User Interviews & Card Sorting

My Philosophy

Interviewing users can be a inexpensive and highly effective way of gathering user information. Interviews can be very free form and investigative when not a lot is known about your users. They can also be quite focused when design decisions hinge on the answers to specific questions. Depending on the nature of a product or website, it can be a good idea to convene a user group at the beginning of the project. Having users on hand throughout the design process can speed decision making when encountering areas of uncertainty.

Card sorting is an inexpensive method of discovering user expectations for how information should be organized. This method provides useful input when devising the structure or information architecture of a website or software product. It involves asking users to arrange items ("cards") into groups and sequences, depending on the goals of the exercise. Card sorting can be done remotely and easily incorporates into a phone or online interview.