What goes into developing a product innovation strategy?

JENN COONCE EXPERIENCE DESIGN www.jenncoonce.com

Jenn Coonce Experience Design•Product Innovation Strategy•Customer Research•UX Process Facilitationwww.jenncoonce.com


What goes into developing a product innovation strategy?

Business ObjectivesCustomer Objectives

Existing Customer ResearchMeasurable Goals

Customer Interviews

Personas

Competitive/Best Practice Review

Competitive/Best Practice Review

Usability Testing

Task Analysis

Sketching


Inputs to product strategy

• Competitive landscape/expert review• Customer research (both historical and project)

• Ethnographic research• Field research (at Meetings, etc.)• User interviews• Satisfaction surveys• Customer service insights

• Analytics• Usage of sections on the site• Tenure/cohort data

• The backlog


Establishing & prioritizing feature sets

• (Specific) customer research• Informational• Exploratory (involving the customer in the design)

• Persona development• Task analysis• Story mapping• High-level group sketching• Feature prioritization (by customer group, business

priority, etc.)


Understand customer motivations

• Concept Testing• Paper Prototyping• In-person Usability Testing• Remote User research• Group validation sessions• 5-second test• Survey• Beta Testing• A/B Testing with analytics• Expert Review


Deciding on a research strategy

• What do we and don’t we know?• Are there are major areas of disagreement

among the team (or client)?• How unique is the user group?• How important is it that we get it right?• What is our research budget?• When will we have the biggest opportunity

for implementing findings?


Usability Testing


One-on-one analysis of a design


Types of usability testing

• In person/remote/bulletin board• Formal/informal• In a facility/in the office• Paper prototype/design concept/live site• Timed vs. open ended vs. task-based


Considerations

• Who do you recruit?– People in the office– Family/Friends– Proxies for customers– Real customers

• What are you testing?– Time to completion– Ability to complete tasks– Understanding of abstract concepts


Personas


Research-based persona process

1. Interviewed 10 interviews with potential dieters.

2. Isolated similarities and differences between users and created attribute scales.

3. Plotted each subject on the attribute lines.

4. Developed personas based on clusters.

Resource: http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2007/11/14/crappy-personas-vs-robust-personas/


Personas represent relevant details about real customers


Research-based persona process

Personas represent key characteristics we know about our customers via actual research.


Grouping exercises elucidate and prioritize top tasks

Resources: http://www.uie.com/articles/kj_technique/http://agileproductdesign.com/blog/the_new_backlog.html

Process for Developing Top Tasks

• Listed top 4 tasks for six personas.

• Grouped items based on affinity

• Labeled groups• Prioritized by

importance to personas


Site Personalization Initiative


The Challenge

• Customers did not absorb the large library of valuable weight loss tips and content offered on the site, preferring instead to jump right in and use the tools.

• Compliance dropped significantly after week 1.

• Previous customer research indicated that customers have common dieting roadblocks and pain points that impact their motivation level and deter their success, with similar problems along the way.


Our Hypothesis

Providing content and added support for subscribers tailored to their tenure could help customers overcome some of these problems.


• Product Owner• Strategists• Information Architects• Designers• Content developers/writers• Front-end developers• Engineers• Project Managers• QA Team• Customer service representatives• Other stakeholders

Collaborative team


First step of personalization product map

• Make the user experience revolve around key tasks leading to weight loss success.

• Improve usability fundamentals in order to help customers be more successful

• Make site more relevant to all user types

GetStarted

Learnthe plan

TrackFood

TrackWeight

Readcontent

Findcontent

Key site tasks


Primary KPIs

• Increased 1-Week Trial conversions• Increased subscriber retention•Tool usage:

• increases among all tenure groups• increases average weeks for tool usage •decreases drop off between weeks 1 and 4

•Customer engagement (e.g., increased site visits and time spent)

•Site usability (as measured from future user testing)


We did several stages of customer research

• User Interviews• Ethnography• Surveys

Prior CustomerResearch

Project-relatedExploratory Research

PersonalizationConcept Research

• Focus Groups on Pain Points

• Individual Content Card Sorting

• Assessing multiple user interface approaches


Ethnography identified common pain points

Interviews and observations of real people in real environments revealed common reasons for drop-off and a cycle of commitment.


Focus Groups Identified Pain Points

Focus groups clarified and prioritized pain points for key user groups.


Card Sorting identified content that could help


We mapped user progression on the site


We tailored personas to the project

Identify needs unique to the project

2

3 Prioritize top tasks to meet needs

Identify characteristics that distinguish distinguish personas

1

4 Identify content that supports top tasks


Visual designers and writers participated in personas


Persona needs & tasks indicated key content


Concept Research tested two distinct concepts

vs


A final version was designed


Personalization outcomes

The outcome:• Diet related content became the number one destination on the site.


Exercise: develop a better restaurant search App


Exercise: Build a better restaurant finder app

Business objectives:• Provide more personalized restaurant recommendations

and ratings competing with Yelp and Google Maps.• Achieve adoption quickly from a small group of

dedicated users.

Target customers who:• Eat out frequently• Live in urban areas• Are 25-45 years old• Tend to be technology adopters



Think of your most recent restaurant search.

Write down each task in the process on a different post-it note

Now organize all your group’s tasks into chronological order



How do these tasks impact the features we might include in our product?


Persona 1: Kimberly

Typical scenarios: • Eats Starbucks oatmeal every morning for breakfast• Eats out at lunch when her kids are at daycare –she looks up

restaurants on her phone, in her car (on UrbanSpoon)—so she spends very little time looking.

• Special occasions with her husband• Family dinners (less frequent)• Will write a rating/review only if a restaurant is really poor.Cares most about (in order of importance):• Cleanliness is primary• At lunch, proximity to where she is right now (even side of the street)

is paramount.• She won’t visit a restaurant without multiple reviews and good ratings• She needs a place that fits her budget (no more than $15)Biggest complaints about the current searching experience: • Photos of restaurants are often of the outside but she wants to see

the inside sparkling clean.• Reviews are not specific enough about cleanliness• Her pet peeve is dirty and sticky menus or tablecloths.

• 36 years old• Part-time therapist• Lives in Houston, Texas• Mother of 4 children• Her husband travels

during the week• Eats out everyday for

lunch and breakfast


Persona 2: Melissa

Typical scenarios: • Eats out several times a week: for quick lunches or dinner with her

fiancé or friends.• Often purchases Groupons for restaurants in her area (Googles the

restaurant first--looks at restaurant site and Yelp).• Likes to try new places in her area.• Often will ask a friend about a restaurant after finding one.• Recently looked up “best pizza in Boston.”• Sometimes will look for a place to visit while she's out and about.Cares most about (in order of importance): • Good reviews• Proximity• Healthy food options• At lunch, speed• Reasonable price• For dinner, good atmosphere• Likes familiarity (a place she's heard of)Biggest complaints about the current searching experience: • Finds the variety of opinions in restaurant reviews overwhelming

• 28 years old• Therapist• Lives in Boston, MA• Single, engaged• Eats out a couple of

times during the week and one weekend night with her boyfriend or friends


Persona 3: Rohan

Typical scenarios: • Does a lot of takeout ordering.• First looks to friends for recommendations or Googles a

restaurant or restaurant search as his first step.• For a specific restaurant, he looks up Yelp and other reviews.• Will search for something broad like “San Francisco

restaurants downtown” or a specific cuisine and read through a lot of reviews to pick a restaurant.

• Writes reviews and ratingsCares most about: • Quality of the food, ambience and service• Favors restaurants he has read about in the New Yorker, etc.• Price is not such a concern• Location is not an issue for networking, but other times it isBiggest complaints about the current searching experience: • He doesn’t like that he has to hop around to so many sites to

find a good restaurant—can take up to 40 minutes.• Wants results tailor-made to him, or that his friends like.• The Yelp map option is not good so he goes to Google Maps.

• Technology Executive• Married with kids• Travels often for work

internationally• Often organizes

networking dinners in his industry



How does what we learned about these potential customers impact what features

and functionality we might include?

JENN COONCE EXPERIENCE DESIGN www.jenncoonce.come-mail: [email protected]

Jenn Coonce Experience Design•Product Innovation Strategy•Customer Research•UX Process Facilitation