"From the very start, e-commerce has empowered the customer to an unprecedented degree...
If the customer is in the driving seat, the logical next step is to rethink everything from that perspective."
Electronic commerce, 2000 Special Report on the Financial Industry
CAP GERMINI, ERNST & YOUNG
  

Susan Harkus
Home Focus on the user agenda Engagement - get it right My work

Focus on the user agenda     Don't ask users     Design useful websites     Fix user experience problems     Validate your online strategies

Focus on the user agenda

In a recent speech on the future of the media, ABC managing director, Mark Scott, pointed out that "the power is now in the hands of audiences, and only [media proprieters] who realise the rules have changed will survive."1 In other words, when the "customer is in the driving seat, the logical next step is to rethink everything from that perspective."2

  1. Mark Scott, Melbourne, 14 October 2009, ABC boss takes swipe at 'emperor' Murdoch.
  2. Electronic commerce, 2000 Special Report on the Financial Industry, CAP GERMINI, ERNST & YOUNG.

User-centred architectures + content & communications that engage
=> Business outcomes

A user agenda is always in play

Adapted from The User Experience, The iceberg analogy of usability, Dick Berry, User Experience Design, IBM Ease of Use team

Users know what they want to do. They just don't realise how much their decisions and behaviour are triggered by their sub-conscious agenda.

A user agenda is specific to the task  and any number of people from different demographics or social backgrounds will share the same set of agenda triggers for a particular task.

The user agenda? Business knows

Why do online communications and online relationships fall short of delivering business outcomes? It's not rocket science but failure happens so often.

Why? ... when business has the knowledge to get it right!

Usefulness is the key

Users storm off websites and trash e-newsletters when they can't do what they expect to be able to do.

The first thing every website page needs to do is provide content that addresses the whole user task - objective + agenda - because that's what's involved in designing useful websites.

Fix user experience problems

Don't think you have to wait for a massive overhaul of your online presence to fix user experience problems.

You can fix problems quickly and easily. Use analysis and walkthrough tools to identify what is actually blocking the user experience and what needs to be done to strengthen user engagement.

Validate your online strategies

Early in Australia's dot.com history, a large retail company created an online shopping portal.

Their focus was to give users online the same beautiful experience that they loved in-store so an incredible effort was put into ensuring the online integrity of the company brand.

Unfortunately, the business strategy for the site was to manage inventory separately and therefore to offer online only a sub-set, often a small  sub-set, of what was available in-store.

Users came to the site, didn't find the enormous range of quality product which they found in-store, and didn't buy enough online.

The portal disappeared several years ago.

Online success is determined by something more than marketing and budget plans.

Why risk failure when it is so easy to validate online strategies against the user agenda?

© Susan Harkus 2009

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