This weeks lecture from Daniel was all about research, mainly user research and how we should be doing it, methods we should be using and the reasoning behind all of this. It was great to get this detailed summary of all that encompases user research because I feel much more aware of what methods I could be doing when it comes to this. Daniel did say that he went into a lot of detail on this and we don’t have to do all of the methods, focus on a few that is relevant. This was reassuring because there was a lot he mentioned and I thought there is no way I could do all of this for my projects.

He firstly talked about a book recommendation that I intent on reading, I love finding new ux books and reviewing them, it is one of my favourite research parts of each project. The book is called UX for lean startups by Laura Klein.

Daniel then went on to say that user research is knowing your audience, he then listed a three point journey that we all should be taking:

1. Systematic investigation
2. Establish facts
3. Draw conclusion

These were the three markers we should be hitting during the research we should be completing for projects. Daniel then went onto talk about Qualitative vs Quantitative. This was a new concept for me as I have never done this before when it comes to research but Daniel said on the research journey you need both and then demonstrated in a diagram including these words. This made it easier to understand and I can visually see where I should be at the start of my project. This was helpful and a new plan to follow for me.

Daniel added that research should be done throughout the length of the project even at the end. This was good news to me because research is my favourite part of the whole process sometimes. I will be ensuring I do this at the end of every project too, to make sure my outcome is the best it can be. The next part of the lecture was Daniel going through the basic steps. I went on miro and write the steps out onto post it notes:

The next part of the lecture was all bout Bias and he explained how this needs to be left out when resreach is involved for it to be fair and right. He gave some examples of bias,

• Cognitive bais
• Group thinking
• Selection bias
• Confirmation bias
• Cluster illusions

and many more, this was interesting to me because I had never thought there was so many types of bias to consider when conducting research but they all make sense and I will be ensuring that I do not take part in any bias’ when I conduct my research.

Daniel then went into some detail about interviews and observations as a part of research, this is something I haven’t done yet for research but I plan to for my project this year. He gave a list of reasons why this is a good idea to conduct:

• Challenge assumptions
• Gather user requirements
• ‘get out of building’ opportunity – to step away from where you are creating or analysing research
• Goals, behaviour context
• Motivation

Online surveys was the next method Daniel talked about and he listed the following exampling why it is good to do:

• Easy way to gather user requirements
• Powerful
• Insightful
• Can reach a wide group of people

 

He then gave some examples of good online surveys that we can use for example, Typeform and survey monkey. This was a great help and something I will be doing.

Card sorting was the next method Daniel discussed with us on user research. He gave some bullet points as to why we should be using this method:

• Qualifiable
• Helps define structure and priorities
• Helps understand user experience

This is something I haven’t done but the images Daniel showed made me want to because I love anything post-it note orientated and seems like a fun way to break up research and information.

Analysing the research 

The next part of the lecture was all about analysing the research collected, Daniel talked about triangulation, and showed a diagram explaining this. Once I seen the image I then understood, it is to see if there are any common findings within the research or user testing etc. This is a unique and new way of sorting through the research and something I have never done before. I am excited to try this.

User Personas was the next part, Daniel said that these can be short or long depending on how much information the client had offered to give, but I have looked into these before and know about them. Daniel added they are a great way to get to know the needs of the users and really lets a designer figure out what the user should get out of the project etc.

 

Daniel also talked about empathy maps. This is something I want to do and am going to do soon for both projects because I think it is similar to the user personas but is a bit more personal and assisting to the user, it will allow me to fire out the users needs and really empathise with them.

Affinity Diagrams was the next method Daniel talked about. He recommended the k’s method and this also is new to me and looks to be an interesting way to sort through research and break it up so it is easier for me to understand it and move forward with it. The diagram on miro really interested me.

Reflection 

Todays lecture was very detailed and a lot of help. Research is one of my favourite parts of any project and learning about user research has really helped me understand the importance of it. I also learned why all of these methods are so important and imperative for the user and myself. I learned various methods and how there really are endless amount of ways to collect user research today wether it is online or in person. I also learned lots of tips and reminders from Daniel throughout fro example, call people people, do not referent to them as humans, people are not data points, avoid leading questions, use plain English. These tips were really informative and I will be sure to take them on board. Overall I really liked this lecture and learned a lot from it, it was great to learn new methods of user research and go over ones I already use as a refresher.

I used spider diagrams, my sketchbook and procreate to try and come up names for my app. I wanted the name to be fun, friendly but get to the point of what it is or what it can do. I wanted an inspiring name and one that was catchy and people remembered.

Below are the images I made that helped me come up with my name.

I kept coming up with words like global and green in my head so i messed around with a few ideas and i put a star at the one I liked the most.

The name I picked was Global Hero

Why?

• It is catchy
• It is positive
• It is encouraging
• It is inspiring for those who want to help the planet
• I can imagine it on merchandise

I made some mind maps and spider diagrams on some ideas I had for the pitch. I explored all areas of global warming and climate change, trying to come up with the best product I could.

 

App idea development

After coming up with some product ideas I wanted to focus on an app because I felt that was the best idea and the one I could come up with the best ideas for.

I made some on procreate and felt this was a good space for me to be as free I wanted to be and come up with the craziest outcomes.

Why Global Warming?

 

What I want my app to be?

1. A place were young adults and teenagers can find out about climate change
2. A guide to a better and cleaner future
3. A place were people can find out how to help/contribute all in one

I then used spider diagrams to try and figure out the best things to include in this app and to really see what would work best.

Why make mind maps?

Mind maps are a great way to explore your craziest ideas in a grouping sort of way, new ideas lead to new ideas as you make the mind map bigger and I think that it is one of the best ways for me to create the most creative ideas. This form of idea generation is really helpful because it doesn’t have to be perfect or thought out it can be wild and I enjoy making the connections. I really think this benefited me in this pitch because I got to group together ideas and form a product.

 

For this task I wanted to do some user research for multiple reasons but user research like surveys is really beneficial  for a project to get to know the user and their needs. Since I am designing and presenting an app pitch I needed to find out the following for a target group:

• To know how much they know about global warming
• To find out if global warming is something they care about/think about
• To understand how they would want to help
• To get to know if they would use an app or not involving this subject
• To know if they know how serious it is

Who is my Target Group?

My target group is teenagers and adults really anyone who uses apps and is concerned with the environment and how they can help contribute to saving it. So I sent out this to as many ages I could to get a diverse result to make it more informative.

The survey

I made the survey on Typeform, I have made previous surveys on this site for other projects and I found it really helpful and easy to use. The questions I asked weren’t too difficult to answer, I tried to get to the point quickly to make it more convenient for the user to answer and stay interested. I asked questions that would only benefit my research and to give me some answers

Why do User Research?

• To get to know the users
• To understand what the users know and what they need
• To make a better product
• To get sound knowledge and information on the target group, that I wouldn’t get otherwise

What did I find out?

1. I found out that the target group do not have time to think about global warming/climate change because they are too busy
2. I found out that the target group thinks the topic of climate change is boring
3. I also found out the the target group do not feel they know enough about the topic to know how to help

Reflection

Overall I feel I got alot from creating this typeform survey and sending out to my selected target group and feel that the responses I received rally opened my eyes to what the target group know about the topic of global warming. The results were scary for me because it confirmed my thoughts on that people do not care enough about it or are too busy to think about it. Now I feel I have enough information about the users to try and create a product that will solve all of these problems.

For the pitch I made three user personas, I did this because I find user personas a great way to get to know and understand the users needs. I love making these for each project and find them very helpful in the process. I also plan to include them in my pitch to back up what I am saying and really make my point – that more people aren’t aware on how to help climate change.

Below are the user personas I made

Why make user personas?

1. To highlight the age difference in people who do not know a lot about climate change, or know how to help contribute to helping do their part.
2. To back up my point on how there are many people in many professions that want to know more
3. User research is necessary in any project
4. To get to know the needs and wants of the users
5. To make my app a better product for those who are going to use it

Reflection

I think these user personas will really help me create this app in the best way possible. I know who I am designing for now and feel like I am prepared to design an app to cater for all needs. I enjoyed creating personalities and ensuring each user had some desire to learn about climate change and want to do their part to help. I discovered that the age range is endless for this topic and all ages are concerned about it.

I wanted to some up some of the things I have learned from doing my proposal. I think it is important to self evaluate at the end of projects and this one was a tricky one for me so I felt I had faced a lot of challenges along the way.

Challenges

The hardest part for me was definitely understand all of the legal terms I wasn’t aware of before I began this. I also had never made an invoice before so I feel like it was scary and hard for me to get the grasps of. I also feel like a big challenge was type, I always find this with every project and think that with the proposal, since it is a document the type was so important. I wanted my proposal to be simplistic and sleek and I feel it was hard for me to select a fitting typeface that done all of the talking. Another challenge for me was designing this proposal. I felt like it was hard to see examples and to know if I was under designing or over designing it. Since it is a legal document I stayed clear of colour or illustrations but then again I then felt this was too boring. Overall I feel like this project was really knew and scary for me but I feel like a more knowledgeable designer because of it.

Main things I learned:

• Legal Terminology
• How to write an invoice
• How to take a website and turn it into a proposal idea
• How to design a proposal in a fitting way
• How to overcome fear of new things/projects

Reflection

I felt that I learned a lot from this project and tried to take in as much legal jargon as I could but it was hard at first to get motivated to do so. With research and development and getting stuck in it got easier. I think that this was a something very different for me as a designer and I know what a proposal is now and how important they are for when it comes to selling your skills as a designer. I am happy with how it turned out and feel like the sleek idea and design really paid off.

 

I wanted to find out more on pitching and more specifically, how to give a good pitch. I feel like Daniels lectures helped but I wanted to do my own research and get good sources that are known for their pitching techniques. I found this ted talk on a speech coach that is known for his pitching coaching and speech coaching, he is called David Beckett and the video had lots of hits so I wanted to see if what he said was of any value. The video was called ‘How to give the perfect pitch’ and it was exactly what I was looking for.

The video was around 30. minutes long and I am going to discuss some of the main parts that stuck with me.

He started by saying that he has so many years of experience with pitching, he has coached for pitches that were 1 minute, 2 minutes, 3, 5 and 7. He mentioned that a pitch should be no longer than 7 minutes. This shocked me because I thought pitches could be any length.

What makes a great pitch?

This section was fascinating and just what I was looking for, he talked about 4 principles.

1. Communication is what the listener does
2. Its all about simplicity, clarity and focus – Shrink the pitch right down and get to the essence of the story
3. Conscious decisions – about what you are going to say and do from the very first second to the very last
4. Certainty – stand by what you mean because you mean it. It creates confidence in you

He talked about getting the story straight for the next part of the speech and this also interested me a lot. He firstly said you must know your audience. Then went onto brainstorming with post-it notes to get the pitch out of your head. Then make a clear opening, the power of three (to break things down) and then closing. This list really helped me understand how important it is to break down your pitch and focus on objectives.

He said if you go away with anything today it would be that you should get the pitch out of your head onto post it notes and brainstorm. This was the most important message he believes. This was shocking because I thought it would a more complex idea. He quoted the David Allen book on productivity and said that our brains can’t organise more than 6 things so then we have to get them out and write them down. This will make your pitch more successful.

The Pitch Canvas 

This was one of the most interesting parts of the talk because he broke down the pitch into sections to make it successful, efficient and a better pitch.

The boxes you must include:

• Simple statement
• Pain (+gain)
• Product
• Product demo
• What is unique
• Customer traction
• Business model
• Investment
• Team
• End statement
• Why you ?

One of the boxes that surprised me was the pain (+gain) box. David said if this section is not in your pitch then the investors will not care. There has to be a problem (pain) and then a solution (gain) for the pitch to be successful. This was eye-opening and I will ensure that my pitch has a pain area that my app will solve. He said that there is four questions you must ask yourself.

1. Is there a problem to solve?
2. Is the problem big?
3. Will people pay to have this problem fixed?
4. Have you validated that?

His source for this evidence is that he has interviewed lots of investors and this is what they want to see the pain. David said that investors say this is the most important part of the pitch. Taking a look at this pitch canvas was really helpful and great to watch him speak to proudly of it. This is something I will be referring back to when creating my pitch to ensure I have all of the elements.

David also put a huge emphasis on practising. This was reassuring  because I am good at practising things, he said that if your pitch is 3 minutes and you are in a particular competition or in line with others, they will cut you off so do it in 2 minutes 55. It is always better to be under than over time he mentioned.

Ending the talk David talked about closing, as in closing the pitch which was fitting. He talked about how you should close your pitch with passion and power. Don’t finish on a low note, finish on a high note. He said by doing this – stating who you are, what your product does and what you want from the audience, this will help you finish like a true professional.

What did I learn? 

I learned a lot from this talk and am glad I took the half hour to watch David speak so great about pitching. I wanted to know how to make a great pitch and I feel I know and got what I wanted. I got tips on what to include, I learned about how to end a good pitch. I also got to take a close look at his pitch canvas that not everyone gets to see. I now know what investors believe to be the most important element of a pitch – the pain or problem. I also know how much David believes in brain storming with post -it notes which was great to hear because I do that all the time and it is something I can do for my pitch too.

I wanted to start working on my pitch and more specifically the layout of the presentation since I now know what I am going to include as the content I wanted to sketch out what I wanted the pitch to look like.

I made a spider diagram to get some ideas on what I wanted my pitch to look like for the audience. I kept getting buzz words like clean, fresh and easy to read. I want the audience to be able to read everything on the screen and really take in my information.

What do I want my pitch to be?

• Easy to Read
• Clean
• Legible
• Mainly images – I don’t the audience to be reading the screen all the time, I want to be saying all of the information
• Not too long – I don’t want there to be so many slides were I am clicking through so fast the audience can’t pay attention
• Enjoyable

All of these words came out in my spider diagrams and I wanted to ensure this is what my pitch turns out as. I then moved onto sketching out a few ideas for layout.

Wireframes

I just sketched out some wireframes for a good reference when I am making the pitch on Google slides or Powerpoint. I wanted to go for a slick and simple design. I felt this was the best idea because the images I am going to be using are going to be shocking enough and busy. So I am going for a simple left text, right image layout and a white background so the images stand out.

Reflection

I am excited to get to work on this pitch because I have a nice vision for the layout in my head. I envision a really clean and fresh outcome that will really reflect my app idea –  A Go Green message. I think the wireframes will really help in the creation process and was a great way to get out some different ideas.

To better my pitch I needed to back up what I was saying, so I had to do some research to validate my points. I wanted to research all about global warming and climate change. I took to the news headlines for some shocking sentences that would catch the audiences attention and make them really pay attention to what I was saying.  This images below are the headlines I had chosen to include in my pitch and look further into.

All of these headlines are current which made me want to include them even more, because these are on the news right now so I know it is important to others. I tried to select the headlines with the most shocking language that would really captivate any audience for example hellscape, intense storms and plagues. There was so many other headlines I could of chosen showing me that it is so current every news station is covering it. I wanted to do some more research into this so I then took to more mainstream research,

What is Global Warming?

Global warming is the unusually rapid increase in Earth’s average surface temperature over the past century primarily due to the greenhouse gases released as people burn fossil fuels.Despite ups and downs from year to year, global average surface temperature is rising

What is Climate Change?

To begin this project I thought it would be a good idea to use some of Daniels idea generation methods and begin brain storming some ideas. I have lots of ideas since the scope is so wide for this project. I feel I have too many in my head so I am using the post-it note method of brainstorming to get them out on a wall, so I can group ideas together, or come up with a great concept.

I started with coming up with an idea for the project, any idea. I wrote down things from global warming, women, health, safety and so much more. I tried to write down whatever came into my head when I thought app ideas or website concepts. I wanted to create as many post-it notes as I could so I could see them visually on a wall, step back and try to group some ideas together.

Which ideas stood out to me?

As seen below, I groups the ideas that stuck out to me, or the ideas that I thought could go further:

• Global warming
• Education
• Well-being
• Recycling

These are the words I thought worked well together, and this started to form some app ideas in my head, as seen below.

• An app that gives you a reminder to take out your recycling,
• An app where you earn points when you recycle, save on your Carbon footprint, when you walk instead of drive
• An app where you can donate to local global warming causes/charities
• An app where you can plant trees
• An app that educates people on global warming/climate change

 

I then wanted to do another brain storming activity that is focused on global warming, I wanted to brainstorm devices that I could make an idea on, for example app or website or even an e-book. The image below is what I came up with and what interested me was the futuristic ideas, like vr or a hologram that comes up from an Apple Watch. All of these concepts are great for development and help to keep my forward thinking cap on. After all I am designing for the future.