There are a bunch of different ways to test and learn.
Main Test Ingredients:
- Something to test: An app, website, physical product
- Someone to use it: Candidates, potential customers, known customers or users
- Someone to facilitate the test with the candidates: ask them the right questions
- Someone to capture the output: not influencing the test in any way
- Someone to write up the findings: conclude learnings, make recommendations
Environments to Test in:
- Testing facility: set-up with cameras and microphones and observation room
- Anywhere: “guerilla testing” conducted in public spaces with people
- Everyday: “diary studies” capture peoples feedback, actions and behaviours over a long period of time in their everyday environment
- Shadowing session: watching the candidate use what you want to test or learn about in it’s everyday set-up
Who to Test:
- Who the company wants to hear from: what is the primary objective of audiences the company wants to learn from and why?
- Who uses it day to day
- Who is using a competitor product
- Who you think will use it
- Who uses something like it in another sector
How to find the people you want to learn from in tests:
- Write down who these people are, the more the better
- Use this information to research them further, conduct interviews to learn more about them
- Write a recruitment brief, this will outline how we make sure we are talking to these people
- Partner with a recruiter, they will need to know what cash incentive participants will get, how long the test will take, when it will take place and where
- Partner with your company, working with marketing and customer services teams will allow you to easily talk to customers
- Screen your participants on the phone before you book them in, you need to check they didn’t just tick boxes to get a bit of free cash
- Write up your call-sheet, the list of participants, their contact details and when they have agreed to visit to do the test
What to test:
- Keep it simple. The general rule of thumb is we try to cover to much in sessions.
- Task assignments. “Can you change the profile picture?”
- What do you see? Capturing what gets the attention of a fresh pair of eyes is critical
- Confidence. Are participants comfortable with buttons, actions and expected consequences of their taps and clicks
Useful Links
https://lookback.io/
https://www.webcredible.com/services/usability-lab-hire/
http://www.sutherlandlabs.com/