Paul Rouke and PRWD on User Centered Design

I have recently been asked if I would take part in another Q and A session on a wide variety of User Experience topics, such as conversion rates, best practice sites, UX methodologies, UX development processes and ROI. A previous Q&A session on Findability for e-commerce websites provides more specific business advice which you may also like to take a look at.

Questions were asked by Kevin Wei, from China, who is studying on a postgraduate course in Design and Branding Strategy at Brunel University. In his own words - “It’s a great course for students to develop design thinking and creative disciplines in branding or related industries. During this course study, most of my research projects related to the internet, like search engine branding strategy, e-advertising design and current dissertation research titled “user experience design strategies for e-retail brands”.

Below is the full session which on reflection should provide a variety of business benefits and industry insights which I hope you will find useful.

1. Could you tell me a little bit about your current work that relate to user experience or usability?

Through my specialist user experience agency PRWD I am working on a variety of projects at the moment which have user experience as the central driver to the client solution. To name a few examples I have been working with Fast Web Media, a digital agency in Manchester, providing them with both information architecture services and the complete user experience and visual design solution for their client Nationwide. In addition to this project I have also provided the new user centred design for another one of their clients, the England Rugby Football Union (RFU), in particular for their new corporate website focussing on the up-coming Rugby World Cup.
I have also been working with CDMS, part of Littlewoods Shop Direct Group, providing an interactive online press gallery for one of the multi-million pound brands at Littlewoods Shop Direct, along with the user centred design and development of new fully personalised customer experiences which are expected to significantly increase online conversion rates, due to both the user centred design and the levels of personalised that they are introducing.

2. The term of user experience seems to be popular in the internet industry, do you think it is just new jargon to repackage usability, or beyond it?

The terminology used in our industry has changed over the last 10 years, starting with the likes of HCI (Human Computer Interaction) through to usability, user experience and customer experience. I wouldn’t class user experience as jargon, its just our industry is looking for the terminology which will resonate best throughout the online world. With an increased use of the term customer experience I feel this has evolved due to the importance finalised being realised as to how good (or bad) a sites experience is for the paying customer (more directly related to transactional websites of course) although I prefer to use the term user experience, as this discipline isn’t just focused towards e-commerce websites but any site where users have goals and businesses have conversion metrics (sign-ups, enquiries, applications, account management)

3. What do you think the current problems of online user experience on e-retail site?

This is a huge topic in its own right! For instance I I have recently answered questions posed by Dave Chaffey from Marketing Insights on the 1 single subject of findability in online marketing and e-commerce. My responses specifically related to e-retail sites, as its from my experiences as lead user experience at Littlewoods Shop Direct, a multi-million pound online UK retailer with brands across all target audiences, that I have encountered and solved a wide variety of user experience problems (or barriers as I like to refer to it, as users face barriers to achieving their objectives). Along with findability, another even more serious issue for e-retail sites are checkout conversion rates. Losing potential or even repeat customers during this critical stage of the shopping journey accounts for on average of 65% of sales loses on UK e-commerce sites – when you consider the UK e-retail market was worth £30.2bn last year, while worldwide online sales will hit £250bn during 2007 (Source IMRG), that is a huge amounts of lost sales revenue for e-retailers!

Another problem for e-retail sites is the lack of attention dedicated to improving the user experience of visitors arriving from search engine marketing campaigns on the likes of Google Adwords. Businesses are continuing to invest growing amounts of money in the acquisition and recruitment of new customers, yet due to no focus on where within an e-commerce site to send visitors from these sources and with a cumbersome and barrier littered user experience, the money it costs to get the visitor to the site is wasted.

4. Could you recommend any of e-retail brands that you think it tackling user experience design most effectively?

One recommendation would be looking at Comet who have invested significantly over the past couple of years on improving their user experience, with a particular attention paid to the checkout process, trying to make it as comprehensive yet user friendly as possible. An additional note on Comet is how organic search has been integral into the development of their site, but this is another topic altogether!

Overstock are another online retailer who put user experience at the centre of their strategic plans a few years ago, ultimately providing customers with an information and feature rich experience which tackles all the key issues of findability and checkout conversions that I have mentioned earlier.

Although not a perfect user experience, the Ajax driven diamond search facility on Amazon is a good introduction as to how technologies such as Ajax can be implemented with careful consideration to allow a customer to interact with your product range more intuitively and more customer focused. This is especially true for very large sets of products where the more intuitive and personalised a user can filter the products, the quicker and more likely they are of converting into actual sales.

5. What are the main elements of successful user experience design on e-retail site?

• Visitors should be able to find what products they want how they want to, whether that be through category browsing, filtering and sorting products to match their criteria, through the search facility and through promotional elements which specifically target different customer types.
• A visitor should always feel comfortable with what they have added to their basket, where they are within the site and where are the key shopping tools such as the search facility, help information and checkout options.
• Providing user reviews, comprehensive product information (if the user requires this), wish lists and detailed and clear delivery costs and options available
• Relevant and targeted cross selling of products which benefit the visitor
• Personalisation of site content where information is known about the user
• Checkout processes which are totally clear as to how long the process is, what fields are mandatory, summary of order and delivery costs, useful support information ie. why we need this information, this field should contain xyz, user friendly messages if a user has missed completing a field (perhaps using context sensitive messages as a user is competing a form) and not forgetting providing complete piece of mind on security measures in place

This list could go on for a while but there should be lots to think about here…

6. Could you briefly describe your ideal online user experience development process to e-retail, and what roles would you consider important?

1. Identify key strategic goals for the business
2. Involve all affected areas of the business which will be impacted with the e-commerce operation
3. Develop personas of the intended target audiences
4. Carry our user groups and other information gathering exercises to understand your target consumers
5. Based on all of the above, develop initial drafts of information architecture
6. Carry out card sorting with a sample of your intended target audiences to compare the in-house information architecture with how real users would expect to navigate and find your products
7. With an information architecture in place, specialist user experience designers to develop paper prototypes of key pages within a site, covering shopping journeys, checkout processes and account management facilities
8. During this process feedback requested and used where applicable to continually optimise the pages
   Produce the paper prototypes using the likes of Axure RP Pro to allow for engaging testing
9. Test the prototypes with real users and in-house team members, gaining feedback on the experience people have
   Enhance the prototype using an experienced visual designer to correctly visualise the importance of various elements within the site, and to develop the brand synergy which in turn will provide an exceptional brand experience for consumers
10. Design and develop the site based on all the above
11. Carry out user testing at key stages of the development to ensure the site continues to provide an exceptional user experience
12. Ensure feature rich web analytics in incorporated into the site so even the smallest detail can be seen which can be used for continually optimise the user experience of the site as usage increases
13. Once live, monitoring of site usage, conversions, drop-outs and other customer interactions
14. Periodically user test to continually optimise the user experience, especially on areas such as checkout
15. Constantly consider more ways to enhance the user experience by introducing more customer friendly tools and interactions

In terms of important roles to consider, as you will see from the above a large e-commerce development would involve a wide variety of roles, from marketing and operations to user experience designers and technical developers.
The 1 most essential role within the project is for the information architecture and user experience design – without the highest attention paid to developing the right user experience, ultimately the site will suffer in areas of user task completion and more importantly conversion rates.

7. Do you think user experience design alone enough to make a positive relationship between e-retail brand and customer? What else do you think can enhance it?

Definitely not. Brand proposition, niche or wide product ranges and customer service are 3 areas which all impact on a customers perception of a brand. Brands that are using business blogs to talk to their customers can also enhance the relationship between them.
On the flip side businesses need to be extremely careful who they partner with in terms of advertising, as this can have a serious negative effect on a brand perception. A recent example of this is the likes of First Direct, Vodafone, Virgin Media, the AA, Halifax and the Prudential removing their adverts from Facebook as there were appearing on the British National Party page.

8. What do you think ROI (return on investment) from user experience, especially like a totally personalization system is quite costly?

This is true, and its why its mainly the larger and blue chip e-commerce sites such as Amazon are truly embracing the possibilities of personalisation. ROI can be significant when businesses provide personalised shopping experiences, but for businesses without the necessary budgets for complete personalised experiences, there are lots of small user experience improvements which can be carried out to provide a ROI which far exceeds simply driving more traffic to your site via Google Adwords or similar.
I have recently posted an article on the business benefits of user testing, which again can be carried out with large or small budgets. This can provide conversion improvements from 2% all the way to 100% and above with the correct planning, testing and implementation.

9. How would you explain the benefits of an online user experience design approach to a project manager who is unfamiliar with it?

The simple (but highly powerful) benefit is that you are committing to ensuring your online user experience allows your customers to interact with your brand without un-necessary barriers, in turn optimising their chances of task completions and conversions.
A site with a strong user experience will be visited more often, receive much more referrals and convert more visitors compared to one where the user experience hasn’t been considered.

10. What positive future implications of online user experience to change e-retail industry?

• Single page checkouts will begin to be introduced into more into e-commerce sites, and when implemented correctly will help to streamline this part of the process and improve conversions.
• Richer and more engaging ways to shop will provide users with a more enjoyable and memorable shopping experience
• Sites will become more personalised and flexible so consumers feel much more apart of the brand, and that the site is working with them to provide a more intuitive and involving user experience.

To all online marketing managers, project managers, site owners, designers and developers (of commercial websites) - if you haven’t yet experienced user testing of your (or your clients) site 1st hand, then (budget permitting) I would strongly recommend getting your feet wet.

Instant benefits user testing can provide you and your business (or your clients business)

1. Provides immediate quick wins - you can then action and subsequently enhance the user experience and user task completion rates, in turn increasing site conversions and ultimately your ROI
2. Establish why checkout conversion rates are low and drop-out (abandonment) rates for a particular stage in the checkour process are high - again for E-commerce sites, a serious issue effecting the majority of sites large and small is poor (or poorer than what can be achieved) conversion rates of customers who have begun a checkout process. User testing this key shopping journey can identify where users experience barriers to progression and any areas of frustration or security concerns.
3. The significant Search Engine Marketing company budget isn’t being wasted - rather than continuing to throw money on Google Adwords marketing and similar, driving more potential new customers to your (un-tested/poor conversions) website, budget is spent optimising the user experience of the site which will provide much greater increases in return on investment
4. Help identify key issues in information architecture - knowing that users struggle to find a key area/tool within the website can be invaluable, providing the necessary proof that key changes need to be made
5. Raises issues not even considered internally - perhaps an area that is considered optimal may in fact have room for improvement
6. Shopping behaviours can be identified and the website tailored to maximise conversion opportunities - for e-commerce sites, providing there are enough participants, user testing will provide insight into different shopping behaviours (hunters, followers, impulse buyers) which in turn can help a business identify how critical information and calls to actions should be positioned within a page hierarchy as users progress through a shopping journey
7. Quashes any in-house politics - real users provide the insights into what is and isn’t working on your site
8. Creative marketing messages and promotions ignored - the expensive, slick piece of on-site marketing is actually overlooked as users exhibit banner blindness, instead they go looking for actual site content and not forms of advertising or promotions

User testing, when conducted professionally, can provide an overwhelming insight into how real users actually interact (or attempt to interact) with your site.

As I have experienced on both transactional and non-transactional websites, from SME’s to blue chip companies such as Littlewoods Shop Direct, the return on investment by carrying out user testing can be outstanding to a businesses online operation

Understandably work is required on identifying your existing and potential target audiences, and ensuring the right users are recruited to carry out the user testing, but with the right user testing facilitator (a service I personally provide through my user experience agency) and the right structure of test scenarios, gaining the insight available through observing a user using your website can both shock and excite website owners, as they realise both the current failings of their site (whether in user experience, information architecture or technical errors) and begin to understand that by making sometimes subtle changes to their site will significantly increase user task completion rates.

What if you have no budget for user testing?

• For businesses and clients without sufficient budget - improvise! Use friends and family who use the internet to a level which fits with one of your customer segments
• Task these people with the same site objectives inline with your commercial objectives
• Observe them as they navigate the site, successfully or un-successfully, and you will begin to realise the potential of user testing

With reference to the title of this post, in addition to observing user testing, a second factor comes in to play - think out loud methodology.

What is think out loud methodology?

The user is encouraged to talk about their experiences when carrying out task and scenario based exercises, so when they may have paused their mouse movement whilst contemplating where to look/what to click on, the user testing facilitator encourages (but only subtly) the user to talk about what is going through their minds at this key stage - remember the more cognitive effort a user requires to complete their tasks can enhance their frustrations or limit their patience in carrying out the task

I have spoke to other usability professionals, some of who don’t like to rely on what the user says, and although this can be true dependant on a variety of factors such as a facilitator who wrongly provides prompts for the user, or when a users actual site interactions conflict significantly with what they are saying, for any user testing that I have facilitated or being involved in, the user is always encouraged to ‘think out loud’.

How to maximise the potential of think out loud user testing

I would like to point you to an excellent and comprehensive article over at UX Matters entitled When Observing Users Is Not Enough: 10 Guidelines for Getting More Out of Users’ Verbal Comments. A quick summary of the 10 points that Isabelle Peyrichoux talk about in depth are:

1. Be aware of your own judgments and projections
2. Be genuine and transparent
3. Adapt to each user. Do not ask users to adapt to you
4. Be conscious of the way users are interacting with you
5. Get users to speak about their own experiences
6. Notice when users are censoring their own comments
7. Get users to speak in terms of problems, not solutions
8. Ask “Why?” and dig deeper
9. Make objective and precise observations
10. Allow users to be spontaneous and follow their flow

Although this great article will be of more use to user experience professionals and people involved in user testing on any level, it should provide an incite as to how user testing and the think out load methodology can be combined using basic (but often un-used) human relationship qualities to provide optimum user testing data and results.

Eye tracking - another level of user testing and customer insight

Coupled with the user testing and think-out loud principles, taking the testing another step further by introducing eye tracking can provide an even greater insight into exactly how users are interpreting a website and trying to find their way around to achieve the tasks/goals they have been assigned.

It would be diluting my points on user testing with the ‘think out loud’ methodology to go more in depth with the benefits of eye-tracking on this post, although it is certainly an area I will talk about more on a later post, especially as my user experience agency has now introduced this service to our clients.

Using Web Analytics To Further Identify Site Conversion Improvements

Although I’m a big fan of using web analytic data to uncover a vast range of improvement possibilities with site content and conversions, for this post the most useful think I can do is direct you to the following pages on the excellent blog of Avinash Kaushik dealing with all things analytics:

• Experimentation and Testing: A Primer
• Excellent Analytics Tip#5: Conversion Rate Basics & Best Practices
• Excellent Analytics Tip #8: Measure the Real Conversion Rate & “Opportunity Pie”

I hope you’ve found this article useful, and any feedback (and diggs) are greatly appreciated!