Connecting Quant and Qual
Yo Growth Designer 👋
I’m Tregg Frank. I've been designing things on the Internet since 2005. Most recently, I started my own company called Divinate, an AI-powered tool that helps you make sense of user research in seconds.
My career has taught me the value of research. Talking to customers is the wind in my sails. I’ve also always cared about measurement and growth. The two, to me, are massive competitive advantages when in the hands of product designers.
So, let’s talk about how you can connect the two together and use a tool like Divinate to get insight faster. Time to become… dangerous.
🔮 May your data reveal all,
Tregg, Cofounder, CEO, Designer @ Divinate
The numbers don't lie, right?
Well, the numbers might lie.
Growth design is very data-driven. But chasing metrics alone can also increase chargebacks, refunds, and calls to support. Not to mention the damage to the brand. Sometimes our growth goals can lead us down paths of quick wins with long-term losses.
One of the best hedges against short-term thinking is to talk to our customers. Yes, do some user research. Qualitative data, baby.
Research tells us two things in a growth context:
- The mental models our customers have of our business.
- The why behind the numbers.
Those things are nearly impossible to divine from quantitative data alone.
Step 1: Identify Problems
Converting freemium users to paid plans is notoriously tough. You add some banners and nudges in the app to push people to upgrade, and... nothing changes. This isn't just hypothetical—I've dealt with it.
At Stark, we added a button to try a new, premium feature called Sidekick in a side menu. Sidekick is an AI accessibility audit tool.
Users ignored it because they thought it was an ad. The only way we understood why it was failing was by talking to our customers.
Sometimes the problem is obvious and easy to fix, but when a feature like Sidekick gets zero engagement, it might not be the feature that's the issue. It could be poor design choices, placement, or copywriting. Instead of guessing, talk to your users and test your assumptions.
Step 2: Talk to Customers
It's crucial to move quickly. Instead of lengthy focus groups, book short, targeted calls with up to six users to gather feedback. You should have enough insights to start iterating by session two or three.
If you have a budget, use a recruitment service. If not, tap into your active customers, network, or even people at a coffee shop.
Schedule 30-minute sessions, keeping in mind that about 25% of people will cancel, so if you need six sessions, book at least eight. Work with what you've got, and don't worry about perfection—speed is key.
Step 3: Synthesis
If you need to present your findings to your team, Divinate can help you make sense of the research sessions you conducted in seconds. It’s pretty easy.
Drop the recordings of your sessions into a folder. Each session will be summarized, tagged, and have themes written automatically. You can highlight the moments you found most insightful in the transcript and playback the video at any time.
From there, Divinate generates themes (the most common and impactful learnings) based on every session in your folder. These themes have citations and link back to the source, so you know where the system got the ideas from.
If you're doing it the old-school way, this synthesis process takes days or weeks. Divinate speeds you up big time and can help you catch connections you might have missed otherwise. And remember, growth is about moving fast. Use the tools that'll help you do that.
And, spoiler alert, we're working on some tools that'll help you combine quantitative and qualitative data quickly to do this exact kind of workflow. But more on that soon.
Concluding Thoughts
By connecting qualitative insights with quantitative data, you can avoid the pitfalls of chasing short-term wins and truly understand the “why” behind your metrics. This builds a deeper connection with your customers, allowing you to serve them better. As you continue to iterate and optimize, continue to talk to your customers. It provides clarity and direction better than most other things. Don't just aim for growth—aim for growth that's intentional.
About the Author
Tregg is the cofounder of Divinate, a product designer, and side project cooker. When he isn't designing or trying to start things, Tregg can be found hanging out with his wife and two sons or riffing around on guitar.
About Divinate
Divinate helps designers, product managers, and researchers like you make better product decisions by making sense of user research faster than ever.
