Q 657. What is an Empathy Map? How can it be utilized to understand the customers' requirements in new product development?

 

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Empathy Map is one of the key elements of the larger Design Thinking framework. It is essentially a visual tool that uses a collaborative approach in understanding a user's need in detail. It drills down a user's thoughts/ views in to actionable outcomes and priorities.

 

An empathy map contains four quadrants, with the user at its center. Empathy map format:

 

 

Let's understand how this helps in understanding the user's requirement during the development of a new product.

 

Says: In this quadrant, we write down what the user/ customer is saying out loud or quoted from their verbatim.

• For example, "I would like my information to be secure", "I want the the user interface easy and friendly"

 

Thinks: Here, we write down what we feel the user is thinking. This can be tricky since this is not verbally stated by the user. However, using our prior experience in the field and by asking probing questions, we can arrive at the user's thoughts.

• For example, "Why is the payment screen taking so long to come up?", "There are too many ads on the home screen"

 

Does: In this quadrant, we write down the typical actions a user does. Again, this can be best obtained through research/ experience.

• For example, "Stuck on payment screen", "Finds home page navigation challenging"

 

Feels: This is the most tricky quadrant. Here, we write down what the user's sentiments are. As a product developer, we need to ask ourselves what bothers the user, how does he feel when navigating through the platform, does he get irate at a certain screen, etc.

• For example, "He is impatient when he has to wait for a page to load ", "He his happy to see a discount percentage upfront"

 

Basis all of this information gathered, we can now write down challenges/ opportunity areas and come up with clear goals/ action plans when developing the new product.

In Marketing, it is essential to understand the consumer. We can use a tool called the empathy map.  An empathy map is a visual tool for understanding and empathizing with consumers. It captures their ideas, feelings, behaviours and requirements. It allows teams to gain deeper insights into customer experiences and perspectives, which can then be used to guide product development, marketing tactics, and customer support activities. As its name suggests, the objective of the empathy map is to put oneself in the place of the Consumer or customer to be studied to better understand the latter. The empathy map is a canvas on which we will represent on a single page what the consumer hears, what he sees, what he says, what he feels and what he does. By looking at things from a consumer's perspective we bring together the information and knowledge available about them to fill out the empathy map. To establish an empathy map, you need to bring together people who are likely to know the Consumer you are targeting well. The empathy map can also be done by a single person, but it is richer if done by a whole team.

An empathy map is Consumer-centered and generally consists of below parts.

 

- General information: A description of the target we want to understand, its socio-demographic profile and an overview of its situation. Here you need to draw up a portrait of the person or group of people in the segment you are targeting.

 

- Reflection: in this section, you document what the client thinks or says internally. This may include their goals, motivations, anxieties, desires, and concerns regarding the product or service. What does the customer want to achieve? What does success look like for this customer? and what must the customer do to achieve this?

 

- Perception: What the person hears from others, from colleagues and friends and those around them, but also what the person sees on the market and in their environment.

 

- Says: This quadrant captures what the customer says, such as verbalized statements, quotes, or comments about the product or service. What the person says, how have you heard your consumer or Consumer express themselves? or what can you imagine the customer saying?

 

- Fact: This quadrant focuses on the customer's actions and behaviours. What activities do they carry out regarding the product or service? How do they interact with this? What are their weaknesses or sources of frustration? What the person does and the behaviours you observed in particular.

 

- Feelings: In this quadrant, you will investigate the client's emotions and feelings. What are their emotional reactions or comments about the product or service? Understanding their emotional state can provide valuable information about their desires and priorities. What the person feels and thinks, we can also put here their aspirations and the problems they encounter. This section often contains a subsection called “pains and problems” which represents their frustrations and blockages. Another subsection called “benefits and gains” is where we will put the aspirations and dreams of the Consumer we are targeting.

There is a pitfall to avoid when drawing up an empathy map. You must avoid attributing your own feelings to the targeted Consumer when drawing up an empathy map.

It is important to put a date and version number on the empathy map because the empathy map will be frequently updated based on additional knowledge that we have about the Consumer of our product and/or services.

The advantage of the empathy map is that it is created quickly and provides a very good overview of the profile of our client and/or Consumer.

To use an empathy map to determine client requirements during new product development, you should perform the following:
1- Define your targeted consumer segment. 

2. Collect customer insights. It is about understanding more about your targeted clients through surveys, interviews, focus groups... Collect as much data as possible for your empathy map.

3- Complete the empathy map using the information you gathered. Use Post-it notes to capture key observations, remarks, behaviours, and emotions from your target clients.

4- Examine the completed empathy map for patterns, themes, and similarities in the customers' thoughts, feelings, behaviours, and wants. Identify challenges that can be addressed through new product development.

5- Use the Empathy Map insights to generate ideas and solutions for innovation or product improvements that better address customers' wishes, preferences, and challenges. Use the Empathy Map as a reference to ensure that your solutions meet the demands of your target audience. This Empathy Map would probably serve the blue ocean strategy.

6- Using the ideas generated, construct prototypes or Minimum Viable Products (MVPs) and obtain consumer feedback via testing and validation. Use this feedback to iterate and improve your product thoughts.

Using an empathy map during the new product development process helps organizations obtain a better understanding of their customer's demands, resulting in more customer-centric and successful solutions.

Ousmane has provided the winning answer to this question. Well done!