Diary Studies webinar and ebook

January 25, 2019
Frank Spillers
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Summary: Diary Studies are one of the most under-utilized and least understood UX techniques. Diary Studies are slightly more complicated than user testing and require additional know-how in study design, moderation, and deployment. In this webinar and complimentary e-book, you’ll learn how to use diary studies like a pro, avoiding the pitfalls inherent in diary studies.

Diary Studies webinar and ebook…

New to Diary Studies? See the Power of Diary Studies in UX Research...

In short, usability testing can only get you so far. Specifically, once your users have left your test session (20 min-90 min typically), you might miss “after effects” or latent issues and usage insights. Understanding what happens over time with your product is critical to key performance indicators: user engagement, adoption, retention, or conversion. Diary studies fill this gap in the user research toolbox.

Attend this upcoming Free 45 min. webinar to learn more and get the ebook “The Secrets of How to Get the Most Out of Your Diary Studies“.

From the complimentary ebook, you’ll get with the webinar:

Diary studies are valuable as a user research tool for the following reasons:

They help detect what you can’t see in the lab (during usability testing).
They let users “live with the product or service” and report on their experience.
They blend day-in-the-life ethnography insights with unscripted product/service use.
They capture latent usability issues over time.
They help intercept micro experiences.

Remember that observation is the primary method of detecting user behavior. Observing users avoids the problem of users self-reporting their behavior. The problem with Diaries is they are a self-reporting tool, which means they are devoid of observation! When you cannot observe your users as they report an issue, this can cause fragmented or misinterpreted insight. So how to use a diary study without this major issue?

Don’t expect Diary Studies to replace 1:1 interviews, observations of user tasks, and ethnographic interviews (aka Field Studies). Diaries should be considered an adjunct to user research, not a replacement for usability testing and field studies— the two pillars of UX research.

So, it’s important to remember that Diary Studies are limited. Their limitations, however, can be mitigated by proper set-up, deployment, and moderation.

Diary Studies- will users love your product after they are done testing it?

User testing is great, but it only gives you a limited ‘time-slice’ of user behavior. What happens when users start using your product for more than one hour? What issues, confusions, or obstacles do they run into over time? What does user adoption look like across time?

A diary is what it sounds like. A user takes home a diary (usually digital) and records key moments of their day or experience with your product or domain. This sounds simple enough, but deploying, managing, and interpreting diary study findings requires some key skills.

The Diary Study is one of the most under-utilized user research techniques for several reasons. First, it’s a self-reporting tool (you can’t watch users at home). Additionally, getting users to play along with a research study requires motivation and often some coaxing. In this webinar, we will share with you secrets of how to deploy a diary study and get the most from your participants.