From Chaos to Concept

CH 5MAKE IT MEASURABLE

“There are so many people who can figure costs, and so few who can measure values.”

— John Jennings

* This chapter won't teach you how to set up Google Analytics or any other analytics package. It will help you understand what to look for, while providing some concrete examples of what you can do today to better understand the usage of your systems using tools like Mouseflow.

FaUX

This is a hard chapter to begin because for me, the most pressing topic to discuss when it comes to measuring how well a system works is also one that no one talks about. Fraud happens in every industry, but when it happens in the user experience design industry, I call it FaUX. Fake UX can happen in a few different ways, but the one I want to shed light on is straight-up fraud no matter how you look at it.

The definition of fraud is “wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.” In my career, I've been asked to participate in this sort of behavior three times. Once I recognized what was going on, I refused to continue, or continued without complying with the request. I wanted to bring this topic to light because I think it is a growing trend and something I want to discourage whenever possible.

A UX or Product Design/Management professional often sits in the unique position of helping to define both what gets built and how the success of those efforts will get measured. There is a slight conflict of interest there but in most cases, good ...