While you still enjoy the last weeks of summer, Alter State invites you to enter autumn with freshly gained knowledge on User Research. On August 26th, we organize our second Masterclass dedicated to User Interview, OPEN TO EVERYONE.
The Masterclass will be a bit different than the previous one, in a pleasant way, of course. We offer you to join a 1.5-hour session, divided into three parts: presentation given by international speaker + Q&A, User Interview-focused theoretical and practical sessions.
The article below presents you the value of User Interview and various user research processes to innovation creation. You will have a deeper view of what benefits User Interview provides and when it’s the best time to apply it. And the cherry on top - get to know what special Alter State team prepared for the Women Innovation Program 2021.
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User Interview - a goldmine of the innovation process
User Interview of one of the UX methods, helping get insights into what users think about innovation. User Interview mainly helps comprehend what customers prefer, hate or value the most regarding the exact innovation or its idea.
You may think why innovators should trust User Interview? Looking through the simplistic perspective, UX specialists, designers, and other idea stakeholders are not the users and can create a product based on existing opinions and biases.
As innovators, we must look way broader, observe the environment, and listen to what people-users actually need.
Most importantly, don't think of a User Interview process as an informal conversation or sales meeting. It might be strategic 1-on-1 sessions where the researcher asks user questions regarding a site, product, service, application, etc.
What exact benefits User Interview can provide?
Any innovation idea without proper research and testing is simply a hypothesis. In this case, a User Interview brings value to the innovation process in various ways:
Helps to understand your persona. User Interview supports the strategic analysis process of target people, what and how big are their needs. A clearer picture gives us a higher probability of innovation success.
Pours new and extraordinary ideas. It helps to answers millions of questions oriented to ideation, design and development processes. User Interview becomes your guiding star when deciding on your solution for real & existing problems.
Saves from unnecessary risks. User Interviews also execute a task in providing visibility of innovation formation opportunities. Strategic use research can help to test even the tinniest barriers at whichever innovation process you are.
Laser glance at competitors. By implementing proper User Interview, innovators can identify the pros and cons of competitors, helping to form a general understanding of main features, strategy or even metrics as part of their solution. All this knowledge is valuable when creating and improving your own innovation.
When to apply User Interview?
Proper User Interviews can help you give a laser focus on necessary details, offer new ideas, save time and ease the workflow of creating innovations.
Simply speaking - User Interview becomes a true guide star in the innovation process and can be done in various situations:
At the zero-idea stage or before you start creating. Apply User Research to build personas, journey maps, feature and workflow ideas.
Throughout the creation process. Enrich a contextual inquiry study on how users perceive descriptions of tools, processes, etc.
At the end of a usability test. Collect verbal responses related to observed behaviors.
Don't forget to evaluate the quantity and intensity of the user interviews. It can depend on your product or service specialty or the amount and difficulty of tools or updates planned to be made.
How to prepare & execute a strategic User Interview? Come to learn in the second Alter State Masterclass!
On August 26th, together with outstanding women innovators, we will practically learn about User Research techniques during the second Alter State Masterclass dedicated to User Interview, which is a part of the 5-month Women Innovation Program.
Precisely for this program, we focus on providing international collaboration and knowledge-sharing opportunities between participants while working on challenges addressing Sustainable Development Goals, such as future of energy, future of healthcare, future of education and future of cities & mobility.
Registration for the Alter State Women Innovation Program has started. Although the program is tailored for future and experienced women innovators, EVERYONE is welcome to apply now!
Written by Kristina Kirkliauskaite