Zero Budget User Recruiting and Interviewing
Even if you have zero budget for online tools, you can still create prototypes, recruit users and get product insights. Theresa Charleston of National Geographic Learning describes how to conduct product discovery with zero budget.
“I didn’t have a budget. I just had some designs. I used [free accounts]. I was able to recruit users on Facebook, Twitter and Craigslist.”
Transcript
Jim Morris:
Hi there, fellow product leaders. Even if you have zero budget for online tools, you can still create prototypes, recruit users and get product insights. Theresa Charleston describes how to conduct product discovery with zero budget. Enjoy.
Theresa Charleston:
I've found that if you're on a budget, or you need to get users and you're not really sure how, you don't want to pay for someone else to recruit them, you can use good old Craigslist, Facebook, Twitter. And that way you can share the information out to both friends and family, but also to strangers. And you can do your own targeting. So you can actually use what I've done in the past, where for example, my scenario was, I didn't have a budget. I just had some designs. I used a free Invision account. And I needed to get these designs out for people, but I didn't know how to both get users or collect their data, or their feedback.
So, what I did was I put my designs into Invision on a free account. I was able to recruit users on Facebook, Twitter and Craigslist, all three of them. I then generated the link, sent out some questions that folks were meant to follow along with, and I used Typeform.com, which is a great survey tool. It will send out questions. It's a really lovely interface too. So it sort of engages people a little bit more than just a boring old survey. And then it gives you all of your answers, your demographics at the end.
Theresa Charleston:
So I was able to give this to people. They were able to follow along with the survey while they were navigating through the screens. And then in some cases, I was able to send out either a QuickTime link or a Loom link, that's L-O-O-M, in which case the person can record themselves. So it just records your screen, you enter into a meeting, so like a Zoom, and it will record your face, or you can just use Loom and it records your face.
Theresa Charleston:
The nice thing about Loom is that it records your screen and your face and it's free. So I was able to send out that link to people.
Jim Morris:
Question. Does Loom record the clicks as well?
Theresa Charleston:
No, it doesn't record clicks. But Loom is really nice if you just need a way of capturing what the person is doing and then capturing their face as well. And it's not for everybody, because some folks, especially if you've got a really young demographic that you're testing ... Like in my case we're testing young students, sometimes even as small as in kindergarten grades. So of course they're not going to know how to use Loom. And so, it will work for your more tech-savvy users. You can say, "Hey, we'd love if you could record your face and your screen at the same time." And so, if you've got a group of people you think will understand how to use that, then you can send that out and get their face and get their responses, both audio, video and in the survey, which is really nice.
Jim Morris:
Did you incentivize them for those tests?
Theresa Charleston:
We did. So I always try to incentivize, even if it's friends or family. In that way, you can usually get friends or family to do it free if you have a zero budget. But I'll usually always incentivize. And my incentive is usually an Amazon Gift Card. You can also log onto one of those websites that will allow you to ... So you can give like $5, $10, $50 gift cards for whomever you want. But often those sites ... And I forget the name of it actually. I'll have to get that to you.
Jim Morris:
It's like perks something or other.
Theresa Charleston:
Yeah. It's one of those sites that-
Jim Morris:
I love the Amazon cards because you can enter them into the system right away and the next time you use Amazon it automatically applies that way. That way, people don't get these gift cards piling up.
Theresa Charleston:
Right, exactly. And the nice thing about it too is that almost everyone uses Amazon. So you know it's a winner. We've gotten really good feedback on that. And I think even a $5 to $10 gift card, people are incentivized by that. Everybody loves a discount.
Jim Morris:
Wow. So I was going to ask the price. You go down pretty low then sometimes?
Theresa Charleston:
Well, only if it's something where I'm ... Usually, I'll only go $5 to $10 if it's me as an individual, where I have no budget and this is coming out of either my pocket or the pocket of a startup who has literally no money. Most cases though, I'll usually do about $50. It's anywhere from $30 to $50. And it depends on the length of the test. It depends on the sort of advanced technology of the test. In other words, if I'm asking someone to fill out a survey and record themselves and if it's a little bit more trouble, then I'll give them more money. Yeah.
Jim Morris:
Thanks for watching. You can find more product discovery resources, at productdiscoverygroup.com.
Jim Morris, Product Discovery Group
Jim coaches Product teams to collaborate with each other and seek customer input early and often during the design and ideation phase.
