ZDNet: developer: Users First: Survey Your Users

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ZDNet: d e v e l o p e r: Users First: Survey Your Users

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Users First: Survey Your Users By Jakob Nielsen



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Many aspects of usability can be studied by simply asking the users. This is especially true for subjective satisfaction and possible anxieties which are hard to measure objectively. Questionnaires are also useful for finding out why users visit your site and what features they particularly like or dislike. Surveys don't work for getting feedback on new design ideas. Users can't comment on things they haven't seen, and their hypothetical answers to questions like "would you like a persistent navigation bar on every page with buttons for every section of the site?" are worthless. The way to get user feedback on new designs is to build a prototype and get a few test users in to try out the prototype. Only by observing how people actually use a new design can you learn whether it works.

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Surveys are indirect methods, since they do not study the user interface itself but only users' opinions about the user interface. One cannot always take user statements at face value. Data about people's actual behavior should have precedence over people's claims of what they think they do. People rationalize their own experience and may say that they didn't have much

http://www.zdnet.com/devhead/stories/articles/0,4413,2211547,00.html

12/09/2001

ZDNet: d e v e l o p e r: Users First: Survey Your Users

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experience and may say that they didn't have much trouble finding what they wanted even if they had clicked on five wrong buttons before they hit on the right one. Only a usability study can find out which design elements work and which need to be changed. Next >>> Keep It Short

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http://www.zdnet.com/devhead/stories/articles/0,4413,2211547,00.html

12/09/2001