Previewing the test yourself is a good first step, but we all know from trying to proofread our own content that you really need someone else to spot your mistakes.

That’s why, in our studies, we always run a pilot test with a small group of people before launching the real test. Because they bring fresh eyes to the study, this initial group will find things that you missed – confusing task wording, typos, and so on.

Note that we want to make this pilot as realistic as possible, so we use the same invitation we normally would (but tweaked to say that this is a dry run and the incentive (if any) doesn’t apply to it).

Who should participate

There are 2 types of people who should pilot your tree test:

• Project stakeholders
  It’s good for team members and sponsors to see what made it (and didn’t make it) into the study, and this gives them a final chance to approve (or raise issues with) your tree and tasks.
  
  
• Representative users
  If possible, try to include a few users in your pilot as well. These could be actual users, or surrogates such as customer-service staff or friends/family that resemble your target audience.
  Getting some real users means that you can double-check that your tree and tasks are written in language that they understand (not just the jargon of your organisation and industry).
  
  

Running an in-person session

Next: Who should participate