User Experience Design: Finding usability test participants

when a good test user is hard to find

Suppose you were appointed to a usability test. How can I solve the following 3 questions about the recruitment of the persons under test? These problems have been bothering me for the past year.

• A developer wants to perform a usability test for mobile apps that target users with a senior lawyer . So how do you make these extremely busy and powerful people test?
• A designer who designs a recliner for the first class of a plane wants to have a couch control test for his target users. How does he attract rich people to participate in his test evaluations?
• A technology company has developed a security service that assists in locating and tracking terrorists . How does it hire spies to test this service?

You can obviously come up with some ideas to help solve these hard to find test participants. For example, a developer who tests for a lawyer can simply give some money to a lawyer who is willing to take the test. Or you can invite some first-class passengers to take part in the company's entertainment, and then conduct a 30-minute test interview about the seat design. but all of these activities are predicated on the need for your wallet to be full of drums. For example, you pay 476 dollars for a lawyer.

using alternate participants

This is another solution. Why don't we use test participants that can replace them? These people may never actually use these products, but they can share some important and relevant features with the target audience.

A usability test that is not done with a real user sounds pretty ridiculous: "Usability testing is about testing with real end users." This is so familiar because the alternative may face problems that the real user does not consider to be a problem (a good aspect of the error). Real users, for some reason, encounter difficulties, but sometimes they don't bother replacements (bad aspects of the error).

Well, now the question has become: Are you going to test with a replacement or are you incapable of usability testing? so are there any replacements that are better than others?

to identify the super substitutes from the rookie of the bench.

When you decide to adopt a replacement, the first question to ask is, " what kind of background do users need to use this product?" "For example, for an airplane seat, if you want to test the availability of control, we don't need to know if the user is really rich." Although standard cabin users may not have experience in first class travel, they have the same cognitive and judgment skills as first class users. Therefore, it is fairly straightforward to use a substitute to test the usability of those day-to-day products.

In contrast, we may lose a lot of positive, legal-related usability advice if we test the aforementioned mobile product with a lawyer who has no legal knowledge. This is because barristers usually have background knowledge that is not available to the general public , and the use of substitutes to participate in such tests can be problematic.

So how do we make sure that our replacements are as similar as the real user? You need participants who are similar to your user role, and here are some useful suggestions.

Don't use your co-workers.

The easiest alternative to find is your co-workers. But there is a lot of risk in using in-house colleagues in usability testing . These people may know the details of the product being tested or they have designed it. They may be narcissistic in design constraints or weigh their own bad relationships, so there is no high expectation of taking part in the test. In my experience, insiders are basically less suitable as replacements for real users.

New Employee

Compared with the old staff, the new employees may be relatively not very familiar with the history of the product. They may be aware of some of these areas but there is little detail about your solution. This allows them to be potential good replacements, and they can give you some "fresh" insights.

the risk you need to be aware of : New hires may be less likely to be harsh on their new owners ' products. You can give them the basics in advance to make them understand that what you need is an unreserved opinion. But they may still feel anxious about the tests. So let them know that this is a great opportunity for them to show their analytical skills.

A newly retired expert

If you're too busy for some users to find them, such as a lawyer, a doctor, or a company president, look for someone who used to do the job . Retired people often miss work and try to find some opportunities to stay alive.

the risk you need to be aware of : Because of the age-aging problem of the replacement, you may get some incorrect usability advice, such as the visual sensitivity and so on. But in practice we find that most newly retired people have the same insight as their peers. But if your retired surgeon has been away from work for years, his subjective assumptions about the working environment may be wrong.

Those who are around the real user

Another good alternative is a colleague from a busy business person. For example, can you ask a pediatric nurse to replace a chief physician to test the functionality of certain products?

the risk you need to be aware of : Your replacement will not have the same level of background knowledge as the real tester.

The students or their teachers

Compared with colleagues, students and teachers in the same field may have similar ideas in their profession. For example, a trainee lawyer is a better alternative to a qualified lawyer, and a medical school student can play a doctor's role well. You can consider establishing a good relationship with a neighboring university to gain academic resources and approach teachers and students.

you need to be aware of the risks : Your replacements may have relevant background knowledge, but they lack the actual experience to master the easy way and the compromise or compromise in practice.

Course Training representative

Does your company train users to use the software you have designed? If so, see if you can use these courses to make a general usability test. Explain to the training representatives that they have the opportunity to participate in the next version of the product design. This is a great way to find the usability test participants that are hardest to get. In my opinion, even a spy like 007 would need a training class.

you need to be aware of the risks : the training is strictly speaking of beginners. They may have the right background knowledge but lack the actual user's prior experience of the product. Since you don't have much time, you need to organize a good training program and give the training representatives the right incentives. They will be the ones who have the most opportunity to sit down with the user to drink coffee, eat cookies and finish the test.

several basic recommendations for using replacements

Before you start using replacements, carefully consider the following points:

First, the use of replacements can only be effective in some user studies . Using a substitute in a field survey is a bad idea because the actual user scenario is an important part of the study. Therefore, you need to carefully select the way to use a replacement, such as usability testing is a usable place.

Second, don't use it as an excuse to avoid using real users to evaluate products . For most products, it is relatively simple to find or hire real users, so there is no need to use replacements at all. But even if your users are hard to find, you should also try to create a database of participants to prepare for subsequent tests. Using real users is still the golden rule, and hiring them is not as difficult as you might think: Sometimes it just takes a few volunteers. Here are a few ways:

• Place a registration form on your site to recruit participants.
• Find the discussion and blog that the user is aggregating and send an invitation.
• Write a report about the product to the magazine, which contains the invitation to test.
• Require the user to be affiliated with the community and professional organizations to assist in recruiting.
• Do appropriate research and test at an industry convention or trade show.

If you register only one participant per month in the way described above, this is still worth the effort. Because you can have these participants introduce you to someone else.

Finally, when you apply a replacement strategy to any usability test, include at least one real user and compare his or her results with those of the replacement. If you find that very different, reassess the risk of the change design.