Empathy Map

Understanding Empathy Mapping

This is the first stage in design thinking after a user's persona has been created. User's needs, goals and pain points needs to be identified and deeply understood to solve their problems.

An?Empathy map?is an easily understood collaborative visual chart used to know about a particular type of user, consisting of four squares which are say, think, does and feel. We have user empathy maps, where you record feedback from a single user and aggregated empathy maps, where you consolidate feedback from a group of people.

As a product designer, my designs are always User Centered to solve user's problems stating what they say, think, feel and do during the interview stage with their body language, thought and ideas put into consideration to better understand them alongside with the design team.

The four quadrant in Empathy Map-

The?Says?quadrant contains what the user says out loud in an interview about the product. E.g i'm willing to pay a little more to get a reliable and experienced dog walker.

The?Thinks?quadrant captures what the user is thinking when interacting with a product. What's the user thoughts? E.g I want to book a recurring dog walker.

The?Does?quadrant encloses the actions the user takes. What actions and behaviors did you notice. E.g Find it difficult to create an account or refreshes pages several time.

The?Feels?quadrant contains information about the user’s emotional state. What worries the user? What does the user get excited about? How does the user feel about the experience? E.g She is sad that she can't spend more time with her dogs.

Steps in Building an Empathy Map

1. Define scope and goals (i.e decide whether to use user empathy map or aggregate empathy map)

2. Gather materials like sticky notes, pen and lot more. (i.e log into your fig Jam and get ready to work)

3. Collect the personas or research made from the interview

4. Label each sticky notes with each quadrant name in your fig Jam file

5. Collaborate with team members to discuss and state what they think should be in each quadrant from the research result.

Benefits of Empathy Map

1. it helps to illustrate user attitudes and behaviors.

2. it helps to categorize your knowledge of the user into one place.

#design #empathy #productdesign #problemsolving #teamcollaboration #understanding #userexperience #userexperiencedesign

#usercentereddesign