This document provides guidance on conducting early stage customer development interviews to inform user experience design. It emphasizes the importance of getting out of the building to talk to real users, provides tips for planning interviews, asking open-ended questions, being a learner not an expert, and making sense of what is learned. Sample questions are given as well as dos and don'ts for interviews. Quantitative and qualitative user research methods are also briefly outlined.
Generative AI - Gitex v1Generative AI - Gitex v1.pptx
UX techniques for customer development and making sense of qualitative data
1. It’s hard to understand people
Early stage customer development
Johanna Kollmann - @johannakoll
Lean Startup Machine London, 23 June 2012
Photo by NASA JSC Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa_jsc_photo/7257865176
2. UX helps you to get out of the building
Photo by Bottleleaf http://www.flickr.com/photos/bottleleaf/2258627441/
3. (Some) research methods (yeah we have a lot)
Quantitative Qualitative
Surveys Contextual inquiry
Generative Interviews Mental models
Interviews
Diary studies
Automated card sort Usability testing
Surveys Moderated card sort
Evaluative Automated studies Wizard of Oz
Analytics
A/B Testing
Multi-variant testing
Adapted from figures by Janice Fraser, Nate Bolt, Christian Rohrer
5. Plan who to talk to where about what and why
Photo by angelamaphone http://www.flickr.com/photos/angelamaphone/2663422833//
6.
7.
8. What topics shall the interview cover?
Dieting
Buying food
Exercise
Preparing food
Eating out
Busy lifestyle
Struggles
9. Prompts rather than set questions
Day-in-a-life (today, yesterday)
Decide what to eat
Last time on a diet
How active (want vs. do)
Preparing food for oneself
Preparing food for family/friends
10. Have a ‘softball question’ ready
Please tell me a little bit about your
cooking this week.
Could you tell me about the last
dish you prepared yourself?
13. Ask open questions – don’t lead
YAY NAY
• Who • Did
• What • Have
• When • Are
• Where • Were
• Why • Will
• How
Were you trying to do A or B?
What were you trying to do?
14. Some great all-purpose questions
• Has there ever been a time when you had x experience?
• Could you tell me about that?
• What was great about that?
• What was awful about that?
• Why did you do that?
• And then, what happened?
• If you had a magic wand, what would you make the situation be like?
By Janice Fraser
15. Do’s and don’ts
Photo by Hilde Skjølberg http://www.flickr.com/photos/hebe/3004800079/
16. Do
Be the learner, not the expert
Ask naïve questions
Ask for specific stories
Allow people time to think
Listen!
Take notes or record
Take photos or collect artefacts
Photo by Tomas Hellberg http://www.flickr.com/photos/tomhe/35312882/
17. Don’t
Be an interrogator
Ask questions that sound like blame, or argumentative
Ask for solutions
Try to solve problems during the interview
Ask what features people want
Ask people to imagine theoretical situations
Photo by G Meyer http://www.flickr.com/photos/kainet/144703613/
23. Resources
Notes from my Leancamp session on this topic http://johannakoll.posterous.com/ux-research-tips-
for-customer-development-not
Mental Models by Indi Young
Storytelling for User Experience by Whitney Quesenbery & Kevin Brooks
Remote Research by Nate Bolt & Tony Tulathimutte
Undercover User Experience by Cennydd Bowles
Designing for the Digital Age by Kim Goodwin
LUXr resources and materials by Janice Fraser (http://www.slideshare.net/clevergirl/) and Lane Halley
(http://www.slideshare.net/LaneHalley/)
Articles on User Interface Engineering (http://www.uie.com/browse/usability_testing/)
Notas del editor
Non-leading interviews allow you to capture what a person is thinking in their terms, with their structure and vocabulary intact. Indi deliberately writes prompts rather than interview questions. Also easier to parse quickly. if you go for a non-directed interview using prompts, make sure everybody in your team has a shared understanding of the intent behind each topic. Janice calls this topic map.
Non-leading interviews allow you to capture what a person is thinking in their terms, with their structure and vocabulary intact. Indi deliberately writes prompts rather than interview questions. Also easier to parse quickly. if you go for a non-directed interview using prompts, make sure everybody in your team has a shared understanding of the intent behind each topic. Janice calls this topic map.
begin interviews with a 'softball' question - a question that is simple to answer and puts the participant at ease.
Be careful with WHY. ‘How did you know that X?’ ‘What were you thinking at the moment when X?’ This does not interrupt the recounting process. So ‘tell me how it was that you came to be looking for this site that day’ does the work of ‘why were you looking... ?If you’ve made people comfortable, Why should be ok.