Comments on: What Metric are you Designing to Improve Today?

By: Louise

Louise — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 11:41:19 +0000

Thank you – this is an approach we’re trying to drive towards but it’s tough. The people around us are focused on content and think of design as aesthetics.

So we started with a general goal.
Site should serve new target audience better than it does now.

And then looked for some measures of that and some turned out to be remarkably simple.
- fewer visits to the sitemap
- fewer “lost” enquiries
- more traffic to the content designed for them

but it took a lot of discussion to get there.

By: Gregor

Gregor — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 08:19:41 +0000

Quite often people have an idea in their head of what metrics they want to improve but they aren’t aware that they’re actually addressing that metric.

So, saying that they don’t want to look so crappy might mean that they want to increase enquiries through the site but having a more professional image, even if they can’t explain that!

By: Phil Buckley

Phil Buckley — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 18:22:30 +0000

I hate to admit it, but I’m in the middle of a series of weekly meeting talking about a redesign strategy with no clear goal.

By: Josh

Josh — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 08:44:49 +0000

@idont You make a good point. I didn’t phrase them in an actionable way.

By: Stephan Barrett

Stephan Barrett — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:30:04 +0000

Joshua, I totally agree with you here. I find many of the prospects we talk to redesign for the wrong reasons. To make matters worse, some businesses pick the agency they work with based on the wrong reasons, or choose how much they should spend before considering the value of the improvements being made.

Designing to improve metrics is the only thing that matters in our business.

By: idont

idont — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 00:19:54 +0000

Hi Josh,

These examples are impossible to mesure in practice and they are more intended for the managment (useless?)….

(Eric Ries) Metrics must be “AAA”:
- Actionable
- Accessible
- Auditable

Something like:
- “We want to increase the percentage of people completing the subscription process in the sign up page.”
This is AAA. The present situation and the different solutions (with A/B split test) can be evaluated. And later, the performance can still be monitored.

Really good videos about metrics (From a “Facebook Garage”):
http://www.vimeo.com/user908262/videos/

Eric Ries’ one is really interesting.

http://www.slideshare.net/startuplessonslearned/eric-ries-engagement-loops-the-levers-and-metrics-of-engagement

By: Tanner Christensen

Tanner Christensen — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 16:02:18 +0000

The key here is, as you stated, “How do you know when youâ€™ve been successful [if you aren't designing to improve some metric]?”

How many businesses do you see everyday who revamp their website or advertisements or marketing materials (or a piece of one or all of them) without a clear metric for measuring the success of the change?

Unfortunately it seems that aesthetics are put before everything else in design education programs these days. It’s just another reason you need to write a few more books Joshua.

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By: Adrian Chan

Adrian Chan — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 17:10:54 +0000

Josh

I might want to say “behavior is subjective, but it’s outcomes can be quantified” … but that’s just me splitting hairs.

Your point is even more important when it’s married to organizational goals, strategies, and tactics (traffic, clickthroughs, page views, SEO, etc). Site traffic and activity can be tracked and measured by tools and one’s design goals monitored for their success.

By: lexx

lexx — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 12:34:21 +0000

I totally agree with the metrics approach. Apart from a great way to value the redesigns, it is a very honest and straightforward way to make business and prove that you redesign the flow and meaning (of the homepage for example) to something better. Not just the aesthetics.