Skip Primary User Research At Your Peril
Understanding why you're building before you actually start building reduces the risk of costly—and potentially fatal—mistakes
When I was at Scient (“We build businesses!”), we had a methodology that should look familiar to any developer—strategy, design, detailed design, build.
Whether the customer was a Fortune 500 company, a startup with a big check, or something in between, we were fanatical about our process.
But without fail—usually at the beginning of ‘design’—clients would question the need for the customer experience team we were bringing onto the project. And within that team, the target that got singled out most was ethnography.
Say what?
If you’re not familiar with ethnography, it’s a type of qualitative research that involves immersive study of people in their natural environments. It relies on extensive observation and interviews, focusing on understanding the "why" behind behaviors within a subject’s context.
While true ethnography may be overkill for some projects, I’m amazed by the number of companies that still balk at basic primary user research—aka talking to potential users…and actually listening to what they say.
For some reason, the idea of investing a little money before investing a LOT of money seems ‘excessive’, ‘unnecessary’, and ‘bloated’ to certain people.
“We already know what our customers want!”
“Can’t we just get something out there and see what happens?”
“Users won’t even understand what we’re asking them!”
Seriously?
And before you think that having an LLM spit out an interview guide for a junior staffer to ask some questions or doing a couple of focus groups qualifies as primary research, think again.
Experienced user researchers are like scientists with a microscope. They’re curious. They’re skilled with their tools to reveal what’s hiding in plain sight. They don’t accept answers at face value. And they know that a great question is often more important than the answer.
They’re the sort of people you don’t want to play at poker because they’ll spot your tell.
And yet—despite the proven benefits and the countless books, articles, and podcasts begging people to understand the problem they’re solving before building a solution—primary user research is routinely skipped.
But why?
I feel the need. The need … to build!
Keep in mind, most founders are builders. And builders want to build. And anything that keeps them—and their impatient investors—from scratching that itch is considered a waste of time. And time is the enemy.
What’s so shortsighted is that every wrong assumption that could’ve been corrected, every unnecessary feature that could have been deleted, and every insight that might be the key to your ‘secret sauce’ easily justifies the time and money spent on user research.
Those insights also help you know the difference between the movable vs. load-bearing walls of your strategy. And that keeps you from doing something dumb that brings everything down on your head.
Yes, entrepreneurs have very strong opinions. They have to be stubborn enough to push through barriers where others have failed. But those same strong opinions can just as easily get in the way of healthy curiosity, simple listening, and a little humility that help you recognize solid assumptions from wild-ass guesses.
So, before you rush to build your next great idea, take a pause and acknowledge that your understanding of the problem and the solution is probably a little…fuzzy. Then spend some time listening to a handful of potential users to challenge your assumptions, fill in gaps you may not even see, and give your idea more resolution.
And appreciate that primary user research is the first line of defense protecting you…from yourself.