Lectures slides in Interface and Interaction Design course in Tallinn University. 8 February 2010.

1. Personas in Interaction Design
Hans Põldoja
Tallinn University

2. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share
Alike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative
Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California,
94105, USA.

3. Personas as a design tool
• Determine what a product should do and how it
should behave
• Communicate with stakeholders, developers and
other designers
• Build consensus and commitment to the design
• Measure the design’s effectiveness
• Contribute to marketing
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

4. Personas are based on
research
• Real-world observations
• Ethnographic interviews
• Contextual inquiry
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

5. Ethnographic interviews
• Interview where the interaction happens
• Avoid a fixed set of questions
• Focus on the goal first, tasks second
• Avoid making the user a designer
• Avoid discussion of technology
• Avoid leading questions
• Ask for stories, demonstrations and a tour
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

6. Contextual inquiry
• Context: interview should take place in the
environment where the product is actually used
• Partnership
• Interpretation: reading between the lines
• Focus: direct the interview as new issues arise
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

7. When research is not
possible...
• Information about the users supplied by
stakeholders and subject matter experts
• Market research data such as focus groups and
surveys
• Market segmentation models
• Data gathered from literature reviews and
previous studies
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

8. Persona types
• Primary (1)
• Secondary (0...2)
• Supplemental
• Customer
• Served: non-users affected by the use of the
product
• Negative
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

9. Persona’s elements
• Photo
• Background info (age, gender, computer, tech skills,
disabilities, ...)
• Goals
• Information seeking styles
• Usability needs
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

10. Goals
• Goals must be inferred from qualitative data
• Each goal should be expressed as a simple
sentence
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

11. User goals
Life goals
✓ Be the best at what I do
✓ Learn all there is to know about this field
Experience goals
✓ Don’t feel stupid
✓ Don’t make mistakes
✓ Have fun
End goals
✓ Find the best price
✓ Process the customer’s order
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

12. Non-user goals
Customer goals
✓ Be sure about the child’s safety
Corporate goals
✓ Increase market share
✓ Use resources more efficiently
Technical goals
✓ Support all major browsers
✓ Maintain consistency across platforms
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

13. Examples

14. FeedFordward
scenario needs feature behaviour
Laura wants to set * Guidance * Wizard Laura starts the application and begins
remix your information environment up her application filling in the information in the First
Persona: Laura, 11 June 2007 so it can track her Run Wizard. It asks her for the blogs
Laura Marsden student's blogs and
post to her own
she wants to monitor, and her blog she
wants to post to. It asks her to
blog. define her contexts and she chooses
profile
"I need to "comment on student work for ..." for
each cohort she is teaching.
Laura is a lecturer in Built
Environment Studies at a traditional know what my
University. She's been experimenting
with using blogs for student work students are Initially the Radar has a lot of items,
Laura decides to *Manage attention *Mixer
and has found the experience really
good, but has had problems keeping writing about, track what her *Scan and Decide *Radar and so she decides to try the Mixer.
students have been *Defer action *Context She adjusts upwards the slider for
up with the sheer volume of posts.
As a result she hasn't been
and how it writing over the the course she is teaching tomorrow
past week so she and slides down the others. The
commenting on or highlighting
relates to the can decide whether number of posts in the radar now
particular work in a consistent and
looks a lot more manageable.
methodical manner. 'real world'" to post a comment
on their work. She
background decides rather than Laura scans the Radar and sees a good
She's also aware that also she
* 28 years old, engaged, female comment now she'll point made by one student, but which
hasn't been keeping abreast of new
* PhD in environmental design and planning do it later when would be made better with an
developments, particularly local
* Currently a lecturer in the School of Built she has more quiet appropriate reference. She drags the
construction works and planning
Environment at University time available - item to her "comment on student work
applications that would make good
* Confident experimenter with the Internet but has there's some other for..." context and continues scanning,
cases to look at with her students,
a lot of gaps in her knowledge that keep cropping up work she has to adding a few more items as she goes.
but also with new developments and
and vexing her as she doesn't feel very 'technical' do.
trends in urban planning generally.
* Has used bibliographic tools in the past but Working down the list in the
prefers to rely on a known canon of classic works She decides to *Editing control *Context
"comment on student work for..."
Laura is very enthusiastic about *Publishing control *Entry Editor
and textbooks on her bookshelf write comments context, she creates a new Entry in
using technology in her job, but *Conduits: AtomPP
and publish them and drags into it the Item she
thinks that the amount of time it attributes so that her + Trackback
selected earlier - it appears in
takes her to work with students * enthusiastic - possible early adopter students can see "references".
using her current approach will * less experienced with computers and internet the comments.
mean too much work for larger * less experienced in research
She writes a comment, and then
student groups.
saves the entry. She then drags the
user needs comment onto "Laura's Teaching
Blog". The application publishes the
* Keep up with students posts and be able to make comments
comment, and sends a Trackback
related to them
Ping to the student's blog refenced
* keep up to date with new developments, especially new
in the entry. The Entry alters its
building projects and planning applications
state to show it was published
* generate new ideas for student activities This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0
UK: England & Wales License. To view a copy of this license, visit successfully.
* effective help for when stuck http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/uk/
or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300,
San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.
(The FeedForward Blog, 2007a)

15. FeedForward
scenario needs feature behaviour
Zoe wants to add * Ease of use * Input Manager Zoe drags the URLs of the tags from her
remix your information environment images using browser onto a blank FeedForward
Persona: Zoe, 13 June 2007 particular Flickr InputManager. The application does a quick
Zoe Pascal tags to her mix behind-the-scenes check of the site and
discovers an RSS feed for the
photostream. It adds each one as a new
profile input source
Zoe is very enthusiastic about
"Inspire me!"
She wants to sort *Serendipity *Mixer Zoe plays with the Mixer sliders to alter
visual art, and has been working on a
and play with the *Flexibility *Radar the composition of items in the Radar. She
portfolio of pieces using a lot of uses the Tiles view of Radar, which
images to see if any *Visual sorting *Context
digital collage. She's been using shows previews in squares.
combinations look *Speed *Items View
Flickr and doing Google Image
interesting
searches, but keeps coming back to Zoe creates a new context called
a few key themes. "Friction", and opens its Storyboard. She
drags items into it from the Radar, and
She recently started on a local moves and resizes the items to make an
part-time course in Visual Arts interesting display
which has a series of structured
Zoe drags the "Friction" context onto
activities that she needs to keep on
background Zoe decides she *Flexible export *Items View
the Images conduit. The conduit pops
top of - she has two part-time wants to make a *Images Conduit
* 20 years old, single, female up a "select folder location" dialog, and
jobs, waitressing and working as a full work based on
* GCSEs Zoe selects the Desktop. FeedForward
volunteer at a community project, the items she has
* Currently studying part-time diploma in Visual inspects the items and extracts the
and sometimes finds it difficult to collected and Other scenarios image links; it then downloads the
Arts; working in a cafe
keep track of everything. arranged. She for this user: images to Zoe's Desktop.
* Like using the Internet, especially Flickr and
wants to make a
MySpace
large-scale work Course activities She constructs a collage using the
* No real interest in using bibliographic services -
so needs the full Peer monitoring printouts of the images plus a range of
prefers using books
images not other media, and then scans the result.
* Very visually-oriented
previews. Or another
persona?
attributes
* younger
* experimenter - possible early adopter, but high threshold She decides to Zoe selects "Friction" in Contexts, and
*Ease of editing *Context in the Storyboard view clicks the "New
for retention show a small
*Ease of publishing *Atom Conduit entry" icon. The Entry Editor launches,
* less experienced with computers and internet preview of her
with Attachments and she writes a quick bit of text
* less experienced in research work via her blog
feature about the work. She clicks the "image"
user needs icon in the Editor and selects the
collage JPG on her desktop. She clicks
* Be provoked by inspiring images Save, and the Entry sits on the
* Produce new collages from Internet images Storyboard.
* Keep up to date on what other students (who aren't
MySpace users) are creating She then drags the entry onto the
* Keep notified of course activities and deadlines This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 "Zoe's Blog" icon, and the application
UK: England & Wales License. To view a copy of this license, visit
* very visual mode of thinking and working http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/uk/ publishes the entry and uploads the
or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300,
San Francisco, California, 94105, USA. image attachment.
(The FeedForward Blog, 2007b)

16. Design each interface
for a single primary
persona.
(Cooper & Reimann, 2003)

17. References
• Cooper, A., Reinmann, R. (2003). About Face 2.0: The Essentials of Interaction
Design. Indianapolis, IN: Wiley Publishing, Inc.
• The FeedForward Blog (2007a). How Laura uses FF. http://blogs.cetis.ac.uk/
feedforward/2007/10/18/how-laura-uses-ff/
• The FeedForward Blog (2007b). How Zoe uses FF. http://blogs.cetis.ac.uk/
feedforward/2007/10/24/how-zoe-uses-ff/

18. Thank You!
• hans.poldoja@tlu.ee
• http://imkedesign.wordpress.com