Digital Design with a focus on User Experience.

Information Architecture & User Experience

Briefly

A Venn diagram showing two circles. In the left is IA and the right Art Direction. The overlap is labelled 'Great User Experience'.

The way I see it there are two 'lenses' through which User Experience can be viewed and my work involves both. — They are clear, well thought through Information Achitecture paired with great visual design. Not only do I Art Direct and design but I am a practising Information Architect (IA) too.

Less briefly, what follows is the way I see my work on the IA side of the spectrum.

Designing-in inclusivity

Good design, regardless of the product, hinges on a variety of factors. One of the most important, and thankfully one that most clients now care deeply about, is a desire to have their system or website work well for whoever sits down to use it. It is this belief in enabling every user to get out of a product what s/he wishes that allows good design to become great design and where systems don't just work well, they just work. I like to call it designing-in inclusivity.

This inclusivity essentially boils down to two closely related factors that every great digital design out there should achieve: Usability – the inherent ease of use of your system, and Accessibility – the ability of your system to be used by anybody.

Specifically, the benefits of this clear thinking provide a platform for allowing all people – savvy, novice, young, old and even disabled to use the same system and get out of it what they need. This benefits everybody, and to an extent it is enshrined in law through legislation like the UK’s Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) which requires goods and services – and therfore websites – to be accessible to disabled as well as able users. On today’s web it’s more than just desirable to be designing-in inclusivity.

Case studies

Of course, there are tangible business benefits too. A system or site that works for everybody is overwhelmingly more successful. Consider two of the projects I have been involved with as an IA. The benefits of the process are definitely quantifiable.

By thinking through all the factors required by a user who wants to open a bank account, I helped redesign a system for Lloyds TSB that converted an 80% drop-off in started applications, to an 80% rate of completion. That's a huge turn-around. To achieve this we didn't just make all the form-filling easier by organising it efficiently, we did things users really appreciate too, like setting their expectations by telling them it would take ten minutes and letting them know what paperwork they'd need to find before they started.

Not only can you change your money with Travelex at the booth, but you can buy it in advance at a better rate and have it counted and waiting for you when you get to the airport. I scoped and designed a full system to allow users to easily convert currency and order it. To check we'd got our thinking right we performed user testing on a prototype. The system uses Ajax technology to instantly feed-back conversions and competitors' rates. The result is a highly usable e-commerce solution for Travelex.

The way it works

My IA practice begins at an early point in the project lifecycle. Documentation is passed on to the creative designer and supervision is required until delivery to ensure the product is designed and developed appropriately. I might perform or make some or all of the following tasks or documents along the way.

  • Requirements gathering
    – The briefing, learning and research phase.
  • Structural analysis and taxonomy
    – Is the data flat, ordered, faceted?
  • Persona development
    – Profile the people who will likely use the site.
  • Site-map creation
    – Documenting an overall view of the site & processes.
  • Wire-framing
    – Detailed diagrams showing functionality on a page.
  • User journeys
    – Demonstrate how a typical user might navigate the site.
  • Content documentation
    – Matrices detailing who creates what, for where.
  • User testing
    – Getting real, unbiased feedback from genuine users.

Easy eh?

Well, the resulting websites and systems after the process are.

Do get in touch if you'd like more information. Sample documentation is available upon request.

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