User Research and Strategy
for BudKeep
Hyper Island Prototyping Project
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Role: Researcher, Analyst, Strategist
Background
BudKeep was launched in Stockholm in September of 2018. They operate on a business model/concept similar to that of Airbnb, but instead of renting houses or selling experiences, BudKeep offers a platform to utilize unused storage space in a neighbor's home.
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BudKeep's mission was motivated by utilizing the spaces we have in our home to provide a cheaper option for storage, providing another way for some extra money to be made all the while reducing environmental impact and decreasing the need for storage buildings around major cities.
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The concept, plan and platform were going well however company growth and increased user empowerment were essential for the project to keep moving forward.
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In March of 2019, my team and I had the opportunity to join forces with BudKeep and provide solutions to a challenge they were facing: "How can we increase trust on the BudKeep platform?"
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Understanding + Insight
Our team met with the BudKeep creators to learn more about their insight, vision, ideas and preferences on how they envisioned BudKeep growing and moving forward.
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We asked them about their user base and target use base for future expansion and discovered very quickly that they did not have sufficient user personas or user data for us to use as foundational understanding in order to ideate on solutions for the challenge.
Their user data was minimal due to them being brand new in the market.
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We decided it was essential to conduct our own user research so our ideas can be inspired and supported by data.
Method
In order to gather sufficient data, our team sought out to understand the potential user base of BudKeep.
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We had questions such as:
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"What might drive an individual to sign up as a host on BudKeep?
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What might drive an individual to use BudKeep as a renter?
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What features make users feel safe on a P2P platform?"
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We decided upon the method of distributing an electronic survey to everyone we know in Stockholm. We developed the questions as a team and each distributed it throughout all of our networks. This would generate the most results to conduct an analysis and move forward with the project.
Electronic survey:
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10 questions
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77 total respondents in the Stockholm area
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Multiple choice and free response questions
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Intention:
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Understand the motivations of potential users: why they would use the service, in which situations they would use the service
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Understand the hesitations of the potential users: reasons why they would not use the service
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Understand the behaviors of the potential users
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Gather data on demographics and details of home storage space
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Results
I had the honor of personally analyzing all of the results and drafting the written report for our clients.
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The details of the results may not be publicly disclosed due to privacy contracts.
I can discuss, however, the general outcomes and the use of the results. From our survey, we collected demographics and details of home storage units. We gathered insight on the motivations for signing up as either a renter or a host, behaviors regarding use of storage, needs surrounding storage use, to name a few.
The data provided for understanding conditional factors as well as unconditional factors in which the users would or would not utilize the service.
These factors provided for identifying areas of potential weakness that the company can address when making adjustments in order to increase trust on the platform.
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Team members discussing flow of prototype
The results provided our clients with useful information that we then applied to several more dimensions of our project. We provided the client with more than one solution to the initial challenge of increasing trust on the platform and provided them with both a short term and long term business plan, including marketing strategy, service design elements and tech development.
Alongside conducting the survey analysis report, I drafted several user personas and contributed towards designing a prototype of an improved website based on the results of user testing.
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Both our clients and our team were happy with the final outcome.
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