“Do we have a template for research plans?”
“Which study did you ask ease of use questions on? Need to re-use those…”
“Have we been asking the same warm up questions?”
Isn’t fun to sort through 100s of documents, trying to answer these questions?
No. It is not.
If you don’t have one yet—you NEED a single source of truth for your research templates. A toolkit for anyone on the team to find research plans, interview questions, note-taking templates.
There is NO reason to make 5000 versions of each of these.
So save yourself some trouble—make a copy of the UX Research Toolkit templates we compiled for you.
What does this article contain?
- UX Research plan template
- User interview question bank
- Note-taking template
- Guide + template for synthesis
- Research report template
Make copies of all of them and customize to your needs!
May you never have to hunt to find a template again.
The Looppanel UX Research Toolkit
1. The UX research plan template
This is literally the most popular template we have ever published.
Depending on where your team works, you may want to try the
This UX research plan outlines the goals, methods, and timeline for your research. It acts like a roadmap for you to stay on track and ensure that your research is productive.
A good research plan contains the following:
- Clearly defined research objectives: What is the core goal of this research project? What is the key business outcome we want to drive? Often getting clarity here is most important—sometimes research isn’t actually needed at all, and it’s better to know that sooner than later.
- Identification of the target audience: Is there a specific subgroup of your customers you’re interested in? Get on the same page with your team to make sure you sample correctly!
- Selection of research methods: Depending on what you need to validate you may need one (or more!) methods. User interviews may be perfect for in-depth persona development, but maybe an unmoderated usability test works just fine to test a small design iteration.
- Establishing a timeline and budget: Is it possible for you to give the team answers by the time they need to make decisions? If not, what can you get them in a week, vs what questions are important enough to spend 2-3 additional weeks on. If your study takes too long, the team may make decisions without it anyway.
- Key questions to answer. Think of this as the “drill down” version of the research goal. If the goal is to reduce churn, your key questions may be related to why they’re churning and what might retain them longer.
Get detailed instructions on building a research plan, with a template here: How to Create a UX Research Plan + Template
2. Usability testing - Interview Question bank
While each project is unique, there is some pattern to the chaos:
- You probably have a standard set of intro / outro questions you want to ask all your users
- Many research questions follow a similar pattern—for example, ease of use questions for usability tests, or pricing discovery questions may look similar across projects.
For this reason, you want to create a standard template of questions the team can rely on—especially if you have Product Managers and Designers running research.
In this Airtable, we have collated over 60 standard question types you can use and re-use across the team. The interview questions are organized by categories (warm up, usability, discovery, etc.) so you can filter and sort to find what you need!
We’d recommend making a copy of this template and customizing the questions where necessary to suit your team.
Remind your team though! While the guide is important, it's also crucial to keep the conversation flexible and conversational, allowing participants to speak freely and provide valuable insights.
3. Note-taking for user interviews
Ahh, the note-taking process. How is it that it’s so hard to get folks to take good notes?
Well, a really good template helps. Many teams end up creating their own, but we’ve saved you a step by making one for you!
Use this FigJam template to take notes during research sessions with your team!
But let's face it, trying to keep up with a conversation while scribbling notes can be tough! If you’re tired of madly scribbling through calls hoping you didn’t miss anything, try Looppanel’s automatic notes.
You can skip the rapid scrawling during interviews and still get amazing notes, ready for analysis!
The notes are also tied to an incredibly good transcript, so you can jump back to the parts of the call you care most about.
4. A Guide to Research Synthesis
We spoke to researchers from all backgrounds and team sizes, ranging from Etsy, Spotify and Wrike to freelancers, to learn more about the best practices and modes of doing research synthesis. It’s a great place to get started, highly recommend reading it here.
How to do research synthesis manually
Organizing and analyzing user research data is the key to uncovering valuable insights that drive informed decision-making. Here are two questions to get you started.
1. Did you find evident patterns in the data?
Sometimes, patterns in the data are crystal clear, guiding you toward actionable insights with ease. Other times, you're navigating through a sea of information, searching for the underlying meaning. If patterns are apparent, synthesis focuses on extracting evidence that communicates the main takeaways effectively. However, if conclusions are elusive or for critical projects, a deeper dive into the data is warranted.
2. How do you process information?
Understanding how your brain processes data is crucial in selecting the most effective synthesis method. Based on this, there are 3 ways to go about synthesizing research data.
- Affinity mapping: In this method, researchers use Post-Its in tools like FigmaJam or Miro to visualize data points from user conversations. Then group notes by themes and dimensions for collaborative synthesis sessions. Here’s a guide to help you affinity map your way to answers!
- Mental synthesis: Another approach is to construct storylines and identify patterns mentally, with key quotes highlighted for reference. Transcripts and videos serve as data banks to support the narrative. We recommend this one only if you’re a long-time research veteran!
- Structured data analysis: This one’s for fans of Excel. You can categorize insights in tables, with each participant's response recorded in rows and separate columns for questions and metadata. This method facilitates pattern detection and internal communication of findings.
Depending on where you work, here are some synthesis templates to get started with:
- UX Research Analysis Template - Figjam
- UX Research Analysis Template - Miro
- UX Research Analysis Template - Excel / Google Drive
How to use Analysis tools like Looppanel
Alternatively, automated tools like Looppanel offer a seamless solution for research analysis.
Here’s how.
AI-Assisted Note-Taking
Looppanel seamlessly joins your digital interviews on platforms like Google Meet, Zoom, or MS Teams. While you focus on the conversation, Looppanel records, transcribes, and takes notes automatically.
Once your call ends, review your notes by question, transcript section, or create shareable video clips for your team.
Streamlined Data Analysis
Looppanel's AI thematic analysis tools save you time by grouping relevant data and identifying key themes. While you still review the data, the process becomes much more manageable, thanks to Looppanel's automated tagging feature.
Organized Data by Question
Forget about sifting through piles of data. Looppanel organizes your notes based on your interview questions in your discussion guide. This way, you can tabulate and view responses across different calls to the same question.
Try out Looppanel’s analysis features here.
4. Research Report Template
Congratulations, you’re almost at the finish line!
But don’t get lazy yet—the success of your research ultimately hinges on your ability to sway decision-makers. This is why presenting your findings in the right manner matters A LOT.
We worked with UX design leader Dan Winer (Head of Design at PandaDoc) to create this Research report template to help you structure your findings correctly.
Dan advises using the Minto pyramid to structure:this means that you lead with the conclusions first, present key findings next, and save the detailed information and data for the end.
Why? Because stakeholders rarely have the time to read detailed pages about your methodology, participants and thought process. They just want to know the results and why it matters to them. So, structure reports such that it prioritizes what actually matters to your audience!
We’ve put together all of Dan’s tips and guide to creating a great research report here.
Conclusion
We hope these templates empower your team with the confidence and ability to better research!
If you feel like the UX research toolkit is missing something critical, write to us about it! We’d love to hear feedback and potential notes on how it has helped you.
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