12. Latent Needs Needs that the user is unaware of When met, they deliver delight, exceed expectations and resonate Can be difficult to uncover Users do different things than they say Observation is best method to discover
13. Direct Needs Needs that the user directly communicates Phone, e-mail, web form, etc. Customer typically doesn’t tell you exactly what they want Need to be cautious
14. Assumed Needs Most often come from internal sources Strong possibility of being wrong
16. Discovering Customer Needs “You’ll learn more by meeting a real, live customer and spending an hour with him than you can learn from fifty research studies or analysts’ reports” -Adrian Slywotsky, The Art of Profitability
17. Market Segmentation Before talking with customers, identify the appropriate market segment and associated user personas Align with business strategy
21. Observation Observe user in natural setting Remember they are “experts” Put yourself in the user’s shoes Minimize your influence on their actions Allow them to get frustrated Watch for: Workarounds Body language Anything that is surprising Anything that challenges your assumptions
22. Conversation Make the user feel as comfortable as possible Generate 2-way conversation Resist reading from a script, keep it dynamic Ask open-ended questions Make the conversation about the user and not the product Ask naïve questions to draw out responses
23. Documentation Capture EVERYTHING Take photos of the environment Document as quickly as possible after the interview/ observation Record The things that are most important to the user Expressions Direct quotes
34. Alternatively Bring users in during the validation phase of development If feedback is attained early enough, changes can still be made
35. Customer Needs “A market is never saturated with a good product, but it is very quickly saturated with a bad one” -Henry Ford Aaron Carrano June 4, 2010