All posts about
User experience

User experience is about how a person feels about using a product, system or service. (source: Wikipedia)

A Consistent Experience is a Better Experience: Service Design

Added on 20 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
One of the many intro’s on Service Design, trying to answer the question of its value for commercial purposes.

“If there is one thing that has held the test of time, it’s that history is bound to repeat itself. What was once old will most certainly become new again in the cycle of time because good ideas never go out of style. Service design is a shining example of this fact. In spite of the fact that the conception of service design is nearly 30 years old, it is an idea that is more relevant than ever today. Service has become a serious topic of discussion in the design community these days and it’s being recognized more and more as a key to business success in competitive markets. Good service design breeds satisfied, loyal customers. This post will walk you through the basics and how you can begin using it to your advantage to turn travelers into your very own brand ambassadors.”

(Mark Eberman a.k.a. @bikeboy389 ~ Digital Compass)

The Role of UX: Learning from Sustainability

Added on 20 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
UX designers express their identity crisis. Some deep mind work needed.

“In recent times, it has become increasingly difficult to describe who UX professionals are and what they do. As a new entrant into this profession, defining who I am and presenting the skills I possess as something that is valuable to any organization has been an uphill task.”

(Antonia Anni a.k.a. @tonianni ~ UXmatters)

UX Dimensions of Conflict

Added on 20 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
UX design remains a people business.

“Even though there is no single answer to the question of how innovative or conventional a team should be and no clear gauge for how free or controlled a development process should be, you can make thoughtful decisions about what the right settings for those knobs are within your own organization. In doing so, make sure you take a value-neutral approach and understand your own biases going in. Then, choose the appropriate balance for your team, and select whatever tools and processes make the most sense for where you’ve set those knobs.”

(Mike Hughes ~ UXmatters)

Want to Improve Your Coordination? Attend to Patterns

Added on 19 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
Using patterns creates rhythm, confidence, and trust.

“Like many of you, I’m passionate about crafting communication products that help others understand and act. I appreciate the work by writing practitioners who ask how sentence structure can support humans. I’m intrigued by the work of those of us who explore taxonomic relationships and ensure our tools bring consistency to thought. And recently I’ve become engaged by the thinking of information architects who attend to patterns and components.”

(Thom Haller a.k.a. @thomhaller ~ ASIS&T Bulletin Dec. 2011 – Jan. 2012)

Yes, Experience Can Be Designed

Added on 15 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
In the DTDT or ‘There is no such thing as…’ category. And where does this debate lead us to? It depends.

“As experience design has evolved from early ideas about human-computer interaction to our present understanding, we can see how the industry has shaped the tools for studying, influencing, mediating, and sometimes even controlling the way people experience the artifacts they interact with. But that raises a question: can experience really be designed? And it certainly triggers lively debate.”

(Sorin Pintilie a.k.a. @flyandcolors ~ UX Magazine)

For the love of experience: Changing the experience economy discourse

Added on 14 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
Really hope her dissertation changes the discourse.

“The attention for experiences as economic offerings has increased enormously in the last decade. However, the lack of a clear definition of experience and the bias towards the organization’s perspective in the discourse cause much confusion. In this study experience is taken back to its basis: the encounter between an individual and his or her environment. Different concepts, effects and values of experience are defined to construct a more integrative discourse for the experience economy from the individual’s perspective. To reap the benefits that the experience economy offers, the role of organizations has to change from a directing and controlling one to a more supporting and facilitating one. A true recognition of the co-creation that takes place in experiences shows how much latent potential for creating value there is yet to discover.”

(Anna Snel a.k.a. @annasnel)

Can’t get no satisfaction: Why service companies can’t keep their promises

Added on 12 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
For a lot of companies, it’s just annoying that they have customers.

“Service companies can’t show customers a tangible product. Since services are intangible, the only way to sell them is by making a promise to perform. But most service companies fail to keep their promises, leaving customers frustrated, confused and abused. Why do so many service companies fail to keep their promises to customers?”

(David Gray a.k.a. @davegray ~ Dachis Group)

Career Advice for User Researchers

Added on 5 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
Learning from the seniors.

“The first thing you should decide is what you want to focus on. There is a great variety of roles in user experience. Some UX professionals are generalists who do everything from user research to UX design – and sometimes even software development. Others specialize on a particular aspect of user experience such as interaction design, visual design, content strategy, or ethnography. And many fall somewhere in between – for example, a UX Architect who conducts user research and is responsible for every aspect of UX design except visual design.”

(Jim Ross a.k.a. @anotheruxguy ~ UXmatters)

Planning User Research Throughout the Development Cycle

Added on 5 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
How can you ever make something worthwhile if you haven’t looked into it, a.k.a. research.

“(…) we’ll discuss how research planning can reduce costs and decrease the time it takes to perform user research. One of the biggest challenges in performing user research is determining which research approaches to apply and when to apply them. The research methods you choose are dependent upon a variety of factors, including budget, schedule, development phase, business goals, and research questions.”

(Demetrius Madrigal and Bryan McClain ~ UXmatters)

The difference between a UX Designer and UI Developer

Added on 2 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
DTDT (again): Interface is part of the object and experience is part of the subject, be it for design or development purposes.

“UX Designers focus on the structure and layout of content, navigation and how users interact with them. (…) UI Developers focus on the way the functionality is displayed and the fine detail of how users interact with the interface.”

(Ben Melbourne a.k.a. @benmelb ~ as in the city)

The Anatomy of an Experience Map

Added on 1 December 2011 Peter Bogaards
Great and necessary piece of information visualization for understanding purposes.

“Experience maps have become more prominent over the past few years, largely because companies are realizing the interconnectedness of the cross-channel experience. It’s becoming increasingly useful to gain insight in order to orchestrate service touchpoints over time and space.”

(Chris Risdon a.k.a. @ChrisRisdon ~ Adaptive Path)

The upper bounds to quality

Added on 25 November 2011 Peter Bogaards
AAPL seems to falsify this. People willing to pay high prices for superb quality.

“The digital age changes our notions of quality, and in particular, our notions of the limits to quality. Generally, there are two limits to quality: The first limit is your imagination. If you are innovative, you can increase quality in many creative ways. The second limit to quality is what the customer will pay for. If your product is priced too high, even if it is of super high quality, you won’t be able to sell many.”

(Alan Cooper a.k.a. @MrAlanCooper ~ Cooper Journal)

Towards an Aesthetic of Friction

Added on 23 November 2011 Peter Bogaards
It’s academic, so it must be European.

“Dr. Marc Hassenzahl is Professor for Experience Design at the Folkwang University of Arts in Essen, Germany, and research manager at MediaCity, Åbo Akademi University, Vaasa, Finland. He is interested in the emotional and motivational aspects of interactive, mostly tangible technologies, that is User Experience, Experience Design, the hedonic side of product use. Marc worked with companies, such as Samsung, Nokia, German Telekom, and lately BMW, on his vision of designing ‘the experience before products’, arguing for a postmaterialistic notion of designing things. He recently published Experience Design: Technology for all the right reasons with Morgan Claypool.”

(Marc Hassenzahl ~ TEDxHogeschoolUtrecht)

The Impact of Persuasion

Added on 23 November 2011 Peter Bogaards
The Don at TEDx (again), event organised by a Dutch ‘university’.

Understanding features in terms of complexity instead of functionality ~ “His studies and books on design theory coupled with his extensive academic and industry experience help companies produce enjoyable and effective products and services. Norman brings a systems approach to design, arguing that great design must touch every aspect of a company.”

(Donald A. Norman a.k.a. @jnd1er ~ TEDxHogeschoolUtrecht)

Complexity and User Experience

Added on 23 November 2011 Peter Bogaards
Great to see B&A revitalising.

Understanding features in terms of complexity instead of functionality ~ “The best products don’t focus on features, they focus on clarity. Problems should be fixed through simple solutions, something you don’t have to configure, maintain, control. The perfect solution needs to be so simple and transparent you forget it’s even there. However, elegantly minimal designs don’t happen by chance. They’re the result of difficult decisions. Whether in the ideation, designing, or the testing phases of projects, UX practitioners have a critical role in restraining the feature sets within our designs to reduce the complexity on projects.”

(Jon Bolt a.k.a. @epic_bagel ~ Boxes and Arrows)

Everything is a service

Added on 22 November 2011 Peter Bogaards
But what if ‘everything’ is, then ‘nothing’ is.

“The emerging service economy will require business and society to do some some fundamental restructuring. The organizations that got us to this point have been hyper-optimized into super-efficient production machines, capable of pushing out an abundance of material wealth. Unfortunately, there is no way to proceed without dismantling some of that precious infrastructure. The changes are already underway.”

(Dave Gray a.k.a. @davegray ~ Dachis Group)

When Is an Immersive Digital Experience Appropriate?

Added on 21 November 2011 Peter Bogaards
Whatever you build, make sure it’s usable and ‘fun’.

“So, when is an immersive digital experience appropriate? Although platforms should focus on getting users to their destination, the content users find there can be immersive. Programs should be immersive, but balance experiential design with usable design. Immersive experiences are notoriously difficult to document, from a UX perspective. The frameworks I’ve outlined are helpful in defining immersive experiences to a sufficient level of fidelity for a client to feel comfortable with the direction your solution is taking, but doesn’t inordinately influence the creative team.”

(Jordan Julien a.k.a. @thejordanrules ~ UXmatters)