What user testing has taught me
User testing is always an interesting adventure.
It’s even more interesting if you’re facilitating instead of observing from the safety of a one-way mirror.
Apart from the usual ‘client bashing on the glass yelling “just click the dam button!”’ or the user that seems so incompetent, you wonder how they manage to dress themselves, let alone make it to the testing session, the one lesson I always find interesting is what user’s think is important.
It’s always interesting to work with clients for six months, shaping new ideas that have come out of research, finessing them repeatedly, putting them in front of users and finding that they’re not wanted.
How is this avoided?
It’s pretty hard to avoid really. Getting concepts in front of users early is a good start, but often users have trouble understanding prototypes or lo-fi designs.
Sometimes the only true test is to get user’s using the final solution.
