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The Krug Method
Hey BUXERS!
Get ready to wrap your head around this mini-cast about Steve Krug’s book, “Rocket Surgery Made Easy: The Do-It-Yourself Guide to Finding and Fixing Usability Problems.” Krug’s book does a good job of explaining how to do user testing yourself in an easy to read, understand and realistically do your own user testing. It’s an easy read that provides step by step instructions in an way that is easy to read and understand.
I’ve been reading the book this week so user testing as been on the brain. In today’s podcast, I go over the Who What Where When Why and How of Do It Yourself User Testing. A link to the full article can be found here.
Ben and Newman have tackled this book previously on the site in the following stories.
Newman: 4 Points of Wisdom from Steve Krug’s ‘Rocket Surgery Made Easy’
Ben: 4 MORE Points of Wisdom from Steve Krug’s ‘Rocket Surgery Made Easy’
Here is a basic outline of the Krug Method…
WHAT?
Watching people try to use what you’re creating/designing/building (or watching something you’ve already created/designed/built), with the intention of
(a) making it easier for people to use or
(b) proving that it is easy to use”
WHY?
- To improve your product or design
WHO?
- 3 Users
- Preferably from your target market
- But realistically, could be “just about anyone”
WHEN?
- Start as early as possible in the design process- even a doodle on a napkin
- Krug recommends a morning a month
WHERE?
- Realistically, anywhere you have a user and a computer you can get feedback on a design
- Krug recommends a meeting room
HOW?
- Be prepared- invite everyone in advance, follow-up, have a back-up plan, make sure everything works.
- Be professional- be on time, follow a program, welcome participants, be respectful of people’s time.
- Come up with tasks and scenarios for users to complete. Make sure to test them too.
- Record it- use a screen sharing tool and record it to refer back to when deliberating or making the changes later.
- Deliberate- prioritize usability issues based on the test and delegate tasks for fixing the issues before the next round of user testing.
