‍Radek: Hello! Business is all about attracting as many customers as possible, but as we said in one of our previous episodes, Not everyone is our customer. Some may negatively evaluate our product, waste our time, or use it in a way that may harm themselves or others.: Hello, in today's episode we continue the topic of patient experience. So if this is something that interests you, I invite you to listen to this episode. And our hospitality will be , which has been working for many years . I invite you.

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All of this can have a big impact on our business. To avoid such risks, there is a tool that we use in design — it's called antiperson.

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Today we will tell you about why it is worth using it when designing and building a business, and how to create such an antiperson.

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Feel free to listen. Podcast Design and Business.

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Ilona: I invite you — Ilona Skarbowska and Radek Rejsel. Hi.

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Radek: Hi.

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What is antipersona?

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Ilona: Radek, as if we could start from such a high level for now and as if you could tell what an antipersona is.

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Radek: An antipersona is such an anti-hero in our business. This is such a silhouette of a user, a customer who can not only not buy, not use our service, but also very Harm our business a lot.

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Ilona: It can mess up.

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Radek: It can be very confusing. Probably most of you are well versed with the term persona itself, because it is often used precisely in the design of services. Persona is the recipient of our services, business and solutions.

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The antipersona is in order to drive away and discourage as much as possible those individuals who may harm our business, to which our service is not dedicated.

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I often hear from young businesses that there is no point in dealing with antiperson. It makes no sense to deal with customers, that we don't want to attract, because the risks that we can catch there are not really important. We'll take care of them later.

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Ilona: I think that often the consciousness of the persons themselves is quite low, so if there is a low awareness of making normal personas, then what about the antiperson.

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Radek: Yes, but once we have a persona and have worked through it, it's time to deal with antiperson. Especially in young businesses. If, for example, our brand becomes a target of hate and we don't address it early enough, It can even kill us.

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In more mature businesses Sometimes you can cover up some things. We will also talk about this today, about such examples. However, when it comes to young businesses, it is especially worth doing.

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And if we go even deeper into this definition of the persona itself — how to understand it, then there is such an example on the Internet that you can meet. This is an example of a product for which it is worth designing antipersonae.

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Antipersona in product design

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A safe is often given as such an example. Someone who designs a safe must create a product that is easy to use and meets the needs related to the storage of some valuable things. And the second thing that is addressed with the antiperson is that this safe must be hard to break into.

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Ilona: This is basic value of the safe It protects our valuables, our money, what we put inside.

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Radek: And now yes, this first part, or how this safe is supposed to fulfill the needs of storing valuable things, that is the part from the persona. And how to prevent the break-in of such a safe, this is the part that we will work out thanks to antiperson.

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And now we have to think about how such a burglar can get into such a safe. We need to predict what tool he can use and Properly design the solution of this safe so as to effectively prevent him from doing so.

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I think this is just such a very simple but very cool analogy that you can proceed from, e.g. designing some bank securitywhen making any transfers.

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It seems to me that Blik is such an example. There, for sure, the designers and creators of Blik had to make an antiperson to figure out how not to break either Prevent potential thieves from stealing money.

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Predeath Strategy — Look to the Future

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Ilona: Yes, and it is usually done in organizations in the workshop, which is called premortem. It sounds a bit like a spell from Harry Potter, but it's not a spell at all. We don't say premortem and magical things don't happen.

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It's more about getting the project team, who know this solution very well, to sit down and think about what the potential might be Fraud, unfavorable and poor use of the product or service.

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Radek: Yes, in general, premortem is a great mental and strategic exercise. When we design strategies, we usually think of positive scenarios, but it is also necessary to hedge in case the strategy will encounter some unpredictable event and we have to deal with it.

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These can be all kinds of crises, both economic and personal. When we make a strategy, we always ask ourselves: what can go wrong? What could stand in our way? Thanks to this, we have prepared certain scenarios that allow us to effectively implement the strategy.

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Well, that's all about antiperson, yes in a nutshell, but I think it's crucial to understand why it's worth creating an antiperson in the first place

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Why create an antiperson in business?

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Ilona: Well, what value does the creation and use of this tool, or antiperson, give us in the context of our product or service?

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Radek: In general, it may happen that I mix antiperson with persona, dear listeners.

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Ilona: I will correct you.

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Radek: But unfortunately, I love doing it. I'm sorry, too. Today we are talking about the antiperson, about this antihero.

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Why is it worth creating it? I think there are at least five main reasons for this. First of all, We reduce the number of negative reviews. Secondly, we increase the safety of using our product.

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The third reason is protection of sensitive datathat can be misused. The fourth is the time savings we waste on servicing customers who won't buy anyway. And in the end — improving the quality of our products, which is a bit of a result of all these actions.

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Negative feedback and brand image crisis

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Radek: And when it comes to reducing the number of negative reviews, then I have an example from life. I once bought shoes that I thought were beautiful...

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Ilona: So you flew to design.

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Radek: I went for design, but I also don't buy things that are cheap, because I like to wear things for a long time... I focus on quality. And it turned out that these shoes broke down very quickly, to my surprise.

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Ilona: You must have been very angry too.

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Radek: I got very angry and went to advertise them. AND my complaint has been cancelled, because these shoes turned out to be shoes for basketball or some other sport, which should be practiced indoors in a special hall.

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I think I was just such an antiperson for these shoes...

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Ilona: For this particular product.

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Radek: I was very upset, of course. However, I am not the kind of person who will go to make an affair and drama, press on the Internet...

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Ilona: And foot negative comments...

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Anti-Persona and Better Customer Targeting

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Radek: Although I could do that.

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And now I think to myself that the brand has not secured a certain important thing. Messages were not secured in the purchase processthat would discourage me from buying these shoes.

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Because I don't play basketball or any other sport these shoes were made for. But this information was not secured. So if such antipersona, she could pick me like thatwho is looking for designer shoes...

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Ilona: As a potential customer who will simply be dissatisfied.

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Radek: Who will advertise. Who will post on the internet...

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Ilona: Also in one of our podcasts we talked about a statistic that says that It takes 12 positive opinions to eliminate one negative opinion.. So going back to the analogy of those shoes, the complaint of which was not recognized, it would be necessary to sell 12 pairs...

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Radek: Basketball players, not another antiperson.

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Ilona: Exactly, to the basketball players who would give a positive review to cover this one of yours.

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Radek: Yes, exactly. And I think in terms of negative feedback there are tons of great studies, which show how difficult they are to deal with and how much they affect the brand, purchasing decisions, as well as customer acquisition.

This is very strong data. It is important that Build a positive image on the Internet, because negative reviews effectively scare away potential customers who have not yet made a purchase.

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Big brands can handle it better, but younger companies may not survive it — negative feedback can be downright a knockout for them.

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Ilona: It can lay down the business simply.

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Radek: Exactly. It is worth mentioning the so-called snowball effect. One negative opinion attracts people who like to complain, even if they are not actual users of the product or customer.

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Therefore, it is worth protecting yourself with an antiperson to avoid a situation in which people who are not the target group buy our products and then they are dissatisfied with them.

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Products that cause harm — examples

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Radek: Another important aspect is the misuse of the product, which can lead to certain consequences, which are related to emotional or physical harmwho have used them in the wrong way.

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Filter Snapchat

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An example is Snapchat and its “speed filter”. It was an overlay that showed speed while driving, and users took selfies or made videos with it. It is easy to imagine what kind of threat this could have generated.

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IlonaIt could have been used in a situation where generates danger and potential accident.

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Radek: She was made for it. Not that there were accidents, but actually there were accidents...

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Ilona: To shoot such situations.

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Radek: Yes. This was evident posing a health and life hazard while driving.

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Pokemon Go

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Ilona: Reminds me case with Pokemon Go, where users, driving cars, caught Pokemon, because it was easier and faster. The developers then introduced a restriction - when the application detected a higher speed, it asked several times if you were definitely not a driver, but a passenger.

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And in a very cool way It made me think. It was such a stumbling block that said, hey, but are you sure you're not a driver because it's dangerous. I think it worked to improve security.

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So they also identified this problem that people are using the app in the wrong way.

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Antiperson as an aid in predicting problems

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Radek: Well, right now doing such an exercise in which you ask yourself this question: in what wrong way? In what risky situations? What can you use such an application for? For example, in the case of Snapchat, it could prevent people from dying in the streets.

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Ilona: Such a filter would not have been created at all.

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Radek: Exactly. This whole filter was very strange. All this made Snapchat have image crisis and lawsuits, but it's a big company. Smaller companies need to think about such risks even earlier.

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Snapchat initially downplayed the whole thing and introduced a sticker warning not to use the filter while driving. ultimately completely removed this featurebecause it was clearly a one-way street. Therefore, it is worth addressing potential risks in advance, especially if they are obvious.

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Another example, perhaps no longer digital, but depicting inappropriate use of a product, is the story of Procter & Gamble, which released so many nice cubes for the dishwasher.

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Children swallowed these colorful pills and even did online challenges to see who would swallow more. The company responded well — They immediately redesigned the packaging, added information about the dangers and engaged influencers who explained to children not to do such challenges.

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And again, if there was an antipersona, if you could think that these beautiful, colorful objects could become the focus of kids' attention, you could predict a little bit and maybe Introduce some security and such a situation would not have happened if these pills were swallowed.

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Which is quite absurd, but many things seem absurd to us, and people do them, and maybe it's worth thinking about.

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Ilona: And it is thanks to such an antiperson that we are able to catch more ideas for the use of our product.

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Anti-Persona and Protection of Sensitive Data

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Radek: Another important aspect is protection of sensitive dataEspecially in digital products. We have all heard of cases of data leakage, or maybe some of us have experienced it ourselves.

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If we store sensitive data, such as financial or medical data, in the application, we need to make sure that people who could steal it do not have the opportunity to do so.

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‍Technical safeguards it's one thing, but it's also worth making it clear to users that data is protected, which can act as a deterrent to potential thieves.

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Ilona: A bit like deterrence through product design. For example, the iPhone has a remote lock function, which makes it less profitable to steal such a phone, because there are fewer things you can do with this phone. It cannot be... or it is much more difficult to reset it from scratch and without any consequences to be able to resell it.

Radek: I hope the Airpods will be protected just as well. I see my stolen ones all the time somewhere in Lublin. Thief, if you can hear me...

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Ilona: I doubt they're listening to our podcast, but we're crying because Radek had to buy a second Airpods.

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Radek: I do not like to buy new things, and unfortunately I did not manage to buy used ones. Those were used, after the family. As for the data leak itself, I think we know too many examples.

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How do you reach the right users and customers?

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Radek: Another thing is that we can reach people whom our service or our product can actually help.

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Ilona: Yes, exactly. This is something that I myself use very often. Once we have created a persona, that is, the profile of our ideal client with his concerns, needs and challenges, then we have such a box with its exact description.

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But unifying, having an antiperson, that is, someone we don't want to attract, we can create different content more accurately — whether it's podcasts, blogs, ads, or even the user's path in the product.

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Thanks to this, we address the needs of our persona, and not attract antipersonas, that is, people, for whom our product has no value. This also helps to avoid a situation in which our message is directed at people who may generate the negative opinions that you mentioned at the beginning.

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Radek: Yes. In the end, all this leads to an improvement in the quality of our product. There is a saying, although I do not remember the author, that”Quality is the best business plan”.

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We should take care of this first, to make our product or service as good as possible. And it is antipersonas that can bring us closer to this quality, because they create such an interesting balance between who we want to attract and who we don't.

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This is the “sweet spot” between the persona and the antiperson. Persona, that is, the Ideal client, and the antiperson, that is, the one we do not want. With a well-defined antiperson, we can Design solutions more effectively, which at the same time protect our customers from potential threats from these unwanted users.

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This makes our product safer, more accessible and above all more personalized, which is very important.

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Ilona: Yes. This tool is really useful, especially when someone on the team — be it design, marketing, or sales — Brings a brilliant new idea.

We can then pull out our persona and antiperson to assess whether the implementation of this idea will accidentally direct us towards people who are not our target audience. It's a great way to check, whether the product is not going in the wrong direction.

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Radek: Yes, exactly.

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Antypersona and persona — an essential duo in business

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Ilona: I have to admit that I really like this quote about quality as the best business plan. I had never heard him before, but I immediately thought, “Tell that to Ryanair!”

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But in fact, they also have their quality, only their “sweet spot” is completely elsewhere. Their antiperson can be someone who expects the highest quality of service during the flight.

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Ta antipersona does not have to be in such a negative sense, because we kind of use this phrase anti-hero, which may suggest that this is something wrong. No.

Radek: Sometimes it is.

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Ilona: Sometimes it is, as with Snapchat and the filter they did.

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Radek: Or a data thief.

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Ilona: Yes, referring to the safe, or to the theft of data from digital products. But if you look at other products, each product has its own persona and its antiperson. And it is this service, this quality of ours, that defines who we speak to.

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Well, a little opposite or such a second pole will be our antipersona. We need to know who is not our client in order to Don't try to address the entire marketbecause it makes no sense.

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The effect of antipersonic on the resulting product

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Radek: And who is the antiperson of our podcast? We also have it very well defined.

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Ilona: Yes, definitely. This might be a good time to talk about what it looked like in practice. create a persona for our podcastbecause we haven't developed it yet.

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When we started thinking about the podcast, and this was before Winter was created, we noticed that There was a lack of dialogue between design and business. What was needed was a platform that would translate UX in a business context.

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We decided that we will do a podcast, where we will invite people from the business, will we, for example, also be talk about these business issues, about the fact that you have to count the return on investment in UX.

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Radek: Which, by the way, is very difficult. Last time I saw this meme with Pablo Escobar waiting. I think it was just “Customer Experience designers waiting for a return on investment”.

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Ilona: As I say it, there is some truth in every meme. But going back to this antipersona, yes, we made it very clear then who our persona is. We want to talk to business owners, to people who... I laugh a little, that they're sitting in Excel and looking at which direction the business is going, they're looking at the numbers.

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Radek: Maybe they don't even necessarily look at numbers, but they're just sitting in business, designing strategies, and marketing sales are, let's say, such their horses. And this UX turns out to be very important, but It is not yet clear why it is important.

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Ilona: It's so elusive yet. And then there was an antipersona of the podcast, and we told ourselves, without even calling it an antiperson at the time, that we didn't want to talk to the designers. Podcasts for UX designers is a mass.

Radek: They are very good.

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Ilona: They are very good, so why should we go to this Red Ocean, that is, the Red Ocean, where it already is Lots of podcasts to choose from. Where can we go to Blue Ocean, the Blue Ocean, where these podcasts showing the business value of UX are not there.

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And at the time we started, there was no podcast, especially in Polish, that combined these two fields.

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Creating an antiperson in practice — a case study

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Radek: I think they were, but probably not in Polish. Let's do an exercise like this, okay? Are you ready?

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Ilona: Okay.

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Radek: Let's add this antipersony template for our podcast, so that our listeners have the opportunity to try it themselves and see how such an antiperson is made.

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Ilona: Can I contact our editor now? Can you paste it on the board now? I'm the one who paints now and the boards will appear here.

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Radek: Maybe we'll add a link, Asia will paste the link in the episode description. Then we told ourselves that these are UX designers. What is the purpose of such a UX designer when listening to a podcast?

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Ilona: I think these I would divide UX/UI designers into two subgroups., that is, those beginners and those who have already been in the profession for some time. Both of these groups will have a fairly similar goal, except that it will probably be achieved in different ways.

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Both groups want to know something. Maybe someone would like to learn about the news, maybe they can deepen their knowledge of UX. Anyway, a podcast about UX for designers would probably be about design life.

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Radek: Or about very deep UX issues.

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Ilona: Yes, or maybe for UX managers too?

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Radek: But we have these UX designers here. What are their motivations?

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Ilona: Motivation can be the desire to deepen knowledge.

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Radek: Why?

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Ilona: Because, for example, they want to be better designers.

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Radek: Or get a good job. Or enter the industry. What you need to achieve the goal?

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Ilona: I need this knowledge that I am trying to acquire precisely by listening to a podcast.

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Radek: And I need someone who... has some specific knowledge related to this issue. Ok. IB what actions do i take to do it?

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Ilona: In the context of listening to podcasts? Subscribing to the podcast?

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Radek: Searches for podcasts first.

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Ilona: Looking for podcasts. Maybe I choose the ones I like, check, listen to new ones.

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Radek: I observe and so on. Yes. What platforms does it do this on? What platforms? Where to look for such a podcast?

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Ilona: Yeah, well, I think Spotify, YouTube would be my first choices out there somewhere if I thought of myself as such a person. iTunes, or Apple Music...

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Radek: They're probably on LinkedIn, in different groups.

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Ilona: I would search on streaming sites more.

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Radek: Just so, would you just type us in?

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Ilona: There are also Podcast Rankings, where you can filter, say, topics and see a collection of podcasts about UX there.

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How do specific customers affect the business?

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Radek: And what are the consequences of people who want to learn UX and acquire new competencies, perhaps get into the industry... What will be the consequences of that They will be our customers?

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Ilona: Such a person can turn on an episode, audition for five, ten minutes and come to the conclusion: “This is not for me,” and then give us a poor rating. This is a reference to what you talked about earlier.

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Maybe also start talking in your environment: “There is nothing interesting about this podcast.” If we do not clearly define who we are targeting the podcast and why it was created, then such opinions may appear.

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And on the other hand, we, as the host of this podcast, can look at the statistics and say, what happens, we bring up topics that are important from our perspective, our customers talk about it, and for example we see that 90% of people drop out. So this Audience drops after 10 minutes of podcast.

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And we without combining quantitative and qualitative knowledge, so here we look at quantitative data, we can go to this analytic tool, fire up this tenth minute, and it can say, Hey, maybe we said something in that tenth minute that scares this person off.

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This could give us wrong data again and based on erroneous data we're going to start making a decision about the future of the podcast, and that may not be the point at all.

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Creating an Antiperson Summary

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Radek: So, in order to build such an antiperson, you have to determine, what goals does it have, what she wants to achieve, what is their motivation.

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It is often the case that, for example, he wants to steal something, he wants to gain some knowledge or to impress someone. There is a situation behind this, for example, I want to make money, so I need data that I want to use in a way that is not entirely legal.

The next thing I do, which is what I do in turn to hack into the system or eat something that is not edible. What tools, technologies, what ways will I use to achieve this goal? So, for example, I will use a crowbar to disarm such a safe.

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In the end, what is most important — What are the consequences for our business, what will come of it, what harm. Will it be that my brand will be defamed or will I face some lawsuits and huge fines?

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These things are absolutely the most important and it's really worth thinking about. I will emphasize once again, probably 58 times already, that as long as we are big, huge brands, corporations, we are able to cope with it somehow. Such lawsuits or such situations are often not a problem for such brands...

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Ilona: Until the time.

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Radek: Until the time, of course... But when we are younger, when we are just starting out, when we really care about it, to make the best first impression, we can not think about the fact that it is not important. This is absolutely important.

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therefore I encourage everyone to do this exercise. — checking risks, analyzing who is not our customer, to whom we do not sell services and who, in case of misuse of our product, can cause harm to themselves or others. Such actions can expose our business to unpleasant consequences that we want to avoid.

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Thank you very much for this episode, if you enjoyed it, I invite you to listen to others. I invite you to subscribe to our channel and I hope to see you soon.

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Ilona: Thanks. Hi.

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Radek: Hi.