Why doesn't anyone use your app?

Absrtact: You can hear almost every week the news of the new upstart nouveau riche, which has seed funds and a gorgeous landing page; they have the promise of technology media coverage and change the world;

You can hear almost every week some of the new app startups, they have seed funds and gorgeous landing pages; they have the promise of tech media coverage and change the world, but the only thing that's not there is the user, because no one actually wants to use their app.

At Google's I/O conference, Google's search user researcher Tomme Sharen (Tomer Sharon) answered a historical conundrum: "Why isn't anyone using your app?" We like to quickly browse the focus of the "Catch a group", the 30-minute speech condensed points are as follows.

The six main culprits of "unmanned app":

1, you do not understand the problem you want to solve

Does your app have problems that people actually encounter? To confirm this assumption, many startups do not use actual product testing, but instead open a landing page to measure how interested they are. You should have seen these apps. It's a website that makes bold promises, like "we're going to change the way people buy tacos!" Sign up here! The problem with this approach, Sharon says, is that the only thing you know is who will be interested enough to leave their email address. Whether your app meets the real needs and is worth the time and attention is another question.

2, you always consult the idea of small partners

Your mother always likes anything you do. Your friend always pretends to like anything you do. So asking your friends and family about an app is basically useless. Sharon explained: "Of course, they like your idea, but the opinion is unfair." There is no doubt that they will use your app. And they're going to spend a lot of money buying your app!. Instead, you should jump out of your circle of acquaintances. Talk to your app's target audience.

3, you only listen to the user said, but did not observe them

So setting up landing pages and consulting friends is not enough? So, ask a lot of users--and ask them if they're using your app--, and this looks like the right way to get you to design the perfect app, right? "The first principle of doing research is not to just listen to what the user says but to ' Observe and study ' their behavior. ”

Sharon used the recent study of the British Highway public toilets as an example, and 99% of the people in the study said they would wash their hands after leaving the bathroom. But after setting up devices to track the habits of the actual user, it was found that only 32% of men and 64% of women actually had hands.

4, you do not test the most risky assumptions

Each product has a hypothesis, but the assumption is the most important. Sharon calls it "the most risky assumption", which is the core of the product. Sharon said: "If the most risky assumption is not true, then the whole idea will fall apart." ”

Let's imagine how the idea was achieved before. When YouTube was officially launched, they assumed we would know how to click the Play button, we knew how to remove the video with the paper clip button, and the blogger would embed the video in the article. But these most risky assumptions may be simpler to return to: they upload videos if they are quick and easy to operate. Although the hindsight, but testing these assumptions is to ensure that toutube online success is essential.

5, you have "little architect Bubba" mentality

Now, very popular bare metal features release an app, test the user viscosity, will it "center" (or change the basic function of the product), and then actually launched. Rather than designing a product for use, it is more necessary to have an entrepreneurial workflow and a strategy to maximize the benefits of a start-up company before running out of funds. Sharon called it the "little architect Bubba" mentality.

Although this approach is feasible--instagram was originally just a check-in service app called Burbn, which might be an example of a central operation-but Sharon insists it's not the way to build a successful app. Something can be coded and designed, but it also needs to be designed based on people's needs as a primary consideration.

6, your product is easy to find a substitute

How to solve this problem? Sharon says this is as simple as validation or invalidation, and there are three key components to the approach: the question (Does the app have any real problems that people care about?), the target population (is there enough people with this problem?) Are there products (can our products solve the problem of the target population?) Isn't that standard business plan material? In the culture of startups, it's easy to forget that app is a commercial product.

But we think Sharon's best advice is how you talk to the target audience, and they have feedback that is worth listening to. You've assembled potential users, using all of the research on human needs and digging into subtle nuances that are easily overlooked. Avoid simple right and wrong questions. Skip digital feedback. Instead, he wants you to ask questions about repetitive behavior and questions that you like to be able to answer short.

Good question:

"Why did you update your site recently?"

Bad question:

"How many emails have you received in the last one hours?"

Because fundamentally, a well-designed app, like any other well-designed product, is designed for people's needs. The more you understand the instinctive nature of this demand, the more relevant your product is to this demand.