Get Your Own Google Alerts

For those who do not have these, Google alerts are a neat way of staying in touch with specific content posted on the Internet. You register for a Google alert using specific keywords and then any time those keywords are posted online, you are sent a link in an email. Check out two Google alerts I received over the weekend for Hinterland Who’s Who (in this case, they were blog postings):

• Remembering Hinterland: By Bundy(Bundy)
  If you’re Canadian and over the age of 30, chances are at some point growing up you’ve seen the Hinterland Who’s Who commercials on TV from the Canadian Wildlife Service and Environment Canada. These informative vignettes first appeared …
  Bundy’s Blog – http://bundysblog.blogspot.com/
• I saw you on TV!: By Mongoose(Mongoose)
  I knew right away that it was a red-breasted nuthatch, because it looked and moved exactly like the red-breasted nuthatch in the Hinterland Who’s Who vignette. Well, I suppose that’s a big “duh,” but then, people in real life are …
  Trucks and the City – http://trucksandthecity.blogspot.com/

To get your own Google alerts:

1. go to www.google.com/alerts,
2. enter your search term in the box provided (don’t forget to add quotation marks around a specifc phrase, such as “Hinterland Who’s Who”),
3. set the type of search you’d like Google to make,
4. the frequency of alerts and
5. your email.
6. Start again if you’d like more than one alert!

And you’re all set! Enjoy this easy way of staying in touch with the buzz online.

Examples of Online Research Tools – Limited Time

Want to see the card sort and online survey software in action? Take the Wild About Gardening survey and card sort to get a taste of the form and function of these essential online researching tools. Check it out now — it’s only available until Feb. 22, 2008!

Finding suitable survey software

We want it all, don’t we? We want to do our research using global tools online. It must be free, easy to use and adaptable. What’s amazing is that these sort of web applications are out there. There is an OptimalSort-type of tool for online surveys.

I give you (well, not me but through me) SurveyMonkey.com. It’s intro says it all: “Intelligent survey software for primates of all species. SurveyMonkey has a single purpose: to enable anyone to create professional online surveys quickly and easily.”

There are some hitches, of course. To use the free version, you can only ask a maximum of 10 questions and are unable to brand your survey. But to the empty-of-pocket and wildly-desperate, who cares?

Sorting through card sorts

Card sorts are an effective means of organizing your content when you are creating or redesigning a website. This method allows you to get beyond your own perseptions of what the content architecture should be and allows you ask those who will actually care — your users.

There are loads of online card sorting tools, but the best I’ve run across is OptimalSort, a beta site that allows you to upload your content, set parametres such as allowing the user to create their categories (or use ones you’ve defined), promotes your sort and then delivers the results to you in a comprehensive way. I recently had a successful experience using OptimalSort in a study that broadcasted to more than 30,000 people (imagine the number of results!)

While in the IA stage, I would recommend combining an online card sort, which can survey thousands, with a hands-on, in-house sort using pen and paper, stock cards, individual test subjects and your own eyes. In the end, nothing beats observation in testing!

If you’ve found a better online card sort tool than this one, please let me know.