Optimal Blog

Think about the last time you were visiting a friend or family member’s house and needed to find something. Like a spoon, for example. You start in the kitchen because that’s where we’ve all been trained to find things like spoons. But where do you look next? Some may look in the drawer near the dishwasher, while others may look to the drawer that’s by the cabinet that holds dishes and bowls. Point is, people use context clues and other points of reference (like familiarity and habits) to find things that they’re looking for. 

The same goes for navigating a webpage.

However, unlike the spoon example, there’s much more variation in website structure than kitchen layout. Websites vary from industry to industry, ranging in purpose from ecommerce to digital portfolios and everything in between. So when someone lands on your website to find something or complete a task, is it obvious where they should go to get things done? 

Your gut might tell you that it is. The people on your design team might tell you that it is too. But what really matters is what happens with actual users. Whenever you’re building a new website or optimizing an existing one, it’s important that you build it with quality user insights. That starts with user experience (UX) research.

And before you ask if we mean qualitative or quantitative research – the answer is both. Let’s explore a particular user research method that’s essential for gathering the information needed to build intuitive site navigation. It’s called tree testing.

How tree testing evaluates findability of topics on a website

For anyone unfamiliar with tree testing (sometimes referred to as ‘reverse card sorting’ or ‘card-based classification’), it’s a series of tests that help you understand where and why people get lost in your content.

It works by taking text-based versions of websites and stripping the influence of navigation aids or design elements to build a study. Participants are shown the text-only version of your website or app and are asked to indicate where they would find specific items or topics.

By removing everything but the labels and how they’re organized, you can work out just how effective your website structure is at enabling people to find what they need. If test participants consistently struggle to locate specific items, you’ll know there are issues with your structure. It can also help you visualize what paths participants take to get to specific site information.

Another point worth mentioning is that tree testing not only uncovers site navigation flaws, but it reveals word choice and microcopy that may not be clear to users. To reference back to the initial analogy, one person might say “where would I find your spoons,” while another may ask, “where do you keep your utensils?” So, tree testing can also be helpful for understanding which words work best in your site structure.

When should I conduct a tree test?

While it’s best to conduct a tree test early in the research phase of a project, there’s never a wrong time. (Unless that time is not at all). And if you have an existing website, this is a good time to establish a base of your existing site structure. The results you gather here can help to highlight any issues with your site’s structure and provide the data needed to compare to any improvements.

If you’re starting from scratch with a new website, you can run tree tests on different versions of your proposed site structure and then compare the results to determine which makes the most sense to your users.

How do I conduct a tree test?

Running a tree test is simple. You can use an online tool (like TreeJack) to collect all of the necessary quantitative data you need to ensure successful site navigation.

But what about the qualitative side of it all? We’re so glad you asked.

How to add qualitative data to your tree test

Running tree tests is a great way to gather quantitative data about your site navigation and topic findability, but it's not so good at providing you with qualitative insights, or why people are looking for information the way that they are.

Traditionally, you could get your gift cards ready and set up an in-person study where you watch people perform the tasks laid out in your tree test, and subsequently ask why they searched for things the way they did. But that takes a lot of time, coordination, and compensation. Alternatively, you could set up a remote usability test using a platform designed to record users as they complete your tree test.

This way, you’ll get the quantitative results you need to make decisions, backed by qualitative insights from real people. You’ll be able to set up your test to get answers to questions like: 

• “Why did people go to X category to find information on X?”
• “Why did it take so long to find X?”
• "Why did people take that path to find X?"

Combine quantitative and qualitative research solutions to paint the whole picture

Teams that solely rely on quantitative data are only getting half the story. By pairing tree testing tools, like Optimal Workshop’s Treejack, with UserTesting’s Human Insight Platform, researchers are able to not only see how people search for information on a website but get to the bottom of why. When used together, quantitative and qualitative data reveal the most valuable insights for tree testing.

This is a guest post from our friends over at Askable. Check out their blog.

Writing screening questions is an everyday part of life as a UXer or researcher of any kind, really. And at first glance, they seem straightforward enough. Draft up some questions that help to either qualify or disqualify people from taking part in your research, whether that’s a survey, an interview or something in between.

At Askable, we have seen thousands and thousands of screening questions. Some horrible and some amazing - and everything in between.

So here we go – 5 of the most common mistakes made when writing screening questions – oh and how to avoid them.

1. Using closed-ended questions too often

What’s the quickest way of knowing if someone went on a holiday in the last 6 months… You ask them, right? “Have you been on a holiday in the last 6 months – Yes or No?”. Duh.

But actually, a question worded in this way is signposting the answer you’re looking for, which may lead to false answers! And also, the answer doesn’t give you any extra information about that person’s travel habits, etc.

So, perhaps a better way to ask the question would be: “When was the last time you went on a holiday?” Provide multiple choices. This also gives you that added info, like if it was a month ago or 5 months ago, in this case.

2. Using open-ended questions at the wrong time

Open-ended screening questions can be great, but only for certain info. Avoid using them when you have strict criteria. But instead, use them for getting inside your applicant’s head a bit more. An example would be to ask as a follow up to the example above “Tell me about where you went on your last holiday”.

Open-ended questions are also fine when the answers could vary wildly. A good example is “What is your occupation”. There are simply way too many possible responses to have as a multi-choice.

3. Using industry jargon

How many people in the general public know what EV stands for? It’s Electric Vehicle by the way.

Or how about the term ‘Financial Services’? Are we talking about a bank or payments company or an accountant?

Work off the lowest common denominator, assume the applicant doesn’t know anything about your industry. Because often, they don’t or they think of it differently to you. When we live and breathe a topic, it’s all too easy to forget that others do not.

4. Too many screening questions

We often write too many screening questions for a number of reasons. Sometimes we do it because we forget that screening questions are just that – to screen. Not to survey! Don’t start adding questions in there that are actually part of your research.

Other times it can be because our criteria is just way too narrow. Whatever the reason, a good rule of thumb is to never have more than 15 and the less the better.

5. Not trusting the majority

We have learned this time and time again at Askable – most people are good and honest! We even have a saying now for it – “default to honesty”.

Don’t get overly concerned that your screening questions give too much away. Of course, keep it vague, but don’t go crazy. The 99% of people in our experience won’t take advantage of you. So serve the 99 and not the 1.

Wrap Up

Think about these next time you are writing up some screening questions, setting up your research or trying to figure out who it is you really want to talk with. Do this and you will be on your way to some seriously awesome and accurate insights!

In-person user testing is an important part of any research project, helping you to see first-hand how your users interact with your prototypes and products – but what are you supposed to do when it’s not a viable option?

The recent outbreak of coronavirus is forcing user researchers and designers to rethink traditional testing approaches, especially in-person testing. So what’s the solution? Enter unmoderated user testing. This approach circumvents the need to meet your participants face-to-face as it’s done entirely over the internet. As you can probably guess, this also means there are a few considerable benefits.

Here, we'll take a look at 5 reasons to consider this testing approach. But first, let's explore what unmoderated user testing is.

What is unmoderated user testing?

In the most basic sense, unmoderated user testing removes the ‘moderated’ part of the equation. Instead of having a facilitator guide participants through the test, participants complete the testing activity by themselves and in their own time. For the most part, everything else stays the same.

The key differences are that:

• You’re unable to ask follow-up questions
• You can’t use low-fidelity prototypes
• You can’t support participants (beyond the initial instructions you send them).

However, there are a number of upsides to unmoderated user testing, which we’ll cover below.

1. You can access participants from all over the globe

There’s a good chance that your organization’s customers don’t exist solely in your city, or even just in your country, so why limit yourself to testing local individuals? Moderated user testing requires you to either bring in people who can visit your office or for you to actually travel to another physical location and host testing sessions there.

With unmoderated user testing, you can use a variety of participant recruitment services to access large groups of participants from all over the globe. Making these services even more useful is the fact many allow you to recruit the exact participants you need. For example, drivers of Toyota hybrid vehicles who live in Calgary.

2. Unmoderated user testing is cheaper

Have a think for a moment about all of the typical costs that go along with a hosted user testing session. There’s the cost of a location if you’re traveling to another city, the remuneration for the people you’re testing and the cost of equipment (that you may not typically have access to). Sure, moderated testing can be made much more affordable if you’re hosting a session in your own office and you have all of the required gear, but that’s not the case for everyone doing research.

Unmoderated user testing really only requires you to choose the tool with which you want to run your user test (variable cost), set up your study and then send out the link to your participants.

3. It’s easier to manage

Unmoderated user testing means you can set aside the difficult task of managing participants in person, from scheduling through to finding notetakers and people to help you with the recording equipment. As we noted in the above section about cost, all you have to do is select the tool and then set up and run your study.

4. Automatic analysis

Running in-person, qualitative usability testing sessions can deliver some truly useful insights. There’s really nothing like sitting down in front of a participant and seeing how they interact with the product you’re working on, hearing their frustrations and learning about how they work. But any insights you gain from these sessions you’ll have to derive yourself. There’s no magic button that can generate useful qualitative analysis for you.

With unmoderated user testing, and especially with the right set of tools, you can run your tests and then have analysis generated automatically from your data. Take our IA tool Treejack as just one example. The functionality built into the tool means you can send out text-based versions of your website structure and then see how people make their way through the website to find what they’re looking for. At the end of your test, Treejack will present you with an array of useful, detailed visualizations like this one:

5. There’s less chance of bias

Ever heard of the observer effect? It’s a theory that basically states that the observation of a phenomenon will inevitably change that phenomenon, commonly due to the instruments used in the measurement. The observer effect and other biases often come into play during moderated research sessions specifically as a result of having a moderator in the room – typically with their own biases. Removing the moderator from the equation means you’ll get more reliable data from your study.

And the best place to get started?

Unmoderated user research requires unmoderated testing tools. With health concerns like coronavirus and influenza leading to reduced travel and in turn making in-person testing more difficult, there’s never been a better time to start using unmoderated testing tools. If you haven’t already, take our full set of 5 tools for a spin for free (no credit card required).

Today we’re launching a new look for Optimal Workshop. While it’s a new direction for us visually, there’s also a little more to this story than meets the eye. This new identity represents a total rethink about how we present ourselves to the world, from our tools like OptimalSort and Reframer to way we present updates just like this one.

This brand update was a 7-month effort from concept through to execution, involving talents from both inside and outside the walls of our Wellington Office. Here, we’ll share a little about what made us decide to make this change and where you’re going to see the biggest changes.

So, without further adieu…

Why we made this change

• We’d experienced a lot of change and grown at a rapid pace – Our previous brand had grown organically for 12 years. But we’ve matured, and we need a brand identity that will continue to grow with us. 
• We needed a brand that’s accessible to all – We place accessibility at the heart of our product decisions, and we wanted the same for our brand. Our previous design guidelines often made this a struggle.
• We needed a brand identity that clearly communicates what we do – Our brand needs to be clear, flexible and robust. A brand system that’s simple to configure means it’s easier to create new assets and ensures every bit of the design is usable, beautiful and communicates our value clearly.

What’s new

Here’s a quick round-up of some of the changes you can expect to see around the place – from the big things like our company logo right through to the smaller tweaks we’ve applied across the website.

Our tools

When you log back into your account, you’ll find that everything works exactly the way that it did before – we’ve just applied a fresh coat of paint. Of course, if you do happen to come across any bugs or quirks, get in touch with our support team by clicking the little blue chat icon in the bottom right corner of the screen.

Our logo

The most noticeable change is front and center with our logo. We’ve evolved it to outline what’s important. Now, we like to think that you can interpret it in a few different ways:

• A cycle of learning
• Circling the answer/highlighting the solution
• Putting “Optimal Workshop” at the centre

We’ve also designed our new logo to be quite flexible. We’re able to swap out the colors as well as the “O” to celebrate special occasions, people and events:

Our colors

We’ve also refreshed our color palette. We still love green and blue, but we’ve introduced yellow as well as a few other options. Here are the highlights (no pun intended):Our new brand color is yellow. The color of Post-it notes, smiley face emojis and bright ideas. We hope it represents things like warmth, approachability, insight, discovery and enlightenment.

Our new colour palette ranges from yellow through to green and blue. We use tints of yellow to allow flexibility and accessibility when designing, while the dark navy is versatile and reliable. We place an emphasis on whites and grey tints for freshness and lightness.

We also use accent colors to add more variety and life. We’ll let you find these on your own as you experience the new palette on our website.

Our typeface

One of the biggest improvements we’ve made to the accessibility of the website comes in the form of our new typeface. Obviously Sans is our new heading typeface – it has a “steady” style, but it’s also quite interesting structurally.

You’ll see Obviously Sans throughout the website, app and blog. It’ll also make its way into our emails and other comms too!

Highlighting what matters

The act of highlighting something is universally understood. We all use highlighters and we all know what it means when we highlight something. Highlighting to find patterns is what research is all about.

We often highlight to:

• Discover themes
• Uncover insights
• Simplify complexity
• Emphasize meaning

Here’s what the highlighting looks like in practice:

Wrap-up

So, that’s our brand refresh. We’re still the same Optimal Workshop, just with a new look that better represents who we are and what we do.

We’re trying to become an ever-more important part of the work that user experience professionals carry out every day. Whether that means hosting user interviews, validating their ideas, testing and probing their information architectures or running surveys, we want to be a part of it.

We believe in better experiences for all and putting people at the heart of decisions. The team at Optimal Workshop genuinely enjoy working together to build something that will leave the world in a better state than we found it.

Join us on the journey – there’s more to come.

Start: Check out our brand new website

Every day, people around the world use our research tools to craft better experiences for their users. Whether it’s a website for a new public library, an app for a self-driving car startup or even the layout of a physical retail store, our tools give researchers and designers everything they need to ensure the way people work, think and act are at the heart of every design decision.

We talk about our tools on a fairly regular basis (after all, we are quite proud of them), but this time we’re going to do something a little different. Here, we’re going to show you 17 creative ways to use OptimalSort, Treejack, Chalkmark, Reframer and Questions. Hopefully, we’ll inspire you to head off and start doing some more testing of your own. Let’s get started!

1. A/B test the structure of your website or mobile app

Tree testing is one of the best methods to assess the strength of your navigation structure, and Treejack is the best tool to execute this method. You can easily set up more than one Treejack study to run at the same time, allowing you to A/B test different navigation structures and pick a winner.

2. Run designs past your team

Ever struggle to get consensus from your team on a new logo or design? Use OptimalSort to solve the problem! Create a closed image sort with categories set up so your team can sort designs based on their preferences. You can then look at the results and determine the best path forward.

3. Improve your note-taking at conferences

Reframer is a powerful qualitative research tool, and most of what makes it so useful for usability tests and user interviews also makes it a great tool for taking notes at conferences. Once you’ve taken all of your notes, you can use tags to mark up different insights and then share the results with your coworkers.

4. Reduce the content on landing pages

Card sorting is a great way to work out if you have any redundant content on your landing pages. Let’s use the example of simplifying your homepage. You can ask participants to sort cards (containing homepage links) based on how often they use them. You could then compare this data with analytics from your homepage and see if people’s actual behavior and perception are well aligned.

5. Work out if your icons need labels

Determine if your icons are helping your users by testing whether they understand their purpose. Upload icons that you’re currently using (or even plan to use) to Chalkmark, and ask your participants to identify their meaning by using the post-task questions feature.

6. Use card sorting to build better stores

Card sorting isn’t just a technique for the digital realm. Run an open card sort with OptimalSort to figure out where items in a retail store should be grouped. If we use the example of a supermarket, the cards would be different food items and the ‘aisles’ would be the categories.

7. Make scheduling usability tests easier

You can use Questions as a scheduling tool by setting up a survey designed to ask people which times they’re available to come in for usability testing sessions. You can send out one link to every participant and view the results in a single location. Easy!

8. Test your information architecture (IA) in different countries

Did you know you can use our integrated recruitment panel to remotely research participants from all around the world? This is a great way to see how different languages, countries, cultures and backgrounds interact with your website.

9. Use heatmaps for first impressions

Chalkmark’s heatmap feature is an excellent way to get first impressions on your designs. You can see where your users clicked so you can get insights into what’s working (or not working) with your designs. It’s also fast, so it’s easy to iterate.

10. Run an empathy card sort

Empathy tests are a great way to find out whether your website, app or design is creating the right feelings with your users. Set up a closed card sort with a list of the words which could represent your design, then set up categories based on relevance. Show people your design and then ask them to sort the words into the categories which best match the experience.

11. Use Treejack to test your mobile IA

The number of people using smartphones to browse websites continues to grow, making the UX of mobile websites key. Use Treejack to test the mobile IA of your website so you can work out if people are getting stuck.

12. Find out how people get home

Use first-click testing to find out if a text link or an icon is the best choice for navigating back to the homepage of your website. A quick test in Chalkmark will improve your website and save you design work down the line!

13. Run multivariate testing

Ever heard of multivariate testing? It’s not too complicated. Basically, you just compare more than two versions of your studies to understand which version performs better with your audience. You can run this type of testing with Chalkmark and Treejack to determine the right design to iterate on.

14. Run a pizza card sort

Yep, you heard us. Running a card sort asking people which toppings are good for pizza and which ones aren’t is a great way to introduce people to the benefits of the card sorting method. Plus, it’s always fun to show off the results on a Friday afternoon in the office.

15. Use Treejack to improve your SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) is an important part of any modern website, with an SEO-tuned website much more likely to show up in search results. There are many factors that go into SEO, but one of the most important is a website’s navigation. Use Treejack to improve how people navigate through your website and you’ll likely see your search engine ranking improve.

16. Use Reframer as a field assistant

Login to your Optimal Workshop account on your laptop and get out into the field with Reframer! When you’re out conducting usability tests or user interviews with people away from your office, having Reframer makes it much easier to collect all of the necessary data. Once you’re back, use Reframer’s analysis features to make sense of your findings.

17. Test your paper prototypes

How are you supposed to test your paper prototypes when your users are spread all around the world? Well, you can simply take a photo of your prototype and use Chalkmark to remote test it with your users. Easy.

Wrap up

So that’s our list of 17 creative ways to use our tools. Have you got any of your own? If you do, don’t hesitate to click the little Intercom chat bubble in the corner of your screen and let us know! We always love to hear from you.

If you haven’t yet had the chance to play around with our 5 tools, you can try them for free - forever - by signing up here (no credit card required). Don’t just take our word for it, either. Check out these case studies from Xero and Intercom to learn about how 2 organizations managed to significantly improve different areas of their businesses.

Information architecture (IA) isn’t the easiest space for a newcomer. The myriad terms and technologies can often be quite tricky to understand on their own – not to mention how they all fit together.

We wanted to help, so we’ve put together a comprehensive cheat sheet/glossary that you can use whenever the topic of IA comes up.

Information architecture

Information architecture is the structure used to organize and label content on websites, mobile applications and other digital environments. At a very basic level, IA determines the paths people take to get to the content they’re looking for and where they might get lost.

IA isn’t actually one “thing”, but a number of different elements:

• Labels: How information is represented
• Navigation: How people make their way through the information
• Search: How people look for information

It’s also the layer upon which you build the design. This means that for your users, they’ll never likely see the IA – but they will feel the effects of the decisions you make when designing it. Your IA should help people find what they’re looking for, regardless of where the IA exists. It’s as important for desktop users as it is for mobile.

Experience architecture

The term ‘experience architecture’ refers to a wider set of practices or terms that includes information architecture. Experience architecture covers IA, interaction design and experience design. It’s similar to how user experience (UX) is just one element under the wider customer experience (CX) umbrella.

Note that just as the field of information architecture has information architects, experience architecture has experience architects; people responsible for planning and executing experience architecture deliverables. Typically, the experience architecture role is quite varied in that it requires expertise in user-centered design, human behavior and interaction design.

User journey

A user journey is basically what it sounds like – the experiences someone has when they interact with something. It’s also most commonly used to describe these experiences and interactions in a software context.

User journeys describe the steps users take to complete a task when interacting with a website or other digital service. For example, for a photo storage app, the user journey may look something like this:

1. User runs out of storage space for photos
2. User finds new photos app on app store
3. User installs new photos app
4. User creates account
5. User begins uploading photos from device

Typically, you’d create a user journey in the discovery phase of a project, as you can use this tool to visualize what the users need and to influence wireframe and information architecture development.

Depending on your needs, your user journey may be quite a bit more detailed, with overarching categories ‘before’, ‘during’ and ‘after’ to show where the user is with regards to using the product. You can also add in ideal emotions at each stage.

Wireframing

Chances are if you’re using a website or mobile app, it was a wireframe at some point in the past. Wireframing is essentially a way to design digital applications at a structural level, a way to map out broadly where different elements like content and functionality sit before adding in visual design.

Wireframing is to websites, apps and other digital applications what the rough first sketch of a building is to a finished skyscraper. It’s foundational, yet entirely important to nail down broad strokes ideas before investing more heavily in design.

Why might you produce a wireframe? In addition to using it as a way to prototype ideas prior to the visual design process, wireframes are an important method of getting stakeholders and other teams onboard.

Labeling system

In the world of information architecture, labels represent a relationship between your users and content. The idea behind labels is to communicate information to users without using too much space or requiring much work on the user’s part.

Let’s take a look at an example. ‘About us’ is a label that represents a larger chunk of information. On a website, this could be information about the people who work at the organization, what the office space is like and the work that the organization does. You wouldn’t want to present all of this information to a user on the homepage, so instead, you use a label like ‘About us’ to trigger the user’s association with that term. Once they’ve seen the label, a user can decide whether they want to proceed. In a nutshell, a label should be used to communicate information clearly and efficiently.

Labels are understandably important, and things can go awry when the people designing websites and other digital applications don’t adequately consider the importance of correct labeling. Perhaps more than most other parts of a website, poor labeling is an easy way to spot websites where user needs haven’t been appropriately considered.

Search system

Search is how your users go about looking for the information they require, whereas a search system is essentially a search engine: a way to sidestep the act of navigating through a website and search directly for information. One of the biggest misconceptions when it comes to designing digital applications is that search is the answer to all navigation problems. Search systems are often seen as a way to avoid developing user-focused navigation systems, as the common thinking is that users know what they’re looking for and so will just plug terms into a search bar.

This isn’t actually true, and there’s a great quote from Larry Page that neatly summarizes this argument: “The ultimate search engine would basically understand everything in the world, and it would always give you the right thing. And we’re a long, long way from that”.

Search engines often become bandages for websites with inadequate browsing systems. When considering adding a search engine to a website, consider how much content you actually have. The last thing you want to do is have to maintain a search engine when the browsing experience meets user needs.

When a search engine is appropriate:

• Websites with large quantities of content (50+ pages)
• Websites with long, dense pages
• Any situation where browsing will take significantly longer

Metadata and taxonomies

In the world of information architecture, 2 terms that get thrown around and mixed up more than most others are taxonomy and metadata. Here’s a breakdown of what both of them mean, and how they relate to each other.

Metadata makes content findable and understandable for users and computer systems, it’s data about data. Rachel Lovinger describes it as “information about the content that provides structure, context, and meaning”. Photos typically have significant quantities of metadata attached to them, information like where the photo was taken, the date the photo was taken and the device the photo was taken on. Metadata is particularly important to search engines, helping to surface the right content based on what the user is searching for.

Taxonomies, on the other hand, refer to structures that organize information. Unlike metadata which applies to individual pieces of content, taxonomies help to organize content into hierarchical relationships.

So how do metadata and taxonomies work together? Well, if a taxonomy’s goal is to organize content, it needs terms to be stored as metadata. Christine Benson notes that “a taxonomy organizes information, and metadata describes it”. They’re really 2 parts of the same whole.

Wrap up

Hopefully, we’ve given you a clear idea of some of the more important information architecture terms and how they relate to each other. If you want to start rethinking your own website’s information architecture, there’s no better place to start than with a comprehensive understanding of how your users think the information on your website should be structured. You can read more about one of the best methods for this process, card sorting, right here on our blog.