Tool details
Card Sort
Quick and easy way to spark conversation about what matters most to the people you are designing for.
Tool category:
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When to use
You want a quick and easy way to spark conversation about what matters most to the people you’re designing for.
Why you should
To get insight into what really counts for the person and the relative importance of different aspect from different angels.
What you get
An understanding of what is most important to the card sorter and how they reflect on the topic from different angles.
Steps to take
Make your deck of cards. Use either a word or a picture on each card, but whatever you select, make sure that it’s easy to understand.
When tailoring your deck of cards to your precise research objectives, be sure that you’re mixing concrete ideas with more abstract ones. You can learn a lot about how the person you’re designing for understands the world by making this exercise more than just a simple ranking.
Now give the cards to the person you’re designing for and ask her to sort them according to what’s most important.
There are a couple variations on this method that work nicely: Instead of asking the person you’re designing for to rank the cards in order of preference, ask her to arrange them as she sees fit. The results might surprise you. Another tweak is to pose different scenarios. Ask the person you’re designing for how she would sort the cards if she had more money, if she were old, if she lived in a big city. Note down what you observe during the sorting sessions.
Further reading
Pictures are a better choice if the person doing the Card Sort speaks another language or cannot read. You can also use the Card Sort exercise to start a deeper conversation about what he or she values and why.