In-depth interviews

User interviews have become one of the most popular techniques when we want to obtain feedback and comments from users about a site, an app, a product, or a specific process. In large part, this is because UX interviews are quick and easy for participants to answer. Likewise, they represent an easy, reliable way for UX designers to gather data.

However, what at first may look like a quick process actually requires a lot of work behind the scenes. Because one of the fundamental missions of this blog is to provide information about the UX universe, we have gathered relevant information that can help you in your process of conducting in-depth user interviews, whether you are an experienced UX-researcher or not.

Photo by Walls.io on Unsplash

If you want your interviews to yield useful, meaningful results, preparation is critical. There are three key steps you should follow to prepare a UX interview properly:

1. **Set the interview objectives**. Simply defining broad objectives already helps you narrow down the context about which questions will be asked.
2. **Recruit the right users**. It’s simple: interviewing an elderly person about using an e-scooter is of little use if they never ride one. You have to find and segment your target audience.
3. Prepare guiding questions beforehand. They will serve as support during the course of the user interview; even so, make sure you include questions that cover the same topic from different angles. Remember that your questions are a guide, not a script.

In any case, if you want to learn the step-by-step process for conducting an interview, you may be interested in our User interview guide, where we review everything you must take into account before, during and after the sessions.

How to conduct a successful in-depth interview

To know how to conduct an in-depth user interview, we must first understand the difference between a normal interview and an in-depth interview. While the former tends to be somewhat general, the in-depth interview consists of 30- to 60-minute conversations with a single participant. The candid, interactive nature and length of these interviews often lead to richer, serendipitous insights that are hard to obtain with other methods.

Nevertheless, the purpose in both kinds of interview is the same: to learn about the user’s pain points, expectations, or even desires.

When is the best time to run in-depth interviews? They can be carried out at several points in the research process:

• Before the specific project is launched. You can even run these in-depth questions before having a clear concept of the project, since they can provide information about the potential customer base and interest. The information you collect, besides helping you develop future users, will be very useful in defining which aspects of the product to change.
• During the early launch stages. Typically, when companies are about to launch a new product (e.g., a videogame), they release a beta version. In-depth interviews can also be carried out during those first weeks, combined with usability tests that help to better understand user behavior. In this phase, the interviews can be economically critical, as they may determine whether further investment in the product is warranted.
• After the product is on the market. Even with the product running live, user interviews should continue. With these in-depth sessions we can still find observations and issues to resolve.

If you want to learn more about UX research, don’t hesitate to check out our programme to train as a UX Researcher: Advanced Research Specialisation Programme. (Note: this training is in Spanish)

Programa de Especialización en Research Avanzado

Types of questions

There are different kinds of questions to ask users. Each covers a specific need, but all represent a fundamental step that UX-researchers carry out to build a knowledge base before the design phase.

In-depth questions about expectations or hopes

These aim to explore what the user might expect from the product. Below are some key questions you can use for inspiration to create your own and gather general feedback, determining a user’s impressions of the product:

1. What are you thinking while you look at this?
2. What do you think about “x” feature?
3. What do you believe this product/feature does or will do?
4. When and where do you think someone would use this product/feature?
5. What do you expect to gain by using this product?
6. What would prevent you from using this product?
7. Do you feel this product serves the same purpose as another one?
8. (Upon a specific gesture from the user, such as shaking their head) What caused that reaction?
9. Do you trust the product?

Questions after performing specific tasks

These respond to the need to ask users about tasks that test the usability and comprehension of the product’s interface.

The goal of these in-depth questions is to find potential problems users have while interacting with the product.

Final follow-up questions

These are questions intended to wrap up the research session. They can help you elicit unexpected information through the user’s reasoning and reflections on product use. You will likely need additional follow-up questions depending on the participant’s answers.

1. Do you feel this design was made for you? Why?
2. What did you like most about the design?
3. What did you dislike most about the design?
4. If you could change something about the design, what would it be?
5. Would you download or use this product if the changes were made?
6. Do you feel this is something for desktop? Mobile? Or both?
7. Would you recommend this to a family member or friend?

Every interview and every participant is different, and the experience of the UX Researcher is essential for creating a comfortable atmosphere during the session and capturing all the answers and insights we’re looking for.

Once we have all the data on the table, the remaining task is to know what to do with that knowledge, how to turn those ideas and theories extracted from the answers into a real solution that yields greater return for our project.

This is a translation of the following article from our corporate website:

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