I just noticed it redirects from sleep.io is all. It seems like while .com's are great, having something like sleep. whatever is pretty awesome. I was just curious as to why you chose one redirect over the other.
We decided that while we wanted to capture the .io domain for completeness' sake, for the reasons listed above (SEO implications, not "correct" usage of TLD), sleepio.com made more sense as the default / redirect target.
We built the main sessions in Flash first because it was the quickest way to discover what it was that we were building! So the Flash version has been around longest and is the most stable (and currently the slickest). Once we were confident of the functional requirements we built the HTML5 version, but that's still in beta so we display the Flash version by default if you have it installed/enabled. Quite a few technical challenges we had to overcome to chain videos seamlessly in HTML5 on iPad...we'll definitely be writing about it once the launch dust has settled...
Thanks for taking the time to look at it and give such thorough feedback.
The name thing is the one thing that always seems to delight people; it's indicative of the care/attention we pay (hopefully) to the user throughout the programme. To arrive at names we started with census records of top baby names going back 50 years, and now periodically add to them with names people enter that we don't have. It degrades gracefully though if we don't know your name!
Noted re: speed of transition. We're adding paddles today too. We decided to keep all animations in synch, but that's a good call on waiting til viewed. We'll look at it.
If we can get permission from the journal we supplying the original paper would be a great idea, although a more accessible format might be better. You can read abstract on pubmed here: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22654196
So that you provide as little friction as possible to getting people to sign up. For example, with your current button I was reluctant to press it because I would assume there would be a big form on the other side. However, I'm more likely to sign up for more info if it's only an email required.
You've inadvertantly highlighted a UX failing of ours - that's not actually a sign up form!
We ask for your first name so you can meet The Prof; another thing we're wrestling with, how to introduce that (non-standard) experience in a clear way...
"All we need is your name to show you a preview", or "You won't need to enter anything else unless you purchase". Emphasise that the name is all you need, I think that would solve the issue.
Thanks, but I actually think we need to be even clearer. It should be obvious what to do without reading anything. And if high-functioning HN users are making that error, your average Boots customer almost certainly is.
Unfortunately there isn't an obvious affordance for this sort of interaction (that I've yet come across) - it looks like an email signup, when in fact it's more like 'play a game'...an interesting challenge...
I'm just thinking out loud here. One approach is to replace the green Try It Now button with an image of the Prof, under which you say "Hi. I'm the Prof. What's your name?", following by text field and green button. Then experiment with what the green button says.
It would be interesting to see if a vague 'what's your name' approach, rather than a specific direction with a stated outcome, wins in a split-test.
Nice idea - we would need to connect the headline explaining the programme with the Prof more clearly, but that's pretty easy. Will work it up, thanks!
The thing we've wrestled most with (and haven't yet cracked) is how to accept time entry in a way that is unambiguous to even the least confident users, and also encompasses the range of quanta we need to manage (from mins to many hours). We've tried a few different solutions but 24hr dropdowns result in the least comprehension errors!!
We've taken what are the clinical standard measures - and some indeed feature counterintuitive questions. And you're right, one of the main issues with 'insomnia' is an unreliable sleep pattern.
We don't want to know how you slept last night, since this may be unrepresentative; but as you say an 'average' may also not capture it/be a natural way to report it. 3 x sample points ('last 3 nights') may be longwinded. Will consider...any ideas on a better question?
Start with "do you go to bed at roughly the same time (within 1-2 hours) most nights?" and only ask the "what time" question if people say yes to the first one.
How about a visual analog round clock where people can drag the hour hand to a certain point, and choose to create a range by dragging and so extending the time slice with another hour hand.
Thanks for the suggestion - it's something we've considered; the issue with our tests to date has been getting the minute-to-minute fidelity with a circular interface (plus it's actually quite hard to drag something accurately in a circular motion). But we should revisit this all with fresh eyes - and the idea much appreciated!
Hmmm because our primary target (middle aged women) are not that web-savvy i guess, and the .com is the default TLD. We bagged sleep.io when it first went on sale but haven't considered using it as the default.
To ask the opposite (and possibly stupid) question - why would you make sleep.io the default?
Yes that's the vision! That when you have a problem, you just 'visit The Prof', and he gives you a blended programme to help you. Sleep is a good starting point, since it is a) socially acceptable to talk about, and b) is highly co-morbid with other problems - a good way in to health in general.
A limitation of our current media-rich approach however is the cost of adapting content - we took a short term cheap, long term expensive approach... :)
To me, the obvious follow-up would be social anxiety because it is intrinsically hard to talk to other people about, yet discussing it with a computer doesn't pose any difficulty. (I'm currently reading a 'use CBT to cure social anxiety' book which has been rather eye-opening.)
Regardless, I like the site, though it sometimes gets a bit choppy on my old macbook pro. I think £50 might be a bit steep as an up-front cost - it almost put me off.
Also, have you considered doing an iphone app for the diary? I use some supposedly motion sensing app to wake me up with music. It doesn't work very well, but for your purposes I could easily see just thumping the phone when I notice I'm awake instead of having to look at a clock and remember a time.
Yes, we'll need an umbrella name. But right now it's more important for it to be immediately obvious what the problem is that we can help with, since we rely on self-diagnosis, (the user is actively looking for a sleep solution either online or in Boots store).
