works for you (most offer free trials). Broadly, the most important considerations for a screen sharing tool are its compatibility and ease of setup for both the moderator and the participant. Browser and OS compatibility have a big impact on whom you’ll be able to talk to, and you probably don’t want to arbitrarily limit your recruiting pool by who can run your screen sharing software (unless the interface you’re testing happens to be platform specific, too, in which case it doesn’t matter). You want to make the setup process as quick and smooth as possible so that you don’t prolong the session or frustrate the user with tedious instructions.
For platform versatility, you can’t beat browser-based screen sharing solutions like Connect, GoToMeeting, and LiveLook, since they only require users to run a fairly recent browser, and the OS doesn’t matter. The only minor downside is that these solutions currently require users to have a Java-enabled browser; most are, but if some users don’t have it, having them set it up can be time-consuming, and they may not even want to.
The solutions that aren’t browser based are often the ones that require users to download and run an executable file or have a certain program installed (Skype, iChat). Downloading and installing files can be a security issue for users who are behind corporate firewalls, as well as a trust issue for users who don’t like the idea of installing things at the command of a voice on the other end of a telephone. If you decide to use screen sharing software that requires any heavy installation or user registration, you’ll probably want to arrange in advance for your users to dothat.
If you plan on having people observe your sessions remotely, screen sharing features may make that a lot easier. Most tools limit the number of observers; make sure that yours can support as many as you need. A handful of tools enable chatting between the observers and moderator, which is handy, but the participant should always be excluded from the chat, to keep distraction to a minimum. If it’s not possible to block the participant from the chat, you can use an instant messaging service to chat with clients behind the scenes.
On a final practical note, there’s cost to consider. Pricing structures differ from tool to tool but generally fall into a handful of categories. Adobe Connect and GoToMeeting offer subscription plans, which are best if you intend to conduct multiple usability testing sessions over the development of your interface (which we encourage), and they also offer free trials if you just plan on doing a one-off study. Tools like Skype (for international calls) charge just a few cents a minute, which is cost effective if you don’t plan on conducting usability studies regularly, but they make you buy a set number of minutes in advance. Watch out for additional charges you’ll incur if the screen sharing lacks a particular feature you need; for instance—LiveLook currently lacks support for observers to listen in on sessions, so you’d have to pony up for a conference call service, which can be pricey. And if you’re using your phone to dial internationally instead of a voice chat service like Skype, watch those long-distance charges.
For the full story on the state of remote research tools, check out Chapter 8. For now, Table 2.1 provides a quick comparison of some handy screen sharing solutions.
Table 2.1 Screen Sharing Tools at a Glance (Circa Mid-2009)*
* See Chapter 8 for more details.
Recording
Session recordings are useful if you want to be able to document, share, and closely analyze the testing sessions after the fact (bear in mind, though, that recording is not strictly essential for the purposes of running the study). Unlike in-person testing, in remote testing you can usually capture everything important about a session with just a simple software tool. Some screen sharing tools, like GoToMeeting and UserVue, have built-in recording functionality, and some Skype plug-ins will record Skype video as well (for example, eCamm’s Call Recorder for Mac). If recording functionality isn’t built in, you’ll need a screen recording application that allows you to capture both video and audio from your computer. Techsmith’s Camtasia Studio is a common one, although there are free applications like CamStudio as well. Most recording applications produce either WMV or AVI files. Recording is probably the most computing-intensive operation on the moderator’s 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
