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by Rachel

Next Manchester Event: Monday 6th Feb, Applied techniques for conversion rate optimisation:

25/01/2012 in Events

Eventbrite URL: http://nuxmcrfeb2012.eventbrite.com/

Paul Rouke, Head of Usability & Conversion at PRWD will share some stories about the user engagement sessions he has conducted and the key learnings which have developed his view and understanding of the conversion world. You will also learn about some applied techniques that brands use to improve their site conversion rate.

Date & Time: Monday 6th Feb 2012 at 6:30pm

Venue:  Code Computerlove – Ducie House, Ducie Street, Manchester, M1 2JW (The entrance is on Peak Street, look for the cartoon robot sign above the door)

Paul Rouke:

In 1999 Paul started working in the online space, joining as a web designer at Great Universal Stores, at the time the UK’s biggest home shopping business. Over the next 7 years he spent considerable time with end users understanding why they do what they do when shopping online and how site experiences can be improved so that they shop more often and spend more money than what they intended doing. In turn helping the online channel become 40% of overall revenue by the time he left in 2006.

Since 2006 Paul has run his own usability and conversion optimisation consultancy PRWD (PRoductivity Without Difficulty) in Manchester, working with clients including as Speedo, Lakeland, Bank of America, Monsoon Accessorize, Manchester Tourist Board, Stella McCartney, Booking.com, Speedy Hire and All Saints. Paul also works alongside digital agencies such as CTI, Ampersand and Building Blocks.

On any given day of the week Paul can be found either moderating user testing sessions, conducting expert site evaluations, writing user testing reports, speaking at conferences, delivering public and in-house training courses, providing in-house consultancy, having planning or presentation sessions with clients – or for about 2 hours every few months writing guest posts for Econsultancy, such as ‘WTF is usability best practice anyway?’ or ‘9 women x 9 hours = 9 usability insights‘.

You can follow PRWD(@prwd) and Paul(@paulrouke) on twitter.

Prototyping with Mobile First, Axure and Balsamiq

04/01/2012 in #nuxuk, Events, News, User Experience

The next Leeds event will be on Monday 23 January

This is a free, public event

Full Details & Registration on Eventbrite

Presenter

@keithdoyle from Navopia

Giveaways

Sponsor

Venue and refreshments provided by Simple Usability

Leeds Event Monday 28 March

21/02/2011 in Events

This is a free public event by Northern User Experience (Yorkshire)

Tickets from http://nux032811.eventbrite.com/

We have two great sessions planned for the next NUX Yorkshire!

  • UCD: the 70 year journey: is modern UX reinventing the wheel? (Ian Franklin)
  • Tricks and Tools of the Trade (Open Space)

Note that we will be starting earlier than usual at 6:30pm – this is the new time for all future Leeds events

UCD: the 70 year journey: is modern UX reinventing the wheel? (Ian Franklin)

This session aims to make people aware that usability, UX and UCD has a long history and its roots in applied psychology, organisational psychology and ergonomics. Many of the issues faced now are very similar; so although the medium may be different (e.g. websites, social media, mobile phone touch pads) the user issues are the same.

Portrait of Ian FranklinAbout Ian

Chartered Psychologist and Ergonomist who first got interested in UX in 1984 when it was called HCI. After a short spell in user centred design research, Ian worked for the Dept of Work and Pensions on the design of in house systems (green screen then GUI). This included the development of a UCD methodology in the 1990′s which lead to him contributing to the UCD standard ISO 13407. His final work for the DWP was the development of the first touch screen job search kiosks in Jobcentres and the first job search website in 1999 which went live in 2001. During these projects Ian joined the IT company EDS and continued his work in UX. Ian is now self-employed. His passion is the application of psychology to UX and true participatory design, involving the end user in the design process as an active breathing participant. Mantra: technology should be done WITH users and NOT to them.

Ian doesn’t Twitter or Blog, but he is on LinkedIn and contribute to the discussion there. His public profile is here: http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/ian-franklin/3/547/a86

Tricks and Tools of the Trade (Open Space)

At the planning session in January, there was much interest in tricks and tools of the trade. In this session, people will have a chance to share their tricks and tools – ask other people for ideas – and we will post the list of tools & tricks discussed on this website after the event. However, if you want the inside infomation, you’ll have to come to the event itself!

What is Open Space?

Open Space will be facilitated by Keith Doyle. In the session, everyone will have a chance to say what they’d like to discuss, then we discuss it! For more info, search the web for Open Space Technology!

Event Details

Venue: Simple Usability, Round Foundry Media Centre, Foundry Street, Leeds, LS11 5QP

Time: 6:30pm to 8:30pm

Let us know you’re coming

For free tickets, http://nux032811.eventbrite.com/

This is a free public event, if you can register for a ticket then it helps us know how many people are coming.

Twitter

hashtag: #nuxuk

Usability and UX 101 Talk in Manchester – 10th Feb

24/01/2011 in Events

Details are below of an upcoming event I’m talking at, at MMU in Manchester.

“Usability & User Experience 101″

  • When: Thursday, February 10, 2011 from 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM (GMT)
  • Where: Michael E. Porter Lecture Theatre, MMU Business School, Aytoun Street, M1 3GH Manchester
  • Who with: Paul Rouke, Head of Usability at PRWD
  • Twitter Hashtag: #UX101
  • Register for FREE: http://saschoolux101.eventbrite.com/

Read the rest of this entry →

Leeds Event Monday 24 January 2011

07/12/2010 in Events

The next Northern User Experience event will be on Monday 24 January at Simple Usability in Leeds. We have three great sessions lined up:

  1. Remote Usability Testing
  2. Brainstorming of ideas for upcoming NUX sessions
  3. Interaction Architecture for Startups and Digital Agencies

Read the rest of this entry →

Usability Event in Manchester 28th Jan

15/01/2009 in News, Usability

Some people may be interested to know of a free usability event being run by Manchester Digital on the 28th January 2009. I will be speaking at the event along with Judith Garmen and Pete Bagnall.

It’s focused on helping business owners understand the importance of usability for both their internal and external facing websites and systems, with the aim of improving companies bottom line through the likes of improving staff efficiency and the conversion rates from marketing budgets.

A few details below:

  • Title: Usability: What’s The Use?
  • Date: 28th January 2009
  • Time: 6.00pm – 9.00pm
  • Venue: CUBE (Centre for the Urban Built Environment), 113-115 Portland Street, Manchester M1 6DW
  • Cost: FREE!
  • Official Event Page: http://usabilitywhatstheuse.eventbrite.com/

Further details and a brief overview are below:

For the digital sector, usability and user experience are more than new fads.

These topics, and their perceived value to businesses, have been talked and written about many times, but lets get it straight: just exactly what is the use of usability to a company looking at improving their performance, ROI and staff efficiency?

In this FREE event Paul Rouke, User Experience Director at PRWD, and 2 guest speakers Judith Garman of AbilityNet and Pete Bagnall of SurfaceEffect, will be providing a range of real-life examples and industry insights which will help reveal some of the tangible benefits businesses can gain by embracing usability and user experience.

Through the course of the evening you will see why usability can play a significant role in the likes of e-commerce websites, B2B websites, lead generation sites, intranets, internal software systems and the development of bespoke web and software applications.

The event will be followed by drinks, some food and networking.

Dates for Jan/Feb/March Meetings

23/12/2008 in Events

I’ve had confirmation from MDDA regarding the use of their facilities in the early part of 2009. To fit with their schedule of staff and other user groups using the offices, they have suggested the 3rd Wednesday of each month.

So the next 3 months dates would be:

  • Wednesday 21st January
  • Wednesday 18th February
  • Wednesday 18thMarch

Can anyone who normally comes along shout up if this causes a problem – I know the last 3 months have been on a Tuesday, but based on us continuing to use the facilities FOC we’ll need to be flexible on the day of the week that we meet.

I plan on confirming to the MDDA wc 5th Jan so I’ll wait till then for any comments.

Merry Christmas one and all!

Possible Subjects For Future Meetings

20/12/2008 in Events

I though it would be useful to make available the list of subjects which we came up with at October’s meeting, where lots of ideas where brought forward.

Perhaps this list will be useful in getting people to consider doing a mini presentation as part of one of the 2009 monthly meetings.

  • Complex business / manufacturing systems
  • Rapid prototyping
  • Pragmatic / shoestring usability
  • Design evangelism / internal communication
  • ROI and selling the benefits of usability
  • Testing and observation techniques
  • Engagement and organisational culture
  • Open source / agile development
  • Heuristics – do we need a rethink?
  • Ethnography
  • Non-standard design (mobile / accessible etc)
  • Accessibility / WCAG 2
  • Information architecture
  • Words and language
  • Interaction design
  • Usability in news media
  • Internal business systems
  • Perceived vs. “actual” usability
  • Attractiveness and visual design
  • Employee engagement & involvement (internal comms)
  • Personas
  • Internationalisation
  • Talking the language of business

In particular, subjects around ROI and commercial benefits of usability, complex business/manufacturing systems (MRP, ERP), usability for internal business systems, employee engagement, talking the language of business and open source, agile development methods are the type of things that are very close to our hearts at PRWD. We could therefore provide some presentations on these types of topics in due course.

Its a comprehensive list, but shout up if there are more suggestions for topics!