User Research: How We Learn About Your Customers
User research is the systematic study of the people who will use your product. It replaces assumptions with evidence — and ensures that what we build is what your users actually need, not what we think they need.
Research Methods We Use
- User interviews: 1:1 structured or semi-structured conversations with target users. Excellent for understanding motivations, pain points, and mental models.
- Surveys: Useful for quantitative data at scale. Best used to validate hypotheses generated from qualitative research.
- Contextual inquiry: Observing users in their actual environment (or simulated environment) as they perform tasks. Reveals behaviours that users can't or won't articulate in interviews.
- Usability testing: Giving users specific tasks to complete with a prototype or existing product and observing where they succeed and fail.
- Card sorting: A technique for understanding how users mentally categorise information — used to design navigation and information architecture.
- Analytics review: Analysing existing usage data to understand actual behaviour patterns.
How Many Users Do We Need?
For usability testing, research consistently shows that 5 users uncover approximately 85% of usability issues. We recommend iterative rounds of testing (5 users, fix, test again) rather than large single rounds.
Your Role in Research
You know your customers better than we do at the start of a project. Your input on who to recruit for research, and your help facilitating access to real customers, is invaluable.