Nimbuzz!: mobile freedom at your fingertips

Nimbuzz! is a free application for mobile, web and pc and is available for the iPhone, Blackberry and popular Nokia and Samsung phones (Symbian Platform), among others. Nimbuzz! allows you to combine all your friends and contacts on Skype, MSN, AIM, Hyves and other popular communities and you can call, chat, text message and send files to all your friends with just one account. Nimbuzz! has millions of users globally.

4 usability tests

The objective of Nimbuzz! is that the user experience largely matches on the various platforms and that users can easily operate the features. Valsplat has implemented 4 usability tests since 2008, primarily for the new mobile application of Nimbuzz!:

Firstly, the mobile chat application was tested. This research primarily looked at the understanding and the use of the mobile application. How is the concept received? Do people understand how to add communities, how to start conversations and how files are sent?
Subsequently, the iPhone client was tested, where the primary objective is to see how iPhone users experience using the Nimbuzz! App. Does the app match the experience that iPhone users are used to from their iPhones?
Shortly following this, the Symbian client was tested (suitable for the Nokia N97, among others). We have investigated whether users were able to effortlessly use the new version of the Nimbuzz! application. In addition, we have tested the concept of making calls via Nimbuzz!.
In July 2009 the Mac client from Nimbuzz! was launched. This was tested prior to the release. The focus here was primarily on the understanding of the concept and the visuals of the IM application: do these meet the expectations of the user?

During the research

Users experience difficulty distinguishing between various contact people.

The result

Generic icons are replaced by avatars, which improves the ease of identity. Dutch titles and a clear feed-forward in the 'search contacts’ area assist the level of understanding.

You can view Nimbuzz for the iPhone in the Apple App store

The usability tests were supported by intensive Nimbuzz! workshops where solutions for any problems arising were jointly searched for. This working method has improved the user friendliness of both mobile clients as well as the PC and Mac clients in a short period of time.

Everybody with their own device

We have searched for respondents with a suitable device for every research. Respondents have been able to subsequently fully test Nimbuzz! on their own tried and trusted unit, with their own accounts, so that they can add their existing communities. Software screenshots of the units are made with the aid of special hard and software. This allows researchers and those involved from Nimbuzz! to view what is happening with the research live in a separate location.

Challenging surprises

Rutger Coolen, Nimbuzz! project manager: "There is nothing as challenging for a product team as seeing your users run into problems, 'live'. Even if you think you fully understand the users, the user tests always throw up some surprises."

Read more about expert reviews and usability tests.