What is needfinding?
Definition: Needfinding is the process of identifying and understanding the needs, pain points, and desires of a specific group of people or customers.
It involves gathering and analyzing data and insights about the needs and behaviors of the target market and using it to inform the design and development of products, services, and solutions that will meet those needs.
Needfinding is an iterative process, as the insights and understanding of the target market or user group can evolve and change over time.
Needfinding process
The needfinding process has 3 stages:
- Find your target audience
For example, project managers are a target audience for a business selling virtual desk software. After determining the audience, the next step is selecting the target group participants and observing their actions, habits, and routines.
- Observe and record
The goal is to observe, record, and write down everything that occurs during this observation. Researchers can ask participants open-end questions or let them use a product without guidance.
- Analyse and define
After gathering and organizing the information, researchers draw conclusions. In our example, researchers may conclude that PMs spend an hour organizing and prioritizing before starting the first task.
PMs aren’t aware, but researchers can conclude PMs need to work on the priority tasks right away and not waste time on planning and organizing their day.
A possible feature solving this need is a daily to-do list sent to PMs in the morning automatically from their online desk.
