The first release of the app, developed by shopkick, works only on iPhone, but an Andriod version is not far behind. The app uses a proprietary hardware recognition system rather than GPS, so Best Buy is investing heavily in this technology. The app can be used for scanning barcodes, so many more potential applications can be developed to enhance the shopping experience.

Since my main interest is in enhancing the shopping experience rather than persuading shoppers to buy things they didn’t know they wanted (i.e. Pull vs. Push), I’m thinking about the kinds of in-store purchase intelligence the app could deliver. For example, when buying a home theater system, I would like to be able to scan a receiver and see:

• Related items that I need to make the receiver function properly
• Video about installation
• Table of comparative features with special attention to moving one notch up or down in price and seeing the corresponding items which are in-stock and their feature sets
• Discount coupon based on bundling options
• Financing options
• Add to cart and checkout in the aisle

I would also like a big red “Hide Me” button to turn off Best Buy’s awareness of my whereabouts.

Retailers are just beginning to scratch the surface of digital shopping design. It’s an exciting time to be in the multichannel design strategy business, other than all this talk about a double dip recession.

If my panel is selected, I will present methods Usography has developed over the past couple of years for structured analysis of social media using principles from ethnography as a theoretical foundation.

The presentation will focus on identifying needs, gaps and opportunities through virtual participant observation, discourse analysis, identification and operationalization of key dimensions, audience segmentation, formulation of design concepts, and reporting results. There is a significant time element to overlay on the process, because one major benefit of social media as a data collection method is that it is real time. Emerging trends appear in social contexts long before they are surfaced to broader attention through traditional media. This has implications for designers, because there is a latent period between idea and realization, so understanding the trends in a particular product domain is an important aspect of successful innovation (unless you are designing in a market-agnostic vacuum – possible, but not widespread).

My experience with this topic stems from structured review of social media on e-commerce sites. Customers’ passion really strikes you as they express their pain and frustration to peers. But just reading through a mountain of remarks, with no benchmark as to honesty or authenticity or relevance, is not necessarily going to be a fruitful exercise. This is where ethnographic methods come in. They are especially suited to extracting key dimensions from massive amounts of discourse, leading to a deep understanding of the underlying scaffolding that drives behavior.

The trick will be finding a happy medium between tediously theoretical and plebeian pap.

Please go over and vote a thumbs up at: http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/8232

Copyright 2010, Paul Bryan, Usography Corporation (http://www.usography.com)

Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/uxexperts

Retail Ethnography by Usography

The above are basic in-process ethnographic study observations; we haven’t started coding the transcripts.

On the university campus, which is 5 minutes from my home, I see them on their mobile devices constantly. But in the shopping process, they refer very infrequently to mobile technology, and when prompted, they do not envision a significantly larger role. They seem far more likely to use mobile technology for social contact than for shopping (duh!), but I’m surprised at the extent to which that is true. I expected some inkling of a comparison shopping usage pattern using mobile devices.

When conducting ethnographic studies, Usography researchers sketch out a map or diagram of the observed space, whether it is a store, an airport, or an area of a home. The most significant elements of the environment are represented either literally or conceptually. Flows that represent activities or processes are designated by arrows or other directional visual elements. The map can be a snapshot in time, but more typically interactions and physical paths are timed and represented as a holistic view over time. We usually include a few codes at the bottom of the interaction maps that indicate common types of behaviors or expressed emotions, such as consulting a salesperson (S) or acting frustrated (F).

Copyright 2009, Paul Bryan, Usography Corporation (http://www.usography.com)

Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/uxexperts

After  period of observation in the field, we use intercept or in-depth interviews to elicit explanations of terminology, decision factors, perception of what’s most important, motivations and beliefs behind behaviors, and other variables of interest. The interviews may be with participants that we have observed, or may be with “informants” who understand behaviors from an insider perspective, and who collaborate with us in a structured way. The informant may be a salesperson who has just finished interacting with a customer, or may be a manager or gatekeeper in other business settings. Interviews may be unstructured or semi-structured. A snowball or chain sampling method may deployed if the interviews are unstructured, but in commercial settings it is more common to screen participants on the basis of a set of pre-defined criteria.

Copyright 2009, Paul Bryan, Usography Corporation (http://www.usography.com)

Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/uxexperts

2. Observation is a primary data collection method, resulting in “thick” descriptions.

Ethnography is important as a research method when there are key factors that participants either can’t or prefer not to verbalize for one reason or another. For this reason, observation is an essential ingredient for ethnographic research. Observation is either unstrucure or semi-structured. If the variables are understood to a degree that a structured approach can be formulated, then ethnography is not the best method to use. Field notes provide a rich, or “thick,” description of behaviors and events.

Copyright 2009, Paul Bryan, Usography Corporation (http://www.usography.com)

Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/uxexperts

1. The location of research is where the activity under study takes place, i.e. it’s native context.
With research intended to guide the design of a web site, the context of the activity may be where people use the web site, or where they conduct other activities related to the topic of the web site. For example, if the ethnographic study intends to guide design of a vacation resort web site, the context could be the participant’s home, where they use the web site and engage in planning and reminiscing activities. Or, alternatively, the context could be on site at the resort. If the problem we are trying to solve is well-defined, then the location context should be very easy to identify.

Copyright 2009, Paul Bryan, Usography Corporation (http://www.usography.com)

Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/uxexperts