Exploring emerging markets

By Kristoffer Bohmann, Bohmann Usability

Exploring emerging markets. The first step in true innovation is observation and understanding. Innovators need to observe users in action and understand why they perform their actions. Only then will the innovator be able to translate his insights into valuable products and services.

The usability discipline has responded to this challenge, to explore non-existing markets, by developing a range of tool to assist innovative activities. The tools include field studies, prototyping (update: link no longer active), user profiling, task analysis, and other methods and techniques. Of course there is not much news here since this is what innovators have always done. Only the usability discipline is refining the methods and applying them to new situations and levels of analysis.

The benefit from detailed observation and deep understanding is better investments. Companies are more likely to create usable products from which they can and should make a substantial profit -- and less likely to invest in prodcts nobody needs.

Kristoffer Bohmann

Exploring emerging markets

Read More