Chapter 7. Audience Survey
Online and offline interviews
In order to find a solution and develop a concept, we need to think out of the box and apply an outside-in approach.
I focused on millennials and digital-experienced as the current drivers for disruption and made an audience survey — their preferences, problems, behavior.
In my first round I applied two approaches:
- Survey in Russian and English. In 20 questions I covered two main directions: perception of death and remembrance.
- Street interviews: my questions concern a life story, digital legacy, remembrance, no questions about death and funerals.
In this survey I attracted 141 respondents — that was crucial for taking the next step.
Street interviews with digital-experience (18–44 guys) showed the indifference to the topic and no engagement. That was a challenging moment for me and my concept.
Synthesizing both surveys I reconsidered all questions and for the second round asked about a life story from a different angle: how people capture moments, what devices they use, where they keep their content, and their social activity. Then I asked whether they remembered their family tree and whether it was worthwhile to remember.
Also I tried the Jobs-to-be-done methodology. It takes a longer time to get insights, but it is definitely worth it.
It was an interesting experience. Respondents told about capturing moments more willingly than about creating a life story as something significant that takes more responsibility, time and effort. So, the main values for the future solution were defined: quick, simple, engaging, with less effort, no super-mission, ‘funky'.
It is interesting that practically all the respondents think that it is important to remember their family tree and would love to learn more about their ancestors' personalities: their preferences, hobbies, thoughts and reflections. But at the same time they don't think of themselves as storytellers. Because there is no time, no inspiring tool and no motivation - what for?—they may ask. When inspecting Facebook 's timeline as a story for the next generations, I have found that some respondents say that they don't want their children to see their ‘hangout’ pictures, or some people have more than 100 different friends and don't wish to share the deeply personal and intimate content they want to keep.
Takeaways
- It's important to look at the topic from different angles and find motivation and struggling points through the process of questioning.
- Assumptions were mostly approved.
- Remembrance as a subject is boring in the context of archiving.
- Global mission and simple pleasures are of the same importance.
