Research Beyond User Testing: Methods That Complement Usability Studies

  • Washington D.C.: Monday, May 14
  • Toronto: Friday, July 27

Christian Rohrer
Full-Day Training Course

As companies continue to embrace user experience methodologies, usability studies are becoming much more common. However, these lab-based methods have their limitations, and several other research options exist.

Today, companies are asking user experience professionals to better drive different phases of the design process and answer different classes of questions. Given these increased demands, simply responding with “test it in the usability lab” is no longer appropriate. Also, most companies now employ other insight-generating techniques and teams, including market researchers, Web analysts, and corporate strategists. Ironically, the more insights a company generates, the less likely it is to use those insights appropriately. Companies need ways to more effectively determine what to do, how to do it, and how to assess how well they’ve done.

In this course, we’ll discuss an intuitive framework for better understanding all research and insight-generating methods and engage in hands-on training in the most important user research approaches beyond traditional usability studies.

What You’ll Learn

This course will teach both user experience novices and seasoned researchers how to understand research methodologies suitable for a corporate setting. In addition, attendees will do hands-on exercises to explore four key methods:

  • Diary/camera studies
  • Ethnographic field studies
  • Online surveys (pop-up and email)
  • Desirability studies (qualitative and quantitative)

We’ll also discuss

  • Usability benchmarking
  • Online user experience assessments
  • Participatory design
  • Focus groups
  • Phone interviews
  • Eyetracking
  • Customer feedback via email
  • Card sorting
  • Analytics + AB testing

Course Outline

  • Introduction to user experience research, with in-depth, hands-on training in important methods
  • Data analysis for qualitative methods
  • Combining with other types of data—when and how
  • Surveys
  • Field studies
  • Camera/diary studies
  • Desirability studies
  • Communication techniques for large or small N

Format

This full-day tutorial includes lectures, large-scale visual representations and concepts, video highlights and research reports, and in-class exercises.

Course Materials

Copies of all presentation slides

Who Should Attend

This course is suited to any user experience professional with an interest in understanding and using research methods in corporate environments. It’s designed to work well for both experienced research professionals and novices.

Instructor

photo of Christian Rohrer Christian Rohrer is Vice President and Chief Design Officer in the Consumer Division at McAfee, Inc. In this role, he is responsible for user-centered design efforts across all projects from ideation through delivery and beyond. In addition, he and his team determine processes for best gathering user requirements, own user needs definitions, establish UX success metrics, and make strategy/experience recommendations for getting users to move more effectively through the lifecycle. Christian is a veteran of Web user experience design and research, having participated directly in the development of some of the world’s most popular Web destinations, including Yahoo!, eBay, and Realtor.com (Move, Inc.). At Move, he led a talented team of designers and researchers in developing top real estate websites and applications, including the #1 consumer real estate website and the highest-rated real estate iPhone app, both under the Realtor.com brand. At both eBay and Yahoo!, he lead the User Experience Research team and was a co-founder of the Research Council, an executive-sponsored body that advised the company on best research practices and synthesized insights from market research, web analytics, and user experience research. Christian has a PhD in symbolic systems in education (cognitive science) from Stanford University and a BA in computer and information sciences with honors from the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is an active member of various industry organizations, publishes frequently, and maintains a blog and site at www.xdstrategy.com.