2 min
Blink UX is a user experience research and design firm specializing in digital products. What really differentiates Blink UX is our research: All of our client and project recommendations are based on actual end-user observational data.
2 min
Some airline apps can truly help make travel a breeze, and others are a bit more turbulent. So what differentiates a great app from a mediocre one? Here are my five tips for success.
1 min
Recently, Karen Clark Cole and Blink UX were named to the Women Presidents’ Organization’s 7th Annual 50 Fastest Growing Women-Owned/Led Companies award list. I sat down with Karen to learn more about her involvement with WPO and what it meant to her to win this award.
3 min
We are often asked by potential clients if we “do Agile.” Being part of an outside firm, fitting into a client’s agile process can be a curious and interesting challenge given the variety of ways we see agile methodologies applied.
3 min
At their core, wireframes are an efficient, iterative communication tool.
2 min
As a user researcher here at Blink UX, I’ve spent some time assessing and testing websites for the game industry. Game websites have a variety of audiences with unique goals, but the most notable ones are these:
2 min
We take pride in helping our clients design and build exceptional user experiences. So it comes as no surprise that we would want to do the same thing with our usability labs – ensure the user experience for our clients is seamless, innovative, and effective by keeping “technology” out of their way.
1 min
For the past several months, Blink has been working with a truly exceptional and inspiring woman named Rani Hong, co-founder and president of the Tronie Foundation, an international non-profit organization dedicated to end modern day slavery and human trafficking.
1 min
We were thrilled when the Sounders approached Blink to help them design their new MatchPass loyalty program in late 2012. There were three major components to the project: 1. Conduct primary end-user research to learn what fans wanted in a Sounders loyalty program and 2. Design an intuitive and engaging website and 3. Conduct usability testing for the MatchPass website prototype.
1 min
Blink has worked with a variety of healthcare providers over the last several years to understand the users of their websites. The results of this work have been research-based recommendations and design solutions that address many common challenges. Today, we are publishing a whitepaper that summarizes the challenges providers face online, and how a research-based approach to user experience can help meet the needs of their patients and employees.
2 min
A list of usability findings can be difficult to parse: they are long, highlight negative aspects of your design, and no matter how diligently your team works, they never seem to disappear completely. Despite these facts, there is hope.
0 min
Have you ever wondered what would happen if you did a usability test of fruit? We did. Blink created this fun look at something near and dear to our hearts – usability testing. We hope you enjoy it!
5 min
I was asked recently what steps we take to make participants feel more comfortable with in-home interviews or observations. This article contains some practical tips about ways to build trust and rapport prior to and while interacting with participants in their homes. Why bother? Because raising comfort levels leads to better research observations, which is why we go out to people’s houses, condos, or apartments in the first place!
1 min
Stakeholder interviews, user research, user testing—all are integral to our approach on a Blink design engagement—and all require superior note-taking skills. Enter the Livescribe Smartpen. I’ve found the Smartpen to be an invaluable tool for note taking of all kinds, but particularly for note taking during research.
1 min
Understanding user expectations has enabled us to make detailed recommendations and help clients deliver great user experiences. From our research, here are two examples showing how expectations influence the user experience.
5 min
Blink’s new office space had many requirements; workstations, client meeting rooms, project collaboration rooms, training and event space and most importantly, state-of-the-art usability labs with adjoining client observation rooms. All this, plus it had to be a highly usable space, comfortable to work in and look good.
5 min
When Blink conducts usability evaluations, we seek to do more than simply identify the pain points of a web site or application. Our goal is to uncover users’ honest impressions and the impact of these impressions on the overall user experience.
7 min
Blink once evaluated an in-flight email application for a client. It had already been in use as a beta and the client was aware of a few wrinkles in the UI. So it came as a shock when not a single participant in the study could figure out how to open an email in the application. All the while, a feedback option had been available.
5 min
Understanding and attending to the user experience, in addition to the end product, across platforms as a guiding focus for design, can encourage greater customer satisfaction and minimize user confusion.
0 min
The mobile device and application market has grown rapidly over the last few years, allowing users to stay in touch and work with data more effectively on the go. Text entry methods vary significantly across devices, raising an important question: Which input methods actually work well for entering text?
3 min
Great websites guide users to content with elegance and ease, through usable information architecture and a pleasing visual design. But, user experience doesn’t stop there. Users spend more time engaging with your site’s content than using its navigation or admiring its style. Once on the right page, it’s the quality of writing that delivers the value.
5 min
Social networking and content sharing web sites like Facebook and Flickr make it easy for users to connect and share details of their lives with others. Unfortunately, it is all too common to hear stories of users unknowingly sharing embarrassing status updates or photos with their professional colleagues, due to misunderstanding or ignoring available privacy settings in these sites.
3 min
When designing a new system (or redesigning an existing one), it’s important to keep the user’s real-world context in mind. A lot of thought and effort will hopefully go into making sure the product delivers the right set of features, has the right look and feel, and abides by standard UI conventions. But designs that seem solid conceptually can still fail if they do not take into account how real users will interact with them in the real world.
3 min
In the ideal world, every design decision would be informed by user research or usability testing. But in the real world, that’s not always possible. Sometimes, you just have to rely on your own internal decision‐making abilities. Below are some tips we’ve found helpful for increasing the odds of a successful user experience, regardless of the resources available for a project:
