Gathering insights and validating assumptions with limited resources
I have had the opportunity to design products for early-stage tech startups with varying funding levels, ranging from a bootstrapped $10K to a freshly raised Series B of $92M.
Regardless of their financial situation, founders who prioritize and invest in user experience research (UXR) from the beginning tend to avoid the temptations of short-termism and succeed in the long run. On average, the companies I have collaborated with invest at least 1–3 years in comprehensive exploration and analysis of their users and markets before investing any resources to build a digital product.
I understand that for many new founders in the idea stage, that is a hard pill to swallow. However, unless they prefer to gamble their efforts on something likely to fail, they must undertake this extensive phase of understanding and exploration.
The lack of product-market fit combined with funds eventually running out is the reason for 72% of startup failures.
To achieve product-market fit, founding teams must understand their users and market inside-out. This requires either insider experience or deep research (or, in a best-case scenario, a combo of both).
UXR helps founders to make quick decisions that are de-risked and backed by data. Investing in these techniques is more than a necessity; it is a form of respect to themselves. They are respecting their time, money, and business enough to ensure it’s not wasted.
More research = less risk = less wasted
There are 4 key reasons why it is crucial for founders to dedicate additional time to research before allocating resources to anything else for their startup:
1. Problem-solving with a human-centric approach
By understanding the end-users they are solving for, founders can identify potential opportunities and challenges early on. This approach allows the team to continuously test, refine, and improve based on user feedback, ultimately delivering a product or service that better meets customer needs.
2. Gaining competitive advantage
The more founders know about their market, the greater their advantage over competitors. Similar to the concept of home-court advantage in basketball, where playing on familiar ground increases the likelihood of winning, founders who understand their market well can make more informed decisions and position their offerings strategically.
3. Ensuring team alignment
During the early stages, there will most likely be various passionate opinions within the team. By aiming for consensus and making intelligent, data-driven decisions, founders can ensure that the team is aligned and working towards a common goal, minimizing conflicts and maximizing efficiency.
4. Fostering innovation
Staying updated on the latest technological advancements and industry trends enables founders to bring unique and valuable solutions to the market. By being aware of emerging technologies and market shifts, founders can differentiate their offerings, stay ahead of competitors, and meet evolving customer demands.
Ultimately, good UXR increases founders’ chances of success by ensuring they’re building the right thing that solves the right problem for the right people.
It’s important to remember that even in very large teams, the UXR is usually done by a small group of specialists.
When I worked at Norwegian Cruise Line, a 6 billion dollar company, resources allocated to activities such as A/B testing and Hotjar tracking post-launch were limited to just one person. Additionally, only 2–3 people were dedicated to analyzing site traffic and data, primarily focused on informing promotions, offers, and sales.
I was the sole UX designer involved in qualitative research, like user interviews, as an integral part of the design process.
Occasionally, I collaborated with the A/B tester to test ideas live and determine a winner.
For many startups during the first 1–3 years, especially those underfunded, like those led by women or people of color, the research team consists of just one person–the founder. The responsibility ultimately rests on their shoulders and their shoulders only.
Who should understand their market and users better than the founder themselves?
As they decide which tactics to explore, they need to understand the difference between quantitative and quantitative research so they can gather various types of complementary data in the most efficient way possible.
Quantitative
- Provides numerical data that can be transformed into statistics
- Large sample size with generalized results
- Helps uncover patterns
- Foundation for decision-making within communities
📌 Ways to conduct quantitative research with low resources
- Multiple-choice email surveys
- Online polls
- Data & analytics analysis
- Landscape analysis
Qualitative
- Gives actionable insights
- Gives a deeper understanding
- Tells the WHY and HOW
- Small sample size used to inform to design solutions
- Gives a context and opens up new opportunity spaces
📌 Ways to conduct qualitative research with low resources
- User observation and shadowing
- User interviews
- User diaries or journals
- Open-ended question email surveys
Now we’re going to discuss 6 very practical ways to do early-stage research as a solo founder or with a very small founding team.
It is ideal to execute all of these approaches before committing any additional resources to the company.
A founder’s primary objective is to develop an in-depth understanding of their users and their environment, enabling them to confidently validate the two crucial factors that influence attaining product-market fit:
- The problem they’re solving
- Who they’re solving it for
Founders can analyze data from trusted sources, such as market reports, industry publications, and consumer surveys, to gather valuable insights into demand, customer behaviors, and competition.
This data-driven desk-research approach enables them to validate the market need for their solution and make informed decisions based on quantitative insights and facts.
📌 Tips:
- Use FigJam
- Let it be messy at first
- Take screenshots of compelling visuals and quotes
- ALWAYS include a link to the source
- Should be a living board so keep adding to it over time
- Use sticky notes to write hypotheses
- Hypotheses will inform the business plan
- Build a research repository in Notion
Existing digital products or solutions in the market that are addressing a similar problem should be evaluated. Founders should carefully assess what aspects are functioning effectively and what areas can be enhanced.
By comprehending these products’ strengths, weaknesses, and unique value propositions, founders can gain valuable insights to inform their design decisions. This analysis helps them identify opportunities for differentiation and improvement in their own solution.
📌 Tips:
- Use FigJam
- Take screenshots of competitors screen by screen
- Group screens from each product together
- Use sticky notes to jot down thoughts, observations
- Use FigJam stamps to mark patterns, trends, and areas of friction
- Analysis flows, targeted user types, interactions, functionality
- Create an analysis chart for easy comparison
Founders should connect with their target audience through social media, online communities, or email and engage them with questions about their needs, pain points, motivators, and behaviors.
Conducting 1:1 interviews is a particularly valuable aspect of UXR. Conducting a minimum of 30 interviews before the ideation phase is recommended, but even better if founders can aim for 100 interviews.
If they encounter difficulty finding individuals to interview, founders might be pleasantly surprised by how willing people are to offer assistance if they simply ask. Sometimes, a small gesture like a $5 Starbucks gift card can go a long way in encouraging participation.
📌 Tips:
- Use Zoom for user interviews
- For 1:1 interviews, use this interview request template
- Always write an interview guide
- Record interviews
- Use Read.ai to transcribe or have someone else take notes (they shouldn’t try to facilitate and take notes themselves)
- Use Dovetail to analyze interviews & uncover insights
- Google Forms is free and easy to use for surveys
- Try using Zoom polls when talking to a group
- Aim to do at least between 30–100 interviews BEFORE they invest any resources in product or design
I frequently lead these types of workshops and can attest to the significant amount of research-related strategy and alignment that can be accomplished in a short, uninterrupted timeframe.
Founders should allocate a full day or half-day by clearing their team’s calendars. This dedicated time allows them to align on major strategic decisions, present the insights they have gathered, and analyze the problem they are solving from multiple perspectives.
📌 Tips:
- Use FigJam (or a whiteboard in-person)
- Enroll in my live Bootstrapping Your Product course for workshop templates and ideas
- Use a “yes and” mentality
- Remember that all ideas are worthy
- Build off of each other’s ideas
- Be decisive
Founders can gain valuable insights into customer behaviors, preferences, and challenges by following potential customers and users in their natural environments.
For instance, if a founder is creating a productivity tool for remote workers, they can observe and shadow remote workers in their work environment to gain a deeper understanding of their workflows, challenges, and pain points.
Similarly, if the founder is developing a tool specifically for teachers to use in the classroom, they need to be physically present in the classroom to truly comprehend the context and dynamics of the teaching environment.
By immersing themselves in the customers’ environment and simply observing, founders can uncover crucial insights that inform the development of their products or services.
📌 Tips:
- Can be done in person or virtually
- Ask users to take them through their journey step by step
- Use “active listening” techniques to gather emotions behind each step
- Can use tools for eye and mouse tracking to supplement the firsthand experience
- Take notes and record observations using tools like Read.ai to identify patterns or trends
Founders should actively seek inspiration and best practices from industries beyond their own. By avoiding being confined to a narrow bubble, they can prevent the risk of recycling the same ideas with only minor variations.
The concept of the “sea of sameness” illustrates this phenomenon, where companies within a particular industry become so fixated on their competitors that the entire industry starts to blend together. Without infusing ideas from outside influences, innovation and differentiation can stagnate.
📌 Tips:
- Use FigJam
- Fill their board with screenshots of inspirational or best-in-class products, brands, and tools outside of the industry that they’re in
- Use sticky notes to write down new ideas they spark for their own product
- Use blue sticky notes to explain what the screenshot is
- Use orange sticky notes for thoughts and ideas
- Include source links
- Share with their team for a collaborative innovation session
It’s important to note that while conducting user research on a limited budget, it’s crucial to be mindful of potential biases and limitations of the research methods used.
Starting out, founders have no choice but to be scrappy. But while building tech solutions for presumably generations to come, it’s their societal responsibility to check themselves and ensure what they’re creating will help society, not harm it.
Triangulating data from multiple sources and being critical of the findings can help ensure the reliability of the research. Involving diverse perspectives, even within the constraints of a limited budget, can provide unique insights and improve the quality of their research.
Building a startup with limited resources can feel overwhelming, especially when conducting comprehensive UXR to avoid the pitfalls of a product-market misfit.
However, founders need to understand that they can make a big impact with a small budget.
By prioritizing and investing in the techniques mentioned above, early-stage founders can gather valuable insights and validate assumptions, setting themselves up for long-term sustainable success.
