Is Your Site Working for “Me?” Organize a Focus Group!
Just like the title says — “Is your site working for me?” Yep, me, not you. Me as in… I am your customer. Me!
I have been doing web work since about 1995. About 19 years ago (OMG, I can’t believe I just typed that!), I worked at a local health plan as a Medicare Compliance Coordinator. My role was to review Medicare marketing materials created by the health plan to make sure they met the guidelines set by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
Some of the things I had to review included materials for non-English-speaking individuals, font sizes, logos and taglines, product endorsements and testimonials, and telephone and TTY information.
So, for example, with font sizes, all text on materials — including footnotes — needed to be printed at a font size equivalent to or larger than Times New Roman 12-point. For product endorsements and testimonials, we had to make sure speakers clearly identified the organization by name when referring to it. And if there was a paid actor portraying a real or fictional situation, the ad had to clearly state “Paid Actor Portrayal.”
So you kinda get where I’m going with all of this, right?
The health plan also had a team I was part of that worked with focus groups. Focus groups are groups of people who are asked about their perceptions, opinions, beliefs, and attitudes toward a product, service, concept, advertisement, idea, or packaging. Questions are asked in an interactive group setting where participants are free to talk with one another.
Blah blah blah, right :)! Well, I actually learned a lot about web development through that process. There are so many good businesses out there that I think could do so much better if they invited a group of people to review their website and give honest feedback. Heck, the majority of the websites I visit don’t even have a feedback button, tab, or link. (Yikes! I’m one of them, so I better get that added up here!)
Just recently, I provided development services on a project that was already very nice and well constructed. But the client decided they wanted a responsive theme — more specifically, they wanted to combine elements of three different themes into one responsive theme. That was a big project! But I did it.
Because the work was subcontracted to me, I wasn’t present during the meetings, so I wasn’t able to give my own feedback or explain why I felt they might be “shooting themselves in the foot.” If I had been the main developer on the project, I would have done two things:
- I would have shared my thoughts throughout the process as they moved from an unresponsive theme to a responsive one. There are so many pros and cons to making that kind of switch, and it really depends on the business. It all needs to be discussed. I would have been able to demonstrate some of the things that worried me. For this particular project, I would have tried to persuade them to at least remove responsiveness from certain newly formed elements so they would behave properly.There are still some kinks in that design that, if I had been the lead, would have been fixed — but it was out of my hands.
- I would have developed the newly responsive theme on a demo site and suggested that the client arrange a focus group based on their audience to get feedback on the responsive design. Have them try it on desktop and different mobile devices, then gather that feedback. What did they like? What didn’t they like? For example, someone focused heavily on revenue generation may not like that ads now display at the bottom or that ads have become too small.
They may not like how the navigation works (standard menu vs. hamburger menu). Is everything working consistently? The fonts may be too small, or they may be too light and difficult to read. Does the site scroll too long before reaching the end?
I’ve had too many clients say, “But I like this and want this one.” Only for me to respond, “I understand you like it, but you are not your customer. You need to make it user-friendly and how the end user would expect it to work.” Sometimes we can be our own worst advisor.
The last thing an active site owner or blogger needs is to have a site that once attracted thousands of visitors start losing traffic because the new theme isn’t working or performing the way the old one did. Especially if you are a brand. You don’t want to switch to something that’s clearly going to hurt your brand.
You can use a focus group for any aspect of your site. Maybe your site is working just fine, but content is placed in the wrong area. Maybe you just need to enlarge the font or make your logo bigger. Get feedback on the current site before you make drastic changes — like a full redesign that may not have been needed.
There are plenty of online tools you can use to gather feedback, but me personally… I like human interaction. We’ve gotten so accustomed to doing everything electronically that one-on-one, personal interaction has gone by the wayside.
Organize a focus group. It could be a fun experience for you.
That’s my tip for Tipsy Tuesday (although it’s Wednesday)!
That’s my tip for Tipsy Tuesday (although it’s Wednesday)!
