Redesigning TCS.com with Remote Research

Chris Farnum | Senior Information Architect | EnlightenInformation Architecture SummitMarch 22, 2009

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Meta – About This Presentation

NOT about redefining IA or the future of IANOT groundbreaking emergent theories

Instead I want to tell you a case study about…Finding a process to fit the projectRemote user researchIA issues for a global siteA few tips and tricks

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About the Client - TCS

IT Services, Business Solutions and Outsourcing HQ – Mumbai, India Part of Tata Group, one of India’s largest industrial

conglomerates and most respected brands TCS has over 130,000 IT consultants in 42 countries TCS Annual Sales: $5.7 billion (fiscal year ending March 31, 2008)

Known for quality results – CMMI Maturity Level 5

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Project Goal – Redesign TCS.com

Global Message: Position TCS as a global company and highlight the message of the Global Network Delivery Model™

Brand building: Firmly establish TCS positioning and support the “Experience Certainty” campaign now and into the future

Demand generation: Create an environment to support Demand Generation using the new website (i.e., improve calls-to-action)

User-centric Design: Design and Develop site based on key user needs and tasks (i.e., ‘outside in’ vs. ‘inside out’)

Technical Infrastructure: Develop the new site on a scaleable Content Management System to facilitate content development & maintenance - Microsoft SharePoint 2007

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Project Overview

Engagement Plan

Facilitated Work Sessions

Analysis of Key Internal and External Factors

Conduct User Research

Project Requirements

Strategic Assessment Project Requirements

Information Architecture

User Interface Functional Specifications

Technical Specifications

Art Comps

Test Plan / User Acceptance Testing

Launch Specifications

Site Specification

Art Production

Programming

Integration

Quality Assurance

User Acceptance Testing

Staging

Deployment

Final Site

Update

Monitor

Measure

Report

Improve

On-Going Improvements

DEFINE DESIGN BUILD

Feature / Scope Definition

Technical & Implementation

Recommendations

Preliminary UI

Art Comps

Strategy Requirements Design Build Maintenance

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Research Step One – Stakeholder Interviews

Enlighten and TCS staff conducted 28 group interview sessions on site in Chennai and Mumbai and by conference call with:Practice LeadsDelivery HeadsBusiness Unit ManagersSales LeadersHuman Resource LeadersGlobal RepresentativesExecutive Leadership

Estimate: 60-70 participants

Photo courtesy of Scott Mills

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TCS.com Site March 2007 – Home

Long, crowded, and overwhelmingHigh abandonment rate

Overlapping and confusing left nav choices

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Interim Site – Launched Spring 2007

Channel navigation within a closed page element.

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User Research Part One - Overview

Research goals – to gain a better understanding of… Buying cycle and research process Site content and features Brand attributes and positioning How users see the relationships and grouping between different types of content19 Participants Customers representing North America, South America, Europe and UK (15) Analysts (2) Career Seekers (2)User Segments Customer: C-Level Customer: Business Unit Manager Industry Influencers Career Seeker (Mid-career)

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User Research Part One - Methods

Remote user research allowed us to connect with users in their own offices while we remained in ours.

Sessions consisted of: Interview questions

Priorities for features and content Discussion questions about buying

cycle and brand perception

Online card sorting observed in real time to inform organization of content Remote user testing tool: UserVue Online card sorting tool: WebSort Analysis with EZ-Calc

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Remote Research with UserVue

Moderator(Enlighten, Ann Arbor)

Participant(US, S. America,

Europe…)

TCS Observer(Chicago)

TCS Observer(Mumbai)

Desktop sharing via UserVue

Voice via conference call line

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UserVue Kung Fu

Normally UserVue places a call directly to the participant – domestic calls ONLY

For international calling, have UserVue dial an international conference call bridge line

Send detailed instructions with invitations for accessing the prototype and the conference call

Watch out for spam filters! Be flexible in case of poor connections Leave plenty of time between

sessions if you want to capture video Practice!

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Card Sorting Online with WebSort

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User Research Part One - Findings

Top 5 Features Ranked by Average “Importance” Score (1 – 10) Case studies (7.8) International locations/language (6.9) White papers (6.4) Articles about Innovation/R&D (6.4) Press Releases (6.3)

Recommendation: Provide easy access to these basic types of content and make certain that they are well structured and well written. Also, take care to NOT overplay the marketing message.

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User Research Part One – Findings cont.

Key Observations: Strong groupings by Industries and Services/Solutions Products, enterprise software, development environments - difficult to

place Case studies - often grouped together on the basis of document type. Certain individual topics like eLearning and enterprise software were more

problematic

Recommendations: Support browsing either by horizontal services or vertical industries Provide alternate ways to find content by type (case study, white paper, etc.) TCS Products are relevant both within their industry context and also

aggregated as a type of offering Special categories as needed to accommodate topics like Enterprise

Software (e.g. SAP)

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User Research Part One – Cultural Considerations

Need to overcome Western assumptions about India-based businesses

NAMED Case studies – industry and location both important

Location, location, location… Need to demonstrate local presence

Language translation – important, but English acceptable depending on location….

Special cases – Europe, Latin America, Eastern Asia

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User Research Part One – Card Sort Diagram

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User Research Part One - Outcomes

Key Outcomes Strategic recommendations and

prioritized feature set Report to client stakeholder

governance board Personas for high-priority user

segments CIO Business Unit Manager Career Seeker Industry Analyst

High level information architecture recommendations

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User Research Part Two - Overview

Goal - get feedback on initial idea for 5 key pages and features:

Participants - 9 participants (volunteers from part one)6 customers1 analyst1 career seeker1 TCS stakeholder

After five interviews, we updated the prototype to incorporate the feedback we had received so far.

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User Research Part Two – Prototyping Methods

Remote user testing with a clickable prototype IA + Design collaboration = Medium Fidelity Prototype created with Visio + SWIPR Task based user testing sessions Measure feedback via Likert Scale Questions

Ease of Use: 1-10 Usefulness: 1-10

Clients and internal team members observe live remotely and watch video captured from sessions

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Prototype Version A - Home

Industries not expected here

Useful feature but not noticed

Too much duplication

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Prototype Version B - Home

Industries and Offerings split, “Solutions” gone

New layout with Flash promo area better shown, No main navigation bar on Home

Content filter tool now more prominent

Thought Leadership instead of Best Practices

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More Prototype Pages – Channel Landing

Global Navigation bar

Interactive channel landing pages

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More Prototype Pages – Topic Node

Channel navigation

Calls to action

Channel content

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More Prototype Pages – Interactive Map

Details available on roll-over.

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User Research Part Two - Outcomes

Overall Acceptance of the prototype was good. Scores improved from version A to version B Some concerns about usefulness of article content

Revised site architecture – Solutions Offerings and Solutions Adjusted labels – e.g. Best Practices Thought Leadership Repositioned tool for finding Case Studies and other resources Adjusted site navigation and approach to main channels on Home Worldwide map concept proved very popular Contact Us scores improved dramatically in version B

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Next Step - Designing the Solution

Next steps: Revised wireframes and created a Functional Specification Content types and descriptive metadata attributes 9 Core Page Types for the content management system

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Designing the Solution – Functional Requirements

Global Page Components Wireframes & Page Requirements

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Designing the Solution – Moving from Design to Build

Design Comps Production Art Site Inventory Site Copy and Content Creation of HTML page templates Content Management System implementation Flash development QA Testing UAT Hosting…

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The Big Moment Arrives!

TCS.COM Relaunch – February 2008

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TCS.com Relaunch - Home

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TCS.com Relaunch – Channel Landing

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TCS.com Relaunch – Topic Node

Screenshot – with callouts?

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TCS.com Relaunch – Content Article

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TCS.com Relaunch – Worldwide Locations

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TCS.com Relaunch – Worldwide: Google Map

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TCS.com Relaunch – Contact Us

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Web Analytics & Measurement

Our Post-Launch Scorecard

Home page abandonment rate down Offerings - the most popular channel Industries Channel funnels traffic to Offerings About isn’t often the first section visited, but gets the second highest

amount of traffic Worldwide pages – 8% of site traffic Thought Leadership gets the fewest visits of any of the main sections, but

includes all main visitor groups: investors, careers, client content. Often followed by white papers and case studies in the same visit Visits occurs late in sessions, not right away

Before – Jan 2007 After – Feb 2008

Ave Pages Per Visit 3.43 pages 4.5 pages

Visit Length 2:35 mins 3 mins

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Web Analytics – Home Page “Heat Map”

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Final Thoughts

Prioritizing features can be challenging - user research helps in making tough decisions

Follow up projects added localized and translated areas of the site

Try remote user testing: When local users are hard to recruit Geographic diversity needed

Prototyping - make your mistakes earlier and get your internal team and the client engaged

Go to India if you get the chance!

Photo courtesy of Scott Mills

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In Closing

Questions and Comments?

Download:

This presentation is available online via SlideShare:http://www.slideshare.net/ChrisFarnum

Contact:

Chris Farnum, Senior Information Architectcfarnum@enlighten.com

EnlightenInteractive Marketing | Web Development | Strategic Consulting

Ann Arbor, Michigan | www.enlighten.com