1. Fault lines of user experience:
The intersection of business and
design
Patricia Hallstein
Vice President, Customer Experience, Economist.com
9 April 2009
CHI 2009| Fault Lines of User Experience | 8 April 2009 | page 1

2. Customer experience at Economist.com
Some background to anchor the perspective I can contribute to
the conversation
 The Economist is a small company and a publication with a
long history and a big global influence
 I joined the Economist.com business unit as VP of Customer
Experience in July 2007 to build a user experience practice
and team
 Economist.com has very ambitious growth goals both in terms of
key numbers (web stats, contribution to the Economist Group)
and in terms of creating a fundamentally different digital
product
 Economist.com is currently transitioning to Agile/Scrum
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3. The Economist newspaper
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4. About The Economist
The Economist was founded in 1843 to “take part in
a severe contest between intelligence, which presses forward,
and an unworthy, timid ignorance obstructing our progress."
 Attracting a global readership, generally passionate about The
Economist and very engaged with the brand
 Growing while the news publishing industry is in decline
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5. Economist readers are
intellectually curious,
opinionated and
influential.
They think and act globally.
They thrive on ideas, and
come to us for ideas and
inspiration.
CHI 2009| Fault Lines of User Experience | 8 April 2009 | page 5

6. 90%
of subscribers
consider The
Economist to be
essential weekly
reading
76%
say The Economist
is their favorite publication
63%
read
advertisements
Source: Affinity Vista; Ipsos-Economist 2007 Subscriber Study
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7. Thousands post pictures of
themselves, friends, family, even
pets on flickr.com
Die hard fans share videos of
themselves reading articles aloud
on YouTube
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8. Fans volunteer to translate The Economist
 Eco Team translates every article as soon as an issue hits the stands
 Eco PDF Team bundles up finished translations into Eco Weekly, a bi-weekly
PDF with two complete issues for forum members to enjoy and share
 nytimes.com/2009/03/02/business/media/02economist.html
 ecocn.org/bbs/
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9. Readers meet up and gather online on
Facebook
MeetUp groups
 Run by fans
Facebook
 More than 90,000 fans
 One official and many
independent groups, e.g.
• SIR - I am rather fond
of your publication
The Economist
15,875 members
• The Economist is my
Bible!
73 members
• I love the covers of
The Economist
125 members
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10. The Economist is growing in every corner of
the globe
July-Dec 2008
Worldwide
1,390,780
% change
vs . July-Dec 2007
+6.4%
North America
786,977
+9%
Asia-Pacific
133,846
+5%
United Kingdom
186,995
+3%
Latin America
15,651
+3%
Continental Europe
239,152
+2%
Middle East/Africa
28,159
+1%
Source: ABC Dec 2008
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11. Circulation and newsstand growth (US)
C ULAT N change 07-08
IRC
IO
9.2%
The
Economist
Fortune
Source: ABC Dec 2008
Forbes
10.9%
The
Economist
Fortune
0.7%
Business 0.2%
Week
-1.3%
NEWSST
AND change 07-08
-9.3%
-13.4%
2.9%
Business
Week
Forbes
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12. Engagement (US)
Read 4 out
of 4 issues
Minutes
spent with
each Issue
Magazine Is
“one of my
favorites”
The Economist
53%
56
41%
BusinessWeek
33%
35
16%
Forbes
32%
37
17%
Fortune
33%
39
16%
Source: ABC Dec 08
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13. Economist.com
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14. Economist.com
Was run on a small budget and minimal crew since dotcom
crash in 2001.
Now a key area of investment for the Economist Group.
Big challenge for the business unit overall:
Design a digital presence for The Economist that is as
meaningful to the world and would be missed as much if it
disappeared as the newspaper.
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15. Economist.com mission
Economist.com wants to become “the foremost destination
for analyzing and debating the global agenda.”
This clearly calls for a customer-focused approach on a strategic
level.
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16. Building a customer experience practice
I joined a new Economist.com leadership team in July 2007,
to start a user experience practice—objectives:
 Create a customer-focused organization
 Build a team
Agreed strategy and process
 Established at strategic level
 Start with small budget, prove value to business, editorial,
readers with key project
 Build customer insights program and introduce user-centered
process
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17. Defining the Economist.com
strategy
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18. Mission: Pursue the
“severe contest” online
Vision: The Economist online is the foremost destination for analysing and debating the global
agenda. It draws on the intelligence of journalists, readers and guest contributors
V1 I value The Economist
online as the premier
destination for debating
the global agenda
F1 Ensure our sustainability by
dramatically growing profit and revenue
F3 Increase operational efficiency
F5 Grow network of
on-brand contributors
Brand
Benefits to Economist
For readers
A1 I learn or discover something new
A2 I gain a deeper understanding
A3 I am able to connect with other "ideas" people
A4 I have a forum to put forward and test my ideas
A5 I am inspired to act
F2 Grow client base
F4 Grow and retain
on-brand target audience
For ad clients
Finance
C1 I reach my desired audience
C2 I get results from a unique programme
C3 I get a premium service
Value Proposition
P1 Community development and management
P2 Content publishing
P3 Guest writer management
P4 Reader services
Process
P9 Integrate print and web
editorial departments
L1 Get better at
strategic change
management
L2 Identify & fill or develop strategic job roles
Learning and Growth
P5 Ad, sales and
campaign management
P8 On-brand
reader acquisition
P6 Product innovation and
lifecycle management
L3 Align
organisation
with strategy
P7 Gain and maintain
customer insight
L7 Establish user
–centred design and
development capability
L4 Stakeholder
alignment and
internal brand
management
18
L5 Establish a culture of excellence
L6 Integrate technology
with business strategy
L8 Develop
editorial
curation skills
Version 17
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19. “Quick Win” project
Proving value and
establishing UX process
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20. Homepage and navigation before
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21. Key players
Editorial leadership
Sales
Circulation marketing
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22. Introducing user-centered process
Creative, iterative, user-centered
Solution:
Research:
Strategize
Understand
business
objectives
user
goals
Design
Develop
Measure
User insights
(ideally
personas
& scenarios)
Interaction:
getting around,
engaging
with content
and others
1. Prototypes
Usability
2. Beta
Satisfaction
3. Final
Engagement
Solution plan
solution
Products
& features
ROI
Visual design:
Typography
Images
Colour
technology
constraints &
opportunities
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23. Homepage and navigation after
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24. Key results
Exceeded expectations in traffic growth:
 Page views per visit in May jumped from 3.3 to 3.6,
contributing 1.2m new monthly page views
 Daily averages jumped after launch:*
• Page views increased by 18%
• Average pages per visit increased by 16%
• Number of unique users increased by 2%
Intangible results:
 Sense of accomplishment for all stakeholders
 Buy-in to user-centred process
*Mon through Thur traffic following the launch, compared against the daily average 6 weeks Mon through Thu prior to launch.
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25. What made it successful
Research and strategy phases
 Extensive stakeholder interviews
Design phase
 Frequent reviews with stakeholders and editorial
 Long, iterative design phase
Development phase
 Rapid, iterative user testing and interface progression (3 days)
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26. Where we stand
Status quo
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27. Becoming a customer-centered
organization: Successes so far
Customer focus is part of the high-level strategy for
Economist.com
Established customer focus for the organization
 Established user experience process
 Established a customer insights program
 Developed and introduced personae (target audience
segments)
and user value propositions
Proved value and established trust with three major
stakeholders—
editorial, circulation marketing, ad sales
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28. Lessons learned
What worked
 Learning to speak the language of the environment and to
address key stakeholders’ goals, in our case:
• Editorial: original mission, journalistic ethos
• Circulation marketing and sales: need to meet their numbers
• Business overall: ROI, “blue ocean” strategy
 First, prove value in a meaningful case
 Then, focus on customer insights that allow people to draw their
own conclusions
What did not work
 Getting bogged down for a while in too many individual initiatives
and projects
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29. Current challenges
Introducing Scrum
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30. Current challenge: Tactical focus through
Scrum
Introducing Scrum created a tactical focus for the
organisation
 Moving the site to a new platform in parallel scrums required
the CX team to focus on streamlining design
• addressed by creating a digital design framework
 Introduction of Agile (Scrum) project management “by the
book” re-enforced a strong tactical focus and a strong focus on
technology
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31. Scrum process flow focused on development
phase
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32. Scrum process flow and user-centred
design?
“Sprint 0”
pre-work
Understand target
audience (personae)
- goals, needs,
behaviours.
- adoption challenges
and opportunities
Define user tasks and
intents (scenarios)
Competitive analysis
– generate ideas
Write and apply CX
prioritization for
stories
Begin user
modelling
where
needed
Apply best practices
to design
Continue user
modelling
Iterate and review
Validate with users
Validate with
users
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33. Re-establishing a strategic role for CX
 Focusing on establishing and spreading customer insights to
empower scrum teams
• Introducing personae, scenarios, task flows
 Influencing how Scrum is established in the organisation
• Engaging in enterprise transition to scrum
• Influencing how backlogs are written
• Introducing “sprint 0”
• Working on establishing a mid-term customer-focused
visioning and planning process outside Scrum
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34. Thank you
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