Your team members don't see the value of user testing. How can you make them understand?

1 Explain the purpose

Before you ask your team to participate in user testing, make sure they understand why you are doing it and what you hope to achieve. User testing is not just a way to find bugs or errors in your content, but a way to validate your assumptions, understand your users' needs and preferences, and improve your content's usability, relevance, and effectiveness. User testing can help you answer questions like: Who are your users? What are their goals and pain points? How do they interact with your content? What do they like and dislike about it? How can you make it better for them?

3 Involve them in the process

Another way to make your team see the value of user testing is to involve them in the process as much as possible. You can invite them to observe or join the user testing sessions, either in person or remotely. You can also ask them to help you prepare the user testing scenarios, questions, or tasks, or to analyze and interpret the user feedback and data. By involving them in the process, you can help them gain firsthand experience and insights into user testing, as well as foster a sense of ownership and collaboration.

4 Provide guidance and feedback

User testing may be new or unfamiliar to some of your team members, so you need to provide them with guidance and feedback to help them learn and improve. You can offer them training, resources, or tools to help them understand the basics and best practices of user testing, such as how to recruit and screen users, how to conduct and moderate user testing sessions, how to collect and document user feedback and data, and how to report and act on the user testing findings. You can also give them constructive feedback on their performance and contributions, as well as recognize and reward their efforts and achievements.

5 Align with the goals

Finally, you need to align your user testing plan with the goals and priorities of your team, your project, and your organization. You need to show your team how user testing can help them achieve their own objectives and solve their own challenges, as well as support the overall vision and mission of your project and organization. You need to communicate clearly and regularly with your team about the user testing plan, the expected outcomes, the roles and responsibilities, the timeline and budget, and the next steps and actions.

User testing is a valuable and essential part of content strategy, but it can be challenging to get your team on board. By following these tips, you can help your team understand the benefits and best practices of user testing, and get their support and cooperation for your user testing plan.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?