STEP 6: Prepare for data collection.
STEP 9: Conduct the interviews.
STEP 10: Analyze collected data.
STEP 11: Transform BS personas to personas.
Other Methods to Answer the Question
Years ago, New York City decided to redesign all of its street crossing curbs so they were flat. The intended audience was people who used wheelchairs. The assumption was that the flat curbs would help them cross the streets easily and safely. While that was true, city officials were surprised to learn that people who used baby strollers, as well as ones who used skateboards and rollerblades, were also fans of the flat curbs (see Figure 2.1).
FIGURE 2.1 A flat curb in front of a New York City crossing.
Play-Doh, the modeling clay used by young children for arts and crafts projects (see Figure 2.2) was not originally intended for children when it was first introduced to the market in the 1930s. Kutol Products, a soap manufacturer in Cincinnati, Ohio, targeted it at people who wanted to remove coal residue from wallpaper. Only after a classroom of children in Cincinnati started using it as a modeling compound (20 years later) did the manufacturer realize its true audience was completely different. Long story short, in 2003 Play-Doh was included in the Toy Industry Association’s list of toys of the century.
FIGURE 2.2 Play-Doh.
One of the hardest things to know in product development is who your target audience is. Product developers might come up with a very specific target audience only to find out that a completely different audience is finding value in their product, which is a good thing. Or, even more surprising, they might discover that their actual audience is very different than the intended one.
Why Is This Question Important?
Getting to know your audience, who they are, what makes them tick, what brings them happiness, frustration, and motivation helps you build a better product, feature, or service. It makes you find better product roadmap decisions when no other data is available. It also prevents your team from going into exhausting debates about different aspects of assumed customer behavior or what analytics data mean. The alternative is that you get a Frankenstein product that is just a conglomerate of features that has everything for no one.
There are two types of information about people that you’ll need: demographics and behaviors. Marketing practitioners generally use demographics to target product messaging through customer segmentation. Since this book is about product development, it focuses on behaviors, largely because they often cut across traditional demographic segmentations. Table 2.1 provides an example that demonstrates this difference. By the end of this chapter, you will have an archetypical profile of several users or customers (or potential users or customers) differentiated by their behaviors.
TABLE 2.1 HUMAN BEHAVIOR VS. DEMOGRAPHIC LABELS
| Behavior | Demographics |
| Owns an iPhone and Android | Alpha male |
| Online 20–30 hours every week | Above-average user |
| Uses a product similar to ours | Millennial |
| Open to trying new things | Average income |
| Reads five “self-help” books a year | East or West Coast U.S. |
When Should You Ask the Question?
Getting an answer to the question “Who are the users?” just as strategizing begins is the most helpful timing. That said, it almost never happens. Because it is not always clear when a new idea for a product, feature, or service is born, it’s also not clear when strategizing around it actually begins. Therefore, any time in the early stages of strategizing is great for asking (and answering) the question (see Figure 2.3).
Assuming the question was answered in the early stages of strategizing, there is no reason to answer it again during the execution stage. After your product has been launched, there might be new, additional audiences using it. If you want to learn who these new audiences are, answering the question anytime after launch is going to be helpful. It will also support future developments and changes to the product.
FIGURE 2.3 When is a good time to ask “Who are the users?” The big circle represents the best time, while the smaller ones indicate other times recommended for asking the question.
While many people mistake analytics data as a way to answer the “Who are the users?” question, data gathered on visitors is limited to basic demographics of people who choose to identify themselves. It’s extremely limited in terms of describing your true audience, their behaviors, and motivations. Therefore, an answer to the question is qualitative in nature, not quantitative.
A hint for you about good timing to answer the question with lean user research is when you find yourself looking at analytics data over and over again, not knowing how to design using it, not learning anything new about customers that inspires design or roadmap decisions, not agreeing on what it means for the product, or just taking wild (or even thoughtful) guesses about what it means. Answering the question through interviewing users will give meaning to analytics data.
Answering the Question with Interviewing and Personas
Converse like a talk show host, think like a writer, understand subtext like a psychiatrist, have an ear like a musician.
—Lawrence Grobel (celebrity interviewer)
Interviewing is a research activity in which you gather information through direct dialogue. It is a great