Course 2 week 4 is all about ideation, the third step of the design thinking framework.

Week 4: Ideating Design Solutions

Understanding design ideation

1. Ideation can be defined as the process of generating a broad set of ideas on a given topic with no attempt to judge or evaluate them.
2. As part of the ideation process, a designer will:
   • Brainstorms out loud
   • Document all ideas: Focus on QUANTITY over QUALITY
     • The list of your ideas is narrowed down based on constraints later on, like budget and timelines.
     • The first ideas are usually not the best one
     • Best ideas are decided by the users, not the designer
   • Avoid judging/evaluating the ideas at this stage
   • Gather a diverse team with different backgrounds and perspectives.
   • Question the obvious(common belief or practice)
3. After this, to review and evaluate the ideas and take them further, the following criteria should be met
   • Feasibility: Technically possible to build
   • Desirable: Best at solving the user problem
   • Viable: Financially beneficial for the business

Recognize business needs

1. Even though a brand isn't a human being, it still has a personality. This includes the business's voice, tone, and goals.
2. Users don't want to communicate with a brand that uses robotic-sounding language.
3. Example: Which E-mail makes you inclined towards that brand more?

Competetive Audits

1. A competitive audit is a tool to explore ideas for designs, so we can learn from others about what has worked and not worked. It is an overview of your competitor's strengths and weaknesses.
2. A competitive audit can help you:
   • Identifying your key competitors
   • Reviewing the products that your competitors offer
   • Understanding how your competitors position themselves in the market
   • Examining what your competition does well and what they could do better
   • And considering how your competitors talk about themselves.
3. We should include both direct and indirect competitors in our audit:
   • Direct competitors have offerings, meaning products, services, or features, that are similar to your product and focus on the same audience.
   • Indirect competitors either have a similar set of offerings, but focus on a different audience than you, or they have a different set of offerings and focus on the same audience as you.

Steps to conduct a Competetive Audit

1. Outline the goal: Goals should be specific and broken down into different product aspects you want to compare. Example:
   • E-Commerce Website: Customer reviews and ratings, return policy details, delivery, and in-store pickup options.
   • Music Streaming Platform: Pricing options, browse and search functions, and creating and sharing playlists.
2. Create a spreadsheet with a list of your competitors (Column): Include at least 5-10 competitors including both direct and indirect competitors.
3. Call out the specific aspects you want to compare in the same spreadsheet (Row):
   • First impressions:
     • Is the website responsive?
     • Does the design complement the product?
     • How do you feel about the website?
   • Interaction:
     • What features are available for users?
     • Is the website accessible to all users, including those using screen readers?
     • How inclusive is their website to non-English speakers?
     • Will the user get confused as they click through the website pages, or is the navigation clear?
   • Visual design:
     • Does the website appear and feel the same throughout all sections and pages?
     • Does the branding match the intended audience?
     • Is the imagery and color palette memorable?
   • Content:
     • Does the tone of the content match the company’s branding?
     • Will users be able to find the details they’re interested in?
4. Research each company: Go through the above-mentioned aspects and think about the following questions for each cell:
   • What works well?
   • What could be improved?
   • Whether your competitor's aspects meet the needs of your specific audience?
   • Take lots of notes, screenshots, and links to use later when presenting the information.
5. Analyze the information:
   • Try to spot trends and themes.
   • What are the similarities between you and your competitors?
   • Is there a certain aspect that your competitors all approach in the same way?
6. Summarize your findings in a report, document, or presentation: A written report should contain the following points drawn from the spreadsheet findings:
   • Competitive audit goal(s).
   • Who are your key competitors?
   • What are the type and quality of competitors’ products?
   • How do competitors position themselves in the market? Describe each competitor’s target audience in a few sentences. Be specific about the characteristics of their ideal customers (e.g., age, location, income, spending habits, etc.).
   • How do competitors talk about themselves? Consider each company’s value proposition. Summarize what they claim is unique about their offerings in 2-3 sentences.
   • Competitors’ strengths.
   • Competitors’ weaknesses: Consider what your competitors could do better.
   • Gaps: Consider what your competitors fail to do.
   • Opportunities: Consider ways you might address the market gaps you identified. For example: You find out our competitors have a difficult sign-up process.
     • Is your product's sign-up process easy?
     • Can you update your sign-up process design to make your product stand out compared to competitors?

Go through my competitive audit and audit report if this section was too short to make sense for you 😝🙃.

How Might We?

1. HMW is another tool used to come up with ideas to solve a design problem. How Might We is a design thinking activity used to translate problems into opportunities for design.
   • How: Encourages us to explore a bunch of ideas instead of moving forward with only one idea for the solution.
   • Might: Emphasizes that our ideas are possible solutions, not the only solution.
   • We: Suggests a collaborative effort.

Tips to create good HMW questions from the Stanford University design school

Consider this problem that a user, Darren, faces: Darren is a concertgoer who needs to keep track of their concert ticket because they need the ticket when they go through security.

1. Amp up the good: Use any positives in the problem as a solution. Example: How might we make keeping track of tickets a fun competition among friends?
2. Explore the opposite: Solve the opposite of the problem you’ve outlined. Example: How might we create a way to lose tickets?
3. Change the status quo: Completely change the process. Example: How might we make a non-paper concert ticket?
4. Remove the bad: Remove the negative part of the problem entirely. Example: How might we make a way for concert-goers to enter a venue without needing a ticket?
5. Create an analogy: compare this user experience to another experience. Example: How might we make going through security like playing a video game?
6. Question an assumption: Remove or change any processes that you assume have to be in place. Example: How might we remove the security check process at a concert?

Another example on HMW by Stanford.

Kwazy Eights🤓

Crazy Eights is another popular design ideation exercise intended to help you think of several ideas in record time. You just need a sheet of paper, fold it three times (to get 8 partitions on the paper), and start sketching (doodling) your possible solution ideas, one in each section within a constant time.

Phew!😌
That was a lot. Again!
But that's a wrap for week 4 and Course 2. We aren't even halfway through the course and I already have a newfound appreciation for UX designers as a frontend developer. I have also started noticing little user interaction points in my daily life which were invisible till now, which is fascinating to me like discovering a UX Quantum realm.🤓
Anyway, off to Course 3 we go!!