end, especially if you’re recording a large screen area, so be sure that whatever you use to record doesn’t noticeably slow yourcomputer.
Taking Notes
While some people are still most comfortable with handwritten notes, there are advantages to taking notes on the computer during remote testing. For one thing, you don’t have to take your eyes off the screen to take notes, and for another, most people (most UX professionals, anyway) type faster than they write. As with any user research, you’ll be furiously taking notes on what users say and do, as well as things you see on their screens incidentally. Fifty words per minute is close to the speed you’ll have to type if you want to transcribe user quotes verbatim, but don’t get distracted from what’s happening in the session; you can resort to your session recordings later, if you have to.
A good old word processing document or Excel spreadsheet should suffice for basic note taking, but if you want to make analysis easier, you can find ways to cleverly take notes that are automatically timestamped to the video recording you’re making. Timestamping your notes (i.e., keeping track of the exact time you took each note) matters only if you’re planning on making highlight videos or conducting detailed analysis after your sessions are complete. For now, we stick to basics; see Chapter 5, “Moderating,” for more about note-taking and transcription techniques and Chapter 7, “Analysis and Reporting,” for more on the analysis process.
Webcams
We don’t ordinarily use a webcam in remote usability sessions, but it’s an interesting option. It allows you to see your users’ facial reactions during the session or vice versa. A growing number of screen sharing applications have webcam functionality built into them. This, of course, would require your participants to be using a webcam, and they’d also need to have any necessary software. Adobe Connect has an integrated screen sharing/video conferencing solution, Skype has both video chat and screen sharing, and Google just recently introduced webcam chat built right into its Gmail chatclient.
As with recording, you need to make sure that any webcam software isn’t going to kill your computer performance; recording is CPU intensive, so test it in advance. And, as with any personally identifying information gathered during a remote research study, make sure that images and recordings of users are gathered with proper consent (see Chapter 4, “Privacy and Consent”) and securely stored or erased, to respect their privacy and abide by all relevant laws.
Drafting the Research Documents
As we mentioned in the introduction, this book focuses on how to do remote user research, so we assume you know how to plan and manage a standard user research study. Specifically, we’re assuming you know how to schedule the project, define the research goals and user segments, recruit users (if you’re recruiting the traditional way), and get everyone (researchers, stakeholders, observers) on the same page about what needs to be done. (If you have no idea what we’re talking about, see Chapter5 of Mike Kuniavsky’s Observing the User Experience.)
There are a few ways in which preparing for a remote study is different. First, the facilitator guide (aka “moderator script”) will contain important new parts that cover introduction, screen sharing, user consent, and incentive payment. Second, the observers need to be briefed on how to use the screen sharing service and how to communicate with the moderator. Finally, if you’re recruiting on the Web, you’ll need to design a recruiting screener and place it on your Web site in advance. We’ll get into that topic in the next chapter.
The Remote Facilitator Guide
Drafting the facilitator guide is usually the most time-consuming part of the research setup process. Note that we deliberately call it a “guide” and not a “script”; you will not be mindlessly reading verbatim from this document. The facilitator guide should always be written with flexibility in mind, anticipating the unpredictable things that happen when you do time-aware research. You’re speaking with people who are in their own native environments performing natural tasks, outside a controlled lab setting. Think of the facilitator guide as a document that establishes everything you should expect to encounter over the course of the session but shouldn’t restrict you from exploring new issues that come up.
A facilitator guide divides your study into four main sections, totaling about 40 minutes: Greeting and Introduction, Natural Tasks, Predetermined Tasks, and Wrap-up and Debrief. Since studies tend to run long, we’ve found that 60 minutes is about the upper limit for maintaining a participant’s attention and investment in the study.
Presession Setup (1 Minute)
Set up a screen sharing session and run your recording software. This method will vary depending on what screen sharing and recording tools you’re using.
Cue your observers to join the session. If you have people observing the session, cue them to join the session before contacting the user. (See “Preparing Observers for Testing” later in this chapter for more details.)
Greeting and Introduction (5 Minutes)
The first part of the guide will deal with establishing contact with the participant. This part comes closest to resembling a “script” in the traditional sense; most of what you need to say probably won’t change much from user to user. The introduction in our sample script has been refined over hundreds of sessions and is the most efficient way we’ve found to introduce a study.
We won’t be reprinting a full facilitator guide here (although you’ll be able to find examples on http://remoteusability.com), we want to point out a few of the important things all facilitator guides need to establish. Elements that will vary from study to study are highlighted in yellow, both here and throughout this book:
Contact and self-introduction. Contact users. Right away, introduce yourself with your name, the company or organization you represent, and remind users how you got their name and phone number. If you’re live recruiting (i.e., calling users who just filled out a Web recruiting form, see Chapter 3, “Recruiting for Remote Studies”), you have to do this pretty quickly. Otherwise, they might mistake you for a telemarketer.
Hello, can I speak to Bill Brown? Hi Bill. My name’s Nate, and I’m calling on behalf of ACME about the [usability study we had scheduled for this time] / [survey you filled out at ACME.com a few minutes ago].
Willingness to participate. Confirm that users are available and willing to speak for the duration of the study.
Do you still have time now to talk to me for 40 minutes about the ACME Web site? [If not, ask whether you can reschedule, and then end the call.]
Ability to participate. Confirm that users have the necessary equipment to participate in the study. You’d be surprised how many people aren’t able to talk on the phone and use their browser at the same time.
Will you be able to use Firefox and talk on your phone at the same time? And do you have a high-speed Internet connection? [If not, end the call.] Great!
Obtain consent for screen sharing and recording. This part takes some finesse, because if your users didn’t anticipate the call (which is always the case with live recruiting), they may understandably become suspicious when you, a stranger on the telephone, ask them to download something. Explain in clear, simple language what you’d like them to do, why, and what they’re getting themselves into. If you’re using a Consent Agreement (as described in Chapter 4), direct the users to the consent form here.
So, during this call today, we’d like to follow along with what’s on your screen while we’re talking to you, and to do that, we ask you to visit a Web site that will allow us to see and record whatever you can see on your desktop. The recording is used only for research, and the screen sharing is completely disabled at the end of the session. Does that sound okay? [If not, end the call.] Great!
[If using a Consent Agreement]: I’d like to direct you to a Web site with a consent form that describes what the study will be about, so you can make your participation official. The address to put in your browser’s address bar is: www.acme.com/consent.
Screen sharing