Importance of user research
The technology and services developed by NES play an important role in people's lives. User research is important because it provides invaluable insights into the needs, preferences, and behaviours of your target audience. By understanding your users on a deeper level, you can make informed decisions when designing products or services, ensuring they align better with user expectations. This leads to more user-centric and effective solutions, reducing the risk of costly design errors and enhancing user satisfaction. User research results in a better overall user experience and increased success for projects or products.
Who conducts user research?
Ideally, a user researcher should lead the research efforts, supported by other team members. User researchers have training and experience in various research techniques and tools for diverse projects. However, with only a few user researchers / service designers employed by NES, then sometimes other team members, such as the PM, UX designer or specialist analyst may also conduct some research activities, particularly in the area of discovery and defining user needs. If you would like to discuss conducting user research, please contact Paula Forbes at paula.forbes@nhs.scot
It is helpful for the user researcher to promote a research-oriented mindset within the team, emphasising that learning about users means admitting that not all answers are known ahead of diving into development.
This approach helps the team:
- Learn the language users use to describe the service.
- Understand users' highs and lows when using the service.
- Develop empathy for users as real people with genuine needs.
User researchers must collaborate closely with other team members to inform their decisions effectively.
When does user research take place?
User research should take place from the project's outset right through to its conclusion. While the research goals and methods may vary during each phase, it generally aims to:
- Understand potential users and what they need from a system.
- Determine what the team should design and build.
- Test the team's designs to uncover any issues.
Therefore, user research should be conducted during every design phase, not just at the project's beginning or end. To create an effective service, you must learn about all user types, including people with disabilities and those who require additional support to use your service. It's essential to actively involve people in your research throughout every project phase.
What research methods should be used?
There are many different user research methods, each with its own strengths and ideal contexts for use. Below we describe some of these methods:
- Surveys and Questionnaires: Surveys are useful for gathering quantitative data and insights from a large audience. They can be used to collect demographic information, measure user satisfaction, or gauge opinions. Surveys are best suited for when you need to reach a broad user base and want to gather structured data quickly.
- Interviews: In-depth interviews allow researchers to delve into the motivations, pain points, and aspirations of individual users. They are particularly valuable for gaining qualitative insights and understanding user perspectives in detail. Interviews are ideal when you need to explore user experiences, gather feedback on prototypes, or uncover hidden problems.
- Usability testing: Usability testing involves observing users as they interact with a product or prototype. It helps identify usability issues, navigation problems, and areas of improvement. Usability testing is best employed during the design and development stages to ensure the product aligns with user expectations and is easy to use.
- Contextual inquiry: This method involves researchers observing users in their natural environment, such as their workplace or home, to understand their workflow and needs. Contextual inquiry is useful for gaining a deep understanding of how users interact with a product in their daily lives and is often used for designing workplace solutions.
- Card sorting and information architecture testing: Card sorting is useful for organizing information and improving the structure of websites or applications. It involves asking users to group content or features in a way that makes sense to them. This method is valuable when designing or redesigning complex information systems to ensure they are intuitive and user-friendly.
- A/B Testing: A/B testing is a quantitative method used to compare two or more versions of a product or website to determine which one performs better in terms of user engagement, conversion rates, or other key metrics. It is ideal for optimizing features, layouts, or content to maximize user satisfaction and business goals.
- Diary Studies: Diary studies involve users keeping journals or logs of their interactions with a product over an extended period. This method provides insights into long-term usage patterns and helps uncover evolving user needs and behaviors. Diary studies are valuable for products or services that have a continuous user engagement cycle.
The choice of user research method depends on the specific goals, timeline, and resources of a project. Often, a combination of methods is used to gather both quantitative and qualitative data to create a comprehensive understanding of user needs and preferences. For example a survey may be used that would highlight some followed by more in-depth interviews to delve deeper into issues revealed by the survey. More information on which methods to use can be found in the following Nielsen Norman articles When to use which research methods and Research Methods Articles & Videos