Testing the Waters
By: Nia Braccidiferro
Even when you and your company believe that you are truly done perfecting your product, there still could be more opportunities to receive feedback and contrastive criticism from your target demographic.
When I first presented my original app prototype to my fellow designers, I thought it would be the final version. I was kindly mistaken. It took me several different attempts to fix my prototype, in order for all my design partners to approve of it.
Since I’m at the final phase of the Design Thinking process, I think I’m proud of my product at this point. I will perfect it more in the future when I acquire the skills to do so, but for now, it was great practice in the art of Design Thinking.
In an article posted almost two years ago by the Interaction Design Foundation, entitled, “How to Get More Honest Feedback in User Testing”, they state that receiving better feedback from the users in your target demographic is a conscious process.
It doesn’t require large amounts of time and effort to put processes into place to gain better feedback. They also suggest having a second person viewing the session or videoing the session. This can allow the extraction of higher levels of feedback. Reviewing or having a second pair of eyes can help pick up things you missed that might have been obvious if you had been paying attention during that period of time.
During this necessary process, there are often problems that make themselves known. One of the problems is that people don’t want to hurt other people’s feelings. To counteract this, the Interactive Design Foundation recommends that you tell a small lie to your participants when you begin the testing process.
Explain that you are testing something for a separate group and that you have no relationship with that third party. This means that they are aware that their feedback has no impact on you. They can’t hurt your feelings because you’re not attached to the product that’s being tested.
In a more recent article by Ditte Mortensen of the Interactive Design Foundation, titled, “User Research: What It Is and Why You Should Do It”, she explains that you should do user studies at every phase of the Design Thinking process.
You conduct studies before you start designing for the purpose of getting an understanding of what your target group needs; you carry out tests during development to ensure that the user experience is on track, and you can measure the effect of your design after your product is released. Mortensen reiterates that this approach can keep you ahead of the game since you will have considered, analyzed, and tested every aspect of it.
In an article published five months ago by Rikke Dam and Teo Siang of the Interactive Design Foundation, called, “Stage 5 in the Design Thinking Process: Test”, they imply that testing is often undertaken with Prototyping, and if done well, it can provide many opportunities to help you learn more about your target demographic, and opportunities to refine your prototype and even the problem statement.
When conducting tests, you should pay attention to the prototype, the context, and scenario in which you are testing, how you interact with the user, and how you observe and collect feedback. The Design Thinking process as a whole is fluid and flexible. The different stages often feed into one another and form continuous loops, and they don’t necessarily follow any sequence in a project.