Ideation
Card Sorting
The card sorting exercise was very revealing in one main way. The sorting really did depend on each participant’s own personal definition and interpretation of the piece of history they were being asked about. Meaning that the facts of history were subjective instead of objective-luckily, there was enough cross over in sorting or processing methods to make up four main categories.
The main categories from the open and closed card sorting are as follows:
- Time Period (When)
- Destination (Where)
- Event (What)
- Person/Group (Who)
Each product/destination required some multi-category or unique tagging considerations for keyword searches and filtering.
Why do a card sort?
Doing a card sort for Zeit was key to help determine how to start organizing the backbone of the site’s informational architecture, the site map.
The goal was to observe and review how potential users of the time travel booking website would categorize the varying times, places, or events.
Card Sorting Processes
Users consistently seemed to parse out events as historical / political / cultural significance and/or milestones achievements and then from sorted a second time by people and events. Some users put these events in order chronologically, separated them out by a time period, or separated them out based on location.
Quick Survey
A quick user survey given at the beginning of both open and closed card sorting revealed more info about what users wanted from their time travel.
Main Takeaway
Female and male participants had very different expectations for safety. While all survey participants were concerned about the general safety of time travel – the female participants were especially concerned about their personal safety.
Future Iterations for Zeit
All interviewees wanted to meet with someone from their past that was deceased. Sadly this is out of the scope of the brief, and I had to put that particular design choice aside. It is important to note that this may be a potential source of revenue in future iterations of this business model.
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