Using proto-personas to Know your user – Pt I

How to facilitate an ideation workshop around solving problems, understanding through ideation, knowledge sharing (based on agreed on personas) and then attributing those personas, via SMEs validation, to surfacing UI to promote next steps plotted on a goal-oriented roadmap.

Execute a Content Audit using proto-personas to gain a deeper understanding of user needs. Consolidate personas, communicate findings, to achieve a deeper understanding of all users.
Empower UX to move forward with experience maps to uncover user behaviour and emotions.

Please note; for client confidentiality sensitive parts of all imagery has been pixelated. All work is copyright ©RussellWebbDesign 2026


Design Process

Service Blueprint

Service Blueprint

Proto-Personas

Service Design

Journey Mapping

Customer Experience Design


Limited Data, Maximum Impact

Delivering with resource constraints and tight timeline, this Content Audit / Inventory Battle Plan leverages the power of proto-personas as the primary intel.

Gather the troops

Assemble all content audit data

Regulated design environments are often constrained – it is important to offer agility and be resourceful. This level of Service Design would benefit from ;

  • Customer surveys
  • Stakeholder interviews
  • Analytics (rationalised down into meaningful chunks)

…and additional data. For this UX project the starting point was an extended collection of unverified proto-personas. These were then rationalised in to bucketed or grouped personas.

Navigating the complexity of proto-personas

Proto-personas: Adaptability in the face of organisational inertia and provide clarity to maintain stakeholder engagement.

Adapt UX to audience and personas

Larger organisations, often new agile methodologies, may still be in the early stages of embracing lean UX, so adapt your approach to your audience is a key skill.

When personas are agreed and validated as the only ‘source of truth’ – there also must be alignment that these refine and adapt personas over time, ensuring that they remain relevant.

Overly detailed personas can dilute effectiveness, especially for large organisations. This task focused on consolidating personas for greater clarity.

Focussed personas work well. Larger organisations multiply these audience types and their impact is reduced. This task looked at grouping and sorting by commonalities

Conduct extensive desk research to develop a deep understanding

Embark on a deep dive of user research to become the brand’s go-to expert on your target audience.

Absorb insights

Take the time to listen and absorb – Become the brand’s knowledge hub.

Absorbing insights and data is vital. Time spent at this stage of your research is key for informing a future IA.

Dig deeper to understand your users problems, needs and goals

Experience maps are your tools to excavate the nuances of user behaviour, emotions, and motivations. Use this to win over their hearts and minds.

Empathy-driven UX; Personas and experience maps

By delving into the emotional landscape of proto-personas, designers can gain a deeper user understanding. This insight fuelled the development of a clear and empathetic experience map.

Understand your audience types ; Their needs, aspirations, and behaviours. Commonalities and patterns will surface.

Common Thread and Outcomes

By selecting the most crucial key phrases from the workshop discussions, I was able to distil the essence of each audience type and crafted them into a call-to-arms that galvanised the mapping stage

Next steps

By consolidating vast amounts of data into prototype persona groups, this Service Design approach conveys insights for stakeholders to digest, leading to deeper user understanding for all involved. This then informs the next stage, ‘Using Experience Maps to uncover user behaviour and emotions.’

Please note; for client confidentiality sensitive parts of all imagery has been pixelated. All work is copyright ©RussellWebbDesign 2024

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