Do-it-Yourself user testing-get the maximum with the least cost

Absrtact: Most Internet companies spend a lot of money on the development or the production of new products, but the effect is often not as good as they had expected, in fact the product data could be very bad. And most of these frustrating examples can at least

Most Internet companies spend a lot of money on the development or production of new products, but the effect is often not as good as they had expected, in fact the product data could be very bad. And the overwhelming majority of these frustrating examples have at least one thing in common: the team of these products don't get enough user feedback in the product design phase.


If you think it's time-consuming and financial to involve user-related research in the product design phase, then you need to rethink the problem, because if you don't do user research at this stage, the cost will be much higher in the future. A study has been done by a dedicated user research agency abroad, the result shows that the cost of solving a problem at design stage is only one-tenth of the same problem in the process of developing an iterative product, and if the product is already in the promotion phase, the cost will be unimaginable. It can achieve at least 100 times times the cost of solving the problem at design time, and it is only a financial cost. Combined with all the human and time consumption, this number will continue to multiply, and the final outcome will be enough to make you regret that you did not do user research decisions.

When will

do it?

Listen to the user and you never have to worry about whether it's too early.
There are a number of ways to get feedback and depth requirements from users in the product design phase:

in the product design has not yet formed when the early days of the design of the real picture on the paper to show the user, to obtain their feedback on the design map. Invite users to use the company's existing products, carefully observe the actions they use and their impressions of the product, and finally find the user's pain point. You can also invite users to use the main competition and watch their usage carefully, and in the process you will obviously find out which features are useful to users, which are useless, which interaction designs attract users, and which are confusing to users. If you need to redesign a feature, such as the ability to register or bind credit cards in your wealth management app, work with your users to validate new processes, making sure they can easily understand each step of the new step without creating a confused mood.

and who's going to do it?

Many times, our research does not require too many users to find many very deep problems.
As a researcher, you don't need to show the design concept of a product to many users, because tune's obsession will make you unable to find a scientific and reasonable conclusion, the feedback from a few users in the early stages of design is far more valuable than asking a lot of users in the development or even the new product phase. A small-scale user survey of 6-8 people produces a conclusion that is sufficient to support user research in the early stages of a product.
Ideally, it is best to have a test with the target user of the product, especially if your team is planning to design a specific group of products, such as money management, shopping and apps. But if your product is suitable for use by ordinary users, then you can be confident that the design and ideas you want to investigate to show any one you meet, or even your office building security, front desk, neighbors or roommates, the harvest will also surprise you.

Where's

?

Do Fast user research, in fact, do not need a formal laboratory.
If you have a comprehensive usability test for the product at the end of the product development or iteration cycle, using the lab and the inside facilities to carry out the test can help investigators to more rigorously and comprehensively track the user's response, but at design time get the user's early response, General Conference rooms and even a relatively empty space is enough to carry out such research. All you need is a table, a chair, a moderator and a subject to test, and then a live recording or a field record of your colleagues, so that you can share the findings of the research test with your design team later.

What

do?

A simple sketch or a low fidelity prototype map is enough to conduct a user study.
When you do this kind of testing, you don't need to show the users who are involved in the test to get their response to the product by showing them a product that is fully designed and functionally implemented. In fact, you only need a simple sketch or paper prototype to show to the user, and what they give back to you is often important or even beyond your expectation of opinion and feedback. Paper prototype testing is especially effective in the following scenarios: Testing the new features of a product or changing the functionality of a product, such as the addition or change of a search box or the process of binding identity information, can be found by a paper prototyping test to see whether new changes make the matter better or more complex and difficult to implement.
If your company has an interactive designer, then congratulate yourself on having a more beautiful and realistic demo to test with. I believe all the interaction designers can quickly based on our vision to produce a super realistic page prototype, you need to do is to download to your mobile phone, and then directly to the test users to watch the wake up, of course, the necessary explanation is indispensable.

how?

The process of verifying the feasibility of the original design and collecting user feedback is called the design walkthrough. This link will generally use the paper prototypes mentioned above; Of course, it would be great if you could provide a prototype demo that has already implemented some of the functionality.
A design walkthrough requires users who participate in the test to restore their day-to-day scenarios and demand tasks for the use of such products. The moderator needs to ask the participating users to perform each task with the specified behavior, and then listen to their comments and feedback on the usability and usability of each step in the course of their use. The trick to note here is not to overly guide the users who are participating in the test. Give them an overall impression of what the product is doing, or describe the scenario that the product applies to and what it wants to achieve, and then let them operate on their own experience with the real product. Of course, if there are two or two or more comparison demos or prototypes that require the user to experience each of them and come up with a better and similar conclusion, you need to balance the different sequence of different user experience demos to reduce the impact of the order on the test results.
Once you get periodic feedback and comments from users who are participating in the test, the next thing to do is to analyze the feedback. You may find some "spoilers" whose feedback fundamentally reverses what you originally expected from your product, but more likely, you will be able to sort out a list of optimization improvements. Of course, the most important thing is to ensure that this list of optimized improvements is shared with your design team in a timely manner so that you can respond to them and take appropriate steps to improve the design of the product.

Why would

do that?

Whether you believe it or not, the user's frequent participation can achieve a good product.
Getting the user involved in the product design phase can lead to a design roadblock or some unexpected discovery, these two aspects are likely to show up in front of you at the same time, which allows you to flexibly correct the mistakes of the previous design process, most importantly, the cost is very low. This is the most effective way to ensure that the product can be accepted by the user and used accurately and easily. In the long run, no matter how small the size or the method is, any effort by the researcher to gain user feedback will save a large part of the design team's time, financial resources and future embarrassment or even a do-over.