Foundational research is always done before you start designing.

Within the
product development life cycle, foundational research happens during the brainstorm
stage (stage one) to help you empathize with users, understand their needs, and
inspire new design directions. During this stage, you will also make personas and
user stories, which you'll learn about soon.

In foundational research, your goal is to figure out what the user needs and how to
address those needs with your product. Strong foundational research can contradict
your personal perspective on what a good solution might be.

Questions you might consider during foundational research include:

● What should we build?

● What are the user’s problems?
● How can we solve those problems?
● Am I aware of my own biases, and am I able to filter them as I do
research?

There are lots of research methods for conducting foundational research, but many
of them are based on observations. Common foundational research methods include:

● Interviews: A research method used to collect in-depth information on

people's opinions, thoughts, experiences, and feelings. You’ll often
conduct interviews of your target users themselves.
● Surveys: An activity where many people are asked the same questions in
order to understand what most people think about a product.
● Focus groups: A small group of people whose reactions are studied. For
example, your focus group might bring together eight users to discuss
their perspectives about new features in your design. A focus group is
 usually run by a moderator who guides the group on a certain topic of
conversation.
● Competitive audit: An overview of your competitors’ strengths and
weaknesses. You'll conduct your own competitive audit later in the course,
so you will understand this research method well!
● Field studies: Research activities that take place in the user's context or
personal environment, rather than in an office or lab.
● Diary studies: A research method used to collect qualitative data about
user behaviors, activities, and experiences over time. Often, a user will
log, or diary, about their daily activities and provide information about their
behaviors and needs, which can help inform your designs.

Design research is done while you design. Within the product development lifecycle,
design research happens during the design stage (stage three) to help inform your
designs, to fit the needs of users, and to reduce risk. Each time you create a new
version of your design, new research should be done to evaluate what works well
and what needs to be changed.

In design research, your goal is to answer the question: How should we build it?

The amount of design research you conduct will vary depending on where you work
and what you’re building. The most common method used to conduct design
research is a usability study, which is a technique to evaluate a product by testing it
on users. The goal of usability studies is to identify pain points that the user
experiences with your prototypes, so the issues can be fixed before the product
launches. You’ll conduct your own usability study in the next course of this certificate
program.

Additional research methods that might be used to conduct design research include:

● A/B testing: A research method that evaluates and compares two different
aspects of a product to discover which of them is most effective. For
example, you might have users evaluate two layouts for the homepage of
your app to find out which layout is more effective.
● Cafe or guerrilla studies: A research method where user feedback is
gathered by taking a design or prototype into the public domain and
asking passersby for their thoughts. For example, you might sit in a local
coffee shop and ask customers if they would be willing to test your app
design for a couple of minutes and provide feedback.
 ● Card sorting: A research method that instructs study participants to sort
individual labels written on notecards into categories that make sense to
them. This type of research is largely used to figure out the information
architecture of your project, which we’ll discuss in the next course of the
program — Course 3: Build Wireframes and Low-Fidelity Designs.
● Intercepts: A research method that gathers on-site feedback from users
as they engage in the activities being researched. Intercepts are often
conducted in the field, so this type of research is often considered a
subset of field research. An intercept study can provide quick, high-level
feedback.

Post-launch research is done after the design is complete and your product has
launched. Within the product development life cycle, post-launch research happens
after the launch stage (stage five) to help validate that the product is meeting user
needs through established metrics.

In post-launch research, your goal is to answer the question: Did we succeed? This
research will tell you how your final product is performing based on established
metrics, such as adoption, usage, user satisfaction, and more.

You should use research methods that give insight into what the user thinks of your
product and if their experience using your product aligns with how you intended it to
function. Research methods you might use to conduct post-launch research include:

● A/B testing
● Usability studies
● Surveys
● Logs analysis: A research method used to evaluate recordings of users
while they interact with your design, tools, etc.

The key to a user-focused product: Research

Research is crucial to creating a product that satisfies users. As an entry-level
designer, it might be tempting to assume what the user needs based on your own
experience, but as you know: The user comes first. Always make sure that your
opinions are backed up by your research. You should get feedback from your users
before, during, and after you design!
Types of research
There are two ways to categorize research: who conducts the research and the type
of data collected.

The first way to categorize research is based on who conducts the research: primary
research and secondary research.

Primary research is research you conduct yourself. Information from direct

interactions with users, like interviews, surveys, or usability studies, are considered
primary research.

Secondary research is research that uses information someone else has put
together. For example, using information from sources like books, articles, or journals
is considered secondary research.

The second way to categorize research is based on the type of data collected:
qualitative or quantitative.

Qualitative research is primarily collected through observations and conversations.

Qualitative research is based on understanding users’ needs and aims to answer
questions like “why” or “how did this happen?”

Quantitative research focuses on data that can be gathered by counting or

measuring. Quantitative research is based on numerical data that’s often collected
from large-scale surveys. This type of research aims to answer questions like “how
many?” and “how much?”

Primary research methods

Interviews are a research method used to collect in-depth information on people's
opinions, thoughts, experiences, and feelings. Interviews can be performed
one-on-one or in a group setting, like a focus group.

Interviews can take the form of qualitative and quantitative research. A qualitative
research method includes open-ended questions that require participants to explain
their answers by providing more details. A quantitative research method includes
only close-ended questions, like questions that require only “yes” or “no” responses
or set multiple choice questions.

Best practice is to conduct at least five user interviews during your research. As you
conduct your interviews, you’ll start to find similarities in the feedback that users
provide about what works and what doesn’t work about your product. This is exactly
the kind of feedback you want!

Advantages
● You’re better able to understand what a user thinks and why.
● You can adjust your questions or refocus the discussion based on the
user’s answers.
● You have the ability to ask follow-up questions in real time.
● You have the ability to ask questions specific to a user’s needs.
● You’ll receive direct suggestions from the user.

Disadvantages
● It’s time-consuming to interview each user.
● It’s expensive to pay participants and to rent space for the interviews.
● The sample sizes are smaller, due to time and money constraints.
● Group interviews can be affected by the bandwagon effect, or going along
with the group’s opinion instead of thinking creatively, which can
discourage open discussion by people who have an opinion that doesn’t
align with the majority of the group.

If you want to learn more about interviews, check out an article about user interviews
from the Nielsen Norman Group

A survey is an activity where many people are asked the same questions in order to
understand what most people think about a product. Surveys are a great way to
measure the success of your product, during development and after it’s launched.
For example, sending surveys after a product is released can help you measure the
effectiveness of your product and provide a foundation for future improvements.

You can design surveys to include open-ended questions for qualitative research,
which allow research participants to clarify their survey responses, as well as
close-ended questions for quantitative research, which generate numerical data.

Advantages
● You can learn more from a larger sample size.
● You are able to gather results and insights quickly.
● Surveys are usually inexpensive because they don’t take as much time for
participants to complete, and they can be done remotely.
Disadvantages
● Surveys often do not allow for in-depth feedback; most questions will
have responses drawn from a set of multiple-choice answers.
● There are some types of research questions that won’t work in a survey
format.
● Surveys usually do not allow for personalization.

If you want to learn more about surveys, check out usability.gov's article about online
surveys.

A usability study is a technique used to evaluate a product by testing it on users.

Usability studies help demonstrate if a product is on the right track or if the design
needs to be adjusted. There are lots of ways to test usability, both in person and
online. It’s a good idea to record your usability sessions, either audio or video, so you
can reference the user data as you make design decisions later on in the process.

Qualitative research is based on observations, and a critical part of conducting

usability studies is observing how participants interact with the product you’ve
designed. Focusing on qualitative research during usability studies can generate
more personal insights by assessing the behavior of users as they experience the
product. Quantitative research can also be used when conducting usability studies to
understand participants’ impressions of the product.

Advantages
● You can learn from first-hand user interaction and observation.
● Usability studies can challenge your assumptions about your product by
demonstrating a completely different result than you were expecting.
● Users can provide in-depth feedback.

Disadvantages
● Usability studies only measures how easy it is to use a product.
● This type of research can be expensive, especially if it’s conducted in
person.
● There can be differences between a “controlled” usability study in a lab
versus how a user experiences the product in their real life.

If you want to learn more about usability tests, check out the Nielsen Norman Group's
article on usability testing.
Secondary research methods
Secondary research can be completed at any phase of the project, since you’re using
information from outside sources. In other words, secondary research is not a direct
result of your product or the user you’re designing for. The information you discover
during secondary research might lay a foundation for your primary research, so you
have a better idea of where to focus your efforts. Or, secondary research might
supplement the findings from your primary research for a project, to reiterate or
strengthen your conclusions.

Advantages
● Secondary research is generally cheaper and faster than primary
research. This means you’ll save time and money.
● You can often find secondary research via online searches and
subscription research publications.
● Secondary research can be a good supplement to findings from your
primary research.

Disadvantages
● You will not learn from any first-hand user interaction.
● You will not receive user feedback specific to your product.
● Secondary research can be misleading and generalizing if not done
appropriately.

If you want to learn more about secondary research, check out an article about
secondary research from Formplus.

Research in practice
As you move forward in your UX design career, you’ll likely get to experience using
several different types of research methods. Knowing the advantages and
disadvantages of each method, and when to use each, can make your research
more effective and can improve your product’s design.

If you want to explore research further, check out this user-experience research
methods article from NN Group. It will guide you through choosing the best research
method for you out of 20 popular options.
Creating an empathy map
Now that you’ve had a chance to review Makayla’s interview transcript, let’s break
down the steps for creating an empathy map. As a reminder, here’s what an empathy
map includes:

Step 1: Add the user’s name. Include the name of the person interviewed in your
empathy map. Having a name attached to it will help if you ever need to look back at
the original transcript or research, and it’ll distinguish this map from other maps you
create.

Step 2: The “SAYS” square. Use verbatim quotes from the interview. In other words,
write down exactly what the person said; don’t summarize it in your own words. If you
summarize a quote, you might accidentally interpret the user’s meaning incorrectly.
It’s also helpful to try to capture themes in the interview that relate to the product
you’re researching. For example, if the user restates the same problem several times
during the interview, then it’s probably a major pain point. Pay special attention to
challenges your user states, and record any desired benefits or expectations they
mention.

Step 3: The “THINKS” square. Here, you can summarize the thoughts expressed by
the user. Add feelings the user conveyed through body language, tone, or other
noticeable indicators, even if they didn’t verbally express them to you. You can make
inferences for some of these feelings, but you have to be careful not to make
assumptions about the user. For example, Makayla expressed concern about her
neighbor’s teenage son and mentioned his age and qualifications. An assumption is
that Makayla wants an adult dog walker. An inference is that she wants a dog walker
with a car and a driver's license who can take the dog to the emergency vet. You can
always ask your user for clarification on their body language if you find any
contradictions.

Step 4: The “DOES” square. Makayla gave us quite a bit of detail on steps and
actions she takes to overcome the dog-walking challenges she faces. All those
actions can go in the “DOES” square.

Step 5: The “FEELS” square. List the feelings the user expresses. The notes you
include may overlap with some of what you listed in the “THINKS” square. That’s
okay! This process is meant to be a thorough documentation of your observations. If
you’re the person performing the interview, you might notice signs of feelings like
anger, frustration, excitement, and others. If the user doesn’t explicitly mention any
feelings during the interview, you can probe for feelings with the question: “How does
this make you feel?”

SAYS

● “I’m not sure how I would know who’s safe to allow in my home or who’s
good with dogs.”
● “I’d love to find a dog walker that I could prescreen.”
● “I’d love a way to book someone consistently.”
● “Ideally, I could schedule dog-sitting days in advance.”
● “...there aren’t many people we can ask for help”
● “I’m willing to pay a little more to get...this”

THINKS

● Wants to book recurring dog walkers

● Would like to prescreen dog walkers
● Would like to find dog walkers in advance
● Dog walking is expensive
● Would like a dog walker who has experience with animals
 ● Doesn’t know enough people to ask them to walk her dogs
● Wants a more consistent dog walker

DOES

● Works a full-time job as a teacher

● Walks her dogs first thing in the morning and evening
● Pays her neighbor, a 17-year-old high school student, to walk the dogs

FEELS

● Guilty when she can’t take her dogs for walks

● Sad she can’t spend more time with her dogs
● Sad she can’t take her dogs on vacation
● Worried about finding a consistent, dedicated dog walker that can commit
to her schedule
● Worried about her larger dog’s needs
● Worried about her current dog walker’s ability to manage a potential
sudden illness in her dog

This empathy map breaks down all the points that your team will need to determine
how your app can meet Makayla’s needs. The real challenge starts when you lay out
the empathy maps from all of your user interviews and figure out how each of your
potential users’ needs overlap.

Types of empathy maps

It's important to understand that there are two types of empathy maps: one-user
empathy maps and aggregated empathy maps (also known as "multiple-user
empathy maps"). One-user empathy maps are created by taking the data from one
user's interview and turning it into an empathy map, like the example earlier in this
reading. This approach helps designers distill a single user's thoughts, feelings, and
traits into a format that's easier to gather data from.

The other kind of empathy map, an aggregated empathy map, represents a group of
users who share similar thoughts, opinions, or qualities. Aggregated empathy maps
are created by creating multiple one-user empathy maps, then combining the maps
where users expressed similar things into a new empathy map. This helps designers
identify segments, or groups of people with similar tendencies, who will use the
product. The insights in aggregated empathy maps allow designers to identify
themes, which helps them better empathize with the groups they are designing for.
To learn more about the different kinds of empathy maps, check out this article on
empathy mapping from the Nielsen Norman Group.

You’re beginning to understand what it means to empathize with your users. Each
time you interact with a potential user, you get a little closer to understanding their
perspectives and pain points. Good luck!

Case studies: Products that address pain

points

To learn more about user pain points, check out these real-world case studies from
Google and Airbnb. Try to identify the unique pain points that led to major design
changes!

● Read about the methodology behind the 2016 Google Font redesign.
● Learn about how a new color system helped simplify Google Maps and
make it more accessible.
● Examine how Airbnb revamped their product design in response to the
ways in which the world changed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Learn more about personas

At this point in the course, you’ve learned about feeling empathy for users and
building empathy maps to identify users’ pain points. You are on your way to learning
all about the users that you'll design a product for!

Now, it’s time to start personifying users. Keeping in mind everything that you’ve
learned so far, you’ll soon build your first persona. Personas are fictional users
whose goals and characteristics represent the needs of a larger group of users. Each
persona that you create will represent a group of users with similar characteristics
that you’ve learned about through your research. Personas are key to the design
process because they reflect the lifestyles of users and give your team an idea of
how to meet users’ needs or challenges.
In the world of UX design, the user always comes first. But to put user needs first, we
have to know who we’re talking about. So let’s explore how to build personas.

Building personas
Personas are created by conducting user research and identifying common pain
points, which are UX issues that frustrate and block the user from getting what they
need from a product.

As you create personas, look for the most common themes in your data and group
the users who personify those themes together. For example, imagine that the data
collected from user interviews for the dog walker app shows that a lot of potential
users between the ages of 45 and 60 are concerned about dog walkers having
access to their homes. That would definitely be a pain point you’d want to include in a
persona that represents that specific age group of users.

Generally, creating 3 to 8 personas is enough to represent the majority of a product’s

user base. Think of personas as an overview of all of your research and interviews.
While it’s important for personas to accurately represent users, it’s impossible to
meet every one of their specific needs. Personas are also context-specific, meaning
they should be focused on the behaviors and goals of users interacting with the
product effectively.

For the dog walker app, think about a scenario from the perspective of a dog owner:

● Daniela is a 48-year-old freelance film producer who lives with their

partner Priya and their two children in Atlanta, Georgia. The family
recently adopted a golden retriever puppy named Cisco.
● The family takes regular trips with the kids for gymnastics competitions,
and Daniela often travels for long periods of time when filming. Daniela
wants to find someone to take care of the puppy, Cisco, while the family is
away or busy.
● Daniela’s biggest concern is trusting a stranger to come into their home
and to take care of their puppy. Daniela would be most comfortable hiring
someone who knows how to properly care for puppies and can take Cisco
on walks and to dog parks.

Here's what a persona might include for Daniela, using the persona template that
was shown in the video:
You can use the information in personas to create designs that speak directly to
users, like Daniela. This ensures users have the best experience when using your
product! For example, in your designs, you might want to indicate that the dog
walkers are screened by the app and must pass background checks, which would
reassure users like Daniela that their dog will be safe.

Here’s a pro tip: Get your team's opinion on the product’s users before you build
personas. Then, after you build personas, review those suggestions from your team
and compare them to the personas you created. Point out how the data validated or
contradicted their suggestions. Everyone on your team needs to understand the
personas in order to truly connect with your users.

There are many ways you can create personas. You can explore a variety of persona
templates like these persona templates and examples on Just In Mind and these
customizable persona templates on Xtensio. You might notice that some personas
are very long and detailed! Or, you might notice different topics in the persona
examples that we haven't covered in this course. Feel free to explore and use a
persona template that works best for you and your design project.

If you want to learn even more, check out this introduction to personas from
Interaction Design Foundation.
Learn more about user stories

You’ve already learned about empathy maps and personas and how they can help
you empathize with the users you’re designing for. Another helpful way to understand
your users is to build a user story around their experiences with your product. As a
reminder, a user story is a fictional one-sentence story told from the persona’s point
of view to inspire and inform design decisions. This is a great opportunity to use your
imagination as you create the stories that capture the needs of your users.

User stories should be written in the following format:

As a type of user (who), I want to action (what) so that benefit (why).

Using this format is a clear way to ensure your user story is communicating
everything you need to know about the persona. The user stories you create will be
very valuable as you start designing your product. User stories can also serve as a
“checklist” to make sure you’re addressing and solving the key problems your users
might face when engaging with your product.

The best practice for user stories is to keep them short, impactful, and to the point,
with a clear action and benefit.

Practice using this format to create user stories related to the dog walker app you've
been learning about.

As a frequent traveler, I want to hire a consistent dog walker so that I can feel
comfortable about the safety of my pets while I'm on vacation.

As a dog owner, I want to trust my dog walker so I can hire them for regular dog
walks.

As a busy executive, I want to trust that dog walkers won't stand me up so I can work
worry-free.

As an indecisive student, I want to try many walkers so I can pick one for regular
walks.
As a mother of two, I want to limit the amount of access to my home so I can keep
my family safe.

As a former police officer, I want to track my dog walker so I am comfortable with the
safety of my pets.

As a widowed executive, I want to find a permanent dog walker so my pets get the
care they deserve.

Keeping these user stories in mind can inform the designs you’ll create. For example,
in the dog walker app, users should have the ability to request a date and time for a
dog walker, select a specific dog walker, and maybe even read the background
checks of dog walkers, since those were all mentioned in our user stories.

Different users have different needs, so be sure to practice empathy and keep their
unique needs in mind when writing user stories. To help you write the most effective
user stories, check out this article from Interaction Design Foundation about how to
write user stories.

Representing your users

Personas and user stories represent the needs of the users you’re designing for. The
more detailed and accurate your personas and user stories are, the better you will be
at designing products that meet their needs. Take your time when creating user
stories. Remember, as a UX designer, the user always comes first in all of your work,
so it's important to understand their points of view.
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/17rD5CoSIk5alcvR_p6fhcHHVPeq9IMGR9P
_ulngiIRA/edit#slide=id.gbfcf64ecdd_0_233

Consider accessibility during user research

Define problem statements

Identifying the problems that users face is one of the most important parts of UX
design. But as critical as research is to the UX design process, some of your work will
still require a small amount of “mind reading” about the user’s experience. That might
seem like it’s contradicting the rule of never making assumptions, but sometimes
users just won’t feel comfortable or know how to express exactly what their problem
is and how it affects them. In this reading, you’ll learn how to define unspoken pain
points and use them to form strong problem statements.

The connection between pain points and problem

statements
As a reminder, pain points are any UX issue or friction that frustrates the user and
blocks them from getting what they need. Minimizing pain points keeps users happy
and encourages them to keep interacting with the product. So, how do UX designers
find and define pain points?

Think about the dog walker app and one of our user personas, Arnold. Arnold is in
his late fifties, and his kids have encouraged him to upgrade to a smartphone. Arnold
is a leader at his company, and not used to admitting he's uncomfortable with
technology. After his wife died, Arnold became the primary caregiver of the family's
animals. But, he works over sixty hours per week, and is unable to take his three
dogs on twice-daily walks. Arnold is turning to the dog walker app for help.

Underneath graphic, text reads: Arnold Jones. Age: 58. Education: PhD. Hometown:
Boston, Massachusetts. Family: Widowed, four adult kids. Occupation:
Pharmaceutical executive.
You learned earlier that there are four categories pain points can fall into:

● Financial, or money-related pain points.

● Product, which are pain points related to quality issues.
● Process, which are pain points related to the user’s journey.
● Support, which are pain points related to getting help from customer
service.
Identifying the pain points your user is experiencing will help you find potential
problems that your design can solve. Arnold’s pain points fall into the process
category. His biggest challenge is that he's not technologically savvy, so he struggles
to understand how to use the app.

Now that you’ve identified Arnold’s pain points, you need to be sure you know
enough about his needs to write a problem statement. Problem statements provide a
clear description of the user’s need that should be addressed. To build a problem
statement, you can utilize the 5 Ws framework.

The 5 Ws and H: who, what, when, where, why, and

how
The most common framework used to create problem statements is the 5 Ws and H
framework. After you define the user’s pain points, you can answer who, what, when,
where, why, and how to solve the user’s problem.

Who is experiencing the problem? Knowing your users and their background is key
to creating successful solutions for them.

What are the pain points you’re trying to solve? Determining a user’s pain points
early allows you to answer the rest of these questions and clarify the context of the
pain points.

Where is the user when they’re using the product? A user’s physical context matters
to your design.

When does the problem occur? Maybe it’s right after the end of a long and tedious
process, or maybe it’s something that happens daily. Knowing when the problem
occurs can help you better empathize with the user’s feelings.
Why is the problem important? Knowing how this problem affects your user’s
experience and life will help to clarify the potential consequences.

How are users reaching their goals by using the product? Understanding how users
reach their goals allows you to map the user journey that they take through your
product.

To design a solution that fits the needs of your users, you have to understand the
problem from their point of view. Thinking through the 5 Ws and how forces you to
write out who the user is and describe the full context of the problem from the user’s
perspective.

Okay, back to the dog walker app! You know a bit about Arnold already, but use the
skills you’ve learned so far to confirm you know enough to solve his pain points.

● Who: A busy executive

● What: Arnold wants to hire a daily dog walker for his three dogs.
● Where: Arnold is likely using the app at work, on the go.
● When: Arnold gets frustrated when he opens the app, starting from the
very beginning of the user journey.
● Why: Arnold doesn’t have a lot of experience with phone apps or similar
technology.
● How: Arnold wants to go easily from the home screen of the app to the list
of dog walkers to the confirmation screen.

Ta-da! You were able to successfully answer all six questions. Now that you’ve
thought through your user’s needs, you’re ready to define the final problem
statement.

The problem statement formula

So, how do you create a problem statement? Start by defining who the user is and
what their needs and motivations are. Here’s the formula we introduced in the video:
[user name] is a/an [user characteristics] who needs [user need] because [insight]
Okay, now apply the formula to Arnold. Arnold is a busy professional who needs a
dog walker. But what’s the insight? His phone! His kids gave him a shiny, new
smartphone. Arnold shared that he often struggles with technology and is having an
issue navigating the app.

Arnold is a/an busy excutive who needs an easy app experience to hire a dog walker
because he's not technologically savvy.
Arnold is a busy executive who needs an easy app experience to hire a dog walker
because he's not technologically savvy.

The impact of problem statements

Problem statements provide clarity about your users’ goals and help UX designers
identify constraints that prevent users from meeting those goals. Problem statements
also help your team measure success. If you expect that Arnold and users like him
will engage the most with your app, you should make the app clear and easy for
them to understand.

The designs you create matter! Empathize with your user as much as you can to
make a product that they’ll want to interact with and use every day.

You’ve already learned why it’s important to make sure you’ve defined the right user
problem before designing solutions. So, are you ready to boost your reading list?
These resources will help you develop a deeper understanding of the define stage of
the design process.

● Design Problem Statements: What They Are and How to Frame Them
from Toptal
● User Need Statements: The 'Define' Stage in Design Thinking from
Nielsen Norman Group
● Are you solving the right problem? from Harvard Business Review

Define hypothesis statements

You’ve spent a lot of time learning about the users you're designing for, and how
empathy and user research can improve your understanding of users' needs. As a
reminder, here's where you're at in the design process:

● Empathizing with users allows you to consider the product experience

from the users’ perspective. By connecting with people directly, like
through interviews, you can discover and understand users' likes, dislikes,
and pain points.
● Then, sort through research you collected about users to define the
problem they're facing. Creating a problem statement helps you clearly
define the user pain points that your future designs can address.
Now, you can begin coming up with solutions that address those problems! You’re
ready to create hypothesis statements. A hypothesis statement is an educated guess
about what you think the solution to a design problem might be. You know the
challenges users are facing, so it’s time to consider how your designs can alleviate
their pain points.

Hypothesis statements don’t have a single standard formula to follow, but there are
two common methods you can try using to write one.

First, you can use the if / then format to come up with a hypothesis statement. Here
are examples of if/then hypothesis statements applied to the users of the dog walker
app:

● If Arnold downloads the dog walker app, then they can utilize the
“simplified” mode setting to view only the basic app functions.
● If Tobias signs up for the dog walker app, then they will quickly and easily
pick a walker that fits their schedule.

Second, you can use the we believe format to come up with a hypothesis statement.
Here are examples of we believe hypothesis statements applied to the dog walker
app:

● We believe that a simplified mode of the dog walker app for Arnold will
allow them to hire dog walkers efficiently.
● We believe that easy access to available dog walkers for Tobias will
increase the amount of walks they choose for their pets.

If / then statements focus directly on the needs of users. On the other hand, we
believe statements take the perspective of your team into account, while remaining
empathetic to the needs of users.

You might encounter situations where you have multiple hypothesis statements for
one problem statement. That’s okay! There will always be multiple solutions for the
problems that users are facing. Your job as a UX designer is to use your creativity
and problem-solving skills to decide which solutions work best for the unique users
you’re designing for.

Hypothesis statements help you narrow down your research insights into goals for
your product, so you can stay focused on the wants and needs of your users.
In this exemplar, each problem statement:

1. Starts with the name of the user.

2. Adds a short description of the user’s characteristics.
3. Clearly describes the user’s need.
4. Explains why the user has that need.

With these parts clearly defined, the problem statement is:

● Human-centered and focused on the needs of a specific type of user.

● Broad enough for creative freedom.
● Narrow enough to be solved by a practical design solution.

The matching hypothesis statements express a clear design goal and the criteria for
success:

● By stating a specific action they tell us what our solution should enable
the user to do.
● By stating the desired outcome they give a specific accomplishment. This
helps determine whether the solution was successful in meeting the
user’s need.

Now compare the exemplar above to your completed deliverable. Assess what
you’ve done using each of the criteria used here to evaluate the exemplar.

Have you constructed a problem statement that is:

● Human-centered and focused on the needs of a specific persona?

● Broad enough for creative freedom?
● Narrow enough to be solved by a practical design solution?
From your problem statement were you able to formulate a corresponding hypothesis
statement that:

● States a specific action and tells us what your solution should enable the
user to do?
● States the desired outcome that determines whether your solution was
successful in meeting the user’s need?

If you’re able to answer ‘Yes’ to each of these questions, nice job! If there are
questions you were unable to answer ‘Yes’ to, then these are areas where you can
improve your problem and hypothesis statements. Go back and try re-writing your
statements with these criteria in mind!

Determine a value proposition

Have you ever encountered a product or app and thought, “I have to have this!”?
That’s not a coincidence! This is the dream for UX designers because we want to
create products that provide a clear value for users.

So, how can you use everything you’ve built so far — empathy maps, personas, user
stories, problem statements, and hypothesis statements — to make users think, “I
have to have this!”?
Start by defining your product’s value propositions. Value propositions summarize
why a consumer should use a product or service.

Value proposition example

Check out a product you might recognize - Gmail – and ask yourself if you can
identify a few of its value propositions. When Google debuted Gmail in 2004, they
were entering an already crowded market of free email services. Gmail offered:

● The ability to send and receive emails for free

● Email sorting, archiving, and starring functions
● Spam filtering for inboxes
● Email conversation views
● 1 gigabyte of cloud storage

Two of the items on that list were unique offerings that no other email services
provided at the time: email conversation views, which put individual emails in the
context of a larger thread, and an entire gigabyte of storage, which was 1,000 times
the amount of storage that competitors offered. Those were Gmail’s unique value
propositions.

Build value propositions

Everything that your product has to offer might seem obvious to you, but you have to
put yourself in the mind of your users. Users don’t know your product or understand
its value yet. That’s where value propositions come in.

To start, you need to do some research in order to answer these two questions:

● What does your product do? Clearly explain the offering that your product
provides users.
● Why should the user care? Describe how your product addresses users’
pain points.

Once you’ve answered these questions, you can follow a series of steps to focus in
on your product’s unique value proposition. Let’s use the dog walker app as an
example to explore how this works in action.

Step 1. Describe your product’s features and benefits. Create a list of all the great
features and benefits of your product, big and small. Don’t hold back; list everything
that comes to mind and then narrow it down later.
a wall covered in sticky notes of various features. Easy-to-use app design,
geo-tracking of walkers, complimentary doorbell cameras, thorough training for
walkers, no hidden fees, quick matching with qualified users, calendar blocking,
monthly organic goodies and new products for your pets, monthly subscription,
background checks, convenient lockers for your house keys, late-notice cancellation
fees, rating system, professional referral only, rate negotiation, upgrade dog walkers
to dog nanny for set scheduled walks, picture requests from your walker, exclusively
for dog walking
Step 2. Explain the value of the product. Anything that you identify as a value
proposition needs to be beneficial to your users. In this example, for the dog walker
app, there were four categories of product values that were identified during user
interviews: accessible, professional experience of the dog walkers, cost, and
reliability. The giant list of features and benefits from step one is sorted into those
four categories.
There were a few features and benefits from the original list that didn't fit into these
four categories and didn't add real “value” for the users:

● Monthly organic goodies and new products for your pets

● Exclusively for dog walking (no other kinds of pets)
● Rating system for walkers
● Training tips

These features and benefits were not sorted into the four categories and were
instead set to the side.

Step 3. Connect these features and benefits with the needs of your users. The goal is
to identify what’s truly valuable to the user and not just a cool feature that users didn’t
ask for. To determine value, take the personas you’ve developed and pair each
persona with a value proposition that meets their biggest pain point.
A wall with different people's pictures and a sticky note underneath.

Tobias: Thorough training for walkers.

Darlene: Late-notice cancellation fees.

Carlos: Upgrade to dog nanny for set, scheduled walks.

Daniela: Convenient lockers for your house keys.

Jessica: Geo-tracking of walkers

Arnold: Easy to use app design

Makayla: Calendar blocking

Step 4. Review your official value proposition list. You’ve narrowed your list down of
lots of benefits and features by matching them with actual user needs. Now it’s time
to review the list of value propositions your product offers. For the dog walker app,
here are the value propositions that matched with the personas that were developed
earlier:

● Thorough training for walkers

● Upgrade dog walkers to dog nanny for set, scheduled walks
● Geo-tracking of walkers
 ● Calendar booking
● Late-notice cancellation fees
● Convenient lockers that hold your house keys
● Easy-to-use app design

And there you have it, your list of value propositions! However, some of these
features and benefits are also offered by your competitors. So how do you know what
makes your product stand out from the competition? Identify your app’s unique value
proposition. This means reviewing the list of value propositions that match to your
personas and removing those that your competition also offers.

One way to check out your product’s competitors is to read reviews. Sort the reviews
from lowest to highest, and closely examine what reviewers are sharing about your
competition. Here are some reviews about a competitor dog walking app:

Can you identify the biggest pain point in this example? A common theme in some of
the reviews is the need for thorough, in-person training for the dog walkers, to ensure
that the dog walkers know how to do their jobs well. Some of the reviews also call out
the need for dog walkers to be reliable. No other dog walking app is meeting this
need, so that’s the unique value proposition our app can provide!

Key takeaways
One of the most important things to know about value propositions is that they need
to be short, clear, and to the point. Users want to be able to easily identify exactly
how your product will meet their unique needs and what sets your product apart in
the market. Sometimes users won’t know what they need until you explain it to them.
That’s the real heart of product design innovation.
Learn more about design ideation

You’ve empathized with your users and determined their pain points. Now you’re
ready to start thinking of ways to solve your user’s problems. Ideating is an exciting
step in your journey as a UX designer!

As a reminder, design ideation is the process of generating a broad set of ideas on a

given topic without judging or evaluating them. When you start thinking of ideas, you
want to come up with as many as possible. The aim is to generate lots of ideas, even
ones that may seem ridiculous at first. Sometimes your most outrageous idea will
turn into a great and unique solution!

Preparing for ideation

Before you start design ideation, you’ll need to do a bit of prep work.

Empathize with your user. Empathizing is the first step in the design process. You
need to know who you’re solving for and what their needs are. You empathized with
your user already by creating empathy maps, personas, user stories, and user
journey maps.

Define the problem. Defining is the second step in the design process. The problem
you’re trying to solve should be well-defined, so that everyone on your team can think
of ideas to solve the same problem. Knowing exactly what problem you need to solve
will also keep your users’ needs top-of-mind.
Establish a creative environment. You’ll need a comfortable space where everyone
on your team can get together and present their ideas. If you’re meeting in person,
choose an ideation space that’s different from your usual workspace. If you’re
ideating virtually, try to find a different space in your home that’s free of clutter and
distractions.

Set a time limit. There are an endless number of possible products and features you
could design, so give yourself plenty of time to come up with ideas. However, you
can’t brainstorm forever, so you’ll also need to set a time to stop brainstorming and
start thinking more deeply about the ideas you’ve come up with.

Assemble a diverse team. You’re trying to come up with as many different ideas as
possible. An inclusive team of people, with different races, genders, abilities, and
backgrounds, will help you come up with all kinds of solutions.
Think outside the box. Don’t limit yourself to traditional ideas and solutions. If you
have a cool idea that seems a little different, write it down! Think big and get creative
while ideating.

There’s no right or wrong way to practice design ideation. There are many techniques
you can use to come up with ideas. If you want to learn more, check out this article
from CareerFoundry, A Guide To The Most Important Ideation Techniques, which
highlights some common design ideation techniques. Once you start ideating for your
own projects, you may even come up with your own version of one of these
techniques!

The importance of design ideation

While design ideation can take a significant amount of time, it's also a lot of fun! You’ll
generate many possible solutions, and you’ll end up using one, or a few, of your
original ideas. This is perfectly normal in the UX design process, and it’s an exciting
part of the working with a team. Narrowing down many ideas to a couple of great
ones is very rewarding.

Design ideation encourages you to come up with solutions that are unique. Don’t
settle for your first solution. In fact, the first few solutions you suggest are often the
least creative because they’re the most obvious. When generating ideas, you should
use your creative powers to their full potential.

Following the design process outlined in this certificate program will lay the
foundation for your product’s design. The more effort you put into empathizing with
your users, defining the problems they’re facing, and coming up with ideas for
solutions, the better your end result will be.

If you're excited to learn more, check out IDEO’s Design Thinking website for a
deeper understanding of how to think like a designer.

Learn more about competitive audits

Competitive audits are one of the many valuable steps you can take during the
ideation process. A competitive audit is an overview of your competitors’ strengths
and weaknesses. Analyzing the brands and products of competitors, or the
companies who offer similar products as you do, can give you a well-rounded
foundation of knowledge about the market your product will enter. That knowledge
will carry into your designs and help you create a product that’s helpful and unique for
users. As a UX designer, you’ll likely partner with folks from other teams, like
marketing or product management, to run a competitive audit.

Your competition falls into two categories: direct and indirect. Direct competitors are
companies that have offerings similar to your product and focus on the same
audience. Indirect competitors can have a similar set of offerings and a different
audience, or a different set of offerings with the same audience. Examining both of
these competitors can offer insights about the path your designs might take and the
users that you’re designing for.

Why are competitive audits important?

Consider how much work your direct and indirect competitors have already done to
design and market their products to users. They’ve already had an impact on the
industry that your product will enter. Studying these companies, their designs, and
their user feedback is a fantastic source of information.

Competitive audits can offer many benefits throughout your ideation phase, including:

● Giving you an idea of products already in the market and their designs.
● Suggesting ideas to solve early problems that you’re facing with your own
designs.
● Revealing the ways that current products in the market are not meeting
users’ needs. This is a gap for your product to address!
● Demonstrating the expected life cycle of a product in the same market as
yours.
 ● Informing all the different iterations your product could take and how those
performed for your competitors.

With these benefits in mind, you can work with your team to identify the features and
qualifications that you think are vital to your product. You'll focus your audit on the
parts of your own design that you want to learn the most about, like the user flow
through your app or the navigation within the app. A little self-reflection about the
designs you're working on will set up your audit for success from the start.

You’re ready to begin!

By investing time into competitive audits, your team will be able to learn from the
mistakes of your competitors and can avoid making those mistakes yourselves. Think
of audits as a tool to help you create something for your users that’s completely
different from the competition, combining all of the strengths of your competitors’
offerings into one fantastic product!

Want to explore competitive audits in more detail? Here are a couple of articles to
help you keep digging: A Product Designer's Guide to Competitive Analysis from
Toptal and How to Conduct and Prepare a Competitive Analysis from Edward Lowe
Foundation.

Step 1. Outline the audit goals

As a UX designer, you know that the ideation process is most effective after you’ve
completed an audit on your new client, Burger Garden, and their competitors. But
before you move into the details of the audit, you have to define your goals. Since
this project is for a website redesign, the goal of the competitive audit is to compare
the user experience of each competitor’s website.

Using consistent language for rating competitor products can also create more
uniform feedback and help you “grade” competitors. You can grade competitors on a
scale of:

Needs work: The app is not usable, and users aren’t getting what they need from this
aspect of the app.

Okay: This aspect has some issues, but with some work, it could meet user needs.

Good: This aspect works well, but doesn’t always provide users with the necessary
information easily.

Outstanding: This aspect feels consistent, and it meets or exceeds the user’s needs.

Step 2. List competitors

Start to build the competitor audit using the template. First, ask the company or team
who they consider to be their direct and indirect competitors. As a reminder, direct
competitors have offerings that are similar to your product and focus on the same
audience. Indirect competitors either have a similar set of offerings but focus on a
different audience, or they have a different set of offerings and focus on the same
audience. Getting this information early can provide good insight into where the
company really fits into their industry.

For example, Burger Garden mentioned that Beef Eaters restaurant is one of their
direct competitors, so they should be included on the list. Based on your own
research, you find two more direct competitors that are also burger restaurants in the
same geographical area as Burger Garden, called Burger Nest and The Spotty Cow.
You also come across an indirect competitor, The Vegan Cow, that has an
international presence and really appealing imagery on their website. The competitor
audit spreadsheet now includes the information shown below.
Step 3. Determine the specific competitor aspects you
want to compare
Defining a list of aspects you want to compare makes it easier to compile your results
for analysis later on in the process. For this example, imagine that you check out
each of the competitors’ websites and rate them based on the following categories:

● First impressions: Check out the website on both desktop and mobile
devices, and make note of your first impressions. Is the website
responsive, meaning that it resizes across devices? Does the design
complement the product? How do you feel about the website?
● Interaction: Explore the user flow and navigation of the website. What
features are available for users? Is the website accessible to all users,
including those using screen readers? How inclusive is their website to
non-English speakers? Will the user get confused as they click through
the website pages, or is the navigation clear?
● Visual design: Review competitor branding and their overall consistency.
Does the website appear and feel the same throughout all sections and
pages? Does the branding match the intended audience? Is the imagery
and color palette memorable?
● Content: Examine the written content included on the website. Does the
tone of the content match the company’s branding? Will users be able to
find the details they’re interested in?

These are the aspects to list across the top row of the competitor audit. In the
example spreadsheet, these aspects are listed in rows 3 and 4. This means you
would fill in information about these aspects for each of the companies you’re
evaluating.
Step 4. Research each company
Now that the list of competitors and features to compare is filled in, it’s time to check
out each of Burger Garden’s competitors and start the audit. If you were conducting
your own audit, you would fill out the spreadsheet row-by-row as you review each
competitor. You can include notes in bullet point form, links, and
screenshots—whatever is most helpful for your information gathering process! Let’s
check out each section of the example spreadsheet.

Audience
Millennials, including families, make up the biggest portion of the competitors’
audiences. There’s also a small crossover between millennials and Gen-Z college
students. This is very similar to the audience that Burger Garden is targeting. Only
one competitor, The Vegan Cow, has a different audience. That’s okay! The Vegan
Cow wasn’t included as a direct competitor because their audience isn’t similar to
Burger Garden’s. It’s still important to compare their website and overall user
experience to ensure you’re getting a good sense of the entire market.

First impressions
The websites that make the best first impression are The Spotty Cow and The Vegan
Cow. Both provide appealing and clear imagery and are fully responsive websites.
On the other end, the websites for Beef Eaters and Burger Nest weren’t very
impressive. While they’re easy to navigate, they both need to work on improving their
layouts.

For the mobile website experience, only one site had issues with responsiveness:
Beef Eaters. Their website didn’t adjust to the smaller screen size of a mobile phone,
so the spacing was misaligned and some information was cut off.
For the sites with lower ratings, the biggest issue was the menu. Sometimes the
menu wasn’t accessible, and other times the menu was included as an image that
was hard to read. That’s definitely something to make note of for your redesign of the
Burger Garden website!

Interaction
The next part of the competitive audit focuses on the user’s ability to quickly and
efficiently find what they’re searching for on the website. Your client, Burger Garden,
needs help to create a hierarchy for their site that’s easier for users to follow and
interact with.

The Spotty Cow’s website includes animations that slow the navigation, and The
Burger Nest’s site has lots of unnecessary content on the homepage, which makes it
hard to find important information like their phone number and menu. On the other
end of the spectrum, the websites that work well have a clear navigation style and
make it obvious which elements are clickable and which aren’t—a characteristic
that’s important to include in the redesign of Burger Garden’s website. The Vegan
Cow is the standout competitor in the category with useful features like a store
locator and comprehensive accessibility considerations including multiple language
options and compatibility with screen reader technologies.
Visual design
A website with clear and consistent visual design is a great way to draw users into a
product and company. Burger Garden’s current website has pretty solid visual design
overall, but there are a few areas that could be updated to better reflect their brand
tone.

The Spotty Cow and The Vegan Cow communicate their brand well with distinct
colors, typography, and photography. But Burger Nest and Beef Eaters both have an
inconsistent visual style on their websites, and Burger Nest’s site doesn’t
communicate their brand very well.

Step 1. Outline the audit goals

As a UX designer, you know that the ideation process is most effective after you’ve
completed an audit on your new client, Burger Garden, and their competitors. But
before you move into the details of the audit, you have to define your goals. Since
this project is for a website redesign, the goal of the competitive audit is to compare
the user experience of each competitor’s website.
Using consistent language for rating competitor products can also create more
uniform feedback and help you “grade” competitors. You can grade competitors on a
scale of:

Needs work: The app is not usable, and users aren’t getting what they need from this
aspect of the app.

Okay: This aspect has some issues, but with some work, it could meet user needs.

Good: This aspect works well, but doesn’t always provide users with the necessary
information easily.

Outstanding: This aspect feels consistent, and it meets or exceeds the user’s needs.

Step 2. List competitors

Start to build the competitor audit using the template. First, ask the company or team
who they consider to be their direct and indirect competitors. As a reminder, direct
competitors have offerings that are similar to your product and focus on the same
audience. Indirect competitors either have a similar set of offerings but focus on a
different audience, or they have a different set of offerings and focus on the same
audience. Getting this information early can provide good insight into where the
company really fits into their industry.

For example, Burger Garden mentioned that Beef Eaters restaurant is one of their
direct competitors, so they should be included on the list. Based on your own
research, you find two more direct competitors that are also burger restaurants in the
same geographical area as Burger Garden, called Burger Nest and The Spotty Cow.
You also come across an indirect competitor, The Vegan Cow, that has an
international presence and really appealing imagery on their website. The competitor
audit spreadsheet now includes the information shown below.
Step 3. Determine the specific competitor aspects you
want to compare
Defining a list of aspects you want to compare makes it easier to compile your results
for analysis later on in the process. For this example, imagine that you check out
each of the competitors’ websites and rate them based on the following categories:

● First impressions: Check out the website on both desktop and mobile
devices, and make note of your first impressions. Is the website
responsive, meaning that it resizes across devices? Does the design
complement the product? How do you feel about the website?
● Interaction: Explore the user flow and navigation of the website. What
features are available for users? Is the website accessible to all users,
including those using screen readers? How inclusive is their website to
non-English speakers? Will the user get confused as they click through
the website pages, or is the navigation clear?
● Visual design: Review competitor branding and their overall consistency.
Does the website appear and feel the same throughout all sections and
pages? Does the branding match the intended audience? Is the imagery
and color palette memorable?
● Content: Examine the written content included on the website. Does the
tone of the content match the company’s branding? Will users be able to
find the details they’re interested in?

These are the aspects to list across the top row of the competitor audit. In the
example spreadsheet, these aspects are listed in rows 3 and 4. This means you
would fill in information about these aspects for each of the companies you’re
evaluating.
Step 4. Research each company
Now that the list of competitors and features to compare is filled in, it’s time to check
out each of Burger Garden’s competitors and start the audit. If you were conducting
your own audit, you would fill out the spreadsheet row-by-row as you review each
competitor. You can include notes in bullet point form, links, and
screenshots—whatever is most helpful for your information gathering process! Let’s
check out each section of the example spreadsheet.

Audience
Millennials, including families, make up the biggest portion of the competitors’
audiences. There’s also a small crossover between millennials and Gen-Z college
students. This is very similar to the audience that Burger Garden is targeting. Only
one competitor, The Vegan Cow, has a different audience. That’s okay! The Vegan
Cow wasn’t included as a direct competitor because their audience isn’t similar to
Burger Garden’s. It’s still important to compare their website and overall user
experience to ensure you’re getting a good sense of the entire market.

First impressions
The websites that make the best first impression are The Spotty Cow and The Vegan
Cow. Both provide appealing and clear imagery and are fully responsive websites.
On the other end, the websites for Beef Eaters and Burger Nest weren’t very
impressive. While they’re easy to navigate, they both need to work on improving their
layouts.

For the mobile website experience, only one site had issues with responsiveness:
Beef Eaters. Their website didn’t adjust to the smaller screen size of a mobile phone,
so the spacing was misaligned and some information was cut off.
For the sites with lower ratings, the biggest issue was the menu. Sometimes the
menu wasn’t accessible, and other times the menu was included as an image that
was hard to read. That’s definitely something to make note of for your redesign of the
Burger Garden website!

Interaction
The next part of the competitive audit focuses on the user’s ability to quickly and
efficiently find what they’re searching for on the website. Your client, Burger Garden,
needs help to create a hierarchy for their site that’s easier for users to follow and
interact with.

The Spotty Cow’s website includes animations that slow the navigation, and The
Burger Nest’s site has lots of unnecessary content on the homepage, which makes it
hard to find important information like their phone number and menu. On the other
end of the spectrum, the websites that work well have a clear navigation style and
make it obvious which elements are clickable and which aren’t—a characteristic
that’s important to include in the redesign of Burger Garden’s website. The Vegan
Cow is the standout competitor in the category with useful features like a store
locator and comprehensive accessibility considerations including multiple language
options and compatibility with screen reader technologies.
Visual design
A website with clear and consistent visual design is a great way to draw users into a
product and company. Burger Garden’s current website has pretty solid visual design
overall, but there are a few areas that could be updated to better reflect their brand
tone.

The Spotty Cow and The Vegan Cow communicate their brand well with distinct
colors, typography, and photography. But Burger Nest and Beef Eaters both have an
inconsistent visual style on their websites, and Burger Nest’s site doesn’t
communicate their brand very well.
Content
The tone of the content is another way to communicate a company’s brand and
engage users. Most of Burger Garden’s competitors use an engaging and fun tone
that fits their audiences. Burger Garden’s tone is a little inconsistent and not as
light-hearted as its competitors. This is an area for improvement when you redesign
their website!

In general, the competitors’ content is short and easy to follow. Burger Garden’s
current website descriptions come off as a bit dry and overly long, so you can point to
competitors’ content as an example to follow.
Step 5. Summarize your findings in a report
After conducting research, gathering data, and analyzing your findings, summarize
your work in a report. What you include in your report and how you present your
findings will vary depending on the audit goals you outlined at the beginning of the
process. For example, if your audit mainly focuses on comparing competitors’
audiences, you might want to include a few informational graphics with numbers and
figures. Or, if your audit mainly focuses on visual design, you might want to include
screenshots of your competitors’ websites with different areas highlighted. You’ll
learn how to create a report summarizing your research findings in more detail later
on in the program, so don’t worry too much about it right now!

Completing your audit

Conducting a competitive audit is a great way to familiarize yourself with user
experience design by getting more information about a new industry, a new client,
and recent industry trends. The information you learn can be used throughout the
design process. If you can, it’s best to take your time with the competitive audit
process so you’ll have a great foundation of knowledge to build your designs on
moving forward. Good luck!
Content
The tone of the content is another way to communicate a company’s brand and
engage users. Most of Burger Garden’s competitors use an engaging and fun tone
that fits their audiences. Burger Garden’s tone is a little inconsistent and not as
light-hearted as its competitors. This is an area for improvement when you redesign
their website!

In general, the competitors’ content is short and easy to follow. Burger Garden’s
current website descriptions come off as a bit dry and overly long, so you can point to
competitors’ content as an example to follow.
Step 5. Summarize your findings in a report
After conducting research, gathering data, and analyzing your findings, summarize
your work in a report. What you include in your report and how you present your
findings will vary depending on the audit goals you outlined at the beginning of the
process. For example, if your audit mainly focuses on comparing competitors’
audiences, you might want to include a few informational graphics with numbers and
figures. Or, if your audit mainly focuses on visual design, you might want to include
screenshots of your competitors’ websites with different areas highlighted. You’ll
learn how to create a report summarizing your research findings in more detail later
on in the program, so don’t worry too much about it right now!

Completing your audit

Conducting a competitive audit is a great way to familiarize yourself with user
experience design by getting more information about a new industry, a new client,
and recent industry trends. The information you learn can be used throughout the
design process. If you can, it’s best to take your time with the competitive audit
process so you’ll have a great foundation of knowledge to build your designs on
moving forward. Good luck!
How to present a competitive audit

After researching direct and indirect competitors, and compiling those findings into a
spreadsheet, the next step is sharing your insights with your team or client.

You can present your competitive audit as a written report or a slideshow

presentation using software like Google Slides, Microsoft PowerPoint, or Apple’s
Keynote. This course will teach you how to present your audit findings as a written
report, but in the workplace you can choose from many different formats to
demonstrate what you’ve learned to stakeholders. In this reading, you’ll learn about
some best practices for creating a slideshow presentation of your competitive audit
findings.

Both written reports and slideshow presentations have their advantages. Slideshows
are dynamic and visually engaging, but require more time and effort to create and
rehearse. Written reports are more concise and less time-consuming to create.
They’re an efficient way to communicate insights quickly when your audience doesn’t
have a lot of time.

Later in the course, you’ll prepare to present a competitive audit for your portfolio
project. You’ll learn more about written reports when you get there. Right now, let's
explore some best practices for presenting competitive audit findings as a slideshow
presentation. Ready to learn more? Here we go!

Tips for your slides and presentation structure

Every good presentation needs an introduction, so you’ll want to begin by laying out
the goals of your competitive audit. It’s also a good idea to outline your research
questions, methodology, and the features or characteristics you compared across
competitors. Summarizing the purpose of your presentation makes it clear exactly
what you're trying to learn about the competition. Note that the example introductory
slide below includes sections for an objective, research questions, and procedures.
Slide that shows goals and methods, broken into Objective, Research Questions, and
Procedure.

Objective: Burger Garden says their clients have lost interest in their product. We
audited industry competitors to understand how the BG app compares.

Research Questions: Are they attracting the right audience that they say they are
speaking to? How does their app look and feel? Does the design complement the
product? Will the user get confused as they navigate through the app?

Procedure: We reviewed these aspects of each restaurant and their app or website
design: Audience, First Thoughts, User Interaction, Visual Design, and Content.
To organize your information for your audience, begin each section of your
presentation with a slide that identifies the section’s topic (similar to a chapter title in
a book). Stick to simple, clear visuals, like the bold text and solid background of the
slide below:
Next, summarize what you learned about your competitors’ products, and how they
compare to yours. Be sure to point out where your product excels, as well as areas
that need improvement.

As you organize your presentation, think about the most effective ways to present
your insights. Keep the overall design as simple and clean as possible. Avoiding
cluttered and confusing imagery makes it easier for your audience to follow along
and focus on the important information. Note how the example slide below outlines
the most important information and expands on it in the section to the left:
Visual presentation of competitive audit findings for Burger Garden located in Kansas
City, Missouri. On the left of the presentation slide, text shows the cost of burgers
(around $10 each), the business size (small), the audience (millennials), the unique
value prop (large variety of burgers and toppings), and the initial findings (clear
branding identified in screenshot A, content ton is inconsistent in screenshot B).

On the right side of the slides are two screenshots. Screenshot A shows the company
name is clearly displayed at the top of their website. Screenshot B shows text on the
website that reads "Each ingredient implemented into our burgers is of the highest
grade and viscosity, assembled with diligence and care for your family unit."
Finally, conclude your presentation with a summary of key points and takeaways. As
you learned earlier, competitive audits can compare up to 10 companies. That’s a lot
of information for your audience to take in! A summary can refresh their memories by
recapping the most important information.

Presenting data effectively

The way you present your data can influence how your audience interprets it. Keep in
mind that different types of data lend themselves to different formats. For example, if
your presentation has a lot of numbers or quantitative data, a chart or graph can help
your audience grasp how the numbers compare to one another. To demonstrate a
specific function or issue with a competitor’s product, consider including a screen
recording in your presentation. Finally, it can be helpful to include a rubric that
explains the grading system you used in your audit. For example, the rubric system
used in the example audit graded the burger restaurants from “needs work” to
“outstanding.” Using that rubric, each restaurant was rated on a scale of one to four
in each category to create a final rating.

Delivering a strong presentation

Knowing what to include in your presentation is only part of the process. As you
prepare to present your findings, keep these tips for effective presentations in mind:

● Get feedback from your team. Share your report or slides with a trusted
teammate ahead of time to get their take on how the information flows.
● Limit the amount of text on your slides. Your slides should include just
enough information to draw attention to important points. Save the details
for your speech.
● Stick to the highlights. A presentation to your team or client should only
focus on the highlights of your audit. If you want to get into more detail,
add them to the appendix of your presentation or create a written report.
 ● Use notes. An outline or note cards can help you stay focused, on topic,
and on time.
● Practice ahead of time. Do a few trial runs before the big day to get
comfortable with the content and pace of your presentation.
● Use relevant graphics. Make sure any images and graphics relate directly
to the topic of your presentation. Choose images and graphics carefully to
ensure they enhance clarity.
● Keep your biases in check. Be aware of your own design biases and try to
prevent them from clouding your judgment during the presentation.
● Be able to defend your conclusions. Make sure you have evidence to
back up your conclusions. Use actual data and specific examples
whenever possible.

Presenting your research can seem intimidating, but remember that you are
representing your users! Competitive audits give you, your team, and your clients
knowledge that will help create well-rounded product designs that work. To ease your
presentation jitters, check out this article from Forbes for expert tips on connecting
with your audience: 20 World-Class Presentation Experts Share Their Top Tips.

Best practices for How Might We

Brainstorming possible solutions to your design problems is an opportunity to get

creative and have some fun! The “How might we” exercise is one of the most
common ways to approach the ideation process.

“How might we” (HMW) is a design thinking activity used to translate problems into
opportunities for design. HMW gets your creativity flowing and encourages you to
think about the problem from different perspectives. This new vantage point helps
you create a wide variety of solutions to the user problem you’re trying to address.
During a HMW exercise, you’d create a list of questions that start with “How might
we” and use those to spark ideas for solutions.

You'll learn about two different methods for design ideation in this lesson: HMW and
Crazy Eights. These are only a few of the many different ways you can ideate
solutions to problems. Completing a HMW activity isn't required for this course, but it
might be helpful to start sketching some of your ideas to get a feel for the process!

Frame HMW questions

To create good HMW questions, you need a well-defined problem statement. From
there, you can reframe this problem statement into questions that will help you come
up with ideas to solve the problem.

Consider this problem that a user, Darren, faces: Darren is a concert goer who needs
to keep track of their concert ticket because they need the ticket when they go
through security.

Let’s revisit those useful tips from the Stanford University design school that you
learned about in the video. These tips will help you reframe the problem from
different angles.

Think of how you might use any positives in the problem as a solution.

How might we make keeping track of tickets a fun competition among friends?

Think of how you’d solve the opposite of the problem you’ve outlined.

How might we create a way to lose tickets?

Think of ways to completely change the process.

How might we make a non-paper concert ticket?

This is especially helpful for long, complex problems.

How might we keep the customer’s ticket from getting lost? How might we make a
lost ticket easier for the security team to handle?
Think of how to remove the negative part of the problem entirely.

How might we make a way for concert goers to enter a venue without needing a
ticket?

Take any negative adjectives and try to turn them into positives.

How might we make the entry to a concert venue less stressful for ticket holders?

Remove or change any processes that you assume have to be in place.

How might we remove the security check process at a concert?

Think of ways to compare this user experience to another experience.

How might we make going through security like playing a video game?

Think of how the problem might be solved by a resource that isn’t mentioned in the
problem statement.

How might facial recognition software help manage concert entry?

If you want more inspiration, check out Stanford’s one-pager on “how might we”
questions.

Best practices for thinking of HMWs

Coming up with good HMWs takes a little practice, but you’ll get the hang of it in no
time! Here are some best practices to keep in mind:
 ● Be broad. A good HMW should allow for multiple solutions. For example,
one of the earlier questions, How might we make keeping track of tickets
fun and competitive?, can be answered in countless ways.
● But don’t be too broad. You want your HMWs to be comprehensive, but
narrow enough to keep your solutions focused. An example of a HMW
question that is too broad is: How might we make ticketing better? This
HMW doesn’t provide clear enough guidance to come up with ideas for
solutions.
● Make multiple drafts. It’s okay to change your HMW questions after
you’ve written them. If you find that your HMW doesn’t help you think of
any useful solutions, change it up!
● Be creative. HMWs are meant to be imaginative and even fun. You can
use the list of tips from Stanford above to think of new, creative ways to
frame your questions.
● Write as many HMWs as you can. The more HMWs you have, the more
solutions you can come up with. If you can make more than one question
out of the frameworks you’ve learned, then go for it!

HMWs are a great way to start thinking of potential solutions during the ideate stage
of the design process. You can apply the HMW thinking process to your portfolio or
CoffeeHouse projects, but it is not required for course completion and doesn't need
to be submitted.

Best practices for Crazy Eights

How do you feel about putting your ideas on paper? In this reading, you’ll learn more
about Crazy Eights, another popular design ideation exercise intended to help you
think of several ideas in record time. Remember that this is one of many possible
ways to ideate. You'll develop ideation methods that work best for you as you explore
them over time.

Crazy Eights is a great way to get ideas flowing for any design problem you need to
solve. With Crazy Eights, you’ll sketch eight different designs, each with a new idea
for solving the user’s problem. The best part? It only takes eight minutes! Here’s a
reminder of how it works:

● Start with a large sheet of paper. Fold the paper in half, then fold it in half
again, then in half one more time. When you unfold the paper, you’ll have
eight squares to sketch in.
● Grab something to draw with. A lot of designers prefer to draw using
Sharpies, but a pencil or pen will work too. You can use whatever you
already have to draw.
 ● Set your timer to eight minutes. You’ll have one minute to sketch each
design idea.
● Let the ideas flow. Draw any and every solution that comes to your mind.
If you have more than eight ideas, feel free to repeat the exercise.

Just like that, you’ve got eight potential design solutions! Keep in mind that this
exercise is often done in a group setting. Each person draws eight sketches on their
own, then the group comes together to decide on their favorite ideas. Each person
shares their top two or three ideas with the whole group, or each person may vote on
their favorite sketches from across the team. The best ideas chosen will usually be
elaborated on through more detailed sketches.

Best practices
Now that you know how to do a Crazy Eights exercise, check out some tips to make
your creativity flow freely while you sketch.

● Do a creative warm-up exercise. Complete an activity where you draw the

person next to you without looking at your paper, or have everyone draw
their own interpretation of a word or phrase. Starting to put pen to paper
like this will get you in the mindset to sketch.
● Make sure your problem is well defined. Develop a set of Crazy Eights for
one How might we question or one problem statement at a time.
● Don’t judge your ideas. Ideating is all about creating lots of ideas, not
creating perfect ones! Sketch any and every idea you have until your
paper is full, no matter how crazy it might seem.
● Don’t judge other people’s ideas. Keep an open mind when other people
are presenting their sketches.
● Include a diverse group. Since Crazy Eights are often done in a group
setting, it’s best that your group represents a variety of work roles,
 experiences, abilities, genders, and backgrounds. This will help your team
have a wide range of ideas to choose from.
● Ideate in a comfortable environment. Do this exercise in a location that’s
relaxed and encourages creative thinking. It’s always great to get out of
your normal work space for creative exercises.
● Don’t be afraid of sketching. You don’t have to be an artist to be a UX
designer, and your sketches during Crazy Eights don’t have to be perfect.
You just need to clearly communicate your ideas. Stick figures are
perfectly fine!

Benefits of Crazy Eights

Crazy Eights is an exciting design ideation exercise that generates a lot of ideas in a
small amount of time. If you have five people do the exercise at the same time, you’ll
have 40 potential solutions after only eight minutes. That’s a lot of ideas!

Crazy Eights also forces you to think outside the box because you have to come up
with many ideas in a short timeframe, without judging them. This means that you will
have lots of unique, nontraditional solutions to consider.

This exercise is meant to be fun and fast paced, so enjoy yourself. Let your creativity
flow without judgement, and come up with some awesome ideas! In the next course
item, you have the option to complete a Crazy Eights exercise for your CoffeeHouse
project if you so choose.

If you want to learn more about how a company called Switch uses the Crazy Eights
exercise, check out this article, Crazy Concept Ideation with Crazy Eights.

Here’s an example of a Crazy Eights drawings for the

CoffeeHouse app.
1. Identify your problem scenario.

CoffeeHouse is underutilizing its app. It isn’t using it to build customer loyalty.

2. Provide an image of your Crazy Eights drawing below, like the image below:

1. Bean Bag Bonus

2. Your favorites

3. VIP status

4. Secret menu

5. Skip the line

6. Reserve a spot

7. Easy order

8. Coffee stories
3. Describe at least three of the ideas you generated with your Crazy Eights activity.

● Easy reorder options in-app. Store favorites, click for an instant refill of
your last order or open a “tab” if you are dining-in and connected to the
CoffeeHouse guest Wi-Fi and you want to keep ordering without going
through the complete check out process every time.
● Bean Bag Bonus program to build loyalty of patrons who buy 1-pound
bags of whole bean or ground coffee.
● Reserve a spot option to encourage more patrons to stay and work or
socialize. A small subset of tables are opened up for 2-hour reservation
slots each day.