Heads up! To view this whole video, sign in with your Courses account or enroll in your free 7-day trial. Sign In Enroll
Preview
Start a free Courses trial
to watch this video
User personas represent the most common types of users you have. It’s important to realize that these are stereotypes and that individual users will act differently than the groups you put them in, but it would be insane to create a user map for the millions of users who could use your product, which is why we group people into personas.
New Terms:
- User persona—The user profile of a theoretical user who represents a larger group of potential users. These user profiles are helpful in putting a name and a face with decisions you make about your users.
Further Reading:
-
Here is a link to the X-Games site. The site and subject matter are designed to appeal to a younger audience.
- This article breaks down how to make User Personas: How to Define a User Persona, by Raven Veal.
Related Discussions
Have questions about this video? Start a discussion with the community and Treehouse staff.
Sign upRelated Discussions
Have questions about this video? Start a discussion with the community and Treehouse staff.
Sign up
Now that we understand how user personas
work, let's try our hand at creating some.
0:00
In this video,
we'll be making user personas for
0:05
people who use a ride sharing app.
0:08
Remember that user personas are just
examples to plan around, and
0:11
they don't represent every
individual's needs and interests.
0:15
Let's make some personas for
0:19
the common types of passengers
who would use a ride sharing app.
0:20
For these exercises, we'll be focusing
on only the passenger experience,
0:24
not the driver's experience for our app.
0:29
We'll start with a businessman.
0:31
He is trying to get to the airport from
his hotel to catch a flight back home.
0:34
We also have some college friends,
0:38
they are trying to go home
after a night out on the town.
0:40
For our third persona,
it's up to you to decide.
0:44
What's the final persona that we
should take into consideration
0:46
as we build our app.
0:50
You can find all these
documents in the course notes.
0:51
Feel free to add information and
dig deeper.
0:54
Look at research for these groups.
0:58
What are the business man's expected cost?
1:00
Or how much would a cab
to the airport cost?
1:02
How often do college friends
go to parties on average?
1:05
The more data you can
gather about your groups,
1:09
the more it can inform your decisions to
help you create the best experience for
1:11
these users based around
the most accurate information.
1:15
We'll be covering user research
in more detail in other courses.
1:20
For now, it's important to understand that
having accurate data about your users
1:23
will help to confirm that you're on
the right track as a UX designer.
1:28
Remember, we talked about
demographic traits, or
1:33
things you can't control,
like your age or your race.
1:35
Demographic information is the type
of questions asked for a census.
1:39
Let's go ahead and pull out the first
user persona from our course files.
1:43
[SOUND] Let's put demographic
things at the top.
1:47
So we have Businessman Bryan,
a sales manager for
1:49
a midsize company who lives in Denver.
1:52
He is 34, single, and male.
1:55
For our purposes, we care about
how much he will use our app and
1:58
the unique perspective he
brings to our product.
2:02
We expect him to use our app
six times total per month.
2:05
And since he has a company card,
he isn't too concerned about how much he's
2:08
spending, as long as
it's somewhat reasonable.
2:12
Psychographic traits are things
that you can control,
2:16
that make you who you are,
like your values or your interests.
2:19
We'll keep these in mind more as we
start to work with these personas.
2:23
Let's write him a bio about who he is and
2:27
the context of being a potential user for
our app.
2:29
Bryan travels frequently and
it's important for his job.
2:33
He takes pride in his work and
he is prompt, and prepared.
2:37
He travels a lot but
2:40
he's frustrated that cabs don't tell him
when they're almost about to pick him up.
2:42
He's willing to give ride sharing
a chance because he's heard
2:46
good things about drivers
getting there quickly.
2:49
And that he can see when
the driver will be arriving.
2:52
He is prompt, prepared,
assertive, and confident.
2:55
His habits are scheduling rides in
advance, using his company card to pay,
2:58
traveling light, and arriving at
the airport with plenty of time.
3:04
We'll visit his goals in stage three,
so let's leave those out for now.
3:08
Let's compare this with another
persona I've made for Social Sarah.
3:12
A college student who is riding back
to her apartment with her roommates.
3:16
Full time college student,
less than $5 splits fare with friends.
3:20
Habits, uses apps to get
home safely after parties,
3:26
splits fares with her
roommates to save money.
3:30
Books the ride for herself and
3:33
her friends,
travels in groups of three or more.
3:34
I've started to fill these out,
but if you have any more ideas,
3:39
feel free to add them in to more
fully expand upon these personas.
3:42
I've also included a blank
persona in the downloads.
3:46
You should take some time right
now to complete a third persona.
3:49
We want it to be a user who
relies on a ride sharing app.
3:53
So the more realistic it is, the better.
3:57
Once we have these personas complete,
4:01
we can more easily make decisions
that can help our audience.
4:03
We can ask questions like, how will
Businessman Bryan like our process?
4:06
Or, will the Social Sarah be interested
4:11
in using this new feature
we're thinking of adding.
4:14
By picturing examples, we can make more
informed choices on behalf of our users.
4:17
You need to sign up for Treehouse in order to download course files.
Sign upYou need to sign up for Treehouse in order to set up Workspace
Sign up