usage analysis march 15 (ides of march), 2001 by kevin fox, for sims 213
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Usage Analysis
March 15 (Ides of March), 2001By Kevin Fox, for SIMS 213
Overview
What is usage analysis?Why perform usage analysis?Understanding your usersTools for usage analysis
What is Usage Analysis?
Theory One-way window between the designer and
real-world users performing their own tasks.
Practice Gathering and analysis of logfiles and other
data from the actual day-to-day use of a site.
Why Perform Usage Analysis?
Task AnalysisDemographic ProfilingDesign Evaluation
Understanding the user
UA Task Analysis
Usage statistics and profiles show real users performing their own real tasks.
Logfile analysis can be used to identify these tasks and their relative frequencies.
UA Task Analysis
Advantages Real users Real environments Real tasks Ideal for iterative design Relatively cheap
UA Task Analysis
Disadvantages You have to have a real site Difficult to obtain demographic data No ‘thinking aloud’ protocol Guessing at a users real intent (usually, more
on that later) Useful analysis can be difficult
Demographic Profiling
How do needs change based on who the user is?
Design Evaluation
How well does your existing site work?Where do users run into problems?
Between Groups Testing
Divert a portion of real users to a new version of a site (or several possible new versions) and compare the results
Importance of keeping user groups distinct (between groups, as opposed to within groups)
True iterative process, using the real world in the feedback loop.
UA and Marketing
Marketing is not a bad wordPutting your site into the hands of the
users who need/want it
Measures of success
Money?Usage?Brand Identity?
What is Amazon’s measure of success?
Tracking Marketing Statistics
Where do your users come from?What forms of marketing are most
successful?
What is Marketing Success?
Banner advertisement clickthrough rates?Comparing use patterns across origins
Targeted vs untargeted advertising (punch the monkey, tricking the user)
In short: All users are not equal
So let’s get to it!
Kinds of InformationSources of InformationTools for Visualizing Information
Kinds of Information
Usage pathsLatencyRates of abandonmentViral marketing
Usage Paths
Where do your users go, and how do they get there?
The most obvious navigation might not be the one they use.
Example: Berkeley Paths (http://fury.com/berkeleypaths)
Latency
How long does a user spend on a page before going to the next page?
Why might this statistic be misleading?
Rates of Abandonment
Multi-stage tasks run a higher risk of being abandoned before completion
Shopping Cart examplePage-by-page abandonment stats can
help isolate usage problems.True for more complex interactive ‘loops’
as well (eVite example)
Viral Marketing
Viral Marketing is usually in the form of iterative traffic. eVite example
Brief tangent: Analyzing viral marketing
Sources of Information
Web site log filesSpecialized usability appsExit surveys
NetRaker
Visualizing Usage Data
Make data approachableBest pattern recognition computer is still
the human brainRecognition tools exist, but the most
useful tools are still those that organize data so our own brains can find patterns
Tools for Visualizing Data
AnalogRealtime Stat providersWebQuiltVIS VIP
Analog
Provides: Aggregate data for referrers Most popular page data Ttraffic over time Frequent visitors (IP addresses)
Lacks: Ability to filter one criterion by another. WebTV example
Realtime Stat Providers
Instant accessRequires preparation on site (usually a
graphic on each page)Doesn’t always work (outages, Browser
issues)Superstats
WebQuilt
Proxy-based site and usage data acquisition tool
Visualization tool
http://guir.berkeley.edu/projects/webquilt
VISVIP
Proxy-based site and usage data acquisition tool
Visualization tool
http://www.itl.nist.gov/iaui/vvrg/cugini/webmet/visvip/pix.html
Upcoming Assignment
“Between Groups” logfile study