UX Design / Exercises

29.08.2022 - 17.10.2022 (Week 1 - Week 8)
Abigail Kartika Darmowinoto / 0350525 / Bachelor of Design in Creative Media
UX Design / Taylor's University 
Exercises

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LIST

• Lectures
• Instructions
• Progression
• Reflection
• Further Reading

OTHER POST:

• UX Design / Exercises
• UX Design / Final Project
• UX Design / Final Compilation and Reflection
• UX Design / Exercises and Final Project (all in one)

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LECTURES
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Week 1, week 2, week 3, week 4, week 5, week 7, week 9 lecture notes are documented as follows.

WEEK 1 (29/08/2022): "Introduction to UX"

What is UI? What is UX?
UI: More like the concept / tool
UX: The experience / feeling of the user -> how a person feels about interacting with or experiencing a product.

UI + UX = Interactive Excellence

fig 1.1, UI UX Usability, Week 1 (29/08/2022), source: UX/UI Design Process

“No product is an island. A product is more than the product. It is a cohesive, integrated set of experiences." - Don Norman

fig 1.2, Design Process, Week 1 (29/08/2022), source: lecture

Important points of UX:

• Usable: design, structure, and purpose are clear and easy to use
• Equitable: helpful to people with diverse ability and backgrounds
• Enjoyable: the design delights the user
• Useful: solve user problem

Experience mostly based on Emotion, AI - run by logic, Experience - run by emotion; which is not easy to decided. User Experience always comes before and after User Interface.

User Experience also come from ambience, like when buying games; the sense of colors, musics, character designs that blends into one and create satisfactory, or when buying Starbucks, and the smell of coffee, relaxing and cozy places which blends into one. So the main point of User Experience is satisfaction of users' feeling.

When finding a problem, analyze the problem by doing this:

WHO is affected by the problem?

WHAT is the problem?

WHERE does this problem occur?

WHEN does the problem occur?

WHY does the problem occur? WHY the problem is important enough to solve?

Sometimes people are clueless when there are no sign / instruction on doing something. Thus, the effective way is to make something "how, subconsciously it should be done".

fig 1.3, doors, Week 1 (29/08/2022), source: lecture

A Norman Door confused the user

fig 1.4, Norman doors, Week 1 (29/08/2022), source: lecture

A good door with UX is different:

fig 1.5, good UX door, Week 1 (29/08/2022), source: lecture

WEEK 2 (05/09/2022): Meet The Users

"It's not the customer job to know what they want" - Steve Jobs

STEPS IN USER EXPERIENCE:

fig 1.6, UX Steps, Week 2 (05/09/2022), source: lecture

fig 1.7, UX Steps 2, Week 2 (05/09/2022), source: lecture

• VALUE METRIC
• Signing up for it or paying for it
• Using it more than once
• Telling others about it

• SEGMENATION
• Demographic (age, gender, education, occupation, income)
• Geographic (countries, region, city)
• Behavior (behavioral pattern - buying behavior, and desired benefits)
• Technology (level of user tech knowledge / skill)
• Psychography
• personality
• gender / age
• values
• race
• interest
• location
• lifestyle
• employment status

• USER RESEARCH / PERSONA

A Fictional ideas of your customer type, and as a content market tool. Make easy understanding on any needs and behaviors.

Examples:

fig 1.8, User Persona, Week 2 (05/09/2022), source: lecture

WEEK 3 (11/09/2022): Meet The Users

“You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work backward to the technology. - Steve Jobs

User Journey Map:

• User Persona
• Scenario
• Goal

fig 1.9, Example of User Persona, Week 3 (11/09/2022), source: lecture

User Persona Goals:

• Context
• Humanizing Data
• Data informed instead of driven
• User focused experience
• Return and Retention

Empathy map is all about the users: "what does the user ..."

fig 1.10, What to determine on Empathy Map, Week 3 (11/09/2022), source: lecture

Example:

fig 1.11, Example of Empathy Map, Week 3 (11/09/2022), source: lecture

WEEK 4 (19/09/2022): UX Design Audit

“If I had an hour to solve a problem I'd spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.” - Albert Einstein

In this lecture session, Mr. Hafiz introduced us to User Audit.

Is it important? When we do testing, we might have some issues, which later be sent to the want who's in charge.

👇To identify first we need to find the problem, identify it and break it down. 

PROBLEM STATEMENT (points)

AUDIT CHECKLIST

Not everyone is having graphic design knowledge, but you can see from the logo and the original design

examples:

• any style guides or existing design systems
• websites pages / presentation design
• logo in all format and use cases
• web presence / social media content
• landing pages, marketing campaigns, their collateral
• original design files vs what's on now

fig 1.12, Audit Checklist, Week 4 (19/09/2022), source: lecture

CONVERSION: TOFU MOFU BOFU

fig 1.13, TofuMofuBofu, Week 4 (19/09/2022), source: lecture

PROBLEM SOLVE:

• See the brand guidelines (like the art direction, etc)

WEEK 5 AND 7 (26/09/2022 AND 10/10/2022): UX User Journey

“You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work backward to the technology. - Steve Jobs

fig 1.14, Week 5 (26/09/2022), source: https://youtu.be/vSx2wayTk0g

USER EXPERIENCE:

1. Brand Attributes
2. User Profiles
3. Goals
4. Site Audit
5. Review User Needs
6. Create User Stories
7. Site Map
8. Wireframes

fig 1.15, Users can be Anyone, Week 5 (26/09/2022), source: lecture

fig 1.16, Users can be Anyone, Week 5 (26/09/2022), source: lecture

User can be anyone, they aren't always designer, so they may have difference in experiencing something.

What's inside User Journey Map?

1. User Persona
2. Scenario
3. Goal

            User Persona Goals:

1. Context
2. Humanizing Data
3. Data informed instead of driven
4. User focused experience
5. Return and Retention

Examples of User Journey Map:

fig 1.16, Examples of User Journey Map, Week 5 (26/09/2022), source: lecture

WEEK 9 (28/10/2022): "UI UX Documentation"

Documentation consist of these things:

1. Overview (define)

Project’s goals, objectives and vision

• Project summary
• Problem (HCW)
• Solution (SWOT)
• Definition (Role/Duration)

2. Discovery (empathize)

Essentially includes user personas, empathy maps, user journey maps, interviews, market research, and any other information that pertains to the customer.

• Market Research
• User Research
• User Personas
• Key Findings

3. Design (ideate)

Summary of initial concepts and sketches of how the product’s journey began + thought processes behind the product’s features. Also include sprints and brainstorming sessions reports

• Sketch
• Wireframe
• Usability prototyping
• Key Findings

4. Prototype 

Consisted of 3 big phases; wireframe, mockup, prototype. Presented to stakeholders to explore the product and understand the context behind usability testing and design concepts.

• Final Design
• Prototype
• Documentation

fig 1.17, Prototyping, Week 9 (28/10/2022), source: lecture

5. Handover

Summarize your UX documentation and include the project’s goals, objectives, and vision. Allows every stakeholder to read about the UX design process and how the product has evolved.

• Engineer
• Developer
• Video Prototype

6. Improvements

References, giving context to the product’s lifespan from the initial concept to the current iteration.

• Next steps
• Long term Plan

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INSTRUCTIONS
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fig 2.1, Module Information Booklet of User Experience

fig 2.2, Timeline of User Experience Module

Exercise 01: Inefficient Item
WEEK 1 (29/08/2022) : Norman Door
Look for things around you which you find problematic and put in the Miro Board.

Examples:

fig 2.3, Exercise 1

Exercise 02: User Persona
WEEK 2 (05/09/2022) : User Personas
USER PERSONAS
are researched and proposed representations of your target user. Each Persona would be framed from real user discovery by researching and observing their:

• needs
• goals
• behavioural patterns

The aim of this exercise is to allow you to gain valuable insights on your users’:

• requirements
• wants
• demands

You are to design 1 main user persona. 

Exercise 03 & 04: Empathy Map and Project Definition

WEEK 3 (11/09/2022) : Empathy Map

Create an empathy map of the user.

The goal isn’t to correctly classify information, it’s to identify with the user. This exercise isn’t about logging every emotional and behavioral aspect of the user, but focusing on the target audience and understanding his or her world as it relates to your work. Going too broad will get things off track.

Change or streamline the categories to work with the session goal, persona or available data. For example, if the persona is a purchasing manager at a B2B company, feelings might not have been relevant or revealed by the research. Make whatever changes are needed to ensure the outcome is useful and the session is productive.

 

WEEK 4 (19/09/2022) : Project Definition

Fill up the project definition.

Exercise 05: Design Audit

WEEK 5 (26/09/2022)

(Brand & visual identity) INTERNAL → EXTERNAL (Channels & Touch points)

A design audit is basically a checkup to make sure that the company is expressing itself consistently across all channels and touch points.

Touchpoints:

• What users are actually seeing and engaging with throughout their user journey, and remedy any inconsistencies
• Touch-points are external (for the users), such as visuals, written, and verbal communications that range from the website to ads to social media marketing and advertising, events, workshops or webinars hosted to the actual product launch and the product itself.
• There are dozens, if not hundreds, of touch points in their journey to and through the journey to your product.
• Is their experience consistent and trustworthy, or erratic and unpredictable

WHY?
Building consistency is building trust

WHAT?
Any style guides or existing design systems
Website pages (screenshots)
Logo in all formats and use cases
Web ads / third party integration
Standalone landing pages, marketing campaigns, and all their collateral
Classes, workshops, presentations, promotional speaking engagements
Social media content
Original design files vs. what’s live right now

Exercise 06: User Journey Submission

WEEK 5 (26/09/2022) - posted in Task 2

Exercise 07: User Experience Survey
WEEK 8 (18/10/2022)

You are to create a User Experience Survey(Questionnaire) regarding the Product that you have chosen to redesign.

Asking for customer feedback before redeveloping/developing a product is ideal and would save the project a great deal of money and effort.

The exercise:
You are to come up with 10-15 survey questions to be applied to a selected user persona. You should survey at least 5 of these individuals.

Use: for survey forms
https://www.google.com/forms/

Work on compiling the following instructions on your current Miro board. Submission for your findings would be in a short presentation deck on Miro.

Use: template found as attachment below https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVPMtqrNA=/?share_link_id=579522559039

How to start?

First
Before coming up with the questionnaire, first you would need to establish what you expect to get out of the questionnaire, how will it help you improve the product, define pain points and even identify what to lose or to keep in the product. Thus you would need to detail the following:Deciding on what and how to measure.
Sampling from your user persona's
Analysing the data; finding trends.
Turn the data into information; storytelling

Second
Look into this
https://surveysparrow.com/blog/user-experience-survey-questions/
Provides 60 questions sample that you can use for your survey. You could use between 10-15 of these questions and customize it for you chosen product and user persona. The answers may be open ended (subjective), which would provide quite a number of opportunities. Or it could be objective and the participants would choose from a series of answers, this would allow you to create quantitative graphs, etc.

What to look for in the users feedback:

• Usefulness. Usability. Enjoyability. Equitability.
• What benefit did the product provide? Example, problem’s, challenges that the product solved; what was found useful by the users?
• Pain Points: identify what’s Usable or what isn’t usable.
• The user’s experiences and expectations of the product and whether it was Enjoyable.
• Other than the target users, would the product benefit other users? How equitable would the product be rated?

Final
Provide the key findings by compiling it, into a comparable flow in presented in your MIRO board. This will be used to redesign the app. Which is the next Assignment where you will be building Wireframes.

PROGRESSION

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Exercise 01: Inefficient Item
WEEK 1 (29/08/2022) : Norman Door
We were tasked on looking some items that are made inefficiently and confusing the users. The items can be anything existed in campus or just random things in home.

fig 3.1, Exercise 1, Week 1 (29/08/2022), source: lecture

First I looked on some items around me, if it's required to look for something  with bad UX, it's hard to find, but whenever it isn't needed, I always find some :'). So after several look up on some items, I decided to go with the usb drive. 

Why??

USB drives always equipped with male plug to connect with the computer ports. There are the void side and the filled side. Whenever we wanted to insert the plug, it's always difficult and inconvenient to use in fast-paced situation. It's kind of feel annoying even it's small thing, when we try to insert the dongle but missed the plug. So, this is what I came up with:

fig 3.2, Exercise 1 Final, Week 1 (04/09/2022)

Exercise 02: User Persona
WEEK 2 (05/09/2022) : User Personas

As for the UX Design exercise, I'm planning on using the same application I used on Application Design. Monny. To determine the user persona, first, I did the market segmentation:

fig 3.3, Market Segmentation, Week 2 (12/09/2022)

After that, I created the user persona following the format provided. I named my targeted users as Charlie and Celine.

fig 3.4, User Personas, Week 2 (12/09/2022)

Exercise 03 & 04: Empathy Map and Project Definition

WEEK 3 (11/09/2022) : Empathy Map

I'm trying to create empathy map, first, I learnt to be the user, Charlie. I empathize on how I would feel if I was her. I dive down to the applications' interface and workflow. Thus I found some pain points that I think can be discussed. 

Other than that, I also try to learn from another similar user (real data) by reading the play store reviews to enhance the findings.

fig 3.5, Empathy Map, Week 3 (17/09/2022)

WEEK 4 (19/09/2022) : Project Definition

Following on that, I started to fill up the project definitions,  the purpose, the objective of the project in the provided questions:

fig 3.6, Project Definition, Week 4 (25/09/2022)

Exercise 05: Design Audit

WEEK 5 (26/09/2022)

Moving forward to week 5, in the practical session, Mr. Hafiz tasked us to learn the design audit. These are some of the contents needed:

1. 

Web ads / third party integration + Social media content

fig 3.7, web ads, Week 5 (26/09/2022)

2.

Any style guides or existing design systems

Standalone landing pages

Logo in all formats and use cases

Original design files vs. what’s live right now

fig 3.8, style guides, logo, original design, Week 5 (26/09/2022)

3. 

Painpoints

fig 3.9, pain points, Week 5 (26/09/2022)

Exercise 07: User Experience Survey
WEEK 8 (18/10/2022)

In order to improvise the UX Design we need to conduct a survey which later be asked on minimum 5 people. 

First I breakdown on things that I need to do:

fig 3.10, to do, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

From that, first I created the survey outline: 

(to note: his survey is combined with the survey I did for application design, thus, some questions may contain about the interface).

fig 3.11, survey breakdowns, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

From that I started to create the questions and make the Google Forms, and spread it and I got 56 respondents:

fig 3.12, surveys, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

Other than that, I also did some interviews, for the subjects, I chose it from my targeted persona:

The outline:

fig 3.13, interview breakdowns, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

Thus, the results;

fig 3.14, interview results, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

User Persona:

fig 3.15, user personas, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

From both survey and interviews, here are some key findings I got:

fig 3.16, key findings, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

Exercises Compilation:

Miro

fig 3.17, exercise compilations, Week 8 (18/10/2022)

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REFLECTION 

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From all the exercises that have been given, I am increasingly interested in this topic of user experience. the challenge is where we can learn about being other people, but on the other hand, it is also interesting and quite challenging to learn. in carrying out the user experience what is most needed is empathy in positioning oneself above other people's shoes. To be a successful UX Designer, I need to grow my empathy and keep on analyzing people.

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FURTHER READING 

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*all images sourced on articles

USER SEGMENTATION FOR UX DESIGN

(Nick Babich)

"Everyone" is not an answer that we can give when we were asked on "Who's the user," sometimes proper targeting is needed in this business, because only few companies in the world are large enough to supply the whole market.

USER SEGMENTATION

User segmentation is needed to do proper targeting - it's a process of dividing users into groups that share similar characteristic. By doing so, we can serve contents appropriately and effectively to certain targeted audience.

MARKETING AND EXPERIENCE SEGMENTATION

Two type of segmentation:

• Marketing
• Focused on creating effective marketing strategies for a product’s target audience. A market segment is a group of people that:
• Have a common set of needs that they want to fulfill using your product.
• Are distinct from other segments (different segments have different needs).
• Respond similarly to a market stimulus.
• Communicate with each other. Since they have a shared set of needs, they can form communities and share the message with their peers.
• Goal: to create a message that resonates with a segment and make it circulate inside a segment

• Experience
• Series of interaction of users with the products.
• Focused on knowing the needs of the user

USER CHARACTERISTICS

Required to know the segmentation, covers up: demographic, geographic, behavior, and technology aspects.

CREATING USER PERSONAS

Collect information about real people who interact with your product and start to find patterns; where the characteristics of users overlap, you can build an archetype, or persona, that represents those users collectively.

Few things that you want to focus on when working on personas:

• Psychological aspects of a target audience (How do users spend their free time? What image do they want to project? What people/brands are they influenced by?)
• User behavior (free vs paid users, new vs returning users)
• Cultural segmentation (appropriate cultural references)

HOW TO CONDUCT USER SEGMENTATION

• State the goal
• Measure user engagement
• consider:
• Time users spend interacting with products. 
• Customer journey milestones. 
• Unhappy paths.
• Tie user segment with business goals
• Don't create narrow segments (too many narrow segments make it harder to adjust your design to different types of users and make it harder to analyze the results of the adjustments.)
• Introduce changes in your product based on segments
• Validate design decision

REFERENCE:
Adobe. (2020, July 29). User Segmentation for UX Design | Adobe XD. Ideas. Retrieved September 7, 2022, from https://xd.adobe.com/ideas/process/user-research/user-segmentation-for-ux-design/

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UX / UI DESIGN PROCESS

(Fen)

Steps:

• 1. Research - Meet the user
• Figure out the things needed to research
•  Use interview + observation, survey

• 2. Empathize - Be the user
• Empathy map
  

• Personas

• Scenarios

• Storyboard

• 3. Ideation - Concepting
• Flowcharts
• Paper Prototype

• Digital Prototype (wireframe - actual design)

• 4. Testing - Seeing how it works
• Prototype should be real enough to get an authentic response in order to validate or invalidate a hypothesis.
• Think critically about what to build in prototype in order to get the feedback.
• Test goal is to find out if the solution works as planned or provides. 

• 5. Iteration - Feedback and develop further
• Adjust based on client's feedbacks

REFERENCE:

Fen. (2021, February 5). UX/UI Design Process - NYC Design. Medium. Retrieved September 7, 2022, from https://medium.com/nyc-design/ux-ui-design-process-for-beginner-753952bb2241

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PERSONAS

(usability.gov)

• Purpose: to create reliable and realistic representations of your key audience segments for reference.
• Should be based on qualitative and some quantitative user research and web analytics.
• Effective personas (as written in the web):
• Represent a major user group for your website
• Express and focus on the major needs and expectations of the most important user groups
• Give a clear picture of the user's expectations and how they're likely to use the site
• Aid in uncovering universal features and functionality
• Describe real people with backgrounds, goals, and values
• Questions that can be asked during personas development:

• Elements of persona:
• Persona Group (i.e. web manager)
• Fictional name
• Job titles and major responsibilities
• Demographics such as age, education, ethnicity, and family status
• The goals and tasks they are trying to complete using the site
• Their physical, social, and technological environment
• A quote that sums up what matters most to the persona as it relates to your site
• Casual pictures representing that user group

REFERENCES:

Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs. (n.d.). Personas | Usability.gov. Retrieved September 7, 2022, from https://www.usability.gov/how-to-and-tools/methods/personas.html