Listen, learn, and adjust
Sometimes it’s hard to take criticism, even if it’s constructive. In your mind what you’ve done is near perfect because you’ve spent countless hours supposedly perfecting it. Of course this thinking is flawed, you’re only one user with one train of thought.
It’s easy to finish a project, move on and forget but it’s important to review and revise once the end product has been released. An age old practice many designers/developers partake is to brand their name to the work and hang it on the wall as if it’s a painting. While I’m on the fence about signing my name to a project, one practice I do believe in is receiving feedback and improving the end product.
Feedback tool on Ford.com
While visiting the Ford.com site I noticed a link, “site feedback”, at the bottom of the screen. It caught me off guard as I’m more familiar with seeing “site designed by…”. Either I have been living in the dark ages or I just haven’t paid attention to this feature before.
Ford.com is obviously interested not only what users think of their product but also of the effectiveness of their marketing. This isn’t surprising with the state of the auto industry these days, companies are interested in where their advertising dollars are spent and the ROI.
This strategy of collecting user feedback and improving ROI isn’t limited to larger companies with marketing departments and CFOs. Small/medium business can also use these strategies to improve their online presense and compete intelligently and effectively within their markets.
Trust human feedback
Google Analytics and other stats packages can provide a plethora of information on user activity but plain English human feedback is just as effective. Remember, take feedback as a positive thing, it is personal but only to the point of the users experience.
Tags: consumer feedback, linkedin, online marketing, ROI, site improvement, usability