Pat’s Point of View

It’s on again, Web Directions South will hit Sydney in September.

From past experience, particularly last year, I’d say WDS is the best web industry conference held in Australia—and I’m not just saying that to win an iPhone :)

There’s a great line-up and a healthy dose of user experience discussion for what is a general web gathering. It’s definitely a sign that usability and the like have been embraced by your average web designer and developer. In particular I’m looking forward to, and recommend to you, sessions by Ruth Ellison, Donna Spencer, Jeff Veen and Mark Pesce (I mean who wouldn’t after last year’s closing keynote?).

If you need more convincing, check out the executive summary what might get your boss to send you.

I’ve just helped redesign the website for this year’s “Yes for Kids” colour ball.

The site was designed to be easily updateable each year, so the same basic structure exists from last year. The design this time around is in keeping with this year’s electric blue theme for the ball.

The ball itself is run by Redkite, an Australian charity that aims to support children and their families through cancer. Here are the vital facts:

• When: Saturday 12th July 2008, from 7pm until midnight
• Location: Foundation Hall, Museum of Contemporary Art
• Dress: Cocktail attire with an ‘Electric Blue’ touch
• Band: Hit Machine
• After party: Garden Bar at the Establishment
• MC: Brad McEwan, presenter of Sports Tonight on Network Ten
• Tickets: $150 each (group discounts available)

It’s a good cause so buy a ticket if you fancy a good night out. By the way, they’re still looking for sponsors too, so if you know anyone…

I am now live on the air…on the net. The latest edition of Gerry Gaffney’s UXpod, user experience podcast, features yours truly speaking on the subject of mentoring. It follows my presentation at last year’s OZCHI and OZ-IA on the same topic, based on my experiences mentoring a group of non IAs through the UCD process to create a new IA for their large website.

I hate to uphold a cliche, but I’m not much of a fan of hearing my own voice. Although listening back to recordings of user interviews, focus groups, workshops and usability testing sessions has meant I am much more used to it than I used to be.

But that said, podcasting is such a great medium for this kind of content, and I was very happy to participate. Hopefully this edition will be as useful for listeners as the previous editions have been. I know I have found it quite useful to hear a concise discussion on a UX related topic, from an expert (although I’d hardly call myself an expert on mentoring). They’re great for when you’re on the bus.

Oh and here’s a tip for you, podcasts of your own voice are great for putting baby to sleep :)

On more than a few occasions recently, I’ve been quite surprised by the level of knowledge—and apathy—surrounding tracking website usage.

Then I read Karl Groves’ recent article The Limitations of Server Log Files for Usability Analysis on Boxes and Arrows. Here’s a snippet:

Server log files are inappropriate for gathering usability data. They are meant to provide server administrators with data about the behavior of the server, not the behavior of the user. The log file is a flat file containing technical information about requests for files on the server. Log file analysis tools merely assemble them in a conjecture-based format aimed at providing insight into user behavior.

When speaking with the owners and managers of websites and intranets, I’m often told that they have ‘tracking’ on their website, but probing deeper I find they are referring to simple web statistics (read “hits”). Looking at the kind of information they are getting from their reports, I am usually disappointed. This old style web stats is just not sufficient these days, and I thought we had got past this.

I’m no expert in web analytics (might I suggest Hurol Inan for someone who is) but I don’t need to be, since most people I’m working with are still struggling with the basics. Like getting any sort of reporting at all. If you don’t know how people are using your website, you’re flying blind.

Don’t get me wrong, no matter how good your web analytics are, it’s still at most, only half the picture. To understand why your audience is doing what they’re doing you’ll need to brush off those ‘soft skills’ and meet your users; user testing, observation and other ethnographic techniques can give you all the data you’d ever need in this regard. But, as with all things, you need a balance. Especially since they can be so easy to gather, web analytics are a good nominee for ‘quick win’ status. It should be a “no brainer” to know what users are doing on your site, even if you don’t yet know why.

The main culprit for this situation, beyond ignorance of anything better, seems to be IT administrators refusing to play ball. I’m never that surprised to hear that no better information about site usage is possible, because some guy in IT said so. However, there is a simple solution to this: build a business case for better analytics and use business to trump technology! It’s not that hard, look for ways in which good web analytics can empower decisions regarding the website. No other part of the organisation (I hope) is operating without some meaningful form of measurement, so if your website is a key channel for your organisation—be it sales, marketing or another objectives—you can’t keep flying blind.

I have started to become quite an advocate for Google Analytics. Not because I think it’s the best thing out there, but because it works well and the value for money on offer is phenomenal. Particularly if you’re generating uninformative ‘reports’ using Analog or something similar, that honestly tell you nothing useful. So I’m amazed that some people haven’t heard of Google Analytics. Like I said, I’m not expert in this field, but if I was shopping around for a web analytics package, I might not choose Google for this purpose (there are good reasons why one might not) but it would surely be my benchmark.

I particularly like the ability to establish goals and track conversion rates along paths that feed that goal. So if you have a website which sells products, you setup the sale of each product as a goal, then identify the paths people might take to get to the point where they actually buy the product. The reports will then tell you not only how many people achieve that goal, but where they fall off the path along the way. This would be very handy for evaluating potential usability problems with shopping cart processes etc. This is the most obvious use; the more complex your website is the more goals and paths you could monitor.

Hopefully, this will help some of you gain better intelligence, in that CIA kinda way, regarding what is happening with your website (or intranet for that matter). And this is just the tip of the iceberg, there are many more sources of data which you can use to find out what’s going on, and why. Web analytics just happen to be a good place to start.

I’m very happy indeed to be speaking at OzCHI this year. My short paper on mentoring and collaboration in information architecture was accepted after the blind peer review process, to my surprise. It’s the same topic I presented at OZ-IA, but thanks for the feedback I received from that experience I hope to improve it substantially.

All this week I’ve been working hard to become nationally accredited in workplace training and assessment, which will no doubt also allow me to improve my presentation. Although I’ll only have about 15 minutes, so I don’t think there will be any audience activities :)

So I get another trip to Adelaide, which I visited a few times for work last year. I’m looking forward to it, although I’m not keen on being away from home (felt my baby kick for the first time yesterday!). However, it’s a lot better than if I had to go overseas.

See what people are blogging about: OzCHI 2007, mentoring, collaborative IA

Well what a second day! If I worried that the quality of the first day couldn’t be maintained, I needn’t have. Even the one complaint I had from yesterday (the temperature: in the big room it was freezing, in the little rooms it was warm) had been rectified.

And I thought there was a great line-up of speakers today, possibly better than yesterday. We started with Scott Berkun talking about innovation, or indeed talking about not talking about innovation. This was a great topic considering the myriad of start-ups, mash-ups and ‘new’ ideas that dominate the web industry, and Scott is an excellent speaker.

I followed this with George Oates and her presentation that focussed on Flickr and its history and underlying concepts. Very cool, made me want to have my own start-up and just begin experimenting.

During lunch I spoke to the guys at Gekko Images about Expression Media, and I have to admit I’m pretty sold on it. I’ve tried it in the past and I think it has the right combination of simplicity and functionality to suit the work I do.

After lunch, Lisa Herrod and Stephen Cox gave us two whole user-centred sessions. I particularly liked Stephen’s talk about using ethnographic research methods within a commercial organisation such as News Digital Media. He is the master :)

To finish off the day, and the conference, was Mark Pesce‘s presentation on…well, on lots of things but most importantly the destruction of the ‘hierarchy’ by the ‘network’. This was more than just a keynote, this was a real reality check. Eye-opening, inspiring and scary in equal parts. I’m sure many people in that auditorium will do just as he suggested, and question why they are doing the jobs they are on Tuesday.

All in all, lost of things to think about over this long weekend (yay!)

See what people are blogging about: wds07

Day one of the Web Directions South conference made me feel good about going to conferences again. Not since the UPA conference in Austin had I been to a conference like this; congrats must be paid to John, Maxine and all the organisers.

The venue is great and the schedule is well spaced: a nice 9:00 start, morning and afternoon breaks of good length, lunch and sessions of a decent length. The exhibitions were well placed without being intrusive. The legendary WDS bag was also a welcome change from the normal conference fare.

This is the equal of—if not better than—any of the big conferences I’ve been to around the world.

And the speakers weren’t half bad either. I enjoyed the opening keynote by Rashmi Sinha. Slideshare is a fantastic app and Rashmi has a great perspective on…everything. I walked away with a new understanding of the various social media networks that proliferate the web. I also had a good chat to her over lunch (and if you’re reading this Rashmi, can you tell me why Slideshare mucks up our logo when I upload my slides? :)

I also really liked the talk that Andy Clarke gave on what comics can teach us about laying out web pages. Very cool.

Quite the serendipitous pleasure was the ‘Mobile 2.0′ talk by Brian Fling. Great stories and the case study of creating a simple but useful iPhone app with CSS3 was fantastic.

And to add to the day, the breaks were a great opportunity to mingle (yes I did say that). Despite my increasing distance from ‘web development’, there is still plenty to talk about and keep me interested. Hopefully next year we can inject a bit more UX material (although to be honest quite a few speakers were talking indirectly about user experience).

Bring on day two.

See what people are blogging about: wds07, slideshare, iPhone

Over the weekend just gone, Sydney played host to FullCodePress, an epic battle between web design teams from Australia and New Zealand. The two teams had the task of designing and building a complete website for a non-profit client within 24 hours.

On Saturday, Jenn and I volunteered to help by taking photos and video. We saw the action between about hours 5 thru 9, so things were well underway and the different cultures of the two teams were quite evident; the Aussies were more noisy and chaotic, and the Kiwis more quiet and focused.

There wasn’t a lot of ‘action’ to be seen during the time we were there, as everyone had pretty much hunkered down and were getting on with work, and hadn’t yet reached the ‘silly season’ that would surely come later on. So my strategy was to try and grab team members as they popped out of their respective rooms (for coffee or facilities breaks) and had little interviews. This seemed to work quite well, especially with the New Zealand team whom otherwise didn’t say much. And to their credit, their approach seems to have served them well.

Some of my footage ended up in Overview of the Kiwi Plan, Team Status Update, and Kiwi Coffee Break. Thanks must be directed to Lachlan Hunt who did a brilliant job of editing all the video and making some sense of what we shot!

Congratulations to both teams, they did a great job, made no less easier under those circumstances. Keep an eye out for round two, to be held in the not too distant future.

To see all the photos, check out www.flickr.com/photos/fullcodepress/. For all the video, visit www.youtube.com/fullcodepress/. And finally to see the results, visit aussie.fullcodepress.mbcomms.net.au and kiwi.fullcodepress.mbcomms.net.au.

See what people are blogging about: FullCodePress

I’ve just launched a new website for the Redkite Yes for Kids Colour Ball:

www.redkite.org.au/colourball/

The Y4K Colour Ball is all about helping Redkite to support children and their families through cancer. Each year this fabulous fundraiser features cocktails, live music and prizes. This year’s theme is “Solid Gold”!

Redkite plays a vital role in supporting children, young people and their families across Australia through the often long and difficult journey of childhood cancer. Its essential emotional, financial and educational services provide stability and hope, as today the majority of children will be cured.

I built the site and Singleton Ogilvy & Mather designed it.

Over the weekend I found an old edition of .net Magazine (excellent UK web design mag) which contains a ‘letter of the month’ I wrote in 2003. In a way it’s what we did before blogs, we wrote letters :)

In response to Richard Brenkley’s letter, I think he’s right about the need for standards and qualifications for Web design, and he’s right that ultimately the fault often lies with clients choosing incompetent designers. However I don’t agree that there should be some sort of legislation to control web design.

Besides the fact that the legal system is having enough trouble handling its current load and adding even more litigious action would be insane, you can’t take away peoples’ right to have a go.

After all, there are dodgy builders, doctors, lawyers, magazines (not .net of course!) and any other profession you care to mention. And yes, most of these professions have organisations and governing bodies that aim to provide some assurance or guide for those looking to employ one of their members. But you inevitably come across professionals who do not meet the “minimum level of design confidence” as Richard puts it.

I, too, am a professional Web designer, but I believe the efforts of information sources like .net magazine are beneficial to the industry, not detrimental. By educating novices and clients alike, the resulting sites—and other digital communications—will be much, much better. At the very least, people will enjoy something which we take for granted; to work in the exciting and innovative Web industry!

After the dotcom debacle, Web designers have suffered a bit of a bad rap. Let’s not perpetuate the stereotype by having a whinge and keeping it ‘in the club’; let’s be open and spread useful information. By advocating the benefits of good web design and showing what a true professional can do, we’ll start to convince people that they should employ us rather than the guy next door.

This was in response to a letter a guy wrote the month before, asking if the magazine should really be telling “noobs” all our secrets and calling for some kind of licence for web designers, because too many people were over their heads and doing bad design. At that time usability was struggling to gain a foot hold and web standards were hardly mentioned, Flash was running rampant and some truly hideous websites were being designed by people with no more than the motivation to do so. So you can see his point. Incidentally, I think the profession has come a long way since then, at least as far as I have seen.

The letter was a fairly honest representation of my opinions, but I must admit my primary motivation was to have a letter published and possibly win a prize. Which I did, I scored a Logitech Z-540 4.1 surround speaker system which nows adorns my Mac Mini. The speakers (and mighty sub) are great for when the lil Mac is used as a media centre. An awesome prize for a few minutes of ranting.