Lucy Trevallion

User insights and testing

User insights shed light on people’s preferences, behaviours, and expectations. This not only shapes the development process, but empowers me to make informed decisions that resonate with a target audience. I’ve managed complex projects end-to-end, from ideation to release. This is not only true for planning and analysing digital products but also for NHS improvement projects that are led by user insights.

My user insight skills

Develop products

Products will only succeed if they fulfill a user need. At the British Heart Foundation I’ve been part of the team gathering and analysing user insights to get to the core purpose of an app, app’s feature or a digital product

Improve UX

In the NHS, I look at user experience of content or products like our website. If end users can easily get what they need they’ll come back. It’s the same for apps or features, it can attract new customers or re-invigorate inactive users.

Targeted content

When I create short-form pieces of copy, or even microcopy, everything can be targeted to what users need, are searching for, or what they’re interested in. This plays a role in my content strategy and SEO.

How can I use insights to improve your business?

Behavioural insights

This looks at how people behave, for example I could track user interactions or do user testing to see how people use an app or prototype – at the BHF when testing the MyBHF app I could give users certain tasks and see if they are able to do them in the app or whether it needs to be clearer. These could be ‘can you log your symptoms?’ ‘Please go to the online community page,’ etc. I also have experience doing A/B testing to set up two options and look at their behaviour to see which one users like better.

I also love using content analysis and engagement tools, for example using Google Analytics, Semrush or SessionCam (aka Glassbox). This could include: backlink analysis to see the link-building opportunities you’re missing, keyword analysis (volume trend, competition level etc), finding longtails and popular question keywords, competitor analysis, looking at customer journeys or session replay to see how real users move around the product.

Attitudinal insights

I have a lot of experience creating opportunities for user feedback. For surveys, I have created best practice guidance for five NHS hospitals. I have experience with popular software such as Microsoft Forms. I love using this as the data automatically populates an Excel document, creating a more efficient process, but also have experience with Google Forms or SurveyMonkey. For interviews/focus groups, I’ve had extensive training in interview techniques as part of my postgraduate degree. I have also led user testing sessions and focus groups looking at prototypes, and led community engagement workshops in the NHS.
Other ways I could get attitudinal insights like this would be through social listening, for example looking at the BHF’s online community on HealthUnlocked to find trends, topics and conversations that users are interested in. At Imperial NHS Trust I also developed my skills in desktop research, such as gathering user insights through audience insight papers or reports, or through first party data such as complaints, anonymous helpline data, or chatbot data.

Line of inquiry

This is an approach for more targeted insights, for example I can use this to address particular concerns or to test if content is effective or helpful. One way of doing this would be designing and analysing on-page feedback or in-app pop-up surveys that answer a specific question.

Sharing these learnings with other teams

User insights can be applied to many different teams, and I’m confident at leading presentations or going to team meetings to share these learnings. I can improve product development by providing relevant insights with product teams or designers, e.g. so the backlog can be prioritised based on what users most want and need. Good user insights also improve user experience, helping keep the existing audience or attract new users – particularly if we can meet a user need that our competitors aren’t.

An example of my process for NHS user insights projects

  1. Create project timelines and roadmaps, stakeholder mapping and engagement
  2. Recruit diversely, both internally (project group) and externally (community engagement to recruit people who have relevant experience and may not previously have been given a voice in healthcare discussions)
  3. Insight synthesis, where I make sense of everything I have learnt through the user insights to identify key themes and areas for improvement. I conduct synthesis on a rolling basis, using Miro to help with affinity mapping – a process of grouping the insights to uncover key themes.
  4. I look at co-design opportunity areas, and create journey maps of the current experience and key areas for improvement.
  5. I create user personas and user stories.
  6. I lead ideation workshops and prototyping and testing sessions with staff and patients. Collaboration is key for user insights projects.
  7. I suggest solutions, using tools such as the value-complexity matrix below, so that I can show value for money and plan a strategy for improvement.
A diagram of a value-complexity matrix