December 2005/January 2006

Volume 46, Number 3

Ready, Fire, Aim!: November Chapter Meeting Review

by Kathy Ramsey

Larry Marine was the speaker at our November meeting, held at the Tivoli Student Center on the Auraria campus. Larry's business, Intuitive Design, helps clients identify and develop recognizable and trusted interaction patterns for their products that increase usage, self-discovery of new features, and acceptance of new products.

AIM First

While many folks still think of "usability" as an afterthought, Larry has a different approach that brings usability stakeholders to the requirements-gathering and product-direction decision stages. One way to achieve this is to separate the traditional User-Centered Design (UCD) process into two distinct phases: problem definition, and solution creation. The modified process looks like this:

Problem Definition:

1. Clarify business and marketing objectives.
2. Conduct initial user research (requirements gathering).
3. Prioritize based on user needs and business objectives.

1. Conduct detailed user research focusing on the prioritized tasks.
2. Design to the established objectives.
3. Test and refine.

The key difference of this approach from traditional UCD is that it identifies the product direction based on user needs and business objectives, as opposed to the more common "build it and they will come" approach, or Ready, Fire, Aim. This new, re-ordered UCD approach is more like Ready, Aim, Fire, and Larry calls it AIM First. Larry stated that his company's AIM First methodology is 100% successful!

Typical Project Problems

Here are some common problems that Larry sees in his customers' projects:

• Unclear objectives
• Vague requirements
• Inconsistent agendas
• Assumptions, opinions, and cultures
• Poor communication across departments
• Emotionally biased design ideas

Intuitive Design (Larry's company) begins each AIM First project by clarifying and setting the objectives. He then measures success by how well he achieves those objectives. In every case where Intuitive Design was allowed to follow the process to a reasonable degree, they exceeded the stated metrics. Note: They either measured success with usability testing, or with real market success.

Larry admits that not every product he consulted for ultimately succeeded in the marketplace, but in those cases where it didn't, it had nothing to do with the design and everything to do with the business management, marketing, or sales approach used. Sometimes, a product is designed well, but isn't managed well, which of course, is something that is out of Larry's control.

Case in point. He designed an infomediary product for the petroleum industry that competed against a product that had held a 100% monopoly for over 10 years. The product he designed saved users an average of 3 hours of work per day. The product quickly gained 30% market share in 4 months, which incidentally, was the 5-year goal. Meanwhile however, the developers overspent their budget by trying to add too many new features before they had finished working all the bugs out of the first version. In the end, the company ran out of money.

People Purchase Things They Like

Every product evokes an emotion as the user uses it. The emotional response is an integral part of the user experience. The success of a product depends on the users experiencing positive emotions that are appropriate for your product and your business objectives.

Some common user-experience objectives are:

• Trust - Users must feel that you are "on their side."
• Comfort - Users must feel familiar with your product, especially the first time they use it.
• Confidence - Users must have confidence that they can succeed with your product more than they could without it.
• Fun - Users don't want to have to work to enjoy themselves. Fun designs are typically more interactive and less informational.

These are just some of the user experiences that your e-commerce or brand message site might try to achieve. Usually, a design should emphasize just one emotion or one objective. For example, a site advertising a medical product might need to exude confidence more than anything else. The user must feel like they can perform their task(s) without error.

Consider these ideas:

• Familiarity and trust increase the likelihood of purchase, especially when comparing similar products from different vendors.
• If your users can't use your basic features, they aren't going to need or want the advanced ones.
• If they can't learn to use your existing product, they won't upgrade to the new one, regardless of whether it has more/better features.
• If they experience difficulties with one product of yours, they won't consider other products you sell.

Delivering Value

The user's experience sets an expectation for other features or products you offer. Managing those expectations is the goal of good design. Users should be surprised by your product's effectiveness, not by their experience with the user interface.

Avoid the off-the-shelf "cookie cutter" approach to product design. Focus your efforts on achieving your business and marketing objectives, which also dovetails with achieving your customers' objectives. By proving to your customers that you truly understand their needs—in the form of appropriate product designs—you earn their trust and loyalty for subsequent product versions.

The website for Larry's business is www.intuitivedesign.com; his email address is LMarine@intuitivedesign.com.