Qualitative measures online

I remember a grad school course in Mass Communications research that made me think it would be hard to ‘measure’ advertising results (Grady Course Listing). 15 years in a creative service business have help prove that in more detail. Don’t get me wrong, I believe that the UI work we do definitely effects results in a measurable way. I just think that companies and service firms struggle with the need to Quantify results that are probably more Qualitative.

We are starting to see the frothiness of web hype (Web 2.0 BS Generator) again with mergers, venture money and hyperbole from consultants, but many of the old adages still apply. The Journal of Marketing has only been around since 1936 and has published a ton of research on effectiveness. One of the articles I remember most came from a 1961 quarterly publication. It was by Robert Lavidge and Gary Steiner and we used it in class at Georgia when we discussed measurement. It took users through the 6 step process from Awareness to Knowledge to Liking to Preference to Conviction to Purchase. Advertising programs have been teaching kids to write copy to get people across that spectrum ever since. Bill Bernbach exemplified the skills starting with the 1959 Volkswagon Think Small campaign and held our attention for decades.

How does that age old ’selling’ translate to the web? Where are we on Lavidge and Steiner’s continuum? Seth Godin has important opinions in his book “All Marketers are Liars” highlights which can be seen in a fantastic video of a talk he gave at Google’s offices (Godin Video). He believes that people “poke around” on a site until they can find meaning. And Meaning is the only thing that leads to Action (purchase in the old model).

His premise is is that you don’t have to invest millions in advertising (like the push model of old) if you can make a story worth telling by your customers. Engage your site visitors with a story? Have you been to a sales training session of any type where they didn’t tell you that? Story telling as a sales process works and it has been since the beginning of advertising. Getting customers to tell them is another story altogether.

So - how can a company cause those conversations to take place? That may be the most qualitative measure I have ever studied.

It’s the Aesthetics Stupid…..

Innovation and creative thought are the foundation of the next generation business ideas. As more and more ‘thinking’ jobs Business Week article move to less expensive labor around the globe, design will become more central to successful business operations.

Cultural differences and varying tastes around the world give us all the opportunity to keep those creative positions in-house. The result is that “Design” can be your business differentiator.

New York Times economics columnist, Virgina Postrel believes we are just at the beginning of a time when ‘design’ and form factor will prove beneficial. Her book The Substance of Style gives case after case of style influencing the purchase decision. In sexy technology toys like laptops and game cubes as well as everyday items like a toilet brush - design matters for sales.

Consumers are expecting smart design in their purchases. They are expecting to see it in products from vacuum cleaners Dyson to MP3 players iPod to automobiles BMW.

Obviously this applies online. Web applications that make sense and are easy on the eyes have higher success metrics. Jakob Nielsen included one of our own case studies 3 years ago in his ROI for Usability Whitepaper. His metrics were for sales and conversion rates as well as user performance or productivity. Granted, gathering a true mathmatical measurement of design improvements is squishy, the underlying results of our examples are that online sales can improve dramatically if design is appreciated.

There are still only a handful of hugely successful online sales stories (Amazon, Cisco, Dell, Apple, GAP) but more and more evidence that the Internet is being used for research and comparison shopping.

As trust in online security increases that awareness and knowledge of a product or service will continue over the vintage advertising continuum toward prefernce, conviction and ultimately purchase. Those final purchase decisions will be guided by preferred “Design” that doesn’t stand in the way of commerce.

Customer-focused works

Customer-focused design and development works. It works for web development as we have learned that if people understand your graphical interface, your application is far superior to many competitors.

Customer-focused also works for products. One of our favorites books on the topic is The Design of Everyday Things. Mercedes-Benz created seat adjustment controls shaped in the L of a seat to allow intuitive adjustment without taking your eyes off of the road.

Another auto example is how things don’t work - like the fuel door on my 2004 Honda Odyssey being in the way of the drivers side sliding door when refueling. Toyota rode 100,000 miles with Mom’s before they redesigned the Sienna and the result is new leader in the mini-van category. Customer inputs made that redesign a huge succes for the auto maker.

Customer-focused works for physical space too. Architects have gotten into the groove using charettes - a combination of town hall meeting, brainstorming and old-fashion teamwork to design solutions that solve customer needs. How Buildings Learn by Stewart Brand has some great examples of space changing over time becasue of customer needs. Who among us hasn’t edited our own homes with personal decisions based on our lives?

More importantly, customer focused works for organizations. Nordstrom is famous for their customer service, but it stems from their organizational chart - an inverted pyramid with the Board of Directors at the bottom and Customers at the top. Building customer-focused organizations starts with just that type bent. In The Roaring 2000’s Harry Dent described a little different tact on customer-focused organizations by having the sales people empowered to make decisions and recommendations to help customers more. His perfect company of the future was only seen in the background (like so many eBay entrepreneurs) while creating customized service for each buyer.

Customer-focused seems like common sense. After all - without any customers, you don’t have a business. But in a recent Inc. Magazine survey, CEOs of the fastest growing companies listed their top concerns as: competitive strategies, managing people, keeping up with technology, managing growth and finances. Nary a “customer” focus among them.

Going forward we can all improve on our customer focus. Try adding customer inputs to your next project whether that be home improvements or product development or application design. Chances are you will find a better solution based on the improved inputs.

Simple is the new More….

Have you seen the new IBM marketing campaign? Simple Drive-through Whole page spreads in national newsprint. Outstanding creative behind a classic American brand. And the message? SIMPLE - from a company with more complex solutions than most of us can imagine.

SIMPLE is not new. It is common sense. And it has been around since the beginning of business. Peter Drucker wrote about Simple in the 1950’s. I listened to Bill Jenson (Simplicity - The New Competitive Advantage ) at a Fast Company Real Time conference. His whole approach seemed right about stripping away the complex to focus on what was important in business - any business. Clarity of purpose is Simple. Very hard - but Simple nonetheless.

Simple is stripping away the old (200 channels and nothing on) with personalized info (Tivo). Simple is not spending 2 years writing requirements for an application, but using faster tools and processes to deliver an application that just does one thing well (iPod, Palm, Basecamp, Blinksale examples). Simple is applying the right people to a task and focusing only on core competencies. For individuals and companies alike.

In today’s web development world, simple is more like the Hollywood movie studio model. Bring in the best talent for lighting, editing, acting etc. and then release them when project is done. Simplify down to what you do well and focus on it. Common sense.

In Jack Trout’s book The Power of Simplicity , he quotes Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. as the CEO of General Motors in 1944 telling Peter Drucker to only put down “what you think is right” in his consulting report on the great company. Simple guidance for any consultant. We should all strive for this simple target.

“Nothing is more simple than greatness; indeed, to be simple is to be great.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Experiential Brand - the final differentiator

According to a recent Pew Internet & American Life report 42% of US homes now have broadband access and over 73% of respondents (147 million adults) use the internet. The vast majority of those users shop. They shop for health care, or new consumer electronics or filter information feeds about their hobbies - but they shop.

Corporations large and small have put their wares online in the hopes of selling products and services through the inexpensive medium. They have spent millions of dollars to ‘promote’ and market through search engine optimization and keyword buys. The larger players have gone to great pains to ensure their marketing message is on key and logo perfect.

But have they invested in their Experiential Brand? The most important brand trait online is the user experience.

Experiential Brand is what people think of your company. Not if the corporate color chart was used correctly, but if the actual web interface allowed users easy access to the information THEY were seeking. Are you helpful and easy to use (read - do business with) or are you aloof and difficult to understand (and generate less sales as a result)?

Ultimately every company who wants to deliver goods and services online will have the commodity of transactional technology to handle the sale. But the truly successful online ventures will have experiential brand tendancies that make their site the preferred venue for those transactions.

Recommended Reading List

Here is the start of a list we give to clients who ask for user-focused book recommendations and knowledge transfer. Standing on the shoulders of giants…..

Don’t Make Me Think
By Steve Krug

Designing for Web Standards
By Jeffrey Zeldman

The Elements of User Experience: User-Centered Design for the Web
By Jesse James Garrett

The Design of Everyday Things
By Donald Norman

Designing Usability
By Jakob Nielsen

Designing Visual Interfaces
By Kevin Mulley, Darrell Sano

Information Architecture for the World Wide Web: Designing Large-Scale Web Sites
By Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville

Homepage Usability: 50 Websites Deconstructed
By Jakob Nielsen, Marie Tahir

Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative
By Edward Tufte

Customers Speak - Are you Listening?

Archived 2001 Vialogix article originally published in The Charlotte Business Journal

Your VCR madly flashes “12:00.” (Still.)

You watch as the elevator doors rudely close on an approaching rider because you couldn’t find the “Open” button in time.

With a grumble, you abandon your corporate intranet and take 20 minutes to search out an answer from a knowledgeable coworker.

Sound familiar? If so, you’ve suffered poor usability and lack of customer-focused design.

When companies focus on technology rather than customers, and when products aren’t easy to use from the outset, corporate value is burned and consumer goodwill wasted.

Successful developers get customer input before, during and after creation of a technical project. From industrial design to web site restructuring, input improves the purchasing experience, turning browsers into buyers.

That approach is producing sound results.

Timex developed a watch with two large buttons and an uncomplicated display after research determined women are more interested in simply setting the time and less enamored with gadgets for technology’s sake. It quickly became a “Pick of the Month” at female.com.

Saab built its new Viggen car using air force fighter pilot experience to create a cockpit-like interior, giving drivers a more usable environment. “The controls are very logical and easy to use in keeping with Saab’s history of functional aircraft ergonomics,” noted a positive Roadtestonline.com review.

Similarly, web developers must shun the hype and spare the eye candy, beginning instead with customers and the tasks they need to complete.

Customer-focused design is not a step or single element found on a web site or online application. You don’t slap “usability” into your methodology or position statement and have a better model. It is, by definition, a process—one that should affect the creation or redesign of any web project at all stages. The goal of customer-focused design is to enhance the customer experience. It requires the strategic involvement of every area of a company.

When IBM redesigned its web site in 1999, the firm’s User Experience Team gathered input from more than 1,000 users. Using surveys, focus groups, usability testing and e-mail feedback, they consolidated and reengineered the IBM e-commerce initiative into “ShopIBM”.

The result: a 400% increase in online revenue; improved customer feedback, selection as the best corporate website for user experience by Web usability guru Jakob Nielson; and a “Best Business Web Site of 1999″ award from the UK’s Financial Times.

Yet Forrester Research reports Fortune 1000 companies spend an average of $1.5 to $2.5 million on web site redesign without knowing if the efforts will make the site easier to use. Usability specialists agree that every dollar spent on testing before a site goes live will save at least $10 in redesign efforts later.

The multiples can be even higher for intranets. Any usability improvement in-house leads directly to saved employee-hours and increased shareholder value.

GE Capital is building the “e-Deal Room,” which will let its lenders review applications online, reducing processing time by 20%. General Electric spokesman Gary Reiner told Forbes magazine that GE would save $1 billion this year on internal-productivity gains from projects such as an improved intranet. (April 30 issue).

Technology is a great equalizer. It can strengthen your customer relationships or drive a wedge through them. As technology becomes more of a commodity, only companies that use it wisely will thrive.

Web Application design vs Multimedia design

Internet design lies at the intersection of application design and multimedia design. In one capacity, the Internet is a forum: a place where businesses, organizations and individuals share ideas and present information to a worldwide audience. The Internet is also a tool, a way for people to interact, conduct business and shop. Web sites usually need to be both.

Web interface is forced to balance the task-oriented functionality of application design with the presentation needs of multimedia design. Finding that balance isn’t easy. Some sites need to be entertaining to convey information. Others need a more informative format to drive customers to make a purchase. While much of a web site is information presentation (multimedia), sites are still essentially a user interface (application).

Overview of Multimedia Design
Dictionary.com defines multimedia as “the combined use of media such as text, graphics, video, and sound, as on a computer system.”

Multimedia is a means of presentation. Early forms of multimedia include the first films with a soundtrack: video and audio being used in conjunction to tell a story. Today’s multimedia is much more complex. All share a common premise: one person or group communicating information to another.

Three common forms of modern multimedia:

Microsoft PowerPoint presentations: This is more or less a digital slide show. It invites little, if any, customer interaction.

Macromedia Director movies/CD-ROM: These are much more sophisticated than PowerPoint, but limited by the unscalable nature of CD-ROM. This format can engage customers by combining all forms of media into a high-bandwidth, multimedia presentation.

Internet: In theory, the Internet is very customer-centered. Unfortunately, many web sites are modeled on the above formats, resulting in sites with poor architecture and bloated file sizes.

In each of these examples, the communicator is retaining the majority ‘ if not all, of the control when it comes to communication. While both PowerPoint and CD-ROMs are intended for this type of communication, the customer-centered nature of the Internet conflicts with this method.

Overview of Application Design
Whether people work in Microsoft Word, Adobe Photoshop or Netscape Navigator, they’re interacting with computers through a graphical user interface (GUI). Prior to the broad usage of GUIs, people were forced to use either command line or menu-based interfaces. It was the unintuitive nature of these earlier interfaces that led to the original development of the first GUIs in the 1970s. Many interface advancements have been made since. The common goal: make human-computer interaction as productive as possible.

With each new application upgrade, you will generally find changes in the following three areas:

Interaction methods: How customers, also referred to as users, accomplish the tasks they wish to perform.

Program capabilities: An application task set. As customers and technology advance, the need for better functionality grows.

Aesthetics: The look and feel of the interface.

These changes are geared toward positive customer experience focused on task completion. Better understanding of customers’ habits means a more successful product.

Web design is not just making cool buttons and picking the right colors. The following pages discuss the many aspects of user interface design, from determining customer needs to usability testing. It can help ensure both the multimedia and application natures of your site are satisfied.

Customer Needs vs. Client Needs
Just as web design balances application and multimedia design, it also balances customer and client needs. While the client may have many needs, the customer has one—accomplishing the task at hand. Too often, web sites mirror the organizational structure of the corporation that produced it. This can confuse customers and make it difficult to accomplish tasks.

Many companies face this problem in their move to the Internet. They fail to bring real-world marketing sense to the Web. Bricks and mortar operations have been getting it right for years.

Customers visit a site with specific goals: to do research on a product/service, to purchase, to get help, etc. If a company’s site makes it easy for the customer to accomplish these goals, it not only meets customer need, it will generate higher sales.

UI Design Principles
As with any discipline, User Interface Design has rules that, if followed, will help create a more usable site.

Task-oriented architecture: Site architecture should put customer needs above corporate structure. Once customer tasks have been determined, make sure content and interaction points are arranged intuitively.

Clear, consistent navigation: Accurate labeling of links and a coherent navigational display are essential. Good labeling, especially for main sections, is key to helping customers find content. Our main concern in navigation is consistency from page to page. Customers depend on consistency as they make their way through sites.

Responsive interaction: A customer’s input produces immediate feedback. Studies show customers feel uncomfortable when it takes longer than 1 second for a clicked link to produce a result. Smaller file sizes and smarter code produces a more responsive page.

Balanced composition: Give proper weight to each element on a page. Navigation, text, images and interaction points should be balanced. Balanced composition allows customers to quickly scan a page and determine where to go.

Concise and pertinent content: People visit businesses online because it’s quicker and easier than calling or traveling to the business itself. If the information on a site isn’t concise, customers might go elsewhere.

Aesthetically pleasing: Most people don’t visit sites to view award-winning graphic design, but the design will be noticed. Aside from the role graphics play in navigation, they also help provide insight into the company.

Interface Protosite
In the same way a corporation’s headquarters was built to a blueprint, so must a web site. A Web site blueprint is called an interface protosite. It’s essential for customer-focused design.

Protosite components:
Site map: A diagram of the site. It shows all pages and their relationship to each other. The map allows for quick reference to page position and provides an at-a-glance view.

Per-page needs analysis: This is a per-page listing of page elements, including navigation, company logo, photos, branding copy and main content. They’re listed on each page to give the development team parameters for design.

Template assignment: This is a grouping of similar pages. Pages that share common elements and purpose should also share templates. The designer should have knowledge of the different templates needed prior to wire frame composition, which ensures it will include all necessary elements.

Wire frame composition: This is a site’s blueprint. Wire frames use rules and boxes to indicate the general structure of a page, thereby creating a raw composition of all page elements. These elements are labeled and any links are called out with the use of color. The purpose of the wire frame: a “graphics-free,” functional view of the site prior to interface design.

Interface Design
Whether a company uses its website as a corporate brochure or as an alternative outlet for serving customers, the same goal applies: brand proliferation. Traditional media allows companies to communicate brand by revealing corporate personalities. New media also relies on personality, but even more important to online brand communication is customer experience.

Interface design is not the shade of green chosen for the background. Interface design is about affecting customer experience on a site. This depends upon a proper navigation model as much as it depends on proper image selection. It’s a balance of engineering and art.

It’s important that graphics complement the content while guiding the customer through the site. To ensure this, the graphics and the structure should be integrated. The customer experience will live or die by how well we strike the balance between form and function.

Usability Testing
Customers ultimately decide if an interface is successful. So it’s vital to get their input prior to site launch. Ideally, usability testing occurs at least twice in site development—during wire frame testing and design testing. Key elements to be tested include:

Navigation labeling: The words used for navigation buttons/text links. Labels should act as umbrellas for all content by accurately communicating what the customers will find.

Composition: This is the overall layout and positioning of items on a page. Elements need to be organized coherently. Customers should not have trouble finding their way around a page.

Task completion: Customers must be able to successfully complete their tasks. Customers don’t revisit difficult sites.

Inevitably, things such as element positioning and functionality will change between the initial protosite and final design. The likelihood of change, coupled with the addition of colors, graphics and photos, requires retesting the interface. Two groups should perform testing: the original test group (to ensure nothing was lost in translation), and new customers (to ensure the original group was not pre-framed by past experience). This second test should use the same parameters as the first. Any interface problems discovered should be remedied and tested again.

The ultimate goal is a site that’s as usable as possible. It’s always cheaper to fix problems during development than to fix them once the site is live.

The most important thing web developers do is foster positive customer experience. When architecture, navigation and site responsiveness are improved, it’s easier for customers to interact with the business. The customer controls the information flow. It’s a designer’s job to make sure users have a reliable means of retrieval.

No One Likes Being Force-Fed
One of the more frustrating online experiences is the animated site introduction. No matter if a designer is trying to tell a story or a business is making sure the customer sees “all the necessary information,” animation is an obstacle to the customer.

As web developers, we must ensure our creation fits the intended medium. We don’t make short films. We don’t design interactive CD-ROMs. We don’t compile PowerPoint presentations. We design for the Web, and that means designing for web customers. People online are in control of what they see, where they go and how long they stay. When we design against this convention, we damage the customer experience. We must be diligent in striving for the best answer.

And that is: Do what’s best for the customer.