For UX researchers and designers, getting business leaders to understand the value of their work may feel like half the battle. But even research with buy-in can easily become a box to check during the product development process.
Simply conducting research isn’t enough. The quality of those insights is a huge and often overlooked factor for product success.
For example, if you fill a study with 100 participants, use those findings and insights to eventually build and launch a new product, and it turns out that over 50% of those participants weren’t in your target audience (or maybe not even human!)…you’ve just spent a lot of time and money building a product that may be completely irrelevant to your audience.
Plus, now you have to allocate even more time and resources to course correcting and building the right thing.
In short, it pays to do research right the first time.
But what are the financial impacts of cutting corners? What makes research “quality”? And what is preventing companies from conducting quality research every time? At Dscout, we wanted to find out.
The financial impact of low-quality UX research
Our team at Dscout recently ran a study to uncover the financial repercussions of poor or misleading insights. We surveyed ~140 folks across research, design, and product and compiled data from Forrester, PWC, IBM, and more in our full report, The Business Case for Investing in Quality UX Research.
The report digs into four key areas where research quality directly affects the business. To quickly highlight them…
1. Reducing risk
73% of participants in our survey said that low-quality UX research leads to incorrect or misinformed product decisions. Using low-quality insights can lead to low-quality or misaligned products, and the repercussions of launching a product that doesn’t work for your end users directly impact support teams, conversion rates, churn, and more. High-quality UXR can help ensure you’re building products that customers will actually enjoy using.2. Reducing development costs
87% of participants in our survey said low-quality UX research wastes time and resources on ineffective solutions. Allocating the time and resources to conducting quality UX research may seem costly up front, but failing to do so can cost exponentially more across design, development, marketing, and, of course, research rework.
3. Ensure a stronger product-market fit
70% of participants in our survey said low-quality UX research causes missed business opportunities due to flawed insights. Building a bad product isn’t the only thing that could happen with flawed insights, you could just waste time building the completely wrong product. Potential customers may see that your competitor offers a much-needed feature that wasn’t even on your team’s radar. Instead, you could spend time and resources on building a product or feature that is just a nice-to-have for a prospect. Taking the time to conduct quality research can better ensure that your offerings provide real value to your customers and edge out the competition.4. Boost customer satisfaction and loyalty
68% of participants in our study said low-quality UX research leads to lost revenue from user adoption and satisfaction. Investing in quality UX research not only helps you build better products, it also helps retain your customers. Proper UXR keeps your company innovating and can lead to more revenue from upselling customers, reducing churn, and ultimately expanding your market share. Check out the full report to dig into the numbers and get a deeper breakdown of the business imperative for quality UX research.What causes low-quality research?
1. Limited time for research
In fast-paced product environments, research often takes a backseat to tight deadlines and rapid iteration cycles. The pressure to deliver insights quickly can lead to compromised methodologies or misinterpreted data.2. Difficulty finding the right participants
Whether you’ve recruited five or 500 participants, if they’re not the target audience (or maybe not even human!), your insights are irrelevant. Even if you do find the right people, you may run into participants who are disengaged or even absent.3. Insufficient budget or resources
Conducting high-quality research is an investment. There is a lot of research to be done across departments and phases of product development. Oftentimes, companies fail to allocate enough budget or resources to meet the demand.How to invest in high-quality UX research
Investing So, how exactly do we combat this problem? There are a few areas where companies can focus additional budget and resources on bettering their own UX research practice…
1. Hire UXRs
This one may seem obvious, but when teams across the entire org need to do research, it can be easy to say, “We don’t need dedicated researchers, the design or product team can run their own research.” While other teams can conduct research (more on that below!), having enough dedicated UX researchers helps ensure quality across teams and allows for additional robust, strategic initiatives.2. Upskill teams
Research is vital to functions beyond just UXR teams, including designers, PMs, and even sales and marketing.Lean on UXRs to guide the following…
- Choosing the right methodologies
- Framing research questions
- Continuing to learn and evolve their research skillsets
3. Recruit the right participants
Don’t settle for a study filled with the wrong participants. Take the time to properly screen recruits, pull a diverse sample, and make sure that the insights you’re collecting are from the people you actually need to hear from.4. Choose the right research tools
Provide the research tools that your team needs to succeed. Invest in end-to-end platforms that streamline recruiting, analysis, and reporting. Tools that support a variety of research methodologies allow your team to run a range of studies before and after product launch.Wrapping it up
On average, every dollar invested in UX brings $100 in return—that’s a whopping ROI of 9,900%. But that ROI doesn’t happen magically overnight. It takes a dedicated team with skills in research, design, business, and advocacy to deliver quality insights that make a difference.
Investing in high-quality research paves the path for better product decisions, lowers development costs, offers a stronger product-market fit, and results in higher customer satisfaction and loyalty.
As the research landscape continues to evolve in different economic environments and in the wake of GenAI, hiring the right UXRs, upskilling your team, and choosing the right research tools will help your team remain invaluable to the business at large.
To learn more about our research and the value of quality UX research, grab a copy of our full report!
To learn how Dscout can help you conduct high-quality research across your entire organization, chat with a member of our team.
Author bio:
Stevie Vanderwiel is the Brand Marketing Manager at Dscout. Check out more of her work on the Dscout People Nerds blog and subscribe to the People Nerds newsletter.
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