Cards: 186 (!)
View the results.
Trends:
1. The majority of cards were put in the "About Publix" category. There 91 total cards placed there, with 51 unique cards which is also the highest number in that distinction. I believe this trend occurs because "About Publix" could feasibly seem like a catch-all for cards that users were unsure of placing in other categories. Publix.com features an extensive section for "Careers" that could also be easily misconstrued as being About Publix. An anomaly in this trend would be if one of the users hadn't put the majority of his/her cards in the "About Publix" section, but no one did. As such, it is apparent to me that the entries to the site map are not self-evident enough in their labeling to be properly assigned to the correct category.
2. Not surprisingly, the second largest category in which cards were placed was the "Careers" section which in actuality does have the most amount of entries in the site map. As mentioned above, there was certainly overlap between "Careers" and "About Publix" understandably. I believe an anomaly here, given how many entries there are under "Careers" on the actual site map, would be a very low total number of cards placed in the category in the activity.
3. Repeats. The category with the THIRD most cards was a category I created called "Repeats" in response to initially testing the site map. Users were responding that they were sorting the same exact cards over. To secure their participation, I altered the test to allow the users to place repeat cards in a category with that name rather than try and mentally assume where each repeat would go. It is amazing that there are so many repeats in the site map. This trend derives from the fact that the same entries appear after several different sub-categorical entries under the "Careers" category on the site. Truly, I think an anomaly in this trend would have occurred without my creation of a "Repeat" category, in that I don't think most users would have sorted all the repeat cards to the same category such as "Careers." I believe they likely would have been dispersed through the different categories as a result of a deduction that they couldn't all logically be in the same category.
4. While there were 31 total items in the "Welcome to Apron's" category, there were only 15 unique entries with all four participants putting cards in. It seems that users were generally able to agree on what cards should go in what would ostensibly seem to be a pretty vague category. It seems Publix's site map entries on this topic were well labeled and easy to identify - unlike the majority of the other cards. An anomaly might have been for card placement of Apron cards in other non-Apron categories because of how well-labeled the Apron cards really were.
5. Lack of participation. I offered this test to approximately 50 people and only got four results. Users who did complete the test said that it took approximately an hour to complete. My own classmates who had to do the same assignment and needed me to do their card sorts evidently even refused my test because of its length (despite promising to do otherwise). Loved ones of mine who took the test sent me emails afterwards saying what an absolute pain the test was. At 186 cards, it is no wonder why the activity a little time-consuming, but at the heart of the matter is the evident difficulty of sorting the cards to appropriate categories which no doubt elongated the process. Moreover, the inclusion of many repeated entries to the site map slowed down and frustrated the participants. Naturally, the participants themselves are anomalies in this activity and I am eternally grateful to them. I believe Publix.com is in dire need of an overhaul of its sitemap to lessen its obfuscation and make its design and channels much more obvious by reducing repetition and evocative language that can be easily and understandably misconstrued.
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