Feedback is essential for UX research, but when is the best time to ask users for their opinions and insights? Depending on your goals, methods, and resources, you might want to solicit feedback at different stages of your design process. In this article, we'll explore some factors and tips to help you determine the optimal timing for user feedback.
Before you decide when to ask for feedback, you need to clarify what you want to learn from your users. Are you looking for validation, inspiration, or improvement? Do you want to test your assumptions, generate ideas, or refine your solutions? Your feedback objectives will influence the type of questions you ask, the tools you use, and the criteria you measure.
In a startup environment the motto is "Talk to customers as much as you can" This is basically because you have an hypothesis of your segment customer that most probably will be wrong or not as specific as it is needed. So, receiving feedback while finding Product Market Fit is critical. Be aware that too much feedback can be misleading. It is helpful to differentiate between exploration (I want to understand user needs) and validation (I need users to test my product) feedback.
The explicit answer to this question is that any time is a good time to collect feedback. The variance is, it depends on the type and maturity of the product/service or if it’s B2B or B2C and ultimately, how difficult is it to recruit participants. If recruitment is challenging, it’s best to prioritize along your user journey to get the most value. If it’s a consumer product, then you should be looking at every aspect of the experience and repeat as frequently as possible.
In my experience, tying feedback directly to the stage of your product or feature lifecycle adds depth to this approach. For instance, if you're in the early stages, focus on open-ended feedback to fuel innovation and address unmet needs - this is where your users' psychology plays a crucial role. Are they seeking something novel, or a solution to a specific problem? Here, behavioral data can reveal a lot - what are users actually doing versus what they say they do? So, it’s not just about when and what, but also about why and how you engage with your users for feedback.
Once you have your objectives, you can select the most appropriate feedback methods for your situation. There are many ways to collect user feedback, such as surveys, interviews, usability tests, card sorting, focus groups, and more. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages, as well as its own requirements and limitations. You should consider factors such as the size and diversity of your user base, the complexity and maturity of your design, the availability and budget of your team, and the validity and reliability of your data.
Another important factor to consider is how your feedback aligns with your design phases. Depending on your approach, you might follow a linear, iterative, or agile process. In general, you should aim to get feedback early and often, but also in sync with your design goals and deliverables. For example, in the early stages of your design, you might want to get feedback on your user research, personas, and scenarios. In the middle stages, you might want to get feedback on your sketches, wireframes, and prototypes. In the later stages, you might want to get feedback on your high-fidelity mockups, interactions, and flows.
As a product designer/UX designer, prioritizing feedback involves aligning key findings with the North Star matrix, which guides the next or ongoing design phases. To achieve this, creating a sheet with the company's key goals for each phase and aligning feedback accordingly can help understand which feedback aligns with which goal.
Another challenge you might face is finding the right balance between the quantity and quality of your feedback. You don't want to overwhelm yourself or your users with too many feedback requests, but you also don't want to miss out on valuable insights and opportunities. You should consider the trade-offs between breadth and depth, frequency and duration, and quantity and quality. You should also prioritize and segment your feedback sources, such as your primary and secondary users, your internal and external stakeholders, and your experts and novices.
Finally, you should remember that there is no one-size-fits-all solution for feedback timing. You should always adapt your feedback strategy to your specific context and goals. You should also be flexible and responsive to changes and feedback loops. You should monitor and evaluate your feedback results and outcomes, and use them to inform and improve your design decisions and actions.
Memory can play a big role in the quality of data gathered from participants. To ensure you are capturing accurate data, It's important to source participants who have recently engaged with your product, service, or feature. If you are looking to learn about a participant's experience with your product or service you might want to recruit participants who used the product or service in the past 3-6 months (depending on the frequency of use of your product/service). Conversely, if you are looking for feedback on a particular feature screening for participants who used the feature very recently will ensure that memory hasn't affected their response too heavily. Running in-product surveys can be a great way to capture feedback here.