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Brown Bag Series, UX Team

Design Research

(is not Market Research)

Research and strategy in design are ways to give yourself a reality check.

the creation center

T-Mobile: Creation Center Copyright 2010 Andrea Small

Design research is used to encourage disruptive innovation before you create new products.

the creation center

T-Mobile: Creation Center Copyright 2010 Andrea Small

Why don’t we just start coming up with cool ideas?

viability

feasibility

desirability YES

YES

YES

Cool ideas often don’t get to, or even tank, in market.

the creation center

T-Mobile: Creation Center

1. Get out of your rabbit hole.

courtesy of xkcd.com

Understand the world through your customer’s eyes.

the creation center

T-Mobile: Creation Center

2. Mediate a group opinion.

Open communication within a team is essential.

courtesy of xkcd.com

the creation center

T-Mobile: Creation Center

3. Connect with an emotional story.

There is no formula for human behavior.

courtesy of xkcd.com

Choose the right method for…

…research …and synthesis

T-Mobile: Creation Center

3. Connect with an emotional story.

Research is about finding the needs people don’t even know they have.

Prepare beforehand. 1.Interview your stakeholder to understand the company goal.

2.Research existing offerings in a product space.

3.Align your research method with the constraints of your project.

http://www.design-research-lab.org/MAPS

You are looking for:

•Behavior that surprises your assumptions.

•Differences between what they say and what they do.

•The way they define their values and priorities.

Interview Get a sense of their life context by talking about their everyday routine and see their surroundings.

Experience Shadow their everyday life to understand their challenges and how they work around them.

Objects Hold a show and tell of the things they use everyday to see what they consider important.

research

Immerse yourself with multiple approaches.

• Card sorts

• Diaries

• Mind maps

• Fly on the wall

• Mystery shopper

• Analogous experiences

• Photo journals

• Contextual inquiry

• Expert interviews

• Questionnaires

• Surveys

• Extreme users

• Cognitive walkthrough

• Secondary research

• Co-design workshops

• Focus groups

• Trend analysis

• Competitive analysis

toolbox

research

goodies

Contextual Inquiry Interviewing individuals in their home to understand everyday lives. > Behavior, value systems, unmet needs, workaround solutions

Analogous Experiences Observing interaction and context at comparative research sites. > Group dynamics, relationships, navigation

Extreme Users Shadowing and interviewing outliers to articulate essential human needs. > Motivators, ecosystem drivers, redefining a problem

research

Synthesis is about identifying people’s unmet needs.

Keep in mind: 1.This should be the sum of each team member’s unique perspective .

2.It’s a bottom-up process to allow surprising findings to emerge.

3.You are translating observations into ways to guide new products.

Rules of thumb: •Get concrete to communicate across practice areas.

•Organize for patterns to visualize the data and get a sense of scale.

•Make leaps to interpret, and then keep on iterating for meaning.

Industry experts Learn from the approach of other businesses to create revenue- generating recommendations.

Cultural landscape Look at the macro trends that effect your customers, from changes in social norms to product fashions.

Subject matter experts Understand the right language and definitions of your research area, to minimize multiple interpretations.

Ramp up your expertise with background knowledge.

synthesis

• Visualizing

• Analyzing

• Organizing

• Experience map

• Filtering

• Interpreting

• Framework

• Personas

• Clusters

• Venn Diagram

• Typologies

• 2x2’s

• Journeys

• Scenarios

• Tensions

• Infographics

toolbox

synthesis

Cluster Filtering pieces of data to see emergent themes. > Themes, pain points, need tensions

goodies

Framework Organizing the motivators and trade-off decisions of your users. > Tools such as 2x2’s, Venn diagrams, or infographics.

Experience map Plotting out needs, actions or motivations of the user over time > Customer journeys, key decision points, scenario plans

Typologies Breaking out the key user values with different definitions. > Strategic landscape, User priorities

synthesis

Now apply these learnings…

…for your own projects!

applied insights

We don’t need another Facebook, but then what do we need?

Say you have a project on a mobile social networking app:

Some parameters: 1.Your marketing stakeholder wants to target young adults (18-34) 2.Your business strategy stakeholder wants to ensure that it is easy enough to learn for a mass market

applied insights

Get to the heart of the matter Use an analogous experience

1. Ask yourself, what is this really about? • Community • Hangout spot

2. Is there something that people do already?

• Parking lot at Dunkin’ Donuts (hmm… no, you need to also think about your client)

• Skate Park

applied insights

Open your eyes, and go out the door:

Look for: • Roles

• Relationships

• Crowded/ empty spaces

• Badges of affiliation

• Hierarchies of status

• Unique language

applied insights

You start to notice a pattern Advanced skaters teach and

mentor in a spontaneous way

Skaters spend as much

time watching others skate

The best skaters have

the same helmet sticker Certain areas respected

as non-social

Casual socializing begins

with asking for tips

The most tricks happen in

front of the lunch tables

Performance and mentorship come up over and over again.

applied insights

Now make it actionable

Your users :

• Socialize through teaching

• Rely on a mix of different skill levels

• Prefer to hone their skills alone until they can perform

So, they need: • Clear marks of “teacher” expertise for learners

• Designated areas to switch into observation mode

• Practice spaces that are set apart from social areas

Practicing space

Teaching space

Performance Audience

SOCIAL

NON- SOCIAL

HIGH OPPORTUNITY

the creation center

T-Mobile: Creation Center Copyright 2010 Andrea Small

thank you!