A surveys does not have to be the dirty ‘S’ word

Jennifer Blatz User Experience UX design and research
Surveys can be useful to supplement empathy interviews.

When it comes to user experience research, there are several methods to gather information. One of those research methods is a  survey. Now, a lot of UX researchers might frown upon the use of surveys. It’s true, they are a great way to gather quantitative information. And that is great to gather in a lot of circumstances. But when it comes to user experience, quantity is not as important as understanding the “why” someone does something. That is the value of qualitative research over quantitative.

So a lot of “pure” UX researchers choose to not even entertain the idea of sending out a survey. I think this mindset is because a survey may be an opportunity to gather some insights, but they are not always very helpful insights. And for those who don’t know any better, a person might interpret these survey answers as gospel. Again, they don’t provide the “why” someone is doing something.

For the survey portion I am sharing above, I used a survey as a supplement to a recent empathy interview session I performed. I was interviewing people on their recent car-purchase journey. Instead of asking participants what kind of car they bought, or what automobile features were of the utmost importance, I chose to gather some of this information in a survey. I gave the participant this survey to fill out before we had our interview. And in case you are worried, I did ask a lot of the same information about why they bought a car so that I could dig deeper in to the “why” they bought what they did. Also, this gave me an opportunity to see just how consistent people were in their answers. Thankfully all of them were.

So, the lesson here folks is that as a user experience researcher, don’t completely rule out a survey. You can gather a lot more information you might not have time to find out in just an hour interview. Remember, as a good researcher, you should have a lot of tools in your tool kit. And yes, a survey should be one of them.

Service Design and creating a Blueprint

Is your organization doing Service Design?

It seems like it’s one of the hottest new trends in the User/Customer Experience arena. Where I work, not only have we been introduced to the concept, we are being encouraged to carry out the process on our products.

What is a Service Design Blueprint?

Yeah that was my question too when I first heard the term some time back. Does it have to do with architecture? Is it only for the service industry? How does this play in to UX? Yes I had all of these questions and many more.

OK, really, What is Service Design?

According to Wikipedia, Service Design is:

  • Involves the activity of planning and organizing people, infrastructure, communication and material components of a service.
  • To improve its quality and the interaction between the service provider and its customers.
  • May function as a way to inform changes to an existing service or create a new service entirely.
  • The purpose is to establish best practices for designing services according to both the needs of customers and the competencies and capabilities of service providers.
  • The service will be user-friendly and relevant to the customers, while being sustainable and competitive for the service provider.

Ok, this all sounds good right? So how do I get started? I am lucky enough to have attended the Adaptive Path Service Design seminar which gave me a grand introduction to the value and process. I am going to share a great asset they provided to me so that you can share it with your teams. (PDF is attached at the bottom of the article.)

Service Design blueprinting building blocks.

Now that you have a bit of foundation of what it means, I suggest you start creating Service Blueprints for the various products and services that your organization produces. You would be amazed the opportunities and caps you will discover from a Service Design blueprint exercise. Give it a try!

Service Blueprint block Example layout