The budget squeeze

This year, there have been major shifts as a result of changing economic circumstances. Budgets are tighter or they have been frozen. Teams continue to experience layoffs, workforce reductions and restructurings. Still, the demand for research is there, and teams are being asked to do more with less.

Integrating user research into your digital strategy

UX researchers have their seat at the table. They’re getting more and more integrated in product and design conversations and business decisions. With that, some UX managers are aiming to help their teams adopt an MBA mindset to help translate business goals and values into UX measures. Many UX teams don’t articulate how their research can support and contribute to business objectives, and in a changing economy like this one, showing your ROI and tracking research KPIs against your overall business goals is critical. Think about what metrics will help show your value to the business and begin viewing them through that lens.

Inclusive research is top of mind

Just a year ago, inclusive research was practically nonexistent and only a few of our clients and agency teams were talking with us about ways they could bring this into focus. Now, we’re hearing requests for it across the board. Many UX leaders are putting an even larger focus on inclusive research and design year after year, and especially as they head into 2024 planning. Some are even pushing for a faster return to in-person research to help aid the process—reaching lower tech communities who struggle with remote sessions or recruiting niche audiences who can be tricky to find without going into specific communities.

The talk of the town: AI

Yes, everyone is talking about AI, but what does it mean for your business? People are experimenting with how it will change the research process, evaluating whether AI will be brought into user research methodologies, and exploring what impact it can have on products and services to build a better user experience. In reality, most brands are still figuring it out as they go.

While the appetite for user insights is growing, companies are forced to scale back with budgets. More than 75% of the companies I speak to want to do more research—yet time, budget limitations, and internal challenges hinder product teams from running more studies.

The benefits of investing in user research don’t end with the user. A customer centric design will save you money on support and development. It will also increase your revenue by increasing sales. The time and money you invest in the beginning stages will provide a number of long-term benefits for you and your business.

A study by Smith & Reinersten found that the key system-design decisions made during the first 10% of a product’s design process can determine 90% of the product’s cost and performance. This is an excellent example of how a small investment at an early stage can have a huge ROI on your final product.

User research will continue to be a powerful tool to inform decision-making, even more so in uncertain market conditions. Collect customer insights throughout the product development process to mitigate risk, react effectively to changes in the market, and drive revenue growth.

Adapting to Customer insights will determine business growth

Gen Z has been changing the products and the way they interact with them for a couple of years now. Companies are starting to adapt to the needs and wants of the new generation.

Gen Z expects everything to work as simply as possible and they also get distracted quickly. Which is why a whole different approach is required when designing products for them as a target audience.

Use qualitative and quantitative research

So far, we’ve seen that more and more businesses see the value of engaging with their customers to understand their needs, pain points, and motivations and make the right product decisions.

To obtain customer insights throughout the product life cycle, product teams are turning to various research methods—the most frequently used being qualitative task-based user interviews, quantitative studies backed with statistically significant data, product analytics, competitive analysis, and unmoderated usability tests.

“Companies today are partnering with trusted UX research firms. The shift to investing more in research means they’re embracing customer-centricity.” CEO/Founder OneSource Labs, Sharon Rahmanian

Overall, our research shows that qualitative methods are more frequently used than quantitative methods (63% vs. 51%). Yet the best results come from a combination of these methods. While quantitative research helps you understand what your users are doing, qualitative research tells you why they’re doing it.

UX tools help research be more efficient and effective

To stay ahead of the competition, organizations need to gather high-quality insights at scale—this is where the right UX tools come in. With the global pandemic and the rise of remote research, the need for digital tools that support user research teams is higher than ever. At OneSource Labs, for example, we’re focused on creating an end-to-end solution for research.

OneSource Labs leverages best practice UX and user research methods, strategic UX research analysis, and actionable user recommendations. With extensive experience across industries: Automotive, B2B, Entertainment, e-Commerce, financial, Healthcare, Tech, Travel and more, we design a wide range of user research studies customized for your business goals and users’ needs. We partner with panel vendors, online testing tools, recruiting firms, and testing facilities to accommodate all of your user research needs.

In Conclusion

As we move into the latter part of 2023, we can see that the remainder of the year and beyond will be filled with lots of experimentation. Implementing the latest trends, including voice interactions, AR and AI will take time. What will that mean for you and the market? Following these trends will help developers and businesses create innovative, delightful, user-centric, and successful websites, mobile applications, and other digital interfaces in today’s ever-evolving digital landscape.

By SHARON RAHMANIAN, Founder & CEO – User Experience Research, OneSource Labs

Today’s dynamic field of UX research is evolving in response to technology, user behavior, and business needs. In order to stay ahead, the UX research community will continue to push boundaries and influence product design, elevating the overall user experience and, ultimately, the success of businesses worldwide. From cutting-edge technology innovations to more inclusive user-testing, our in-depth analysis will equip you with valuable insights to optimize your strategies for maximum impact.

AI and Machine Learning

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning will continue to help take shape in order to analyze large amounts of data more efficiently and effectively, as well as identify patterns and derive insights that can be used for design improvements.

Rapid advancements in AI technology will capture new help augment UX researchers in identifying user behaviors, and sentiments and insights at a much faster pace. This will promote more informed designs that will yield improved directions and better user experiences, leading to increased user satisfaction and loyalty.

However, UX researchers must be keenly aware of potential biases that AI algorithms may replicate in the outputs due to prompt driven interfaces that AI is trained on.

VR, AR, and Web3 research

With the growth of Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR) and Web3 technologies will allow UX researchers to increasingly explore the unique challenges and opportunities presented by these immersive environments for emerging future user experiences.

So, how do they differ? VR uses technology designed to make you feel immersed in a digital space whereas AR tech is more device-agnostic, where it can be achieved with glasses or headsets.
Also with the average smartphone, AR will get to the point where it will be able to leverage different capabilities to deliver a personal, timely experience that changes all the time based on who you are and where you are located. UX research methodologies for VR and AR require user interaction considerations with physical devices as well as digital interfaces.

As many brands are exploring representation of their products in the Metaverse, UX research becomes essential to measure user behavior, expectation, motivation and satisfaction of these new environments.

The World Wide Web is now in it’s 3rd Iteration

As we have seen, the world wide web has continued to evolve over the years from Web 1.0, 2.0 and now 3.0

Similar to how smartphones became the new trend in the late 2000s, the introduction of XR, Web 3.0 and other technologies are transforming how we live, work, and play. Now, users can engage, interact, and exchange in ways never before imagined.

By SHARON RAHMANIAN, Founder & CEO – User Experience Research, OneSource Labs