Below is the interview with Paul Boag, owner of UK design agency Headscape, who produces a weekly podcast on website design and development at BoagWorld.com. He often uses Verify to help validate his design choices, and offered to share some insights on his experience with the app.
What do you do?
Good question! I'm not sure I could really tell you :-) I guess my job mainly consists of working closely with clients to design a user interface that meets their business needs and encourages users to complete their calls for action.
How does Verify help you do what you do?
It helps in a couple of ways. Firstly it allows us to test user interfaces with real people, rather than us guessing what the best approach might be. Secondly, it helps us justify a certain design approach with the client. We find that it can be an extremely useful tool in helping clients overcome their reticence over a particular design approach.
One example of how we use Verify would be on a recent project we did where the client was concerned about the design approach we had chosen. He felt that a particular aspect of the design communicated the wrong connotations. He believed that this design element would make the user think the site was about a different topic entirely. By running a Verify test we were able to prove that was not the case and get design sign-off.
What's your favorite test in Verify?
The Memory Test is the one we seem to use the most. We find it very revealing what people can remember when they only see a design for a few seconds. It gives an indication of whether the site has the right visual hierarchy or not.
Anything else you want to add?
I see so much potential for Verify both for us as a company and also in its future development. I am really looking forward to seeing what Verify come up with next. For example the mood test could be even more powerful if the tester could set a series of emotions that user could chose between. This would be extremely powerful for establishing the right brand direction for a site.