User Research - Contextual Inquiry Exercise
Jen, Leah and I teamed up to get our feet wet with our first mini hands-on UX assignment the other day. Recap of our outing to the Barnes and Noble at Union Square for our contextual inquiry exercise:
OBJECTIVE: Observe user experiences at Barnes & Noble and suggest redesign improvements.
STATEMENT OF PROBLEM: Since there were three of us, we decided to take a "divide-and-conquer" approach to our exercise. We frameworked our problem so that we could each tackle the user task of finding a particular book (The Elements of User Experience by Jesse James Garrett) via different user paths. To ensure that we could fairly compare our results to determine which user path yielded the desired result of finding the physical book in the most efficient way possible (defined as the least amount of time taken), we decided on the below constraints.
Search using only partial information, and inexact data - title only with the query terms “the elements of UX”
User Path #1 - search using the assistance of the information center or other B&N employees (Jen)
User Path #2 - search via kiosk only (Me)
User Path #3 - search using only the visual guides available throughout the store, without any aid from a kiosk or employee (Leah)
5:20 pm - found a kiosk area, but both machines were inoperable
5:25 pm - found a working kiosk on another floor
Input search terms “the elements of ux” - results did not return target title within the first 5 pages
Modified search terms to “elements of ux design” - target returned on first page, second result
When the ‘Find It Here’ button was clicked, it returned a screen with a floor map of the store layout, marked with the location of where the book could be found
This ultimately turned out to be the slowest method, and Jen and Leah have written up their findings separately. My own individual conclusions are produced below.
Clearly marked kiosks for in-store searches
Fairly straight forward UI for inputting search query
Helpful organization of critical information for identifying whether search query was successful - visual image of book cover, title, author, publication date, availability, in-store location (if applicable)
Kiosks, while clearly marked, were still difficult to find - inconsistent placement on each floor, visual marker of kiosk too low to be seen everywhere on the floor (obscured by bookshelves)
Outdated mouse trackpad/buttons - didn’t realize there were (small) right/left mouse buttons below the trackpad area at first - inclination was to tap the trackpad to register a click
Search query using ‘ux’ instead of ‘user experience’ initially returned incorrect/undesired/unexpected results despite being a close match to the target title
No clear indication as to what floor I was currently on, either through physical store signage, or via the kiosk
Cluster kiosks in one or two areas on each floor consistently (i.e. one cluster near the front/back of store, or opposite end of an information/customer service area where it would be less likely a person would be near to assist a user)
Rather than attach the visual signage to the kiosk itself, instead have the signage drop down from the ceiling above a kiosk area to increase visibility throughout the floor
Update/modernize keyboard/mouse at kiosks by replacing with a touch screen display or iPad/tablet device (would make more in-store electronic searching available if say, they were made available also in the cafe area)
Search&Find screens, while straight-forward, could use more contrasting colors to highlight/guide users through the search process (i.e. differentiated color tabs for different media, contrasting button colors for in-store vs. online ordering functions, as well as interface elements)
Include visual signage to indicate which floor you are on
For the ‘Find It Here’ screen, rather than just indicate where a book can be found in the store by way of a static directory map, include a Google-maps-like TEXTUAL as well as visual turn-by-turn direction list as to how to navigate to that section of the store from current kiosk location
Contextual inquiry is about observing user behaviors, but we conducted this experiment by placing ourselves in the shoes of the users - generally a bad idea. UX RESEARCHERS ARE NOT THE USERS. We should never assume to know their problems or their behaviors.
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