Day 70 - 7 Persona Characteristics

A persona is a way to model, summarize, and communicate research about customers.  The fictional character in a persona is depicted as a specific person but synthesized from observing many customers. Building a persona?  It should have these 7 characteristics:

• Social and demographic attributes
• Needs, desires, motivations, goals
• Consumer habits and behaviors
• Expertise
• Cultural background
• Must do, must never
• Customer experience goals

Day 62 - The Who, What, and How of Your Users

Personas are WHO your customers are.
User Stories are WHAT they want.
User Flows are HOW they get it.

These three together help you identify the who, what, and how of your customers. They can help you and your team empathize with your users and build a better product.

Day 16 - Customer Journey Map Tips

A customer journey map is a diagram that shows the steps a customer goes through to complete a task/s.

1. It's important to understand the end points (start and finish) of a customer journey. What is the customer's clear goal.  Where does the journey start and end, i.e. "gets on the train in Chicago and gets off in New York".
2. The point of a customer journey is to figure out the touch points a customer goes through to accomplish their task.
3. Find invisible touch points. Often, all of the touch points aren't clear. For example "waiting on the train platform for a trip from Chicago to New York" might not be apparent as part of the journey.  But this is an opportunity to engage your customer in some way.
4. Understand your customers' mindset before and after the customer journey for a more holistic, empathic account of their experience.
5. Use a persona for your journey map.  Find the most relevant, valuable persona you can and discuss it with your client.

Day 8 - Creating a Persona Checklist

In user-centered design, personas are the fictional characters you create that represent the types of people that will use your product. They're fictional examples of a target user and their goals. Personas are captured in a written summary that includes behavior patterns, goals, skills, attitudes, and environment as well as a few personal fictional details to give the persona a realistic character.

The persona of each character should include the following 8 elements.

1. Name and title.
2. Basics.  As an example, Bob is a 29 year old male living in Boston.  He likes old architecture and machinery and is an early adopter of [your product].
3. Professional and personal background.
4. Quote.
5. Technical background.
6. Favorite apps or websites (1-3).
7. Goals.
8. I need/I want statements.