Caveat - I am in the same position as yourself and do not in any way consider myself an expert.
That said, I feel your strategy here is entirely dependent on how early on in the process you are working, what your timeframe is, and how much flexibility you have. In my case, I am being brought in during concept stage, with the plan to start developing the software in July, and the opportunity to develop a new branding identity and marketing materials as well as user assistance documentation once the software is well into development. So I have time for all kinds of data collection from the marketing department, and to develop user scenarios, usability testing procedures, and eventually personas and use cases. Following that I plan to do wireframes and paper prototypes with iterative testing and design refinement, based on various concept models for testing usability. In other words, I've been given the time and leeway to go all out on not just usability testing but user experience design including re-architecting documentation and designing marketing materials as well as help systems. On the other hand, you may have very little time or leeway for usability testing. There is definitely information out there for executing "guerilla usability testing". Certainly any testing is worthwhile, and if you Google you will find lots of resources. It is up to you which way you take it. Cheers, Erica . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=29332 ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
