User Research is a whole process to set up, and I guess some agencies or clients often have rather save some time and money than run user testing. As a Usability consultant, I would love to have that time and money, but I also understand planning and budget restrictions. Hopefully, we can benefit from a bunch of free solutions to help us know users better. I am talking about analytics solutions, like Google Analytics (which as well allows A/B and MVT testing, allowing to go pretty far in user research), but also powerful and specific solutions like Survey Gizmo, for online user testing.

Recently, Adviso has set up a user testing process on Optimal Workshop to validate Information Architecture. It is based on tasks, and you can test up to 3 tasks on 10 users with the free plan. (If you like, please give a hand on Adviso’s treejack project. The testing will still be on for a few days.) Optimal Workshop proposes 3 products, and here are the details of what is available for free:

• card sorting – 30 cards, 10 users
• tree sorting – 3 tasks, 10 users
• first click testing – 3 tasks, 10 participants

The 3-products offer is available for 1 999USD for one year, but you can also purchase each product separately. And I think the free offer can already prove very useful for a lot of projects. Thanks Adviso and Thomas for the link: can’t wait to try it on my next projects. Coming soon: I’ll test each product and see how it works. (Fun, isn’t it?)