Have you ever developed an application or was part of one where you
delivered exactly what the customers wanted and they weren't satisfied?
I
have seen it time and time again. In fact I'm part of one right now
where one my ex-team mates developed an application that does not meet
the expectation of the customer. We are re-developing major areas of
the application and essentially starting from scratch.
What went wrong?
Customers
often do not know what they want and even if they did, they have a hard
time articulating what they want. They don't understand the
technology. What people do on a daily basis is so natural for them, it
is difficult for them to articulate what they do themselves.
How do you approach your customers if they don't know what they want?
- Find out the details of their activity - ask your target audience how they go about their activity.
- Diagram the activity - Ask until you can create a diagram of their process
- Verify the activity - Take the diagram and confirm it with your customer
- Clarify Your Understanding - Ask about any oddities with the activity
or process, or find out why they may do something one way over another
- Be Your Own Judge - Now that you have mapped out your customer's
process or activity, you can be the judge for yourself if what the
customers are asking actually HELPS their own process o activity.
- Map out improvements - You should THEN be able to map out a new diagram
of how their activity will be easier or better with your product.
The
bottom-line is, if you cannot diagram how your customers lives will be
easier with your application, it probably isn't going to make their
lives easier. If you still are not convinced, here are
5 reasons why every developer or web entrepreneur must create a workflow or activity diagram of their users.