We talked about the objectives of discovery in a previous post so in this follow-up post, we’d like to share some user research methods you can use in the discovery phase of your project.

Desk research

It’s tempting to dive right into setting up research interviews with users immediately or to start designing with what you already know. However, it is crucial to take a step back and look at the wider context of your research. If you don’t know what has come before and what insights have led to the project’s inception, you won’t know when you’ve discovered something new.

Even when you are working on a project that is new and innovative, there will be people that have asked similar questions or had similar problems out there somewhere. Now is the time to find out about the research in areas similar to yours, but don’t just look at existing user research. Look at academic publications, government statistics and research done by charities or other organisations. Social media platforms and user forums can also be a great source of information.

Stakeholder interviews

You can start by talking to team members and key stakeholders to get to what insights have led to the research you are working on. This is also a great opportunity to find out the assumptions of your stakeholders about what they think the problems are and who the users are. As well as kickstarting a relationship with the stakeholders involved, it will help you understand what their vision is for the project and it’s your job to make sure this aligns with the needs of your users.

You can compliment stakeholder interviews by talking to frontline staff and subject-matter experts. Find the people that interact with target users the most, such as customer service advisors. If they engage with customers on a daily basis, they can act as the voice of the customer and will know the problems people are having, common questions they ask and any barriers they face.

User interviews

Doing one-to-one user interviews is the most obvious way to get to know your users. They provide you with the information of what the user thinks/feels/remembers about the subject you are researching. It will give you a lot of information you can build onto and share with your team and stakeholders. Even if interviewing seems straightforward, there are a few things you should think about before you start asking questions.

Contextual studies

Visiting people at their homes, work or doing research in public places can give you certain insights into people’s lives, motivation, their natural environment and the problems they face. It is also a great way to capture what people do and not just what people say. You can ask people the same questions as in an interview, but instead of people telling you how they go about solving their problem now, you can watch how they do it.

Journey Mapping

You won’t get a true picture of the highs and lows of people’s journeys until you ask them to sit down and talk you through their experiences step-by-step. Journey-mapping is a visual technique that is especially useful for identifying pain-points and opportunities and it will help you and your team see things from the perspective of your users.

In our next post, we’ll be sharing some useful techniques for doing your own journey mapping sessions.