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One question into it, and I knew it wasn’t good.

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“To put it simply, technology has changed the way we market. Customers gather information from multiple channels and expect it to be customized. This makes it critical for you to be able to answer these questions: Who are your customers? How do they make purchase decisions?

Once you’re armed with accurate customer personas and a map of customer purchase processes, you can strategically deliver the right information at the right time using the right channel.”

Registration begins at 7:30 am
Presentation is at 8 am
Networking is at 9:15 am

The cost is $20 for Members/$40 for non-Members.

According to an article in Reuters, a Dutch scientist found that half of all product returns are because customers can’t figure out how to use them. The study also revealed some other interesting information, such as the fact that consumers in the US will struggle for around 20 minutes before giving up on a product. The study also found that most of the problems occured at the beginning of the design process in product definition.

Maybe it’s time to start charging more for our services!

I realized the other day that my wife alone has probably greatly (relative to my wallet) skewed the statistics that landsend.com just briefed to thier boss last week while she was looking around: “Well ma’am, we keep losing these 400 dollar sales and we can’t figure out why!”

I’ve come to the conclusion that my wife uses web applications like a grown up version of “playing house.” I can just see a room of Infinity auto website guys salivating over this 60K car that someone is building online and piling on the options while my wife is dreaming of that raise she’s hoping to get…and sure, I admit- I’ve visited the apple.com site and selected a machine beyond my means…who hasn’t?

More realistically though, my wife uses all e-commerce sites like amazon’s wish list. She will build it up for X-Mas shopping to get an idea of the total cost, but mainly to see the fruits of her 30 minutes of shopping excursion all together in one place. She’ll promptly print or take notes, then close the browser… sale lost?Why don’t more sites have a “wish-list” to embrace this behavior? It would be much more interesting for me to know that a my customers are sitting in front of their computers daydreaming about my products then to simply see an abandoned cart and make inferences.

How do companies handle this when it comes to metrics? How do we know if this user is frustrated that there is not a dealership in town, or the shipping prices wasn’t right…or if the customer was “just looking, thanks”

Most of us have been asked to do more with less while simultaneously delivering better insight and more business impact. This session will discuss how one organization has brought together three related functions (market research, competitive intelligence and library science) to achieve these goals, and how the combined function operates at the Optum Division of UnitedHealth Group. You will see how combining functions creates a more customer intimate department, and how you can face the related challenges and issues

Register at the MN-AMA site

Outside of it confirming we read upper-left-to-lower-right and the first “natural” search result is the hottest, here are a couple other interesting finds from the image

• The “fold” cuts right through the 5th search result.
• The last 2 sponsored links in the right-hand column are completely ignored
• Activity on the “natural”-side seems more title focused, activity on the paid-side seems more description and source-link focused.

Here’s the info:

This person will use logic and analytical skills to digest, synthesize, and interpret data to help guide design research and industrial design. They will be exposed to consumer and market research methodologies that influence business decisions.

Responsibilities include conducting secondary research and compiling results, analyzing competitive market data, building an information library and monitoring industry news. The position will also gather competitive intelligence and report on general industry findings and trends to aid in defining new market opportunities.

We need someone with the following qualities to augment our proprietary research technology tools and ethnographic research methods:

• Excellent statistics skills
• Secondary research experience and additional research tools (ie.
  ethnography, contextual inquiry)
• Strong analytic and communication skills
• BS or BFA in psychology, anthropology, sociology, library and information
  services, business or design
• Experience with DFSS, QFD, or Six Sigma a plus
• Interest in working in a product design consultancy

If this is you, drop me a line and I’ll pass your info along.

“BBC titan Lord Reith, will you give the people what they want?”

“No. Something better than that.”

Usability to often is asking the question – and being surprised by the response.

All too often usability evaluations are conducted on products and services already in the marketplace. This is fine for the evaluator to get an idea of the landscape – but for innovative research this is ineffective. Why? Customers, participants, and informants do not have the same information as the design team, the engineering team, or the business team.

They can only comment on what is known – the artifact they’re evaluating. They can make minor recommendations, but will not inspire the team to innovate.

To innovate, we need to stop evaluating what exists and start evaluting ideas, sketches, and prototypes.

As McLuhan delcared decades ago:

We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backwards into the future.

It seems to me that Ray, Barry, and Buzz already love shopping at Best Buy. Jill on the other hand, can’t stand the place. Perhaps the biggest win is Best Buy formally acknowledging Jill’s aversion to their stores.

The article reads as if prototype stores will be created to specifically focus on these archetypes. An interesting proposition – a $50,000 facelift per store to focus on developing a better relationship with a handful of customer archetypes. It’s that kind of commitment that will drive customer loyalty.