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How to use interactive forms in the product development feedback cycle

0 Comments | Permalink | Tag(s): how-to adobe customer-feedback tips product-development

In product development, there is (or at least should be) a constant stream of feedback coming from your users to inform your development decisions. This feedback can come from a variety of formats depending on where you are in the development cycle. You might start out with interviews, contextual inquiry and observation, progress to storyboards and prototyping, but sooner or later you'll be able to put something in users' hands.

Recently, I began a pilot site evaluation for a product I'm working on at TI where I started using interactive pdf forms to gather and compile data from my pilots. In addition to site visits, email, and web surveys, interactive forms can fill a nice little niche in the feedback cycle. For example, surveys are perfect vehicles for assessing product performance at specified intervals. (e.g., alpha release, beta release, end of project release, etc.) Observation and email communication can be a great tool for getting a sense of how people are using your product, their general likes and dislikes, as well as where your product may need improvement, but managing all the feedback can be a daunting process, especially if you have a large number of customers.

This is where an interactive usage form can come in handy - the form can gather a set of common data across a range of users, and provide a way to analyze that data in an quantitative way. This can be a great supplement to the kind of summative assessment you get from a survey, and can also put some of your anecdotal observations into perspective. For instance, feedback forms may reveal some usage patterns you didn't expect in your product. You may also find some correlations amomg certain usage patterns, environmental variables, and product bugs that would be difficult to uncover in an SQA lab. As I go through an example, all this may start to make some sense...

The following example should give you the basic idea of how to:

Design and configure an... | Posted:02.24.08

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Search: Text Preferences: RSS Feed		Entries tagged with: adobe... How to use interactive forms in the product development feedback cycle 0 Comments \| Permalink \| Tag(s): how-to adobe customer-feedback tips product-development In product development, there is (or at least should be) a constant stream of feedback coming from your users to inform your development decisions. This feedback can come from a variety of formats depending on where you are in the development cycle. You might start out with interviews, contextual inquiry and observation, progress to storyboards and prototyping, but sooner or later you'll be able to put something in users' hands. Recently, I began a pilot site evaluation for a product I'm working on at TI where I started using interactive pdf forms to gather and compile data from my pilots. In addition to site visits, email, and web surveys, interactive forms can fill a nice little niche in the feedback cycle. For example, surveys are perfect vehicles for assessing product performance at specified intervals. (e.g., alpha release, beta release, end of project release, etc.) Observation and email communication can be a great tool for getting a sense of how people are using your product, their general likes and dislikes, as well as where your product may need improvement, but managing all the feedback can be a daunting process, especially if you have a large number of customers. This is where an interactive usage form can come in handy - the form can gather a set of common data across a range of users, and provide a way to analyze that data in an quantitative way. This can be a great supplement to the kind of summative assessment you get from a survey, and can also put some of your anecdotal observations into perspective. For instance, feedback forms may reveal some usage patterns you didn't expect in your product. You may also find some correlations amomg certain usage patterns, environmental variables, and product bugs that would be difficult to uncover in an SQA lab. As I go through an example, all this may start to make some sense... The following example should give you the basic idea of how to: Design and configure an... \| Posted:02.24.08
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