[Slides and the accompanying audio posted at http://www.portigal.com/blog/designing-for-unmet-needs-my-presentation-from-warm-gun] Don’t be surprised if Steve Portigal, author of Interviewing Users, invites himself to your family breakfast or follows hotel maintenance staff to the boiler room. For more than 15 years, he’s led hundreds of interviews that help clients understand customers and turn insights into design opportunities. Steve knows that our success depends on letting the unmet needs of our audience shape our designs. Okay—but how do we hit a target we can’t see? How do we design for people who aren’t us? How do we solve for the complexity of those people? Dig into the details, ditch the guesswork, and join Steve to engage deliberately with the people we’re designing for. Look at ways to acknowledge the complexity of your users. Offer solutions rooted in the connections you make with people. Get unstuck and discover opportunities for design that adds value.

1. Designing for Unmet Needs
Steve Portigal
@steveportigal
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2. Click to edit Master title style
Customer development is talking to users
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

3. ACnlicskw etor eqduiet sMtiaosntse ra btitoleu ts ptyeloeple today
Flickr user Presidencia de la República del Ecuador
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

4. ACnlicskw etor eqduiet sMtiaosntse ra btitoleu ts ptyroleposed solutions
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

5. CGleicnke troa teivdeit aMnads Etevra tliutlaet isvteyle
Study people to generate
new ideas
Show solutions to people
to evaluate if they are
desirable, usable, useful
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

6. CGleicnke troa teivdeit aMnads Etevra tliutlaet isvteyle
Study people to generate
new ideas
Ethnography!
Show solutions to people
to evaluate if they are
desirable, usable, useful
Usability Testing!
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

7. IC tlhicinkk t oa beoduitt Mit alisktee rt htiitsle style
Study people to generate
new ideas
Show solutions to people
to evaluate if they are
desirable, usable, useful
Learning about people’s
behaviors, beliefs, goals, etc.
will help you find opportunities
to innovate and reveal if you
are on the right track so far.
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

8. TChlicek d tioff eerdeint cMea bsetetwr teitelen stetyslteing and research
Avoid showing your best guess
at a solution and asking “Do
you like this?”
Create provocative examples
to surface hidden desires and
expectations
Image from Roberto and Worth1000.com
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

9. TChlicek d tioff eerdeint cMea bsetetwr teitelen stetyslteing and research
Avoid asking “Do you like this?”
Don’t show your best guess at
a solution; instead identify
provocative examples to
surface hidden desires and
expectations
Image from Roberto and Worth1000.com
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

10. IC wlicoku ltdo leodviet …Master title style
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

11. CDlriicvke tdoe ecdisiti oMnas swteitrh t iitnles isgthytle
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

12. Click to edit Master title style
What’s Stopping Us
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

13. TChlicek r etos oeudrict eMsa csotenrv teitrlsea stitoynle
2–3 weeks 2–3 weeks 2–3 weeks
Who do you
want to talk
to?
What do you
want to do
with them?
Fieldwork
Do
something
with the data!
Screening criteria,
recruiting
Methodology, field
guide, stimuli
Analysis,
synthesis, design
Interviews, self-reporting,
debriefs
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

14. PCllaicnk ftoor etrdaitd Meoafsfster title style
Who do you
want to talk
to?
1 day 1 day 2 days
What do you
want to do
with them?
Fieldwork
Do
something
with the data!
Who can you get?
Co-workers,
intercepts on the
street
Wide-eyed
observation,
winging it
Small sample, Debrief
massively parallel
data gathering
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

15. CWliec kd oton ’et dhiat vMea ussteerr sti t-leo ustry pleroduct doesn’t exist yet
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

16. COluicrk c tuos teodmite Mrsa satreer htiatlred sttoy lgeet to
Flickr user Eric Gravengaard
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

17. Yes you can
Click to edit Master title style
Resources, presentations and to purchase
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/interviewing-users/
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

18. Yes you can
Click to edit Master title style
Resources, presentations and to purchase
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/interviewing-users/
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

19. Yes you can
Click to edit Master title style
Resources, presentations and to purchase
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/interviewing-users/
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

20. Click to edit Master title style
You are not your user
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

21. YColicuk a troe endoitt Myoausrt eurs etitrlse style
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

22. Click to edit Master title style
The Takeaways
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

23. CWlircakp ptoin e’ dUitp Master title style
• Learn about people’s behaviors today not just
their thoughts about your solution
• Create stimuli rather than just test prototypes
• You are not your users
• Find participants, plan your method, do your
research, and analyze the data
• Who you study isn’t always who you design for
• Build infrastructure for ongoing user input
• There are resources for learning (but then you
have to go and learn by doing)
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

24. CWlihcok ytoo ue dleita Mrna fsrtoemr tiistl en ostty wleho you design for
What is the desired relationship to the product/service/brand/activity?
• Typical user
• Non-user
• Extreme user
• Peripheral user
• Expert user
• Subject-matter expert
• Wannabe user
• Should-be user
• Future user
• Past user
• Hater
• Loyal to competitor
Triangulate through multiple perspectives
By creating contrast, you reveal key
influencing factors that you wouldn’t
otherwise see
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

25. CRleicckru tioti negd ict rMitearsiate: rT tyitplee sotyf lueser
Think about the whole system: the chooser,
the influencer, the user, and anyone who is
impacted by those roles
Challenge assumptions about who the
organization is implicitly/explicitly designing for
• Is that everyone?
• Do they even exist?
This will surface a broader sense – even prior
to research – about who is affected by the
product and who is being designed for
When working with a global producer of
sports apparel, it took four weeks to
untangle the conflicts about who we
should study. Their entire culture is based
on their aspirational customer: a male
lettered high school athlete. The bulk of
their sales come from women 28 to 35.
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal

26. Click to edit Master title style
Thank you!
Portigal Consulting
www.portigal.com
@steveportigal
steve@portigal.com
Designing for Unmet Needs Portigal