The Barnes & Noble eReader app that EffectiveUI created beat out Amazon’s Kindle and moved to the number one spot for free book apps. The good news just keeps coming. Is it Friday already?
A Herff Jones sales rep forwarded this note from an eDesign user:
“Megan, I started going through the tutorials on eDesign and after about 10 minutes the feeling I had could be compared to when I fell in love with my husband. I liked what I had heard about him; I liked what I had observed from afar; but when we actually got to spend time together, I KNEW very soon that he was “the one.” And after 20 years, he is still the love of my life AND my best friend. I must confess that I am in love again!! eDesign is definitely “the one” for this new Yearbook Advisor. I will be so happy when we have the paperwork taken care of and my students see eDesign. They are going to be great with this program. And I am truly anticipating when returning students start working with eDesign and begin experiencing the “real Yearbook experience.”
Thank you both for your help. It is great to work with someone with enthusiasm. Our school hasn’t experienced a lot of that in the recent past but thankfully a new day has dawned – for our school, our students and their Yearbook!”
This totally made my day. Getting feedback like this about a product I helped design refuels and refreshes completely.
I think we (as an industry) create personas that are stuck in time. We don’t know who they were or who they will become. I’m not much like who I was five years ago, most people change quite a lot with time. That kind of information HAS to be important – especially for building brand loyalty. My background effects what I do, what I buy. Who I am. I am more than who am am right now. Everyone is. Maybe personas need to be too, or else they become caricatures.
During some user research we’re doing for a client related to the department of defense, we discovered a group that is totally irresponsible, porn-surfing, binge-drinking, low-tech and yet massive and very homogeneous group of late teens or early 20s men (boys still) in the military. The persona we would create based on the prevailing trend for the demographic wouldn’t have been pretty, and we were afraid the client might find our assessment to be disparaging at best. Their goals don’t go very far, and they certainly aren’t the type of customer the client has in mind… yet.
We already had another persona, a 24 year old male who is just starting to get his act together. So we gave him a back story. He may have been reckless a couple of years back and not very interested in the products our client hocks, but he’s getting there.
By understanding where he comes from, and maybe even where he’s going, we can design a product that fits around the stages of his life and is something that goes beyond filling a very limited and timstamped need. Maybe this will be a new trend in personas. Maybe not. But I think it’s pretty interesting.
Anthony Franco has posted a video of the session on his blog. It’s an iPhone video, which I think is pretty great even though a bit shaky. Thanks for posting this Anthony.
Check it out: Anthony’s Blog