Pharmaceutical Company

Challenge

A global pharmaceutical company sought to validate the design of a new Interactive Visual Aid (IVA) for tablet PCs.  This IVA would facilitate the setup and presentation of sales meetings with physicians. User Centric set out to gather data on user behaviors associated with using the IVA during a sales presentation and identify difficulties and areas of opportunity to improve the design prior to product launch.

User Centric Approach

Employees representing three sales divisions with a range of experience using IVAs participated in a one-on-one usability test session, where they were asked to complete common tasks and to use important features of the prototype IVA. Participants were given a brief training session prior to the usability test. Findings from the usability test sessions were used to assess the comprehension of the various functions and features of the prototype while conducting a sales meeting.

Results

When participants attempted to deliver a presentation using the IVA, several navigational aspects caused confusion. User Centric’s recommendations for addressing these issues included: reconfiguration of the forward and back controls to be intuitive regardless of the tablet’s orientation to the sales rep; displaying title slides to provide a seamless transition as reps navigate between slides; changing labels to links so reps can easily access important information; as well as provide a logical organization (e.g. alphabetical) of resources to increase awareness to representatives as they prepare for sales meetings. 

Notably, nearly all participants commented that the tablet PC seemed heavy after delivering a single standing call during their session.

The global pharmaceutical company was able to leverage User Centric’s expertise in observing behaviors during task completion and ability to provide design recommendations to make significant enhancements to their IVA, creating a more interactive sales presentation via tablet PC.