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      With the prevalence of Agile, Scrum, and Lean, software development cycles have been shortened dramatically, compared to the Waterfall development cycle. As a result, user research has to fit into the same cadence, from study design, data collection, to presentation. While traditional research, especially in an academic setting, would typically take months from start to finish, user researchers in the industry have found ways to make research more efficient and tactical, while remaining effective and informative.

      Many of us at KLI are trying different ways of staying healthy: some of us do yoga, Crossfit, hiking- one of us is even on a rugby team. Swimming and running are my exercises of choice, and I usually choose to go for a run. In my time preparing for half marathons and 5ks, I have tried several apps to use while running. Recently I learned that one of my colleagues is also a runner, so we started talking about the different apps that we use or have tried in the past. We would continue to point out what worked really well and what didn’t which made me wonder what actually makes a running app great for runners?

More than two years ago, in April 2014, Panera announced their Panera 2.0 program. It contained a series of technological initiatives designed to allow customers to interact with Panera in new and innovative ways, including advance ordering and pick up, fast-lane kiosks to order in while dining, ordering from your table within the restaurant, and the ability to save customized orders within the restaurant. While this was slated to roll out in all stores by the end of 2017, Panera is already seeing rising stock value¹ from the initiatives in the last few months. We believe that these new developments really show that Panera is forging a new path for the customer experience in restaurants. To confirm that, we decided to take a look at some of these initiatives from a customer’s perspective, with a quick field trip to the Panera location near our Miami office.

To-go ordering has been around since the first caveman hollered to his neighbor that he was coming over to eat, but things have gotten more complicated in the last 50,000 years. Instead of asking for the flank or rib-eye of the woolly mammoth, now we’re thinking about geolocation, Apple Pay, and an awesome UI. Read on to hear about the top 5 usability mistakes in to-go ordering sites, and how to avoid making them in your app.

Last Minute Deals

Industry leaders are tapping into Millennials impulsivity and desire for savings by offering prices that are only good for the last 48 hours before building. Booking.com now has an Apple Watch app that offers up hotel rooms based on your location, but only for the next 48 hours. With one touch you can book the room, and they offer reduced pricing for the last minute booking.

I received my Apple Watch this past Thursday. I chose the space grey Apple Watch sport with the black band, which was worth the wait. It’s fairly subtle, with one person (okay, a kid!) thinking it could be a real watch. Overall, I am impressed with its performance, especially for a v1 device with limited connectivity options. Powered by my iPhone 6, even on LTE instead of wireless, there is very little lag in most apps. However, the remote app has some issues connecting to iTunes libraries. It’s fantastic as a remote for the Apple TV, but very limited and challenging to sync with my computer’s iTunes library. Here is a day in the life with an Apple Watch.

In part two of our series on mobile payments, Phil and Kathleen review a few exciting mobile payment options and talk about the near future of mobile payment technology.

Phil: In part one, Kathleen and I field tested the PayPal and Google Wallet apps, two popular forms of mobile payments. However, there are a few up and coming forms of payment that take a different approach to the process.

After a challenging experience with mobile payments at a New York music festival, our researchers decided to get together and assess two of the leading mobile payment options currently on the market. In Part One of this two-part series, we field test PayPal and Google Wallet apps on both iPhone and Android smartphones. Next month, we’ll review the mobile payment landscape and share some interesting new developments.

Let's see where Kathleen Henning and Phil McGuinness stand on these mobile giants.