Started session by gathering input from attendees via post-its.
Sample input:
"Everyone is an expert"
“Out of Date Content"
“Slow loading pages"
“Auto-playing videos and flash"
“Too many cat videos not enough time"
Room divided into 2 groups of volunteers to card sort input to find clusters within clusters. Over-arching topics or themes started to form (votes next to each topic. Read below for more information):
Slow (3)
Too much / Poor organization (10_
Security (15)
Bad Navigation (10)
Mobile (3)
Forced Login / Subscription (10)
Productivity / Meta web sharing / passing data (11)
Inconsistency / Inconsistent Standards (13)
Popups / In Your Face / Bad UX (14)
Forms suck / Bad design (3)
Accessibility (7)
Content (2)
Browsers (16)
Everybody then voted for the topics they hated the most. The top 3 items were:
Browsers
Security
Popups / In Your Face / Bad UX
Flash
Ads
Required plugins
Auto-play
Pop-ups
Slideshows
We decided to discuss one of the topics given time limit.
Discussion about selected topic:
Popups / In Your Face / Bad UX
Content that might not be relevant. Animations that auto-play: Carousel, Slideshows, etc...
What we can do:
User Testing
Analytics data on your site
Research on pattern libraries, articles, etc… from “experts"
Build to be accessible
Admit this is a tool to appease stakeholders
Get clear on your goals (page, site)
A good goal - communicate there is “a lot going on"
Additional notes:
Carousel not used as often as you expect. Best practice to not use them but educating clients that’s the case is difficult. How do you get clients (people that hire or pay you to make a website) to understand and follow best practices? Suggestions: Usability Testing bring results so that they see what their users use, think, and understand.
What is the goal of this page, this headline, this paragraph? If you understand…you can make right decisions on what is good for you. It’s easier to justify use of technology (Example: Carousel allows me to display 50 sponsor on our website without disruption user experience too much.)
Ideas for future uxers/campus
Analytics + How people are using them
Sharing Trends
Testing history
Case Studies
Whichtestwon.com - A/B test archive
Why use Best Practices (everybody is doing that)? Why not use Better Practices? - Scotty
I would be interested in results of test. What’s happening out there (@ Stanford)?
