Testing the lawyer signup process
Our test Lawyer signed up for the site with the “think aloud” approach while I casually filmed him. Quantitative data this early in the process didn’t seem as important as the qualitative data, as we were getting great insight through the testing. Since no type of focus group, surveys, or studies had been performed prior to the project (only the client’s lawyer friends), we were also getting comments (and actions) from the test lawyer that challenged the validity of our concept, and our assumptions about the users.
Testing Videos
The lawyer was simply asked to signup to the website without any coaching or instructions. This was a painful experience, as the signup process was not clear to him at all.
(my video camera broke on the spot, so I used my cell phone camera in a pinch. This is painful to watch.)
Actions observed during testing
The signup process was sign up by claiming your existing profile, verify your email, fill out your profile, set your calendar availability, and copy the widget code to your own website.
- The lawyer went straight to the membership form to signup instead of searching for, and “claiming” his profile first.
- The user is confused by the “description” field in the profile
- The lawyer never attempted to interact with the calendar.
- The lawyer showed extreme interest in the widget provided for his own website, but at the same time expressed concern about publicly displaying his availability… a point of contention that could kill our project if an overwhelming number of lawyers felt this way.
- After signing up, the lawyer didn’t understand the dashboard is bare because he’s not verified as a lawyer yet.
What we learned
The overall process of signing up the lawyer was a self-guided tour, leaving the lawyer confused as to where he was in the process. It quickly became clear that we needed to guide the lawyer through each step of the complicated setup process. We need to tell the lawyer what he has to do, such as, “click on your calendar to indicate availability”.
Revised Signup: Guided Process
The revised signup process utilizes more of a progressive disclosure type of approach, combined with tabs across the top to help indicate what steps are completed, and what the next steps are.The lawyer must complete the items in sequence to move along the registration. This solved our problem of the lawyer not interacting with the calendar during registration. Additionally, the end point presents a new message to the lawyer that we are reviewing their lawyer status/credentials. It is no longer the responsibility of the user to find/claim the existing profile; that responsibility was shifted to internal operations, so the responsibility falls on the person (or routine) checking the lawyer’s credentials at the time of sign up.
