CX/UX researchers are a young IT profession for Kazakhstan. These are specialists who study the user's interaction with the product in order to make it better, easier, and more convenient.

What is Customer Experience (CX) and User Experience (UX)? CX is the customer's impression of the company at all stages: from the first contact to after—sales service. UX is focused on the experience of using a particular product: its convenience, functionality and the emotional reaction of users.

Zhazira Berdybai has been working at the Kolesa Group since 2019. Her career path is: call center operator → recruiter of users for qualitative research → CX/UX researcher. She is now a senior CX/UX researcher at Krisha.kz .

In this article, Zhazira will talk about the prospects of a new IT profession for Kazakhstan, the impact of research on business and product, and also share a working case.

A researcher is a friend and advocate of users. When a problem appears in a product, we dive into it, collect and analyze information, come up with hypotheses, and participate in discovery processes. This gives the team confidence in their decisions and the ability to act on the basis of data.

Researchers have been working at the Kolesa Group since 2020. In Kazakhstan, we were one of the first to develop a professional community: we hold meetups, hold lectures at universities. Recently, the first graduation of the Kolesa Academy for UX researchers was celebrated. Out of 1100 applications for a paid internship, 9 guys passed, 4 received offers. And we were the first to publish our salaries. The salary fork of a UX researcher in the Kolesa Group is from 300 thousand tenge to 1 million 250 thousand tenge.

Now in Kazakhstan, there are researchers in many banks, telecom and e-comm companies, and even in startups. According to our calculations, there are now about 60 people across the country specializing in CX/UX research. This is about 1 researcher per 350,000 Kazakhstanis. The needs of the market are growing, and there will be more researchers.

There are dozens of tools in our arsenal. At the Kolesa Group, we often use in-depth interviews and usability tests. We conduct them both in our office and online, because the product Krisha.kz they are used all over the country. For example, I have over 1,000 hours of in-depth interviews and usability tests to my credit.

Researchers also travel to the fields — directly to users. This helps to understand the context and conditions in which a person is located. We often appear at car markets, service stations, developers or real estate agencies.

Here is an example of a study that is similar to speed dating, i.e. speed dating. We invite 10 users to the office and seat them one at a time. We are calling 10 managers and designers, who take turns sitting down with the participants and asking questions about the product. Each dialogue lasts no more than 7 minutes, and then they change in a circle. Surprisingly, in just an hour everyone manages to communicate with everyone, and the guys from the team Krisha.kz there are many new ideas for improving the product.

Based on the information collected, we prepare recommendations on how to improve the product and the processes that affect it. According to them, designers assemble prototypes of the product's functionality. Then we test these prototypes and bring news from users. 

In some cases, we inform you that the design solves the user's task and does not require improvements. In others, we offer corrections and are glad that we identified the problem in time and solved it.

The researcher must be very involved in the product and the team, know the strategy and goals, key metrics and indicators. It is important to bring new knowledge to the team, to grow the CX/UX maturity of products.

The researcher should have developed such "software" as empathy, curiosity, critical thinking, teamwork, observation and flexibility. All this helps to make a clear brief before the study, hear the pain of users and highlight the most important things.

A single search for long-term and short-term rentals. This confused users and rental rates were lower than in neighboring categories. Namely, conversion to contact and successful submission of ads.  

Improve the tenant's path. Increase the feed conversion and the number of contacts per ad.

We have fully checked the tenant's client path: from the idea of renting an apartment to settling in. To do this, we conducted in-depth interviews with 18 users. We have identified what difficulties arise for those looking for an apartment. Then we quantified which of the found problems are most common.

a) Collected all the signals and symptoms about the problems. We added to the list after conducting interviews with the seekers. We have prioritized the criticality of the problems. For example, sometimes people had an "expectation/reality" effect from photos of apartments and watching them live.

b) Generated solutions on how to do better. To do this, we brainstormed with the team and reviewed other products on the market.

c) We designed the client's path — as it was at that time and how to do it in order to take into account all the needs.

d) We collected layouts, conducted moderated usability tests with those who are looking for an apartment and those who want to rent them out.

e) Divided the search for rental housing into two categories — long-term and short-term rentals. The search filter and the ad page have been redesigned. The submission form for landlords has been changed. We've made changes to categories, search filters, and ad pages.

1. The number of users who posted an advertisement for housing has increased by 48%.

2. The number of users looking for an apartment has increased by 25%. 

3. The functionality brought additional revenue for the company.

Of course, this is the result of teamwork together with the service, product manager, designer, analyst and developers. But it was the researchers who made the business closer to users and influenced the product. 

Go to the researchers if you like:

• Genuinely interested in people and their stories;
• To understand how the world works, to be curious about everything;

• To include critical thinking in order to be able to question information and draw conclusions;
• To work in a team: to keep her informed of how things are going with the research and receive feedback about her work;
• To find non-standard ways to solve problems.

Recommendations for novice researchers from the Kolesa Team.

You don't have to study for many years. If you have an education in psychology, sociology, marketing, or experience in marketing/sociological research, you can practice the craft of a researcher in a few months.

With what background is it best to go into the field of CX/UX, said Dinara Abdildinova, team leader of the research team. In her article, she compiled a list of recommendations for those who are looking at the profession.