1. CHAPTER 7 FIND AND SELECT PARTICIPANTS ~ PM DR ROSSENI BINTI DIN~ Mohd Hafiz Mat Jusoh (P66378) Latifah Zakaria (P66351) GGGE6663 2013/2014

2. Find & Select Participants GGGE6663 2013/2014  You must conduct usability testing with people who represent your typical users.  Select participants who use your product known as user profile of the target audience and should have been developed in the early stages of the product development.  This is a critical step because obtaining usability testing results from people who do not match your typical users could negatively impact results.

3. Characterize Users GGGE6663 2013/2014  Visualize the test participant  Differentiate between purchaser and end user  Look information about users

4. Characterize Users GGGE6663 2013/2014  Look information about users  Requirements and specification documents The functional specification or product requirement (blueprint for the product) Business requirements document (product target and why) Design specification (system architecture for supporting) Use cases (information about end users as “actors”)  Structured analyses or market studies Need product manager (R&D) and product manager (Marketing)  Competitive benchmarking and analysis group Some organization assign a group or individual to do benchmarking of their own and competitor’s products It is a source of information for establishing the user profile

5. Define the Criteria for Each User Group GGGE6663 2013/2014  Define expertise  Example : in one study Dana ran, she looked for people with a range of experience using the web  Use matrix expertise to avoid the possible mismatch of expectations when participants are asked to rate their own expertise  Specify requirements and classifiers for selection  Requirements : what participants must come into the session knowing already  Classifier : help you to study participants into categories that may explain some effects you see in the test  Document the user profile  Divide the user profile into distinct categories  Consider a Matrix Test design  To balance the mixtures of user groups

6. Sample Profile Matrix GGGE6663 2013/2014 Never had webcast class Has watched webcasts of class Studies with class webcasts Has computer at home Works in computer lab Undergrad Student 2111, 21 Graduate Student 33433,4 Virtual Student 5,65

7. Sample of Matrix Test Design GGGE6663 2013/2014 USER GROUPNOVICEEXPERT Teller44 Bank Office Clerk44

8. Determine the Number of Participants to Test GGGE6663 2013/2014  Number of participants to test depends on many factors include :  The degree of confidence in the results that you require  The number of available resources to set up and conduct the test  The availability of the type of participants you require  The duration of the test session

9. Write the Screening Questionnaire GGGE6663 2013/2014  For qualifying and selecting participants to participate in the test  Typically based on characteristics, requirements and classifiers that included in the user profile and test plan

10. Write the Screening Questionnaire GGGE6663 2013/2014  Steps for developing a screener :  Review the profile to understand users’ backgrounds  Identify specific selection criteria  Formulate screening questions  Organize the questions in a specific order  Develop a format for easy flow through the questionnaire  Test the questionnaire and revise it  Consider creating an “answer sheet”

11. Find Source of Participants GGGE6663 2013/2014  Internal participants  Qualified friends and family  Web site sign-up  Existing customers from in-house lists  Existing customers through sales representatives  User groups or clubs or other community groups  Societies and associations  Referrals from personel networks, coworkers and other participants  Craigslist  College campuses  Market research firms or recruiting specialists  Employment agencies  Newspaper advertisements

12. Screen and Select Participants GGGE6663 2013/2014  Screener is an excellent tool to use if you have never recruited participants before or if you plan to use an agency to do recruiting.  Screener (document) :  Scripted language for a starting a phone interview process  Getting through the questions  Scheduling the participant (if qualified)  Closing interview

13. Screen and Select Participants GGGE6663 2013/2014  Screening considerations :  Use the questionnaire or open-ended interview questions?  Complete the screener always, or only when fully qualified?  Conduct screening interviews  Inform the potential participant who you are  Explain why you are calling and how you got the contact information  Go through the questions in the questionnaire  As you eliminate or accept people, mark them off on your list  Include a few least competent users in every testing sample  Beware of inadvertently testing only the “best” people  Expect to make tradeoffs

14. Schedule and Confirm Participants GGGE6663 2013/2014  When interview participants to see whether they meet the selection criteria, you should :  Collect their top three available dates and times but not make any immediate commitments  Set priorities among the pool of participants  Once you have decided who should be in which sessions, you should :  Confirm with participants, send session information including directions and forms

15. Compensate Participants GGGE6663 2013/2014  We should compensate those who serve as participants, although it need not always be monetary compensation  Examples :  Participants “off the street”; small token such as a pen or t- shirt  Free or discounted products from your company’s sales catalog  Gift certificates  A simple memento such as calculator  If specific professions; pay an honorarium of about $50 per hour, depends on location

16. Protect Participants’ Privacy and Personal Information GGGE6663 2013/2014  You have responsibility to protect the information and keep it private.  Do tell participants why you are collecting the personal information and what you are going to do with it.  You should also tell them how long you are going to keep them.  Keep the identities of your participants anonymous.  Don’t use names to label recordings or files (just put names on session schedules).  Do not share video or audio recordings of participants for any reason other than the reasons that participants agreed to.

17. Conclusion GGGE6663 2013/2014  Your results may not be valid if your users aren’t representative  Find users based on your personas/user profiles  Depending on your project 3-5 users (or less!) may be enough  If necessary, create a short screening questionnaire  In some domains, may be helpful to track users via a profile matrix  Don’t forget accessibility testing!  Protect participants’ privacy and personel information