“Undo send” exists because user research observed too many professionals go from this is a great email to... I may have ruined my career in one click
From the smartphone you are reading this on, the adjustable chair with lumbar support you are sitting in, and the morning coffee you are holding with the corrugated cardboard sleeve, every detail has been shaped by user research.
The most effective designs work so well that they disappear into the background. Gmail’s autocomplete, the haptic feedback on your smartphone keyboard, and the placement of the “cart” button on your favourite food delivery app are not accidental. They are the result of meticulous design based on customer interviews, usability testing, and real-world observation to make everyday life feel effortless. Great product companies know this, which is why even amid the “Great Tech Reset”, User Researchers (“UXRs”) remain one of the fastest-growing tech jobs, with an 8% increase in roles hired since January 20221.
Great user research fuels great products, and making insights accessible ensures every decision is user-driven
A recurring theme emerged in our conversations with product-centric organizations: the “voice of the customer” is integral to building valuable products and it is the hardest insight to access. It is often locked behind overstretched UXRs who are balancing research, synthesis, and constant stakeholder requests. Even when customer insight is documented, collective knowledge is scattered across disparate interview transcripts, personal notes, and files throughout the organization. As a result, products are often designed for an audience that is not well-understood.
To bridge this gap, enterprises rely on a patchwork set of tools to understand user needs, including point solutions for respondent recruitment, user interviews, prototype testing, surveys, heatmaps, and repositories. All the while GenAI is transforming the user research landscape, enabling rapid, large-scale analysis of unstructured customer data and mass, unmoderated interviews. We are approaching a moment in time where companies can literally “hear everything their customers have ever said about them”, without having a streamlined way to surface and apply these insights.
How do we make research a seamless part of every product decision? That is a Great Question…
Great Question, an Oakland-based user research platform, is building the infrastructure to streamline the entire research process from recruiting participants, designing and deploying studies, analyzing results, and distributing incentives. The Company thrives on helping enterprises become customer-obsessed by making user research more accessible, collaborative, and actionable. Built for the enterprise, Great Question prioritizes privacy, governance, and compliance (SOC 2 Type II, GDPR, and HIPAA compliant).
We are leading an investment in Great Questions $13M Series A because we believe they are building a platform that democratizes customer insights across the organization empowering teams to live in the “voice of the customer”, and build world class products.
From Ned Dwyer, CEO of Great Question:
“It’s never been easier to build software products, but the difference between something great and AI slop is how well you understand your customer and their needs. This round of capital will fuel our next stage of growth as we make it possible to include customer research in every product, design, and marketing sprint”.
From fragmentation to integration: the evolution of user research tools
The next category-defining winner in user research tooling will make access to customer insights as seamless as the products they shape – and Great Question is doing exactly that.
Historically, market-defining “winners” have emerged in distinct pockets of the user research space, including UserTesting (prototype testing), SurveyMonkey (surveys), and Qualtrics (experience management).
User research tools have evolved alongside technological shifts. The rise of the internet enabled scalable survey distribution and the birth of SurveyMonkey (1999). Then came UserTesting (2007), capitalizing on broadband and the proliferation of video streaming to enable remote usability testing at scale. In the 2010s, cloud-based SaaS enabled new levels of collaboration, with platforms like Dovetail (2017) emerging making it easier to store, tag, and share insights across research teams.
Point solutions have shown there is significant value to be created in this sector, but have also led to fragmented workflows, forcing organizations to stitch together multiple tools. There’s an opportunity to disrupt the user research category by creating an end-to-end platform that streamlines research workflows, centralizes insights, and lowers the barriers for non-UXRs to engage with and act on user insights. Scaling research is not about replacing experts, but amplifying their impact by embedding user insights into every product team’s workflow.
Great Question’s vision is clear – and they are just getting started
CEO Ned Dwyer and CTO PJ Murray are repeat founders with a superpower for deeply understanding customers’ pain points. Their vision isn’t just to build another research tool, but to define the category in democratized research, transforming UXR from a gated function into an enterprise-wide capability. And it is working: today the company serves over 150 customers ranging from $1M to $650B+ in revenue, with 75% of paid accounts belonging to non-researchers (e.g., designers, product managers). We are looking forward to supporting their growth in the years to come.
If you are looking to elevate your user research and unlock customer insights at scale, let’s talk. Reach out to us at Inovia at [email protected], or Great Question at [email protected].
1. “New data on the product job market”, Lenny’s Newsletter, July 23rd, 2024