How to Inform Design: How to Set Your Pants on Fire

Panel by Nick Finck, Jeffrey Veen, & Kit Seeborg.

Jeffry Veen shows Haynet as an example of good usability.

He believes that to perform well it is best if he imerses himself in the topic of the clients site. He jots down lots of notes on yellow stickies and covers the wall with the various ideas.

During project definition and research many possible solutions can be quickly eliminated, thereby lowering the overall cost of a project.

To find some of the core ideas behind the sales point of the website Veen collects market research data from people in the real world, often while failing to mention websites, as he feels that the needs overlap. The research ends up averaging out to about $200 per person and most smaller tests usually test about 6 to 8 people.

Veen also feels that analyzing data from server logs also tends to fall off track. Since you are only tracking where people are going wrong with the current system it may not bring about the most effective solution.

I totally agree with this concept. Often people have self fulfilling prophecies about their sites. The first day I talked to a marketer for a major cable and high speed internet provider. He stated that since most of their referals to their website came from direct type in traffic or bookmarks that he did not feel they needed to do SEO. If you don't know what traffic you are missing out on then it is kinda hard to see the need to go after it. This is why only analyzing your referal logs can give you bad or incompelete market data.

Seelong states that it is a good idea to follow the money trail before you get too deep into a project to ensure you will be OK to do whatever you desire. She also likes using survey services such as Survey Monkey.