Planning is an important part of the process to ensure that the quality of the survey is good and that the measurement produces a result with good data quality. The planning phase also helps to anchor the top tasks in the organization and gives ownership to those who participate in the process. A good survey contains clear top tasks as response options, with clear names and relevant follow-up questions. The survey should form the basis for important user insights for teams and reporting to management.
Learn more about top tasks
What is a task?
A mission is about what your users are trying to achieve. It's the specific need they want to meet when they visit your website or use your service. It could be something as simple as "Checking opening hours" or as complex as "Finding information about pensions."
The point is that tasks always start with the users and their needs, not what the organization wants to promote. If the user thinks about the task before they visit you, it's a real task. Therefore, use language and phrases that users recognize - not technical jargon or internal terms.
In short: A task is what the user wants to get done. A top task is what most people want to get done.
Start with research and planning
A planning document is the foundation of a successful summit survey. It gives you a structured overview of questions, response options and priorities, allowing you to collaborate effectively with colleagues and ensure that the survey is well grounded in user data. The document also serves as a handy reference for adjustments both during and after the survey.
Naming top tasks in the planning document must be the result of user needs data. There are several sources of the data.
Collect data on user needs
The first step is to get an overview of potential user tasks. This becomes the knowledge base for a workshop to clarify what is defined as the users' most important tasks, i.e. the top tasks. Here are some sources of insight:
Discovery Survey
This is step 1 in Skyra's process for identifying and measuring top tasks. It is a survey on the website where visitors explain the reason for their visit, in their own words.
Web statistics
Find data about:
Most visited pages
Search history from the site's search engine
SEO analysis
Customer service
Review logs to learn what problems or questions users most often ask customer service.
Strategy documents
Review your organization's strategic goals to identify tasks that align with user needs.
Hold a workshop
A workshop is an effective tool for gathering insights, discussing and creating consensus on what the top tasks are. The end result of a workshop is often a completed planning document with the names of the top tasks, the target groups and the formulation of other follow-up questions.
Tips for a successful workshop:
Set aside time: The workshop should last 1-2 hours.
Prepare a rough task list: Start with a list of possible tasks based on data (more on this below).
Discuss and prioritize: Focus on identifying the most important tasks that matter most to users.
Number of tasks and levels 1 and 2: If there are a large number of tasks (more than 10), you may want to establish the categories first and then specify the subtasks. It is recommended to have a maximum of 12 answer options per question, one of which is always "Other".
Name the tasks
Naming your tasks is a critical part of the planning process. A good name makes the task easy to understand and impossible to misunderstand.
Remember "Other"
It is not the intention to include all user tasks as answer options, but the most important ones. The survey contains "Other" which acts as a collection basket for the tasks that were not included in the list. During the survey or after it is completed, you can clean up "Other" and move answers to the correct task or create new ones and place answers there.
Key principles:
User-centric language: Think about how users express themselves, not how the organization describes it. For example: Use "Learn about pensions" instead of "Pension information."
Consistency: Avoid unnecessary repetitions such as "Check opening hours," "Check price," etc. Instead, use short and precise names such as "Opening hours" or "Prices."
Examples in brackets: For tasks that may be difficult to understand, add examples in brackets. For example: "Update profile (name, password, etc.)"
Use of slash (/): If the same task has multiple names for different audiences, use a slash. For example: "Promote/return product."
Create a rough task list
After collecting data and clarifying task names, you can create a rough list. A typical organization usually has between 5 and 50 tasks in a top task survey. Avoid too many tasks - a list of 100 tasks is probably unnecessary and confusing.
Three types of tasks to consider:
Pull tasks: These are tasks users actively think about before visiting the website. For example: "Find mortgage rate."
Push tasks: These are less relevant and often initiated by the business itself, such as "Sign up for newsletter." Consider omitting such tasks.
External tasks: Tasks that are important to users but may not be offered by the business today. For example: "Learn about tax deductions."
Create a planning document
The planning document is used to create the survey in Skyra, by copying in questions, answer options and texts.
The planning document can either be prepared during the workshop or created afterwards, where a responsible person gathers insights, mapping and discussions from the workshop into a clear and structured list of tasks and questions.
Download
View planning document (Google doc) - English version
Next step - create the survey in Skyra
Once you have completed the workshop and created a rough task list, you are ready for the next phase: setting up the survey itself.