This week, our continued exploration of of 23 user research methods brings us to category number 4: Watch and Listen.
These methods show you what tasks and goals your users work to achieve on a daily basis. More importantly, they help you recognize obstacles to your users’ progress, which often translate into golden opportunities for your new product.
Watch and Listen methods are passive methods, where the user may or may not even be aware of the researcher. There is less interaction between the researcher and the user that other method categories and users probably don’t feel like they have a “problem” to solve.
Web Eavesdropping
Spend some time immersed in social media or discussion boards related to your concept. To avoid disrupting the community, save questions of your own until the end of your immersion period.
Shadowing
Arrange to spend some time following people from your target audience throughout their normal daily activities, making detailed notes about your observations. This is often referred to as Consumer Ethnography. Your notes can be used later for Behavioral Mapping (tool 20).
Fly on the Wall
Choose a location relevant to your product concept. Carefully observe how people interact with each other, with the environment, and with existing products, processes, or technology.
Video Observation
Arrange to record the activities of a given space over a period of time. Leave the camera long enough for participants to get comfortable, and scour the footage for insights into behavior. View the footage in time-lapse to reveal patterns of activity.
AEIOU
In any observational setting, use lists and sketches to record the activities, environments, interactions, objects, and users. The process of recording each of these components in detail often reveals breakdowns in the system, which translate into opportunities for your new product.
Task Analysis
List and diagram the steps your participant takes in order to achieve a given task. The task or ritual may be as broad as trying to quit smoking or as simple as brushing their teeth.
Behavioral Mapping
Diagram a given space, and record the movements and activities of people within that space. This careful observation can reveal breakdowns,
coping mechanisms, and frequently repeated behaviors—all of which can signify opportunity for a new product, process, or technology. Map out the ritual of the consumer use experience to think through ways to impact the ritual for your brand.
Facial Coding
Using the universal facial coding system developed by Paul Eckman, researchers are able to recognize expressions to reveal true emotional
responses. Instead of rationally describing how they feel, the facial expressions reveal the untranslated emotional reaction to communications. This technique is paired with eye tracking.
Neuromarketing
Brain scans are conducted to decode consumers’ emotional responses to a variety of stimuli in order to understand their decision-making
process and behaviors. The emotional response to communication is quantified through this technique. Understanding the significance of
sensory experiences (touch, smell, sound) in brand building is produced from the scan data.
If you’d like to hear more about how to use these methods, give us a call. Or check out our recent posts on Show me, Tell me and Get a Report.