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Page: 1Usability sessions – Courier Mail Sport Refresh - All ObservationsUsability session results

ID Service Affected area Finding Suggested improvement NP P/N Priority Users

1 Current Courier Mail Home Home page Users had interest in specific sports, to get information on these sports they tended

to use the drop-down navigation to get directly to the sub-index page for those

sports. Rather than go to the Sport index or scroll down to the news module on the

homepage.

Make sure Sub-Index & story pages include prominent and clear links to the

Sport Index page & other Sport-sub index pages for users interested in

multiple sports N 3 3

2 Courier Mail Sports Index Header/Style Was concerned that the variation between the CM Homepage & Sport index header

(larger/orange) was too great and would confuse users. None of the 3 participants

complained or even commented on the variationp 3

2 Courier Mail Sports Index Header Banner shaped content panels above navigation invisible to users. "What's Hot,

"What's Not" & Fixtures table placed in this position were completely invisible to

users, who started scanning the page from the navigation down.

Don't place primary content in this position, Split content panel to not

resemble dimensions of banner ad, visually connect to the navigation bar

(orange colour?). Alternatively shrink header size by moving this content

down into the page below the navigation

NP N 3 3

3 Courier Mail Sports Index Header Navigation bar very well received and relied upon. Large, readable font size, good

white space. User's looked here first rather than down the page when requiring a

specific content type e.g. NRL newsNP P 3

4 Courier Mail Sports Index Horizontal modules Equated by all users with a easier to understand page, easy to scan and see what's

available NP P 3

5 Courier Mail Sports Index Page structure Horizontal module layout worked well to help the user understand what content

was available but once the user reached the feature gallery they tended to stop

scrolling. As if they'd decided prematurely that they'd seen all the important

content.

Try to keep horizontal modules of related content each with a clear heading

at the top left (like AFL/NRL) to encourage users to scroll and take in the

whole page. NP N 2 3

6 Courier Mail Sports Index Page structure When asked to view video / images related to AFL/NRL users went looking for this

content in the modules with that heading rather than the Video/Gallery modules

Include video/Image references in the Sport modules themselves. Make

sure that the headings for the picture/video modules are clear and follow

the same top left pattern & style as the above sports related modulesN 1 2

7 Courier Mail Sports Index Top story carousel User's were not clear what the orange navigation dots were, overlooking the fact

that there were multiple stories. Two users considered them to be related to the

video - indicating progress of the video or numbers of videos.

Set the image carousel to animate slowly, put numbers 1-4 in each of the

dots, move them away from the video link, add alt tag with headline of

stories behind dots?. Alternatively consider different interaction model:

Arrow pagination as with the feature gallery below, or a module where the

different story headlines can be seen without having to interact (e.g. League

Central module)

N 3 2

8 Courier Mail Sports Index Draggable team preference Easily understood planned behaviour, was what user's wanted & expected (change

content in the module to reflect the selected team dragged to "My Team" panel).

However user's also expected to be able to access general NRL news & news for

different teams in this module and were unsure how to "reset" the module. Seemed

cumbersome to drag different team or "all team" symbol to to change view after

setting preference

Some alternatives:

- Add another icon next to team badges for "Best of NRL/AFL" Make the

module content change on clicking the teams/general icon, not just dragging

- Don't use draggable interface. Make the drag to area represent "Top

content", when a user clicks a team make the team icon bigger, results in tab

design where the first tab = top content for all teams. Make it "sticky" so that

the team last picked is shown by default.

- Make "NRL" header load in top general stories rather than one for a specific

team. Make sure a very prominent additional link is added to NRL index

N 3 3

9 Courier Mail Sports Index NRL/AFL modules No explicit way to access all content for the sport represented by the module. When

asked users said they would go up to the navigation bar, click the header for the

module or one of the stories where other content would be visible.

User's actions would all work but adding explicit "more content like this"

link should increase views of the indexes (see DT change)N 2 3

10 Courier Mail Sports Index Most Read Comments "What You're Saying" header not clear to users. Understood they were comments

from users but unclear why they were being presented here?

Heading does not give sense that these are picked by the editors, that they

likely to be quality comments or that if you write a goed comment it might

be showcased here. Change to something like "Your best comments"N 1 3

11 Courier Mail Sports Index Most Read Comments User's unclear how or why to do anything with this module Brief quotes seem out of context & link to read more of the comment or

related comments not clear to the users. Change layout to present longer

comment and have visible link to the story with explanation e.g. "Username

commenting on <heading of story>"

N 2 3

12 Courier Mail Sports Index Most Read Comments Default username "Guest" confusing, user was not sure what it meant Don't feature comments by anonymous users and/or change label for

anonymous users, to something like "Anonymous" or "Unnamed

commenter"

NP N 1 1

13 Courier Mail Sports Index Stats/Ladder modules User's found it difficult to read labels on horizontal graph of player stats and found

the player details obscured the chart.

Preferred the red AFL module because player names were displayed

horizontally & not obscured by popup dialog. Preferred the list of stat types

over the dropdown selection because can be read and clicked immediately

without investigating what's available.

NP N 1 1

14 Courier Mail Sports Index Stats/Ladder modules Found Ladder/TV guide more valuable than detailed player stats Have Ladder be the default view especially if you can indicate the user's

team on the ladder. Players involved in Tipping interested in player stats

more.NP N 1 1

15 Courier Mail Sports Index Stats/Ladder modules List of stats in the dropdown on the AFL stats module got cut off (Chrome) - so user

couldn't see or access all the available stats

Reduce number of stats? Make dropdown scrollable? Show pane with two

columns? One user preferred similar NRL panel eve though less stats were

available because the stats were visible and clickable without interactionNP N 1 1

16 Courier Mail Sports Index Secondary sport modules "Cricket" & "Rugby Union" modules were overlooked by two users who returned to

the navigation when asked to view this content.

Change order of items. Place secondary sport modules to the left of "Latest

News" module to take advantage of the visual pattern of the Orange

headings.N 2 2

17 Courier Mail Sports Index Secondary sport modules User's didn't recognise the orange dots as representing different stories and seeing

the one image & text assumed only one story was represented

User's did identify the heading for these modules as a way to get through to

more stories for the sport but the panels might be more effective if more

stories were listed in the module - similarly to the current modules with one

large story & image followed by three story links and a link to "More

Cricket"

N 2 3

18 Courier Mail Sports Index Gallery / Feature gallery When asked to view more image galleries users overlooked the row of image

thumbnails and tried to click the orange "gallery" header.

Make the "Gallery" label for the feature gallery look less like the main

heading/links. Consider creating a single horizontal module with all images

in it & the heading "Sports Galleries" or similar. Alternatively move the

"Other Galleries" above the feature gallery and label it an orange header in

the same style as AFL/NRL above

N 2 3

19 Courier Mail Sports Index Twitter panel Participants didn't seem to recognise the purpose or value of the "Sport Tweets"

panel. New it was something to do with Twitter but no that the tweets were from

teams and players.

Add short one line explanation to the header of the panel something like

"Recent tweets from teams & players"N 1 2

20 Courier Mail Sports Index Twitter panel "Follow Us" not recognised as a button that can be clicked to follow the CM's tweets. "Buttonize" it.

1 1

21 Courier Mail Sports Index NRL TV Guide Hard to read the schedule on the TV guide Increase the contrast between the text and the grey backgroundN 1 0

22 Courier Mail Sports Index Unselected tabs ooon modules Unselected tabs "Hot Topics", "AFL videos" & "Join the debate" not recognised as

user interface. User's scrolled back up to other modules or the main navigation when

asked to find content located behind these tabs.

Make them look more clickable: e.g. underline, lighter background colour

N 2 2

23 Courier Mail Sports Index Facebook social plugin "Join the debate" not recognised as a tabbed area but also it's function not

understood.

Add short explanation of why user might want to like the CM on face book?

N 1 1

24 Courier Mail Sports Index Video Very positive response to video not auto-playing even though it's embedded on the

page NP P 3 1

25 Courier Mail Sports Index Image gallery Very positive response to captions for each image in the feature galleryNP P 1 1

26 Courier Mail Sports Index Promos / SuperCoach Super coach promos were the first thing seen and commented on by all three users.

Described by users as Ads for external services e.g "betfair" betting service

There may be some advantage to styling these promos to look more like the

mastheads own brand/style to make it clear that these are services offered

by the masthead with the credibility/authority that the masthead has. N 1 3

27 Courier Mail Rugby Index Story listing All three users loved the easy to scan vertical listing of stories. Much preferred this

simplicity to the current CM sub-index layouts NP P 3 3

28 Courier Mail Rugby Index Share interface Couldn't accurately guess what the orange plus was for. Suggest using an icon that looks like "share" e.g. one of the share tools,

email etc. Or add a link/button labelled "Share" to the list of options under

"Comments" rather than hiding it under the iconN 1 3

29 Courier Mail Rugby Index Fixtures module Invisible in this location. Banner shaped content panels above navigation invisible to

users. "What's Hot, "What's Not" & Fixtures table placed in this position were

completely invisible to users, who started scanning the page from the navigation

down.

Important content/navigation tool like this should be located below the

navigation. Ideally across the top of the page.

N 3 3

30 Courier Mail Rugby Index Fixtures module Not apparent that user can click through to see game page (future game, live

coverage, results)

The fixtures module as displayed in the mock-up users viewed had no

obvious indication that the module could be clicked to access game/team

pages. Suggest making date/time headers look clickable and possibly

underlining teams on rollover?

NP N 2 3

31 Courier Mail Rugby Index Fixtures module One user expressed interest in knowing when the game would be broadcast on TV -

not just when it was to be held. NP N 1 1

32 Courier Mail Rugby Index Right hand column Not obvious to users that this column contained Rugby Union related content. User's

tended to ignore the right-hand column and not notice that there were content

options related to the current index available

Locate all directly related features/content at the top of the right hand

column and add orange section style heading (linking to the sub-index page)N 2 3

33 Courier Mail Sports Story Story text size Users suggested the text size was good and easy to readN 3 3

34 Courier Mail Sports Story Right hand column Not obvious to users that this column contained Rugby Union related content. User's

tended to ignore the right-hand column and not notice that there were content

options related to the current story/sport available

Locate all directly related features/content at the top of the right hand

column and add orange section style heading (linking to the sub-index page)N 2 3

35 Courier Mail Sports Story Embedded modules "Related links" / Poll modules embedded in the story so that it wrapped around

them were noticed immediately and highly effective. NP P 3 3

36 Courier Mail Sports General perception Users Felt he new design was fresh & friendlier, less traditional and more

interesting. Yet compared to the even flashier Bigpond version they said it had

authority/credibility of the news organisation

NP P 3

Usability sessions - Courier Mail Sport Refresh Page: 2

Usability test results

Refreshed Sport IndexCurrent CM Home

1

Tended to navigate directly to specific

sports by the dropdown navigation

rather than visit the Sport Index

Tended to scroll back up to the

navigation to access specific sports/

index rather than look in this panel

for links to index pages

About the participants

General observations

Not confused by branding/header size

and style change

Content panel above navigation in

similar shape to banner ignored by

users

Good sized, legible navigation options

well received

Not understood as navigation, multiple

stories. Assumed to be related to video

Assumed to bring up team related

content in this module. Unsure how to

re-access general news for the sport

Not seen as topic of comment or link to

full story more comments

No clear call to action to access NRL

index and all related content

Perceived as an advertisement for a

third party betting service. Masthead

credibility no conveyed

Visible stat options more appealing

than dropdown access to more options

Vertical names & overlaying dialog

perceived as difficult to use/scan

Dropdown list cut off in the browser

(Chrome)

Ladder & TVGuide seen as more

valuable than Season Stats

Existence of multiple stories not

realised

These secondary sport modules

overlooked. Placing to right of “Latest

news” might help

Seen as a link like NRL / AFL above

Unselected tabs not recognised as tabs

that can be clicked to reveal content

Not confused by branding/header size

and style change

Recognised as Twitter but value of

content not understood

Not recognised as being a list of

picture galleries like the large feature

gallery

Sport Index

Three guys. 29, 31 & 55 yrs.

All followers of sports, regular users of sports

media

Daily Courier Mail readers

2 read the website regularly, 1 mainly paper

(but also iPhone)

All follow multiple sports

1 tech sophisticated, 2 moderate internet users

All had regular routine of sports news

consumption

Primarily interested in reading news stories for

a few specific sports

Less interested in video and picture galleries

Limited interest in participating (comments,

polls, social media)

Interested in following several teams

Interest in stats from those interested in tipping

All liked the style & tone of of the refresh:

“less traditional” , “fresh”

All found the horizontal modular layout

easier to use & locate content on: “Cleaner”,

“Easier to find stuff”

See the final page of this document for all

recorded observations, their priority and

possible solutions

User’s tended to stop scrolling down

the page at this point. Possibly

because they see the last of the

horizontal modules as where the

important content ends.

Comments/Poll up top but these users

not interested and tended to scroll

quickly to the NRL/AFL news stories

Usability sessions - Courier Mail Sport Refresh Page: 3

Usability test results

Refreshed Sport Sub-Index (Rugby Union)

Not recognised as clickable or where

share functions might be located.

Not noticed by users above the navigation bar. Not perceived as way to

access match results, live scores etc.

Users did not look to the right hand column for more content related to this

sport

Usability sessions - Courier Mail Sport Refresh Page: 4

Usability test results

Refreshed Sport Story Page v1

These embedded elements were

noticed immediately and appreciated

Refreshed Sport Story Page v2

Not noticed by users above the

navigation bar.

Usability sessions - Courier Mail Sport Refresh Page: 5

Usability test results

Current CM Sport Index Brisbane Times (Fairfax)Despite the large dynamic headlines

and imagery perceived as lacking

authority and credibility of the

Courier Mail

Bigpond Sport

Perceived as being traditional and

boring, not having the energy of the

refreshed version