This document discusses Lean UX and validation techniques for products. Some key points include: - Lean UX focuses on user-centered, agile, data-driven and hypothesis-driven approaches to product design. - Various validation techniques are described such as landing page tests, prototype testing, guerrilla user tests, and A/B testing to gather feedback and validate hypotheses. - An MVP or minimum viable product should be both minimum and viable, providing a small whole product to validate rather than an incomplete large product. Metrics like retention, revenue, and conversion can provide insights but require careful analysis.

1. By
Preeti Bhalla
1http://vinsol.com

2.  VALIDATION
 Validation tools and techniques
 DESIGN
 Design Validation
 Design Hacks
 Sketches, Wireframes and prototypes
 PRODUCT
 Measuring a product
 Iterating Faster
2http://vinsol.com

3.  A fundamental change in the way we design products
 Attributes of LEAN UX :
 User Centered
 Agile
 Data Driven
 Fast and Cheap (sometimes)
 Hypothesis validation
3http://vinsol.com (Ruby on Rails, iOS, Android & Ecommerce Apps Development)

4. PROBLEM
MARKET
PRODUCT
4
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5.  It’s a Design Standard
 Company X does it this way
 We don’t have time or money
 We’re new, we’ll do it later
 It’s my Vision, users will screw it up
5http://vinsol.com

6.  Competitor Testing
 Landing Page tests
 Five-Second Tests
 Prototype testing
 Guerrilla User Tests
6http://vinsol.com

7. If you can isolate the 10% of a complicated product, you
can deliver an infinitely simpler product!
 Test someone else’s product
 It points out mistakes that others have made
 Helps you learn about users’ problems
It works even before you have an idea for a product!
7http://vinsol.com

8.  One page sites to see how many people are interested.
 Can be used even before an actual product is build so it’s cheap
 Validates both problem and market
 Draw traffic using Facebook or AdWords and analyse
results
8http://vinsol.com

9.  To test the first impression of the design/product
 Make the user look at your product for five seconds
 Ask participants if they can look at a couple of screens
and answer some questions ( maybe, in exchange of
something)
 Can use usabilityhub.com – Application to test your and
others’ products as well
9http://vinsol.com

10.  Give your potential customers something that has the look
and feel of your product.
 Clickable prototype testing
 Make an interactive prototype
 Decide what tasks to perform
 Ask open-ended questions
 Be careful as it could be labour intensive sometimes
10http://vinsol.com

11.  Cheap and fast method of gathering feedback
 Quickly finds usability flaws in the product
 Can be conducted at any place with a significant footfall
 How to perform guerrilla tests :
 Use a portable kit – Product installed on your laptop, tablet etc
 Ask someone to perform a task
 Observe as the do it
 Do not ask questions in between
11http://vinsol.com

12.  Don’t give a guided tour
 Ask Open-Ended questions
 Follow Up
 Let the User fail
 Look for patterns
12http://vinsol.com

13.  Design Patterns
 Consistency
 Frameworks
 Plug-ins
13http://vinsol.com

14. Design patterns are reusable solutions to a recurring problem
 Understand the difference between copying and being inspired
 Don’t settle for a design pattern without considering your
problem
 Examples : Comments, fetching data , purchase , searching etc
14http://vinsol.com

15.  It makes a design more professional and usable
 Problems with inconsistency :
 Makes products less finished
 Mentally taxing for users
 Try to find out what is making the product inconsistent
in the first place
15http://vinsol.com

16.  Frameworks – Responsive grid line interfaces with decent
styling and functionality
 Use plug-ins instead of building everything from scratch
 These are trivially simple to use
 Saves time and effort
 Example – Bootstrap, Spree, Magento etc
16http://vinsol.com (Ruby on Rails, iOS, Android & Ecommerce Apps Development)

17.  Establish what kind of designer do you actually need
 Try not to judge someone by his random static piece of
work
 Walkthrough his/her projects to see what exactly has
been done by him/her before you hire
17http://vinsol.com (Ruby on Rails, iOS, Android & Ecommerce Apps Development)

18. Diagrammatic representation of flow of an application/
interaction
 Any interaction that needs more than one or two steps has
the potential for branching and hidden errors
 A simple sign up can have a number of steps when it
comes down to a flow diagram
18http://vinsol.com

19. 19http://vinsol.com

20. 20http://vinsol.com (Ruby on Rails, iOS, Android & Ecommerce Apps Development)

21. 21http://vinsol.com

22.  Helps in visualizing how users will move around in the
system
 Creates a clearer picture of how much effort will be
required in design and engineering
 Helps in deciding which states need design
 Helps in visualizing design
22http://vinsol.com

23. Rough representation of your vision of the design
 They are quick and disposable
 Good for starting to communicate your design to others
 Help in deciding where should the elements be in
relation to one another on a page
 Cuts down a lot of documentation work
The only way you can sketch good is to start sketching!
23http://vinsol.com

24. Wireframes lie somewhere between a rough sketch and an
interactive prototype
 Includes all buttons, call-to-actions and navigation
elements of a real product
 Includes all the content that goes into each screen
 Helps in visualizing a deeper level of design
 Helpful in getting usability feedback
24http://vinsol.com

25.  Interaction Design
 It’s about how something works
 Example : Number of steps in checkout, what elements
will be there on each page etc.
 Visual Design
 It’s about how something looks like
 Example : Font sizes. Colors etc
25http://vinsol.com

26.  Visuals enhance information
 Ex : Color schemes of Facebook & Google are very subtle to
enhance information content
 Reinforces desired user actions
 Ex : Encouraging interaction by making buttons look
clickable
 Visuals set the tone of a product
26http://vinsol.com

27.  MVP
 Limited Vs Bad product
 Shipping an MVP
 Metric analysis
27
http://vinsol.com (Ruby on Rails, iOS, Android & Ecommerce Apps Development)

28.  A good MVP has to be both M & V
 Don’t try to do too many things at once, none of which
work properly
 Making a product Minimum doesn’t ensure it’s viability.
 Amazon and Facebook started as MVPs and grew slowly
with time
28http://vinsol.com

29.  A limited product is both Minimum and Viable whereas
a bad product could be minimum but is not viable
 A limited product may not do much but whatever it does,
it does it well
 Aim at making a small whole product than a large bad
product.
29http://vinsol.com

30.  The following mechanisms can be used :
 Opt in – Target early adopters
 Opt out – Target people not looking for a change or an
MVP
 N% rollout – Target a percentage of existing customers
 The new user rollout – Target new set of users
30http://vinsol.com

31.  Retention - A good metric to look out for but be mislead
by forced retention
 Revenue – Don’t sacrifice long term revenue for short
term gains
 Net Promoter Score(NPR) – It’s a good indicator but can
be difficult to collect accurately
31http://vinsol.com

32.  Conversion to paying – Good indicator but skews to measuring
the free part of the product
 Engagement – Good for social networking and gaming
products
 Registration – It’s a good indicator but works better when
it’s lazy
 Customer Service contacts – Could be a tricky indicator
depending on accessibility of services
32http://vinsol.com

33.  Mistakes people make while analysing data :
 Trading-off long term gains for short term effects
 Forgetting the goal of metrics
 Combining data from multiple tests
33http://vinsol.com

34.  Pain Driven design
 Wizard of Oz feature
 Design Validation
 The Two Q’s of validation
 How much to design
 Need Vs Want
34http://vinsol.com

35.  Before you start, figure out what is causing pain for your
users and potential users.
When does Pain Driven Design help?
 Before you have a product
 If you already have a product
 Even if the product is disruptive
 Listen to what your customers have to say
35http://vinsol.com

36. Putting up a front that looks like a real working product
but functions are being carried out manually in the
backend.
 Saves engineering and design time
 Validates feature/product
 Saves time and money
Example : FoT , Aardvark
36http://vinsol.com

37. When starting with an MVP keep the following in mind :
 Design the ‘Test’ first
 Write Design stories (if required)
 Talk about possible solutions with the team
 Sketch a few approaches
 Make a decision (Using Return On Investment(ROI) approach)
 Test and Iterate
37http://vinsol.com

38. QUANTITATIVE APPROACH :
 Includes A/B testing, Cohort Analysis etc
 Can be used alone with one-variable (small) changes
QUALITATIVE APPROACH :
 Includes contextual enquiry , Usability studies, Customer
development interviews etc
 Needed along with Quantitative approach when multiple
variables are involved
38http://vinsol.com

39.  Design what you need to design to learn what you want
to learn
 Design just enough to validate your hypothesis
 Design what is absolutely necessary first and then the
neat
39http://vinsol.com

40. NEAT
• Beautiful
• Cool
• Interesting
NECESSARY
• Easy
• Obvious
• Useful
40http://vinsol.com

41. Give users what they really need and not just what they want!
The three customers example :
Choice
Problem
Value
for
Money
Problem
Social
Proof
Problem
41http://vinsol.com

42. 42http://vinsol.com (Ruby on Rails, iOS, Android & Ecommerce Apps Development)