According to studies, 63% of people remember the stories they hear.
Developing a successful software product means taking on the perspective of your target users.
However, it can be difficult to understand users through traditional market research methods.
Utilizing user story in your product development can help you better understand your target users and their needs.
Not sure how to do this? Keep reading for our complete guide on how to user stories examples and their customer journey in improving your product.
More Isn’t Always Better
You may be experience architects, however, a thorough description of everything a user would do is certainly not needed and it’s seldom what gets utilized. If there’s too much detail, it can cause feature creep.
The best user story has just enough details so that the developer knows what to design.
With those user stories, developers can proceed knowing exactly what they should be designing and developing before the next iteration review.
And as a result, you’ll get a better product faster than if you’d attempted to capture every detail upfront.
The best user story describes: who (the actor), what (action or task), and why (objectives for this action).
Anything that exposes the motivations of your software user is also helpful and if there’s one thing you should do, it’s to interview at least two users about their experiences.
Gain perspective from multiple sources and attempt to correlate them together if possible.
The Simplest Design Is Always the Best Approach
It would certainly be ideal if we could schedule a time to design and test every possible feature that could exist in your product. But this is not feasible, especially when you’re working with a limited budget.
That’s why it’s better to focus on the main features since these will be most likely to make or break the success of your product.
Many common tasks (especially core tasks) should be tested initially by users to determine if they’ll use these features.
If they won’t, remove them from the project rather than spending more money developing something they’re just going to ignore.
Then add only those features that people would truly use and benefit from in their day-to-day lives.
Don’t Forget About Special Cases
Even minor details can be important. For example, if a user story requires the user to create an account, then this could go wrong in several ways:
- The password is too short or not complex enough
- The username is already taken and the system won’t let them use it
- Account activation doesn’t work properly
And all of these things can lead users to become frustrated, which means they may never come back for future updates.
If you’re adding any new features that impact how your users interact with your software, always test those as thoroughly as possible to avoid such problems down the road.
Not All Features Are Made Equal
Some changes should still be considered a higher priority than others. If you notice that certain features aren’t being used, then they should be de-prioritized and reevaluated later on before making final decisions.
Create Your User Story Today
As you can see, a user story is a powerful tool for understanding your target users. By taking on the perspective of the user and developing your product towards them, you’re much more likely to be successful.
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