Context is Everything: It's a wrap. I've just finished a new talk exploring the role that context plays in digital experiences. Focusing on stuff that cuts across time and space (think events, flights, concerts, museum visits) was a good way to explain all the problems and assumptions that creep into designs. For 6 months, I've done at least one live gig a month - using various ticket apps and services to organise these with friends. Almost all of these services fail to handle the tasks or 'jobs to be done' that everyone has at different stages of this journey. They're also littered with basic UX problems and shonky 'hurry up' tactics. But this journey isn't as simple as "Buy tickets. Go to Gig. Go Home." - the actual journey changes across temporal and spatial dimensions, as well as the contexts users find themselves in. It's way more complex (and different for everyone) than most designers would imagine. Do a diary study if you don't believe me! This is why we always get the boarding card as a key option on airline apps, even if you're 500 miles from the airport or checked in already. They're failing to recognise the context generally - but specifically in terms of your physical location and the time of your flight. How can you talk about 'personalising' your app or journey if you haven't 'personalised' for context and tasks? The best bit is that everybody has different rituals and habits in their 'journey' from buying a ticket to getting out at the other end. So the attached picture is just ONE PERSON and only covers the dimension of time. It's merely one *possible* journey out of many. It's a multiverse of users, tasks, devices and digital designs - so there are always problems to work on. Don't tell me you don't know what to do - you aren't asking the right question! This is why doing research into users for digital experiences is vital - there are many different methods to evaluate interfaces or generate insights. Feedback Loops, Intercepts, Polls, Surveys, Usability Testing, Interviews, Diary Studies, Session Replay, Device Testing and Quant Analytics data all play a part.
Mikko Piippo
4mo
Gig in Helsinki??
Monica (莫妮卡) M.
4mo
this is such an important aspect of ux!
CEO @ Speero | Experimentation for growing SaaS, Ecommerce, Lead Gen
4molove when i see people geek and go down rabbit holes of things ;)