Empathy Maps

How do you win the attention of your audience and create content they actually care about? It happens when you take the time to understand and take on their thoughts, feelings and motivations as your own; it happens through empathy. Empathy mapping is an effective way to tap into the head and heart of your … Read more

Customer Engagement and Machine Learning

Today’s consumers are overwhelmed by a constant deluge of advertisements and promotions. They are tired of the noise and fatigued by all the product options. They increasingly desire the personalized attention they get from Amazon, Netflix and other brands they interact with. We are living in an experience economy where mere goods and services are … Read more

10 Tips to Increase Website Homepage Conversion

I started developing website in the 1990’s – HTML 1, before CSS, basic JavaScript and the beginning of the dot com boom. Now there is HTML 5, CSS 3 and all sorts of libraries and frameworks to create sophisticated websites. One thing hasn’t change about websites – they still need to be easy to use. … Read more

Design Thinking, Lean and Agile Better Defining Customer Problems and Solutions

In today’s experience economy, successful companies don’t stand out because of their efficient production or their better engineering. It is their dedication to understanding their customers and their strong commitment to solving customers’ problems and servicing their needs. In the article, Why Design Thinking is the Future of Management, Stefan Link shares: “Design Thinking helps … Read more

The Five Phases of Customer Data-Driven Success

In The Continuum of Data-Driven Success, dear friend and colleague, Annette Franz, Founder and CEO of CX Journey, Inc. shares these five phases of customer data-driven success: Phase 1: Feedback This is where we see companies in the primitive stages of understanding the importance of data (i.e., they know they need to listen to their … Read more

Ethnographic Research is the Key to Really Understanding Your Customers’ Needs

Ethnography is the branch of anthropology that involves trying to understand how people live their lives. Unlike traditional market researchers, who ask specific, highly practical questions, anthropological researchers visit consumers in their homes or offices to observe and listen in a non directed way. In the HBR article, Ethnographic Research: A Key to Strategy, Ken … Read more

Five Tips for Non Directed Interview

Interviews are one of the basic methods of requirements gathering, usability testing, and task analysis. In order to remove our personal biases, expectations and opinions from the questions asked, one of the questioning technique is non directed interview, sometimes called unstructured interview. Mike Kuniavsky, author and a twenty-year veteran of digital product development shares in … Read more

2017 Designer to Developer Ratios Trends

One of the questions that I get all the time is “What is the best Designer to Developer ratio?” As you can imagine, this can vary depending on marketplace and business goals. If you developing an engineering tool for engineers then your engineers who are developing it probably have a good idea of who is … Read more

Customer Obsession Metrics

We are now living in the ‘Age of the Customer’ where the pace of technologic advancement and customer empowerment continues to disrupt today’s business models. The key to competitive survival is data and insights-driven customer obsession. Customer obsession means constantly listening to customers and continuously testing, enhancing, and personalizing the customer experience. According to The … Read more

How to Get from Information to Meaning: From Data to Journey Maps

From the article,”To Understand Consumer Data, Think Like an Anthropologist” in From Data to Action: a Harvard Business Review Insight Center Report, Susan Fournier and Bob Rietveld share: “Corporate social-listening efforts are typically driven by econometricians, computer scientists, and IT technicians—the people who are experts in database management. They understand digital information, but they don’t always … Read more

Big Data Insights Improve Customer Journeys and the Bottom Line

Is big data enough? Aggregate numbers can tell you a lot, but they say very little about how individual customers are thinking and talking about your products. In the article, Don’t Let Data Paralysis Stand Between You and Your Customers, From Data to Action: a Harvard Business Review Insight Center Report, Harald Fanderl shares that: … Read more