Define: Using research to create experience maps

Goal
Target the right problem to solve, and then frame the problem in a way that invites creative solutions

Action
Organize feedback from research by describing what your users are doing, feeling, and thinking

Follow Up
Analyze the feedback at a high level
Experience Mapping
A great way to identify your users’ Pain Points is by starting with an Experience Mapping exercise. This is where your user research feedback will come in very handy.
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7:00 AM Wake up |
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8:30 AM Arrive at work |
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11:00 AM Have to use two different logins |
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2:00 PM Need to fax paperwork, takes a long time |
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4:00 PM Have to enter information manually |
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6:45 PM Leave work late |
What is Experience Mapping?
Simply put, Experience Mapping is an illustration of complex paths that showcase a wide variety of interactions, that can be both digital and real-world. A successful Experience Mapping exercise, when completed, should reveal chronological series of engagement experiences that include a description of both digital and real-world activities, including accomplishments and challenges. When zooming out from this exercise, the whole picture of your user’s “day in their life” journey should reveal key-painpoints and customer burdens that are now your prime opporuntities for finding solutions, and most important, opportunities for innovation.
For example, a real-world pain point might be solved through a mobile feature that could save time and energy for your user. Or an existing mobile app feature could be modified, tweaked or replaced with another feature to simplify a difficult task. For this reason Experience Mapping is a key-ingredient to designing a successful, hollistic app.
We have developed a step-by-step approach to Experience Mapping to help you uncover the insights and breakthroughs you need to make your customer’s experience a success. And, most importantly, how to ensure that all your customer’s touchpoints work hand-in-hand without any barriers.
Organizing the Feedback
To help organize feedback from users organize their statements by what they are doing, feeling and thinking when going through a description of their “day in their life” relating to your product. Organize feedback from the users’ point of view in the following way:

Doing
Example: I complain about not being able to log my time through one single app

Feeling
Example: I feel frustrated at the delay it causes me in my workday and the extra steps I have to go through

Thinking
Example: I believe outcomes of my workday are affected by lack of efficiency and overwhelming number of touch points I have to go through to get one task done
Continue to the Ideate section to learn more about the Design Thinking process.