Archive for November, 2009

Whitireia Polytechnic

November 26th, 2009

Whitireia

Whitireia Polytechnic required a complete overhaul of their current website.

They needed an online presence that lived up to their marketing vision whilst meeting their business and user goals.
Lushai provided complete a re-design of their site architecture, user flow paths, interactive and visual design. We worked closely with Inov8 who provided a custom built SharePoint platform for Whitireia’s CMS requirements.

Visit Whitireia’s website

Top 8 at 8

November 26th, 2009

This was going to be a top 10 at 10 but hey, it’s 8am and all is well.
Plus I only have eight links to get through this morning.

So a quick skim through feedly has given me some juicy links for a morning read. Well worth sharing.
I was even going to try and organise these but it’s too early to try and fancy IA stuff. Onwards

What is UX and how can it help your business?

November 17th, 2009

Ux stands for ‘user experience’.  It can be applied to a wide range of disciplines and we, at Lushai, work it in the online or web space (so far) and work it good.

It is about the experience that you create for your users (these are your customers and other interested visitors or people who stumble across your site from Google).  It permeates every facet of web design from your idea to content to code.

To me a great user experience is one you don’t notice, (it’s only us webby folk that would rave about it) but to your average user they are just satisfied the tool (website) has successfully enabled them to complete their task. Be it book tickets, find the content or article they were looking for or navigate through a photo album.

As the web becomes richer with multiple channels and levels of visual and physical emphasis it is sometimes best to step back and keep it simple.  We like to solve problems. We like to know what your users face as a challenge online and we want to solve it, preferably with you. We enjoy solving complex problems (and sometimes the not so complex problems) with simple solutions.

For us good UX equals smart business.  How could it not be? You are discovering what your user needs to solve their issues and problems.

How do we find out what their problems are?
We use a range of techniques.  One could be trailing them in their work place or their natural user environment. Asking them probing, to-the-point questions, leading questions and vague searching questions (you name it we ask them!) Then once we know your users and their problems we use this to inform our design and create the solution.

Example:

  • You: You are a business, so you want insight into how the people that visit your site (your users) will think, act, and react when using your site right?
  • Us: We’ll use UX research techniques to gather information from your users, yourself & your business.
  • Users: What are their goals when they come to your site? How can you achieve these gracefully and successfully?
  • Business: what are you wanting to achieve with your site? What are the business goals for your site?
  • Together: We will work with you to create a site that reflects your business needs and your users needs. Design and wireframe the concepts we will walk through together. We’ll apply best practice principles, creativity and kick ass design to solve the problems and  needs of both parties.

With good UX  you can get your product or service connecting with your user and answering their needs.

What Ux means to me:  An overall experience that is as smooth as a baby’s bottom. Gracefully taking me from one useful piece of information to the other.  Anticipating my needs, meeting then and every now and then surprising and delighting me.



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