UX insights with Tomaso Vido de Zaccaria, UX researcher

Tomaso is a UX researcher and Eye Tracking specialist at one of the most important international travel sites. During the interview at Barcelona Technology School, he talked about the UX research and shared his work experience in the conversation with Sereen Masri, BTS’s student.

Sereen: Why you became a User Experience designer and researcher?

Tomaso: What brought me to the UX work was more a tool than a study or a field of applications. I learned to use the Eye Tracker and applied this methodology in various fields, like the shopping experience, customer experience, and usability. Eventually, all this brought me to Edreams where I can implement this new methodology in the company. Being in a digital work, I think the UX is probably one of the most relevant fields of application, and also my favorite.

Sereen: Very cool. You studied Communication and Psychology and it’s really related to the UX.  How exactly did you get into the Eye Tracking?

Tomaso: I got into it thanks to my post-graduate, which permitted me to work for a neuropsychology lab, where we were doing research with new technologies related to the User Experience and then, thanks to that, I learned how to use Eye Tracking. After that, I moved to a company in Milan, specialized in Eye Tracking consultancy.

Sereen: Is Eye Tracking about observing people in their natural habitat?

Tomaso: The Eye tracking is more monitoring of a specific behavior of the user. What I’m doing right now is more focused on the experience of the users with our platform and services. We are also interested in doing more exploratory research, but my 24/7 is about looking and assessing the users while they are interacting with our final product.

Sereen: What’s your favorite part of the UX strategy, like what stage do you love doing the most and why?

Tomaso: My daily work, for example, on research, is about gathering with the designers to understand how to proceed, what we are going to test and how we are going to approach the users. Then, we have the moderation part, the testing part in which we can approach the users with the products, the analysis of the report and the communication of the result.

I think I like the entire process, but maybe the last two steps are my favorite ones, about doing the best, communicating the result, sharing the knowledge based on what we learn from the users, and trying to help and evangelize the company.

Sereen: That’s exciting. For a new product, a feature or whatever you are going to release, how do you decide which strategy to use?

Tomaso: It really depends on the purpose. For example, if we want to test how a call to action is understood by the user, we can have for instance one to one interviews, or we can put it online doing an A/B test to see which one we can confirm.

If we are testing a concept or a new product, we can do a focus group or a workshop, putting users together, conceptualizing, and thinking alongside how we should work and how we can explain the product. So, it really depends on the product we are testing.

Sereen: My last question is if you have any advice for us as a student of the Master in Digital Solutions Development. Obviously, it´s a very broad area, so what do you suggest us to focus on, like some professional roles in careers in the User Experience research and design.

Tomaso: I’m always thinking about how our UX teams and department are built. Those profiles who are cooperating in the User Experience can be researchers, as I am, developers, designers, data analyst, data scientist… So, I think there are many different roles and also many different chances to be part of the UX team. Just pick up whatever you like or you can do better, you have a lot of opportunities to be part of a UX team.

Sereen: That´s good to know. We just have to find the right place and get ourselves in them. Thank you for your time.

Tomaso: Thank you for having me.