 3-5 Presented by Nielsen Norman Group

User Experience 2004

User Experience Conference 2004

Las Vegas Oct 3-5Presented by Nielsen Norman Group


Agenda

• Day 1 – Loose Money– Black Jack– Video Poker

• Day 2 – Interaction Design 1– Full Day Workshop

• Day 3 - Interaction Design 2• Day 4 – Main Event

– 3 Keynotes


400+ Attendees

• Amazon• Adobe Systems• Cisco Systems• Accenture• IBM• Yahoo• Qwest• Hewlett-Packard• Bank of America• Travelocity• PayPal

• Verizon• Sprint• Dell• Sun Microsystems• Oracle • Napster• NYSE• PeopleSoft• MapQuest• Ebay• ORC Macro


Interaction Design 1& 2

• Instructor: Bruce Toganazzi: Principal Nielsen Norman Group, Chief designer WebMD, Original designer for Apple, Sun

• 2 day workshop• High level, theory, conceptual


Centralized vs. Decentralized staff

• Decentralized: – Pro – close to developers, supervisors feel in control, closer to

projects – Con – supervisors feel in control, poor resource management; work

done in spurts, less learning from each other, less upper support– Improve with communication among decentralized groups

• Centralized: – Pro – better cross learning, better skills, cross pollination (less

reliant on individuals), more powerful– Con- isolation from developers, isolation from marketing and

projects, managers fear loss of control– Improve with co-locating designers with developers on projects,

primary programmer and designer on projects


Life Cycle

• Engineers like schedules• Old: SDLC, Waterfall = Slow

– Sequential, Separate

• New: Fast Track Methodology– Team based, Cooperative, Involve team – Prototyping, Testing– Improves release time


Systems Design

• Never assume the client knows the solution– i.e. “We need a database to store customer phone

numbers”

• Never start with the technology, start with the problem– Don’t solve the wrong problem with the right technology– i.e. “We need to build a system that does X, because Y

technology requires us to do it that way”

• Complexity/Difficulty of programming should not drive system


Systems Design

• There is no average user• Requiring pre-registration deters users• Use defaults where appropriate: countries, states, etc.• Reinforced many usability guidelines• Don’t trust your own eyes• Don’t trust your own abilities• Magic metaphor: Magic works when it is smooth,

natural, and unnoticed• Any usability testing is good

– Early and often– Diminishing returns

• Prototypes are meant to change


Don Norman Expectation Design: The Next Frontier

• Principal, Nielsen Norman Group• Former Vice President at Apple• General talk on design and marketing• People buy based on design• Online experience leaves a lasting impression

of a brand


Hoa LorangerTeenagers on the Web:

Creating compelling Websites• User Experience specialist, Nielsen Norman Group• Basic usability issues magnified• Teenagers are less skilled• Task success rates- Teens: 55%, Adults: 66%• Teens read less, give up quicker• Enjoy interaction: quizzes, polls, message boards,

interactive content• Many sites confuse teens with sensory overload• Many teens not using new technology• Teens aren’t kids• Volcom, BBC

http://www.volcom.com/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/teens/


Jakob Nielsen Web Usability Guidelines Revisited

• Principal, Nielsen Norman Group

• “The guru of usability”• Mixed emotions among Web

professionals

http://www.urbanev.com/jakob/


Research

• Tested 25 Websites– Large, Medium, Small, E-commerce, Govt.

• Success rates– Site-specific tasks: 66%, 40% in 1997 – Web-wide tasks: 60%


Usability Problems

1. Finding (IA, category names, navigation links)2. Page Design (readability, layout, graphics, amateur,

scrolling)3. Information (content, product info., corporate info.,

prices)4. Task Support (workflow, privacy, forms, comparison,

inflexible)5. Search6. Fancy Design (multimedia, back button, PDF/printing,

new window, sound)7. Other (bugs, presence on Web, ads, new site,

metaphors)


Results

• 88% first action was search engine• Web-wide tasks: sites visited per task: 3.2• First page visited on site

– Homepage 40%• 35 sec on page for low-experienced• 25 sec on page for high-experienced

– Interior page 60%

• Page views per site– 3.3 on temporary sites– 5.5 on final site

• Total time on site– 1:49 on temporary sites– 3:49 on final site


Results

• 43% low-experienced reading carefully• 37% high-experienced reading carefully• Others were scanning• Even though all text may not be read, all text

is important. Typos, incorrect, inaccurate, or outdated information will overshadow good content and jeopardize the user’s perceived credibility of the site.


Search Query Strings

1994 1997 2004

1 word 81% 44% 36%

2 words 14% 33% 36%

3 words 4% 14% 16%

4 words 1% 5% 6%

5+ words 0% 2% 7%

Mean 1.3 1.9 2.2


Revisited Guidelines From 1994-1999

• Rated for current importance:*** still high-impact problem** medium-level problem* minor issue now0 no longer problem

• Reasons for change– Technology improvements– Behavioral changes in users, e.g. adaptations– Designers restraint


Still Equally Important

Links don’t change color when visited ***

Breaking the Back button ***

Opening new browser windows ***

Pop-up windows ***

Looking like an ad ***

Violating Web-wide conventions ***

Vaporous content, non-specific hype ***

Dense content, non-scannable ***


Technology Improvements

Download time *

Frames *

Flash **

Low-relevancy search listings **

Multimedia, long videos **

Frozen (fixed) layout instead of liquid layout **

Cross-platform design *


Behavioral Adaptations

Not knowing what’s clickable *

Blue links 0

Not scrolling “below fold” **

Registration *

Complex URLs **

Pull-down menus, cascading menus *


Designers Showing Restraint

Plug-ins, bleeding-edge technology *

3-D *

Bloated design, overwhelming users *

Splash pages *

Moving graphics, scrolling text *

Non-standard GUI widgets **

Not disclosing who’s behind information *


Designers Showing Constraint (2)

Made-up words *

Outdated information **

Consistency within a Website **

Premature requests for personal information **

Having a single site, not splitting up **

Orphan pages 0






Documents

User Experience 2004 User Experience Conference 2004 Las Vegas Oct 3-5 Presented by Nielsen Norman Group