User Research in Digital Skills User Experience by Accenture

Knowing your users is a key part of creating successful digital products. The Digital Skills User Experience course by Accenture shows that designing based on your own perspective is a common mistake, as users often have different needs, habits, and expectations. Understanding their goals, routines, and challenges helps create designs that truly work for them.

The Role of User Feedback

Collecting feedback from real users early in the design process is important, and understanding users’ perspectives helps designers avoid assumptions. Watching how users interact with existing products can reveal surprising differences between what people say they do and what they actually do. Even small amounts of user input can save time and effort later by guiding the design in the right direction.

Learning About Users

The course introduces several research methods. Interviews and focus groups provide direct insights into what users need and expect. Surveys, market research, and observation of existing product usage help identify patterns and common behaviours. Lab based usability studies track emotions and actions in detail, while focus groups allow for deeper exploration of users’ thoughts. The key is to ask questions that avoid leading users and instead discover their true needs and frustrations.

Creating Personas

Personas are fictional profiles of example users that represent different types of people who might use a product. These profiles include motivations, habits, preferences, and pain points, helping designers tailor their work to real user needs. Understanding personas’ characteristics, goals, and behaviours helps ensure the product meets the needs of various users. Even if research time is limited, creating simplified personas for different user types can improve design decisions.

References

Accenture (n.d.) Digital Skills User Experience. FutureLearn. Accessed 2 December 2025.