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Nike+ teaches us how to deploy application updates elegantly

Deploying a new or revised application can be a scary process. Are you confident your user-centered inquiry captured all of the needs? Are you certain your customers will like the new system better? 

Typically, we’ve found the more expert the user—meaning the greater the amount of time they have invested in understanding your application’s complexities—the more likely they will be averse to change.

We’ve developed application UX for military pilots and there are few people who have spent more time learning an application (think thousands and thousands of hours). The good news is there are ways to insure your new release is a success. 

Make sure your updates reflect real user improvements

Changing to a different platform is NOT a good reason to ask the customers to use a new application interface. You must learn how and plan to better serve them. Observation is your best tool: watch your customers work and look for opportunities to improve their workload efficiency (we call this workload assist), their decision-making efficiency (we call this cognitive assist), and provide them tools to forecast and measure the impacts of their decisions (we call this real-time performance assessment). Having used the above techniques with our cranky pilot user groups, we saw very positive results. 

Enhancing your site is a marketing event. Be prepared to sell it

For your upcoming deployment plan on having a number of communication channels open to educate and engage your customers. Your goal is to solicit feedback, and develop trust. Nike+’s new “beta” site is a perfect example of the power of conversation. 

Here is a shot of their existing site (not authenticated):

Notice the strong “hero” content talking about the value propositions of the new beta version. They even provide a link to the new version immediately below. It’s important to convey to your customers what they will be getting in this change and how it will impact them. Nike+ has done an excellent job with this. 

Here is a shot of the new Nike+ beta site (also not authenticated):

The new site picks up where the old site left off explaining value and benefit for users. We won’t go into the specific benefits of the new site; suffice it to say they spent the time and learned what the users needed. 

Teach the value to authenticated users

Once your customers authenticate into your system, you have enough data to be able to show them how your new system will better serve them. Take this opportunity seriously: Show them. 

Here is a screen of the old Nike+ interface (authenticated):

Note the link-callout stating “see your runs in the new Nike+ beta.” This link provides a direct comparison of the dashboard pages and exposes the customer to a real-time comparison of the applications. It is also a “vote” button.

“Crowdsource” the vote

This is a good time to mention one of the strongest tenants in this approach: NEVER TAKE AWAY THE OLD SYSTEM. You have to wait like an observant parent for the child to discard the item before you can make it disappear. This is because the old system is their safety net. The really exciting part of this approach is that we can measure the users who have opted to use the new interface moving forward and those are SOLID conversion rates. If, after you deploy a new app using this technique and you don’t get many people willingly converting to the new application (voting that it’s better for them), call us. You more than likely missed a real need in your redesign or aren’t clearly communicating the improvements to your customers. 

Provide feedback mechanism

The following three images really just show various views throughout the site, but notice two elements that remain consistent. The “feedback” tab on the right of every page (the last image shows an expanded view of the features) and the “Beta” flag in the upper right corner. Feedback is extremely powerful. Enable it, respond rapidly to the feedback and build trust that you are serving the customers’ best interest. Also, don’t disqualify this input channel just because it’s qualitative in nature. While accuracy of submissions will vary, bug notifications tend to be pretty accurate (something they can react to) and feature requests tend to be lofty but always worth validation. Our favorite part of this approach is the customers’ ability to send congratulations to those who developed the site. As developers/designers/strategists/etc, we need to realize we are part of the application ecosystem too. Kudos go a long way for both parties in building trust and respect.

Note the “return to classic” link on this page. Always provide an escape hatch for those who aren’t quite ready to convert.

This image illustrates the feedback toolset. It’s a third party app and very well done.

Measure measure measure

You can see at the bottom of each screenshot that my browser is reporting NO CP for all of the pages. This may be because Nike+ is using a beacon free traffic analysis tool, or more likely have forgotten to add analytics to their ecology. It’s important that the systems we design capture as much data about the use of the system (and its data) as it does capturing its core data (the data it was designed to share/collect). What we’re saying is the movement between data points by users is as valuable if not even more than the datapoint itself. These measurements can be formed into insights that can help you build a stronger relationship with your customer. That’s something the competition cannot steal. 

Posted by Joseph Juhnke on July 8, 2009