Observing the User Experience

The gap between who designers and developers imagine their users are, and who those users really are, can be the biggest problem with product development. Observing the User Experience: A Practitioner's Guide to User Research, Third Edition helps readers bridge that gap to understand what users want and need from your product, and whether they’ll be able to use what you’ve created.Filled with real-world experience and a wealth of practical information, Observing the User Experience presents a complete toolbox of techniques to help designers, developers and other stakeholders see through the eyes of their users. The book is organized into three parts. Part I discusses the benefits of end-user research and the ways it fits into the development of useful, desirable, and successful products. Part II presents techniques for understanding people’s needs, desires, and abilities, providing a basis for developing better products, whether they’re Web, software or mobile based. Part III explains the communication and application of research results. It suggests ways to sell companies and explains how user-centered design can make companies more efficient and profitable Explains how to create usable products that are still original, creative, and uniqueProvides a real-world perspective on research, including advice about how user research can be done cheaply and quickly, and how results can be presented persuasivelyGives readers the tools and confidence to perform user research on their own designs and tune their software user experience to the unique needs of their product and its usersNew features to the third edition include numerous new illustrations, coverage of mobile UX research techniques, and discussion of newer UX research techniques, tools and software