Probing vs. leading. Saying enough to make your participant comfortable, but not so much you derail the research. 5 pitfalls in the user interview process are demonstrated so that you can avoid them the next time you talk with users.
User story maps visualize the activities, steps, and details users go through in a product or feature. Instead of heavy requirements documents, story maps communicate how the pieces fit together before design and development.
To keep your stakeholders and team members engaged, incorporate storytelling techniques such as writing for your audience, adding anecdotes, and using analogies in your asynchronous research deliverables.
Table design should support four common user tasks: find records that fit specific criteria, compare data, view/edit/add a single row’s data, and take actions on records.
Focusing on shipping new features instead of solving customer problems results in products and services that don't serve real users. Shift the mindset from 'what did we get done' to 'how valuable is the work that we're delivering' to avoid becoming a feature factory.
Informational interviews allow you to connect with users and other people and get a glimpse into their world and how and why they work. They serve as an informal research tool for learning about a new domain or role.
The language-switching feature on ecommerce sites should be placed in the top corners on desktop sites and above the fold on mobile, with enough details and flexibility to satisfy user needs.
Jakob Nielsen's 10 general principles for interaction design. They are called "heuristics" because they are broad rules of thumb for UX and not specific usability guidelines.
Empathy maps help UX teams visualize user attitudes and behaviors, building a shared understanding of end users while highlighting gaps in existing user data.
Modern day UX research methods answer a wide range of questions. To know when to use which method, each of 20 methods is mapped across 3 dimensions and over time within a typical product-development process.
User interviews have become a popular technique for getting user feedback, mainly because they are fast and easy. Use them to learn about users’ perceptions of your design, not about its usability.
User journeys and user flows both describe processes users go through in order to accomplish their goals, but they differ in scope, purpose, and format.
iOS 26’s visual language obscures content instead of letting it take the spotlight. New (but not always better) design patterns replace established conventions.
Elaborate usability tests are a waste of resources. The best results come from testing no more than 5 users and running as many small tests as you can afford.
In a card-sorting study, users organize topics into groups. Use this research method to create an information architecture that suits your users' expectations.
