Many organizations are aware that staying relevant essential for their success. This can mean a lot of things to different organizations. What it often means is coming up with plenty of new, innovative ideas and products to keep pace with the demands and needs of the marketplace. It also means keeping up with the expectations and needs of your users, which often means  shorter and shorter product development life cycle times.  While maintaining this pace can be daunting, it can also be seen as a strength, tightening up your processes and cutting out unnecessary steps.

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A vital part of developing new (or tweaking existing) products is considering the end user first. There really is no point in creating anything new if it isn’t meeting a need or filling a gap in the market. How can you make sure you are hitting the right mark? Ask your users.  We look into some of the key user research methods available to help you in your product development process.

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If you want to know more about how to fit research into your product development process, take a read here.

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What is user research? 👨🏻💻

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User experience (UX) research, or user research as it’s commonly referred to, is an important part of the product development process. Primarily, UX research involves using different research methods to gather qualitative and quantitative data and insights about how your users interact with your product. It is an essential part of developing, building, and launching a product that truly meets the needs, desires, and requirements of your users. 

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At its simplest, user research is talking to your users and understanding what they want and why. And using this to deliver what they need.

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How does user research fit into the product development process? 🧩🧩

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User research is an essential part of the product development process. By asking questions of your users about how your product works and what place it fills in the market, you can create a product that delivers what the market needs to those who need it. 

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Without user research, you could literally be firing arrows in the dark, or at the very best, working from a very internal organizational view based on assuming that what you believe users need is what they want. With user research, you can collect qualitative and quantitative data that clearly tells you where and what users would like to see and how they would use it.

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Investing in user research right at the start of the product development process can save the team and the organization heavy investment in time and money. With detailed data responses, your brand-new product can leapfrog many development hurdles, delivering a final product that users love and want to keep using. Firing arrows to hit a bullseye.

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What user research methods should we use? 🥺

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Qualitative ResearchMethods

Qualitative research is about exploration. It focuses on discovering things we cannot measure with numbers and typically involves getting to know users directly through interviews or observation.

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Usability Testing – Observational

One of the best ways to learn about your users and how they interact with your new product is to observe them in their own environment. Watch how they accomplish tasks, the order they do things, what frustrates them, and what makes the task easier and/or more enjoyable for your subject. The data can be collated to inform the usability of your product, improving intuitive design and what resonates with your users.

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Competitive Analysis

Reviewing products already on the market can be a great start to the product development process. Why are your competitors’ products successful? And how well do they behave for users? Learn from their successes, and even better, build on where they may not be performing as well and find where your product fills the gap in the market.

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Quantitative Research Methods

Quantitative research is about measurement. It focuses on gathering data and then turning this data into usable statistics.

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Surveys

Surveys are a popular user research method for gathering information from a wide range of people. In most cases, a survey will feature a set of questions designed to assess someone’s thoughts on a particular aspect of your new product. They’re useful for getting feedback or understanding attitudes, and you can use the learnings from your survey of a subset of users to draw conclusions about a larger population of users.

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Wrap Up 🌯

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Gathering information on your users during the product development process and before you invest time and money can be hugely beneficial to the entire process. Collating robust data and insights to guide the new product development and respond directly to user needs, and filling that all-important niche. Undertaking user experience research shouldn’t stop at product development but throughout each and every step of your product life cycle. If you want to find out more about UX research throughout the life cycle of your product, take a read of our article UX research for each product phase.

Sitting inside any beautifully crafted and designed digital product, there must be a fully functional and considered information architecture.

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As much as information architecture shouldn’t be developed in a vacuum. Neither should the design and look of digital products. In fact, a large proportion of the function of digital designers is devoted to supporting users locating content they need and driving them towards content that the product owners want them to find.

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Incorporating visual markers to make sure that certain content is distinct from the rest or creating layers that demonstrate the diverse content on a product.

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If you do not have quality content, it is impossible to design a quality digital product. It all comes back to creating a user experience that makes sense and is designed to make task completion simple. And this relates back to designing the product with the content planned for it in mind.

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8 Principles of information architecture, according to Dan Brown 🏗️

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As a designer, the more you know about information architecture, the better the products you design will meet your user requirements and deliver what they need. If you work with an information architect, even better. If you’re still learning about information architecture the 8 Principles according to Dan Brown is a great place to begin.

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If you haven’t come across Dan Brown yet, you have more than likely come across his 8 principles. Dan Brown is one of the UX world's most prolific experts with a career that spans most areas of UX designs. He’s written 3 books on the subject and experience across a multitude of high profile projects. Aiding large organizations to make the most of their user experience.

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1. The principle of objects: Content should be treated as a living, breathing thing. It has lifecycles, behaviors, and attributes.
2. The principle of choices: Less is more. Keep the number of choices to a minimum.
3. The principle of disclosure: Show a preview of information that will help users understand what kind of information is hidden if they dig deeper.
4. The principle of examples: Show examples of content when describing the content of the categories.
5. The principle of front doors: Assume that at least 50% of users will use a different entry point than the home page.
6. The principle of multiple classifications: Offer users several different classification schemes to browse the site’s content.
7. The principle of focused navigation: Keep navigation simple and never mix different things.
8. The principle of growth: Assume that the content on the website will grow. Make sure the website is scalable.

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It’s highly likely that you’ve already used some, or all, of these IA principles in your designs. Don’t be shy about mastering them, or at the very least be familiar. They can only help you become a better user experience designer.

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Wrap up 🌯

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Mastering the 8 principles, according to IA expert Dan Brown will see you mastering the complex tasks of information architecture. Understanding IA is key to creating digital designs with a content structure that is functional, logical and just what your users need to navigate your product. Design without good IA doesn’t work as well, just as a content structure without a well designed interface will not engage users.

What is information architecture? ✏️

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According to Abby Covert, a leader in the field of information architecture, IA is ‘the way we arrange the parts to make sense of the whole.’ Information architecture (IA) is found in every digital product, from websites and apps to an intranet. 

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For the purposes of this article we focus on the importance of information architecture to user experience (UX) design because IA is fundamentally important to the success of your user experience. It determines how users will access your  content and ultimately how successful their experience is when using your product. 

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When put like this it does seem pretty straightforward. Maybe even simple? But these tasks need to be straightforward for your users. Putting thought, time and research in at the front of your design and build can help build an intuitive product. IA is the structure that sits in behind and allows the design to tell the story and the content to be found in an easy way.

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The role of information architecture in UX design 🏗️

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Information architecture forms the framework for any UX design project. You need to consider the visual elements, functionality, interaction, and navigation and if they are built according to IA principles. If not considered fully even the most compelling content and powerful user experience design can fail without an organized and functional IA design. Disorganized content can make finding your way through difficult, meaning users get lost, annoyed and frustrated. Frustrated users don’t stick around and most likely don’t come back.

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Through solving or preempting users’ issues with research and designing powerful and effective IA it reduces usability and navigation problems. Meaning that researched, thought through and designed information architecture can save both money and time for your organization in the longer term.

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What is the difference between IA and UX? 🤯

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Often it can be confusing that there isn’t much difference between IA and UX design. While these terms do relate to each other and need to be considered alongside, they are not one and the same.

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“Information architecture (IA) is the discipline of making information findable and understandable, helping people understand their surroundings and find what they’re looking for online and in the real world” - Interaction Design

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“User experience (UX) design is the process design teams use to create products
that provide meaningful and relevant experiences to users” - Interaction Design

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UX design is well grounded with good functional information architecture but that’s not where it stops. The user experience focus is on influencing users’ behaviors and actions through emotion and psychology. Information architecture is focussed on the users' goals and task completion. They work together to create the very best user experience. IA provides the foundation of a well organized space that is easy to navigate and UX design ensures that the overall experience meets (or exceeds) users’ expectations, through their wants, needs and desires.

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The key components of IA 🧱

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There are four key components to consider when building a strong information architecture:

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Labeling

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How information is named and represented. Labels need to communicate information to users without using too much space or requiring much work on the user’s part.

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Navigation

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How people make their way through information. Without robust IA which has been thought through this is the quickest way to confuse users. If they can’t find their way to the information they need, they won’t be able to complete their task. It really is that simple.

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Search

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How people will look for information (keywords, categories). A search system is especially important when there is a lot of content to wade through. A search engine, filters, and many other tools help users search content. Great UX design will consider how the information will be displayed once searched.

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Organization

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How the information is ordered. These help users to predict where they can find information easily:

• Hierarchical is the hierarchy of the content and literally the order of importance
  the user expects to see information against what the organization needs.
• Sequential Taking a stroll in your user's shoes can be valuable. Considering the path a user would take and the journey they make. Walking step-by-step, ensuring that as users progress through their tasks they are easily led to the next step.
• Matrix This is a little more complicated for users as it lets them choose how to navigate on their own. Users are given the choice of content organization. For example, the searchability of a website. Where the user could choose to search by topic, size, price or any other filter or option.

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Wrap up 🥙

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Information architecture is a key part of a powerful user experience design. Efficient IA helps users quickly and easily move through content and find what they want.  And what do users want but to find what they want, complete their task and get on with their day!

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Provide an IA that functions well, is intuitive to use and well labeled, coupled with UX design that is smooth, attractive and responds to users needs, wants and desires and you’ll have a winner on the day.

What is Information Architecture?

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Information architecture (IA) is a term used to describe how content or information is organised and arranged. This can relate to a website, a retail store or an app. And you could even consider the way a library is sorted to be IA. 

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For the purposes of this we will be focussed on websites. IA is fundamentally important to the success of your website. It determines how your users will access the information and the success of their user experience (UX) whilst on your website. And ultimately if you can keep users on your website long enough to complete their task.

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IA can be broken down into 3 main areas to consider when building great user experience:

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• Navigation: How people make their way through information (website content)
• Labels: How information is named and represented.
• Search: How people will look for information (keywords, categories)

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When put like this it does seem pretty straightforward. Maybe even simple? But these tasks need to be straightforward for your users. Putting thought, time and research in at the front of your design and build can mean an intuitive website is built. But at any point in your websites life cycle it can be of value to test and review. IA is the structure that sits in behind and allows the design to tell the story and the content to be found in an easy way.

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Why is Information Architecture important to web design? 🏗️

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If you’ve ever tried to use something and thought, “where am I supposed to go next?” or “this doesn’t make any sense,” you are encountering an issue with an information ‍architecture.

The Information Architecture Institute

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The way in which your users will use your website depends largely on how the information is presented and organised. By following through the tasks that you expect your users to undertake you can better understand the user experience. If the user can easily flow from point to point, finding what they need in a quick and efficient (and ideally intuitive manner) they are far more likely to stick around. And return when they need to.

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The opposite is definitely true also. If users find your website difficult to follow, hard to navigate and get lost or confused. They will not stick around to find out more. They will move on, and swiftly, to your competition. Frustrated, and disengaged. You will find it difficult to win them back.

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What does good information architecture look like for my users? 👀

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By providing a simple, clear and straightforward path users can stay focussed on their task, removing overwhelm and confusion. How often do you disappear ‘down a rabbit hole’ when on the internet? Confusing paths or overwhelming options may mean users move off on tangents, and become less likely to complete their initial task. Ultimately the best user experience is one that delivers the right information at the right time. Not too slow and not too complicated. 

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Always keep in mind that a great IA is:

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• Navigation: Always think straightforward, simple and intuitive.  Keep the navigation menu clean, clear and brief. Content and information where it’s expected to be. No point putting dog collars under dog food.
• Labels: Consider how pages, content and information is named. This needs to be direct and simple to understand. If you want people to find your store label the page ‘location’ or ‘find us’ or even ‘find our store’.
• Search: Most of your users will use search as a last resort. They will try to navigate their way through your website before resorting to a search option. Considering carefully the keywords for information that support the search tool. If they have already failed to find the information through your navigation, don’t let them down now.

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With all of these lined up in behind great web design, which is clear, bright and attractive. Along with language which appeals to your user.  You are providing a UX that will entice, engage and ultimately keep them on your website and converting.

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What does great information architecture look like for my organization?

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Great IA goes beyond simply being about your user experience. Your organization can benefit hugely with testing, research and insights put into your website IA. 

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With an IA that creates an easy navigable and engaging website your users are less likely to move off to your competitors. You’ve worked hard to get them to your website, through marketing and SEO. Delivering what your user expects and making it easy to find, means they will complete their task, and are far more likely to return. 

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By finding what they need quickly, and intuitively, users are more likely to be converted and generate leads or sales. Delivering and answering questions can also reduce the need for support. If you can, your organization's website should answer your users questions, before they complete. This means they are less likely to need to email and /or call for support, reducing overheads and time lag before conversion.

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Your organization's reputation is so important, your website may be your only interaction with users. If they have an easy user experience, their questions answered, and are able to complete what they need simply they leave with a great impression of your organization. They are more likely to return and their overall takeaway is that your organization is trustworthy, organised and easy to deal with. The opposite is quite possible with poor IA and design. You get but one chance to grab their attention and keep them. Do it badly and you may never get them back.

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Creating great information architecture 👷🏻

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User research with OptimalSort

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Of course the best website IA is based on your users experience. And there is no better way to get a full understanding of your users than by conducting research. At any point in your website's life cycle it can be beneficial to undertake research such as card sorting. At the beginning stages of your website build is best, but your website should be evolving as your organization does, therefore any time there are shifts in what you do or offer is a great time to revisit your UX and how best to deliver this. OptimalSort tests users on how they intuitively would like to see information sorted on your website. Building IA based on data, rather than assumptions, will mean that content and information can be sorted in a way that truly delivers a simple and intuitive experience.

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Maintaining your website with Treejack

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With a great IA, based on card sorting user research, your website content needs to be maintained. Tree testing allows you to see where your users are getting lost in your website navigation. And also how they expect to look for key information. The Treejack tool provides real user insights on how your website navigation is working, how it can work better, and ultimately how to fix paths that don’t work. Providing hard data to inform an intuitive IA.

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Wrap Up 🌮

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So, information architecture is fundamental to your website and how it operates. Want to learn more about information architecture? Take a look at our article, or download 'The Actionable IA Guide'.

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Supporting your website with user research can mean you build and design a intuitive website that simply rocks! 

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Learn more about card sorting with our 101 guide. And more on tree testing. 

UI and UX are two terms that are often used interchangeably and confused for one another, but what do they actually mean? And is there a crossover between them?

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These two terms have only grown in use in recent years, thanks largely to the exploding technology sector. This is great news. For organizations, effectively harnessing UX and UI enables them to build products and services that people will actually want to use – and continue using. For users, they’ll have access to products designed for them. 

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What is UX? 🤳🎯

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User experience (UX as it’s commonly called) refers to the experience that a person has with a product or service. 

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We can determine whether a user experience is good or bad based on how easy (or difficult) it is for users to interact with the various elements of a product or service. Is the sign-up flow easy to use? Does the CTA button on the homepage encourage users to click? UX design exists to answer questions like these – and here’s how.

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At the core of UX design is user research, which you can use to understand customer pain points and actually build products designed for the people using them. Typically, user research involves the use of a number of different research methods designed to answer specific questions. Card sorting, for example, can show you how people think the information on your website should be arranged.

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Designer and information architect Peter Morville came up with the user experience honeycomb, which demonstrates the various components of UX design.

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Don Norman of Nielsen Norman Group defines UX as “[encompassing] all aspects of the end-users interaction with the company, its services, and its products”.

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If this seems broad, that’s because it is. UX actually extends beyond just the digital products of an organization and can be used for areas like retail, customer service and more. In fact, there’s actually a growing movement to replace UX with customer experience (CX), as a way of encompassing all of these disparate elements.

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What is UI? 🪄📲

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User interface (UI), in the most stripped-back definition, is the interface by which a user and a computer system communicate with one another. This includes the touchscreen on your smartphone, the screen on your laptop, your mouse and keyboard and countless other mechanisms.

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With this in mind, user interface design is focused on the elements that users will see on these interfaces, such as buttons, text and images. UI design is all about layout, look and feel. The objective of UI design is to visually guide users through an interface so they can complete their task. In a nutshell, you don’t want a user to think too hard about what they’re doing.

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UI has its origins in the 1980s, when Xerox developed the very first graphical user interface (GUI). Instead of needing to interact with a computer through a programming language, people could now use icons, menus and buttons. The rest, as they say, is history. Apple came along with the Macintosh computer in 1984 (bringing with it the first point and click mouse), and now we’re all carrying smartphones with touch screens that even a baby can operate.

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Like UX, UI has grown significantly – going far beyond what you’ll see on a computer screen. Those involved in the field of UI design today will work as much on the interfaces of computer programs and apps as they will on the user interfaces of cars, wearable devices and technologies in the home. If current trends continue, UI design is likely to become an even bigger field in the years ahead.

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What’s the difference between UX and UI? 👀

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UX and UI are both essential components of a product or service. You can’t have one without the other, and, as we’ve explored, neglecting one could have serious consequences for your product’s success.

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The difference between UX and UI is that UX is focused on the experience of using something and UI is focused on the look and feel of the interface. 

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“User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI) are some of the most confused and misused terms in our field. A UI without UX is like a painter slapping paint onto a canvas without thought; while UX without UI is like the frame of a sculpture with no paper mache on it. A great product experience starts with UX followed by UI. Both are essential for the product’s success”. - Rahul Varshney, co-creator of Foster.fm

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The difference between UX and UI is that UX is focused on the experience of using something and UI is focused on the look and feel of the interface. 

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Or, if you’d prefer a statement from venerable Nielsen Norman Group: “It’s important to distinguish the total user experience from the UI, even though the UI is obviously an extremely important part of the design. As an example, consider a website with movie reviews. Even if the UI for finding a film is perfect, the UX will be poor for a user who wants information about a small independent release if the underlying database only contains movies from the major studios”.

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With this in mind, let’s now take a look at the people behind UX and UI. What do the roles look like in these fields? And, more importantly, what do they involve?

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UX and UI jobs guide 📱🧑🏻💻

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• Visual designer: This role works with other design roles in the organization (brand, marketing, etc) to ensure designs match brand guidelines. Visual designers also work with UX designers to verify that designs meet accessibility and usability requirements.
• UX strategist: At the core, a UX strategist should act as a champion of good UX. That is to say, work to ensure the principles of usability and human-centered design are well understood and utilized. They should also assume some of the responsibility of product-market fit, and work with product managers and the ‘business’ side of the organization to mesh business requirements with user requirements.
• UX designer: The most common UX profession, UX designers should have a strong understanding of the principles of UX design as well as some research ability. Essentially a jack of all trades, the UX designer will float between all stages of the UX lifecycle, helping out with usability tests, putting together prototypes and working with other areas of the organization.
• Service designer: The service designer looks at the entire end-to-end process and works with other designers, pulling them when required to liaise on visual designs and UI work. In a smaller organization, the responsibilities of this role will typically be absorbed by other roles, but eventually, there comes a time for the service designer. 

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Wrap up 🎬

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UX and UI as terms are only going to continue to grow, especially as technology and technology companies continue to proliferate across the globe. If you want to make sure that the user experience and user interfaces of your product or service are fit for the people using them, there’s no better place to start than with user research using powerful tools.

As humans, we have a unique talent. Our brains are designed to identify patterns and fill in blanks. That’s why we see shapes in clouds, faces in the tea leaves at the bottom of our mugs and patterns in rock formations.

This ability to create a whole that’s more than the sum of its parts isn’t an unknown phenomenon. In fact, it’s one of the underlying ideas of what’s known as the gestalt principles of visual perception.

As UX designers, user researchers and web designers, an understanding of these principles can help you to better understand how your users perceive and interpret your products and services – and build better human experiences.

What are the Gestalt Principles?

All the way back in the 1920s, a group of German psychologists (Wolfgang Köhler, Max Wertheimer and Kurt Koffka) wanted to better understand how humans perceive the world around them. They were interested in learning more about how the human brain makes sense of chaos.

These “gestalt psychologists” found that humans tend to group different elements together, identify patterns and find order in disorder. Interestingly, the psychologists found that humans don’t do this randomly – there are a number of principles that our brains use.

At the time, the growing field of design began to use the gestalt psychology principles in order to create designs that are more than the sum of their parts. The hidden arrow between the E and the X in the FedEx logo is just one example of this.

Understanding the Gestalt Principles

What happens when someone first sees the logo of your organization? How do they experience seeing the design for the first time? Gestalt psychology has a powerful role to play in how we perceive objects. If you want to create products and services that resonate with the people you intend to serve, understanding the gestalt principles is a good place to start – and it’s not that difficult.

With a solid understanding of these principles, you’ll be able to better direct people to what you want them to see, know which elements to use and when, and build better human experiences. 

Here are the gestalt pricinples that we’ll be covering:

• Similarity
• Figure/Ground
• Proximity
• Closure
• Common region
• Symmetry and order
• Continuity
• Common fate

Similarity

Principle: The gestalt principle of similarity states that when things appear to share some visual characteristics, they are assumed to be related in some way and we group them. These things don’t need to be identical, they just need to share a visible trait such as shape, size or color.

Look down from a high-rise building at a parking lot and you’ll immediately start grouping cars that are the same color. This is the principle of similarity and it’s a useful tool for UX designers.

How to use this principle: You can use color in your products and services to indicate items with common functionality, for example in CTA buttons or links. On the other hand, you can use shape to indicate grouping.

Figure/Ground

Principle: Our brains instinctively distinguish between objects in the foreground and objects in the background. 

Usually, we will interpret the larger area of an image as the background and the smaller part of the image as the foreground. Whenever someone first opens your mobile app or lands on your website, the figure/ground gestalt principle shows them what they should be focusing on.

How to use this principle: Use figure/ground to guide users to what you want them to see. This is particularly useful when you have something active that you need them to take action on, for example, a sign-up form or a search bar. In the case of the sign-up form, having the rest of the screen fade into the background can show users that the form is currently what they should be focusing on.

Proximity

Principle: Things close together appear to be more related than things that are further apart.

The gestalt principle of proximity is one of the most powerful tools at your disposal, and can easily override other factors like color and shape. Mechanisms of perception (like proximity) compete with one another, and it’s important to understand which mechanisms you can use to accomplish your goals.

How to use this principle: You can use the gestalt law of proximity to get your users to identify the organization or structure that you want them to see without using borders. A good example of this would be grouping items on an online shopping website.

Closure

Principle: When we look at a complex arrangement of individual elements, we first try and identify a single, recognizable pattern.

The law of closure allows us to look at an image with missing parts, fill in the gaps and recognize the complete image so we can understand the pattern. This law is commonly used in logo design, where our brains fill in the gaps to understand the complete image.

How to use this principle: You can use closure to create delight (as in the example above), but it’s important to recognize that closure can also be used to mislead and to harm. As Andy Rutledge explains, even when closure works, it could be telling you a lie. It’s your job as a UXer to be aware of this.

Common region

Principle: When objects are located within the same closed region, we perceive them as being grouped together.

Common region is closely related to proximity and is an excellent tool for separating groups of objects, even if they’re close in proximity, size, color or shape.

How to use this principle: Use visible borders or barriers in your designs to create a sense of separation between different groups of objects.  

Symmetry and order

Principle: Our brains tend to group together objects that are symmetrical with each other.

In German, the law of symmetry and order is known as prägnanz, which translates to “good figure”.

How to use this principle: Your designs should be balanced and complete, or you risk having users spend time trying to perceive a larger overall picture.

Focal point

Principle: What stands out visually will capture a user’s attention first.

Focal points are areas of interest or difference within a composition. You can create a focal point by giving it more weight than other elements.

How to use this principle: Consider the focal point principle when you need to draw a user’s attention to an element on your page. For example, a call to action button or a sign-up button.

Continuity

Principle: Elements arranged on a line or curve are perceived as more related than elements not on the same line or curve.

Once our eye begins to follow something, it will continue in that direction until it encounters another element. A good example of the continuity principle is a line with an arrow at the end. It indicates that we should follow the line to see where the arrow is pointing.

The continuity principle isn’t all about physical attributes such as lines and arrows. Continuity can also come from the logical groupings of items, for example in a field. When collecting information about a user’s location, for example, all geographical information should be arranged together.

How to use this principle: Consider the continuity principle both in terms of physical attributes and logical attributes – especially when designing forms.

Common fate

Principle: We perceive elements moving in the same direction as more related than elements that are moving in different directions or stationary.

We use the principle of common fate every day of our lives. In fact, we as humans are wired to recognize contrasting movement over any other visual cue, whether it’s color, size, contrast or tone. Consider driving down the highway. The cars moving in the same direction as you are background noise, but when a car enters your lane from a side street you tend to immediately notice and respond.

How to use this principle: This principle is key in motion design, with functional animation using common fate to guide our eye.

Wrap-up

Building a solid understanding of the gestalt principles can help you to build better human experiences. Whether you're working on a new website or the sign-up flow in a mobile app, knowing how (and when) you should deploy these principles can mean the difference between a design that's user-friendly and one that's misleading.