GAD332 Interface Design

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GAD332Interface Design

• The Strategy Plane
• Defining the Strategy
• Interface Objectives
• User Needs
• User Segmentation
• Usability and User Research

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The foundations of a successful user experience
is a clearly articulated strategy. Knowing both
what we want the interface to accomplish for
our needs and for our users helps inform all the
decisions we have to make about every aspect of
the user experience. But answering these simple
questions can be trickier than it looks. -
Jesse James Garrett
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1) Defining the Strategy
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Defining the Strategy

• Interfaces are sometime destined to fail before
  any code is created or any art is pushed.
• No one answered
• What do we want to get out of this interface?
• What do we want the user to get out of it?

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Defining the Strategy

• By answering the first question we describe the
  interface objectives
• What do we want to get out of this interface?
• The second addresses the user needs
• What do we want the user to get out of it?

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2) Interface Objectives
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Interface Objectives

• You need to have a clear, explicit understanding
  of the underlying strategy
• EXPLICIT is key
• The clearer you articulate what you want out of
  the interface the more precise you can target
  your goals

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3) User Needs a) User Segmentations
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User Needs

• Dont get into the mentality of designing for one
  ideal user someone exactly like you
• Rather we need to understand who our market is
• Who are they, what do THEY need?

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User Needs

• How do we identify who are mark is?
• User Segmentation
• Demographic criteria
• gender, age, education level, marital status
• Psychographic profiles
• describe the attributes and perceptions that your
  users have about the world or the subject matter
  of your interface in particular

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User Needs

• Demographic examples
• General Men 18-49
• Specific Unmarried, college-educated women 25-34
  making over 50,000 /yr

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User Needs

• Psychographic profiles
• Correlate strongly with demographics
• Deal with people in the same age group, location,
  income level, similar attitudes
• How often do they use your technology
• Is it a part of their daily lives
• Do they work with technology

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3) User Needs b) Usability and User Research
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Usability and User Research

• Collecting data about your users can be very
  valuable
• Sometimes though you can lose sight of the real
  people behind all the stats
• Users groups Personas (user profiles)

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Usability and User Research

• Persona
• Fictional character constructed to represent the
  needs of a whole range of real users
• Putting a face and a name on the disconnected
  bits of data helps keep them in mind during the
  design process

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Usability and User Research

• Where did all this information come from?
• For the most part we made it up
• We want our personas to be consistent with what
  we know about the users from research
• Specific details though are fictional to breathe
  life into these characters

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Questions?