Lesson video

Hi there, everybody.

My name is Mr. Booth.

Welcome to your Design & Technology lesson for today.

It's brilliant that you could join me.

Today, we are gonna look at market testing.

This is part of the communal areas context and part of the "Iterative design: Student Living" unit.

We're gonna look at how you can test your prototypes with your target market and your user to inform evaluations and ultimately make changes and improvements to your prototypes.

The outcome for today: I want you to conduct market testing and analyze the feedback to inform an evaluation.

We have four keywords today that I want you to keep a lookout for.

The first is evaluate, to judge how a product meets the chosen criteria.

We then have user, who you are designing for, who you are designing the product for.

We have target market, the specific group of people a product is designed and sold for.

And finally, market testing, trying out a product with a target market and users to see how well it works and whether they like it or not.

We have three learning cycles today.

The first one is about your user and them testing your prototype.

So let's have a look.

Once a prototype is completed, it's important to evaluate this prototype and the design that you have made.

To evaluate is to judge how a product meets a chosen criteria.

To do this effectively, the designer needs to gather other people's opinions rather than just your own.

It's really important to get a wide range of opinions as well to inform your evaluations.

Gathering feedback from the user and the target market is essential to ensure the product meets the needs of the user as well as being commercially viable.

This is called market testing.

Market testing is trying out a product with the target market and users to see how well it works and whether they like it.

The target market, remember, is a specific group of people a product is designed and sold for, which will also contain your user.

Quick check for understanding.

Gathering feedback from the user and the target market is called what? Is it A, mass production, B, prototype assembly, or C, market testing? Pause the video now, have a go at this, and come back to me when you've got your answer.

It is, of course, C, market testing.

Well done.

As part of the market testing, the designer needs to go back to their original user to check if they have met the original needs and wants.

This is called user testing.

Now, the user is who you are designing the product for.

And for Alex, this was, of course, his cousin who lives in a student house, and he's at university.

"My cousin is an undergraduate student at university, so I'm going to choose him as my user.

He is in his second year of university." So that's Alex identifying his user, and he identified them very early on.

Now, before Alex even thought about what type of product to design, he had some initial needs and wants.

These were sharing everyday items, such as pots and pans and small electrical appliances like a toaster, but also identifying shared everyday items for use in the kitchen, such as cutlery, knives, things like that.

The initial wants was whatever you do design, the user, Alex's cousin, wanted something that is efficient to use.

From this, Alex developed a design brief based on his user's needs and wants.

So let's have a look at that design brief, "Design a storage solution for kitchen utensils and cutlery.

The product needs to help save space and must be efficient to use.

The solution must appeal to university-aged students and be able to be manufactured at an affordable price for students." From this, Alex made his list of criteria that he needed to make sure his design satisfied.

That was storage for kitchen utensils and cutlery, save space and efficient to use, and make it affordable.

Another check for understanding.

In the design process, who is the user? Is it A, the person the product is designed for, B, the manufacturer who makes the product, or C, the shop owner who sells the product.

Pause the video now, have a go at this, come back to me when you've got your answer.

It is, of course, A, the person the product is designed for.

The design brief acts as a checklist to be able to review and evaluate the prototype against.

Alex can take the checklist and his final prototype and check if he has achieved the aims and objectives decided upon based on his user's wants and needs.

A reminder of those.

Storage for kitchen utensils and cutlery, save space and efficient to use, and, of course, affordable.

So Alex has organized all of this information into a table.

So first of all, he has the aims and objectives down the left-hand side, and then the explanation which he has used from his user feedback in the table to see whether he's met those aims and objectives or not.

So first of all, it was all about storage.

The storage unit had space for all the essentials used in a kitchen, including cutlery, kitchen knives, and everyday items, so he can say that he has met that aim or objective.

Next, it was about saving space.

The unit can be attached to a wall or placed on a stand if a wall is not available.

As it stores all the regularly used kitchen items, time can be saved as the user does not need to search through drawers to find items. So once again, he has met that aim or objective.

Next was is it efficient to use? Well, it was challenging to place the knives into the designed slots.

They often clung to the edges of the unit and stuck out of the bottom.

If used with a stand, this could be a health and safety hazard.

So for this aim or objective, he said he hasn't met it.

And then finally, affordable.

The unit was designed to be modular.

Users could buy just one unit or all three, which can then be connected.

The main body of the unit was designed to be one component, which was shelled to reduce material cost.

So for this one, he said he has met that aim or objective.

So we're now onto your first task.

Using your original design brief, I want you to create a checklist of your user's wants and needs to evaluate your prototype against.

Once you've done that, I want you to review your checklist to state whether or not you think you have met the requirements of your user, and explain why or why not.

It would be really helpful to get your user's opinion on this to do this task.

Pause the video now, have a go at this, come back to me when you have completed it.

So how did you get on? Well, hopefully you've got more ticks than crosses.

Let's just see how Laura got on.

So here's an example answer.

So Laura designed and made a storage bag for toiletries to allow students to hang on the back of their bathroom door when they are in the bathroom.

Laura created a checklist for her prototype: hold all the user's toiletries, be strong enough to hang up, transportable, save space, and aesthetically pleasing to university-aged students whilst also being affordable.

As we can see here from the examples that we've got, Laura's targets were met for holding all the user's toiletries, it was strong enough to hang up and also transportable.

So hopefully you have also completed this.

And like I said, hopefully you've got more ticks than crosses.

So we're now on to the second learning cycle: target market testing.

In addition to ensuring that the prototype meets the user's needs, designers also need to ensure that it is commercially viable and will sell to a wider audience, such as the target market.

Feedback from the target market can be gathered as part of an interview or by observing the target market with the prototype, actually using the prototype.

In commercial design, this can be carried out by focus groups.

Now, a focus group is a small group of your target market who are brought together to discuss ideas and designs or even test prototypes.

Now, they can test all aspects of the prototype or maybe focus just on one aspect.

Quick check for understanding.

A focus group is a small group of your what who are brought together to discuss ideas and designs or test prototypes.

Fill in the blank.

Pause the video now, come back to me when you've done that.

It is, of course, target market.

Well done.

Now, before allowing your target market to have a play with your prototype, to test your prototype, you've got to decide what you want to learn from this.

Now, this will help you choose the best way to collect feedback, and it's the same for designers as well.

The main focus of user feedback are typically aesthetics, functionality, and ergonomics.

Now, Alex has decided he wants to focus on the following for his feedback.

He wants to focus on the function and also the ergonomics because those two points came up quite a lot in his user testing.

With this in mind, he decided he wants to carry out target market testing that will involve his target market using his prototype.

Now, to carry out market testing, Alex needs to consider how to record his findings so he is fully prepared to be able to respond to that feedback.

Now, he's decided to record the observation as a video so he can look at it later and watch it back.

And obviously, he's asked permission from the target market to do this.

But what he also is gonna do, he's gonna take a notebook and a pencil so he can make notes, but also make some more sketches.

Now, that's really useful because you can do the sketches along with your target market to really understand what they mean when they are interacting with your product.

Quick check for understanding.

What things do you need to consider before carrying out target market testing? Is it A, what is the favorite color of your focus group, B, how will your focus group get to the location, C, what do you want to learn or find out, or D, how will you record your findings? Select all the appropriate answers.

Pause the video now, come back to me when you've done that.

It is, of course, C and D.

What do you want to learn or find out? How will you record your findings? Now, Alex is gonna record his observations from the target market testing as a mind map, and he's gonna include the key points.

So first of all, every one of his target market could fit all their kitchen utensils into the units.

The knife slots were too small for some knives.

Now, that's interesting, isn't it, because that was also picked up by his user.

The modular design worked well, and all users could assemble the units together.

They liked the look of design and thought it looked good in kitchens, or would look good in kitchens.

Some of the target market said they would have preferred it to be made out of aluminum or stainless steel rather than the polymer that Alex made his prototype from.

Now on to your second task, Task B.

I want you to carry out your own target market testing of your prototype.

I want you to consider what it is you need to learn and also how you will record your target market interacting with your prototype.

Pause the video now, have a go at this task, come back to me when you've completed.

So hopefully you've got lots of information that you've been able to look at and then we can analyze to inform your evaluations.

Let's have a quick look at how Laura got on with her storage bag for toiletries.

Well, she carried out her market testing and recorded her findings.

She also used a mind map.

And we can see that one of her target market couldn't fit all their toiletries in the bag.

The bag was strong enough to hold and hang everyone's toiletries.

It had the right sized pockets for their belongings.

They liked the look of the design and they thought it looked nice when it was hung up.

And, of course, a couple of the target market struggled with the zip and would have preferred something like Velcro.

So that's some really good feedback.

So hopefully you've got lots of good feedback as well.

Now on to the final learning cycle: evaluations inform future design decisions.

Once feedback has been collected, this information needs to be evaluated to make it useful.

Once the feedback is evaluated, decisions can then be made on future design decisions and any modifications you need to make to your prototype.

Alex needs to correlate his feedback from his user testing and his target market testing.

So if we remember from that first learning cycle, Alex organized his user testing into a table like this, and he decided whether or not he had met those aims and objectives.

He also recorded his observations of his target market testing as a mind map of the key points, but he also has that video and that notebook and sketches to rely on as well.

Alex can now evaluate his feedback to help him consider future design decisions.

So he's gonna take both his user feedback and his target market feedback, and he's gonna organize it into what went well and even better if.

And it looks a bit like this.

So what went well? Well, the storage unit had space for all the essentials used in the kitchen.

It could be attached to a wall, placed on a stand.

The main body of the unit was designed to be one component, and he shelled that so it reduced material cost to make it cheaper.

One of his target market, every one of his target market could fit all their kitchen utensils into the unit.

And the modular design worked well, all users could assemble the units together.

Now even better if.

It was challenging to place the knives in the designed slots.

That was feedback from both the user and the target market.

Some of the target market said they would have preferred it to be made out of aluminum or stainless steel.

A quick check for understanding.

What do you need to evaluate and make future design decisions on your prototype? Is it A, target market testing, B, packaging design, C, market research, or D, user testing? Select all the appropriate responses.

Pause the video now, come back to me when you've got your answer.

It is, of course, target market testing and user testing.

Well done.

Alex has evaluated his prototype with his user feedback and has decided two possible future design decisions.

The first being make the prototype from an alternative material to increase the units' durability in a kitchen environment.

And the second one was design the prototype knife slots to be easier to access.

A guard is needed to protect users from the knives when the stand is in use.

On to your final task, Task C.

Correlate your user testing and target market testing to complete the table below.

You can use what went well and even better if to help.

Using the completed table, consider two or three future design decisions.

Pause the video now, have a go at this task, come back to me when you've completed it.

So how did you get on? Well, hopefully you have one or two future design decisions.

Let's look at how Laura got on.

So first of all, what went well? They liked the design of the bag and thought it looked good hanging on their bathroom.

The bag was strong enough to hold most people's toiletries.

It had the right amount and size of compartments.

Even better if, these future design decisions.

The zipper could be changed to be Velcro or an alternative closing method.

I could look at making it slightly bigger to make sure it holds more toiletries.

Then I wanted you to complete the table and then consider two or three future design decisions.

Now, Laura has considered, "I'm going to look at an alternative closing method for the bag.

I will also look at making it slightly larger with one more compartment." So that brings us to the end of today's lesson.

Well done today.

You've been brilliant.

Let's have a quick summary.

Once a prototype is completed, it's important to evaluate your prototype and design.

To do this effectively, the designer needs to gather other people's opinions rather than just their own.

Gathering feedback from the original user and the target market is essential to ensure the prototype meets the needs of the user as well as being commercially viable.

Market testing is trying out a prototype with your target market to see how well it works and whether they like it or not.

Well done today.

You've been absolutely brilliant.

I look forward to seeing you next time.

Goodbye.