Legislation.gov.uk scoops Public Sector Digital Award

After much anticipation, we are proud to announce that The National Archives have won the Best example of ICT-enabled innovation and enterprise at the Public Sector Digital Awards for their work on legislation.gov.uk

Rebecca Gill and Mark Pierce from Bunnyfoot joined the team from The National Archives and The Stationery Office to receive the award at London’s prestigious Guildhall. The award celebrates those who set best practice standards for how ICT can be used to introduce new services, new business models and new ways of reaching out to citizens.

The award was for the work on legislation.gov.uk

Legislation.gov.uk is a place where anyone can explore UK legislation. The National Archives are responsible for this and wanted to combine the 2 very different online repositories for legislation (statutelaw.gov.uk, and opsi.gov.uk) into one high quality website service (legislation.gov.uk) that not only presents the legislation, but supports the users in understanding how to navigate legislation.

The project was complex, but rewarding

For Bunnyfoot, this meant detailed research into how people consumed legislation as well as getting to grips with the complexities of how legislation is created and stored. We designed the user interface of legislation.gov.uk to be both usable and accessible to an audience with varied experience of accessing legislation from the general public to legal professionals. It now outperforms the 2 original sites combined and led to a twenty-fold increase in people viewing revised legislation.

Mark Pierce was the main consultant at Bunnyfoot to work on the design side of the project, “This project challenged me to not only design for a usable experience, but also to think about how the information architecture could be mapped to the URI scheme. More importantly, it has made me understand the importance of designing URL structure.”

Sounds like a cliche, but success really was due to teamwork

The way the National Archives and The Stationery Office wholly embraced user centred design and brought it into the heart of their development is what contributed significantly to its success. They welcomed Bunnyfoot as an integral part of the team and immersed themselves in testing, so they could base design feedback on what users wanted rather than personal opinion. It’s interesting to think that the project would have taken a very different direction without Bunnyfoot’s research as it uncovered a very different group of users who had not really been considered before.

“Working on this project with The National Archives and The Stationery Office has been a fascinating and brilliant journey. It didn’t feel like we were coming together as separate teams, we had a shared vision and goal that everyone was part of. The National Archives winning this award has been the icing on the cake.” Rebecca Gill, MD, Bunnyfoot.

We hope this award inspires other government departments to embrace user centre design in the same way. We will be publishing a case study to explain more about the project and our approach.

The core of the Bunnyfoot operation will remain unchanged and continue to run out of the remaining 4 Bunnyfoot offices in England but still with full UK and global reach.

Currently we have no plans to open any further offices in the UK, but are due to relocate the London office to accommodate our expanding London team and offer new testing and training facilities.

All the Bunnyfoot team wish the new company the best of luck for the future.

Bunnyfoot Mo Bro Awards:

The boys came in on December 1st slightly colder faced, but with big smiles all around as the perpetual nose-ticklers were jubilantly shaved off.

For the past month, the Bunnyfoot Mo Bro’s have banded together in hairy solidarity to raise money for men’s health charities through the Movember movement. Starting clean shaven and baby-faced on November 1st they have suffered (along with their girlfriends) with only a mild bit of whinging about stubble, itchiness, ginger bits, bald patches and stuck food. By the end of the month we have been treated to a glorious display of bushy upper lips, and I have to say I for one am going to miss them!

Congratulations to Kelley – our biggest fundraiser. And yes, Kelley is a girl. Some of our Mo Sistas gave the boys a little kick up the arse keeping us entertained with regular updates of their fingertaches right through to the bushy glory of an Einstein inspired stick on for the final few days. It may be cheating slightly – but hey, it’s all for a good cause!

The funds raised in the UK support the number one and two male specific cancers - prostate and testicular cancer. It’s an issue that needs tackling all year round, so please do still come and give donations, just because Movember is over for another year, doesn’t mean the work is!

You can find our motley crew under the Bunnyfoot Mo Bros or search for your favourite consultant and give them a push. Is it Kelley, the Mo Sista who put the boys to shame? Maybe the Big Boss, Jon Dodd who is never afraid to sport a new look in the name of charity? The team captain who made it all possible, Jamie? Or perhaps you feel sorry for James who has tried so hard, but remained looking baby-faced with his blond tache throughout? Or just spare some pennies for your favourite consultant!

Many thanks!

…It’s Movember, the month formerly known as November, now dedicated to growing moustaches and raising awareness and funds for men’s health; specifically prostate and testicular cancer. Many of the guys at Bunnyfoot are donating their top lips to the cause for 30 days in an effort to help change the face of men’s health. These Mo’s will spark conversations, and no doubt generate some laughs; all in the name of raising vital awareness and funds for cancers affecting men.

Why are we so passionate about men’s health?

• 1 in 9 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime
• This year 37,000 new cases of the disease will be diagnosed
• 1 in 2 men will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime
• 26% of men are less likely to go the doctor compared to women

We’re asking you to support our Movember campaign by making a donation online, pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese..

If you’d like to find out more about the type of work you’d be helping to fund by supporting Movember, take a look at the Programmes We Fund section on the Movember website: http://uk.movember.com/about

Thank you in advance for supporting our efforts to change the face of men’s health. More pictures to come! Follow our Twitter @bunnyfootsays for the latest

Kelley’s “Tom Selleck” is putting the boys to shame as the girls from London join in to support the boys.

Bunnyfoot are sponsoring tonight’s event on the return on investment from usability.

For us, it has always been a challenge to accurately quantify and communicate the value of ROI amongst the many marketing activities that surround it. We would love to increase the appreciation of the value of user centred design within the marketing community, amongst our own clients and their internal stakeholders. UX is seen as a recent addition to the product development life cycle, but we are looking to prove that it is by far the most vital step in bringing any product or service to market.

Tonight, usability professionals will come together to discuss how we can better measure and communicate ROI to our clients.

At Bunnyfoot, we have seen evidence of sales targets being smashed for the first time, downloads increase massively and complaints reduce significantly. When we measure and follow the results consistently, we see those successes sustained, and even further optimised with regular user testing. The feedback we get on our work is hugely positive, citing how it has saved development time and stress, brought teams together and improved awareness and understanding of the customer’s needs to the forefront.

So how do we quantify this? How do we share this? How do we make the marketing community stand up and listen?

The event tonight is unfortunately sold out, although if you want to take the risk, join us at Sapient Nitro from 7pm and any spare spaces will be allocated. Otherwise join @UKUPA on Twitter and follow the hashtag #uxroi

More details available on the UK UPA website

Between us, they have been impressed with the insight we have provided about their key customers, and we have been more than impressed by the way that they have embraced the full value of our services and their commitment to providing the best experience possible for their audience. Together, we will bring you an interesting talk, jam packed with ideas you can take back to your business.

So whether you want to understand:
How to maximise your returns from an international market
Understand more about our methods, such as what you will get out of a workshop, how we can help you produce prototypes or how we test
Get some tips from the professionals to help with your designs
Get some guidance on how mobile user testing can help bring a better design to market first time
Or just understand how real clients are employing user centred design as part of their standard range of services…

…come and listen to Mark Batty, Ecommerce Manager at Boden, speak with Jon Dodd, Bunnyfoot’s CEO

Thursday 30th June
12 – 12.30pm
Search, Affiliate, Display and Digital Arena
Online Marketing Show (part of Marketing Week Live)
Olympia, London

Stop by, there will be 2 experienced consultants on the stand to talk to and an eye tracking station to help analyse your website. Talk to us about what you do and we will get on the case to give you a bespoke solution to optimise your designs and maximise your returns.

Or just stop by for a doughnut.

To find us, just keep going straight ahead when you get into the Online Marketing Show, then turn right when you get to the end.

Jon Dodd, CEO and co-founder of Bunnyfoot, will give a talk on the Evidence Behind Design, looking at the best practice of some of our top clients. Take away some insight of how today’s top marketers increase conversions on the web, improve the flow between marketing communications to reduce drop outs and launch apps to market that encourage immediate adoption.

Jon Dodd will be giving his talk at:
12-12.30pm
Thursday 30th June
Search, Affiliate, Display and Digital Arena

The Search, Affiliate, Display and Digital Arena is on the left hand side of the show as you enter, right on the middle row of the stands.

Make sure you get there early as spaces can fill up quickly!

Boden recognise the importance of cultural differences across the markets they operate in and so the research will be conducted in the UK, Germany and the US.

User centred design consultancy Bunnyfoot, whose consultants include native Germans, will conduct one-on-one usability and user experience testing, and will assist with evaluation and evolution of the site and prototypes.

‘Involving customers in the design of our site will ensure we meet their exacting requirements’ said Mark Batty eCommerce Manager at Boden ‘performing in-depth international testing will help us deliver experiences tailored to some of the key markets we operate in.’

Originally founded in 1991 as a catalogue retailer, Boden’s web site launch followed in 1999. The UK site alone receives over 4,000 online orders every day.

‘Boden is well known for the quality of its customer service as well as the quality of its clothing,’ said Dr Jon Dodd MD Bunnyfoot ‘we are delighted to have been selected to help them enhance the web and mobile experiences they give to their customers’

About Boden

When he couldn’t find what he wanted in the shops - and realised that he and the City had grown tired of each other - Johnnie Boden started a clothing business. Boden’s grown in leaps and bounds since the first range took shape on Johnnie’s kitchen table back in 1991. The company is now turning over GBP200 million a year and employing 800 staff. Over 200 womenswear styles are on offer, as well as extensive ranges of menswear, baby, girls and boys’ clothes. Boden launched in America in 2002, Germany in 2007 and in September 2009 we started selling our clothes in Austria.

About Bunnyfoot

Bunnyfoot (www.bunnyfoot.com) are the leading UK consultancy for specialist customer experience design and usability across all interactive channels. Launched in 1999 Bunnyfoot have 5 UK offices and work globally through in house multi-lingual consultants and with international partners. Bunnyfoot’s clients include; Virgin Holidays, Screwfix, ITV, Siemens, Microsoft, Arsenal and the DWP.

For more information, please contact:

Eleanor Holmes
Phone: 0845 644 0650
E-mail: eleanor@bunnyfoot.com

The UK Usability Professionals Association (UK UPA) has been a source of Bunnyfoot discussion for a long time. There is so much potential when you are part of it to learn, network and grow but we have long felt that it seems more of the London UPA than actually UK spread. We have always tried in ourselves to avoid the London bias by opening offices across the UK, so maybe we are just more sensitive to this than most. We were thrilled when after many discussions about how we could help, a UK liaison role opened to spread the UPA outside London. We jumped at the chance to be part of it as we feel it will bring massive benefit not just to professionals, but all those interested in bringing a great experience to their customers across the UK.

Nick has been championing this motion for a long time. He’s one of those people who crams all he can in every second of life and never lets you down. There’s something infectious about his Northern charm and enthusiasm that makes us want to give weekends up to apply usability to charity, speak at events we have never attended before and do 26 mile challenges for Care International…

And it’s not just Nick you’re voting for. We’re all behind him 100%. With more offices across the UK than any of our competitors, you’re not just voting for Nick from Bunnyfoot Oxford, you’re voting for a 50 strong army of Bunnyfooters across London, Reading, Oxford, Sheffield and Edinburgh!

“We obviously feel that there’s lots of great work happening outside of London and the South East, and think that’s it vital that practitioners working in other parts of the UK are encouraged to participate and engage. Of course Nick is in a great place to do that as he’s working in one of the few, if not only, usability companies that are working to overcome geographical bias by operating in offices throughout the UK” Ali Rawlings, Bunnyfoot Sheffield

The trick missing here is that only UK UPA members can vote…but you can attend UPA events as a non-member.  So, if you’re not eligible to vote, but have a passion for user experience across the UK, email us your feedback…we’d love to hear from you and spread the word about what people want from the UK UPA, not just in London!

If you want a UK Liaison who has the reach, support and enthusiasm to spread the benefits of the UPA outside London, vote for Nick now!

See the other candidates on the UPA elections page

Vote before 12th December 2010 through the UPA survey page

Email your feedback to more@bunnyfoot.com

World Usability Day, dedicated to raising awareness about making our world work better, will this year focus on ‘Communications’. Events will run across the globe on the 11^th November 2010 to raise awareness about making our life easier and more user friendly.

Bunnyfoot, who are specialists in helping to develop easy to use products and websites are partnering with local Edinburgh charity ‘The Craigmillar Arts and Environments Project’ to task two schools on a design challenge that will teach the pupils about creating products with people and ease of use in mind.

Niddrie Mill and Royal Mile Primary schools will participate with two teams of primary 7 pupils. The pupils will be asked to create a product or process that helps or improves communication within their school. The teams will be supported throughout and even shown how to test their ideas with end users in Bunnyfoot’s research facilities, before submitting their final product in early November.

The teams will present their products on World Usability Day to a panel of industry professionals. 

Follow our updates on Twitter: http://twitter.com/bunnyfootsays.

NEW: Read our blog on how the children did when they came in for their first testing session.

About Craigmillar Arts & Environment Project

The Craigmillar Arts and Environment Project works in the Craigmillar and Portobello areas partnering local schools and social projects to raise awareness of environmental issues and to produce community art. They enhance the local area with murals, sculpture and community gardening as well as working with animation to address issues of personal safety and substance abuse. This year the final collection of films were screened during the Edinburgh International Film Festival.

For further information contact:

Mark Carr on 0775 7291 457 Email: greenartcca@googlemail.com

http://www.youtube.com/user/CMartsandenvironment
http://www.myspace.com/artsandenvironment