Eye Tracking Consultancy Launched!

On Wednesday 16th March the Bournemouth University Eye Tracking Consultancy (BUETC) was officially launched. The launch was a sell out attended by over 60 media, web and advertising professionals from companies in Poole, Bournemouth and the surrounding areas.

The evening was opened with an introduction from Professor Jim Roach (Dean of the School of Design, Engineering & Computing) followed by presentations by the Bournemouth University Eye Tracking Team.  Dr Jacqui Taylor (Consultancy Director) indicated the aims of BUETC – to provide an affordable and scientifically based eye tracking service – and then went on to introduce the eye tracking team.

Dr Mike Molesworth (Consumer Insight) then gave context to the role eye tracking can play in ensuring the effective design, development and implementation of all forms of media including online, digital and traditional. He also compared the return on investment of eye tracking data against more traditional forms of data collection.

Craig Girvan (Technical and Research Associate) gave an overview of how eye tracking works, comparing the sophistication of modern day methods (pupil-centre cornea reflection) to the invasive methods used in the past. Dr Taylor then provided insight into experimental design, covering the factors for consideration when devising eye tracking experiments.

Dr Molesworth then returned to the stage and facilitated an interactive session on heat maps generated in on-going studies by BUETC, before presenting in more detail the services on offer at the Bournemouth University Eye Tracking Consultancy.

Following the formal launch, delegates were invited to a post-launch drinks reception where they could discuss eye tracking and BUETC’s services with the BUETC team. Small groups of delegates were also invited to the eye tracking suite to take part in an eye tracking experiment. A video feed to the reception venue was set up so that all delegates were able to see the eye tracker in action.

Feedback from the launch delegates has been very positive with many indicating that they would like to incorporate the eye tracking service in their offering to their clients.

Official Launch – Registration Now Open!

Registration for the Official Launch of the Bournemouth University Eye Tracking Consultancy is now open.  The launch is free, with wine and other refreshements. However, registration is required as places at the launch are limited.

If you would like to find out more please click the following:

Bournemouth University Eye Tracking Consultancy Official Launch

Eye Tracking Workshop a Success!

Last week we held the postponed Eye Tracking workshop with delegates from CHS Creative, Thinking Juice and the Bournemouth University Marketing department.

Delegates were presented to by 3 members of the BUETC team – Prof. Jacqui Taylor, Dr Mike Molesworth and Craig Girvan (BSc, MSc).

They were introduced to the concept of eye tracking, how it can help their businesses and the services that are provided by BUETC.

The delegates also got to see and particpate in an Eye Tracking experiment incorporating their stimuli.

Feedback from the delegates has suggested that this was a well rounded introduction to the concepts of eye tracking and how they could use the BUETC services for their businesses and clients.

Eye Tracking Consultancy Update

Hi All,

Sorry for the lack of posts recently – we have been very busy:

1) We have now completed the online survey of appealing website, with over 250 people responding – many thanks to everyone who helped us out there.  The winner of the £50 Amazon voucher was a Mr Paul Tucker from Bedfordshire – well done Paul, £50 voucher is on its way.  The results are very interesting with everyone agreeing which websites are unappealing, but there seems to be disagreement across age and gender with regard to appealing wesbsite – all of this is subject to statistical analyses which we will then publish in due course.

2) We have begun the second part of this empiracle study where we are tracking people’s eyes as they rate the most and least appealing websites for appeal – what we are interested in, is what people look at when judging appeal.

3) Unfortunately, due to the snow at the end of last year our Eye Tracking workshop (“An Introduction to Eye Tracking”) was postponed – more on that in the next post.

4) Preparations have also begun for the official launch of the Bournemouth University Eye Tracking Consultancy, which is to be held on March 16th – more on this in a later posting.

If you are interested in any of the above please email me at cgirvan@buetc.com

Introduction to Eye Tracking Workshop

BUETC are offerring a 1-day introductory workshop / short course on Eye Tracking.  2 dates are on offer (10th December and 20th January). Places are limited, so book soon to avoid dissapointment. You can submit your own material to be included in an eye tracking experiment during the workshop!

Details can be found by clicking the following link: An Introduction to Eye Tracking

Do Models Improve Website Performance?

Studies have suggested that the presence of a model on a website add to the appeal of the website. What does Eye Tracking have to say?

Does Delia Improve Website Appeal for Waitrose?

A study has shown that the presence of a celebrity on a website impacts how appealing it is judged to be. Another study shows that websites that are judged appealing are also judged usable even if the contrary is true!!

So, what can Eye Tracking tell us about websites with and without the presence of a celebrity:

Do Sponsored Links Get a Look-in?

What can be observed from these Eye Tracking Heat Maps of a Google search with and without Sponsored Links?

1) Sponsored Links do get a look-in

2) Most focus is on the 1st organic result!

Eye Tracking Study Hints For SEO

In preparation for a commercial Eye Tracking workshop BUETC ran an eye tracking study with varied stimuli with the intent to produce materials to use during the course. Eye tracking stimuli included retail websites and search engine response pages (SERPs). Aggregating the Eye Tracker recordings in order to produce eye tracker heat maps Web Design Consultant Craig Girvan made some interesting observations that hinted at ideas to be taken into consideration with any search engine optimisation (SEO) efforts:

“SEO is more that getting search engines and their spiders to index your web pages appropriately. It is also about attracting the attention of the human who is using the search engine to find something. With indexation and search engine spider’s in mind current SEO thinking would recommend keyword or keyphrase prominence, proximity and density applied to all text on a web page and most importantly the title of the page (found in the <title> tag of every page). However, with a saturated market (e.g. mobile phone contracts) everyone will be doing this. As the title of a web page is used as the link text on SERPs all results on a search page will look similar. One of the eye tracking studies we conducted hints that rembering the human is important when preparing the title for a page.

“In the heat maps below you will notice that the result “O2 | The UKs….” attracts attention regardless of where it is on the SERP. Obviously this can be interpreted in a number of ways – it could be the text (all other results start “Mobile Phone…”), it could be the verified by verisign seal, it could be 3 very short words and associated white space. But, one thing is for sure it stands out from the crowd and attracts attention. A more robust study would be required to understand this further.”

Eye Tracking Heat Map Mobile Phone Search Engine Result Page

Eye Tracker Heat Map of Mobile Phone SERP

What makes a website appealing?

Wow, we have about half the responses we need to our website appeal survey and there is certainly an emerging pattern indicating what webs designers and indeed website owners must do in order to ensure their websites are appealing. And remember, a website that is judged appealing is also judge more usable even if the contrary is the case.

I can not provide further details yet as it could alter our survey results but if you are interested in more information either respond to this post or email me.