Customer first: BIOMATDB’s user-centric approach drives efforts to create innovative digital solutions

How BIOMATDB is applying the user-centric approach

User-centric design takes centre stage in BIOMATDB’s efforts to build a game-changing database and marketplace. At the beginning of the project, a knowledge compilation exercise was performed to collect information on the contextual and environmental aspects relevant to the biomaterials solutions to be developed. This included, for example, data on related biomaterials projects, resources, publications, and products. In conjunction, the consortium defined and identified the five groups of stakeholders that are potential future users of the two core applications: researchers, demanders, suppliers, enablers, and investors/policy makers [4].

Already at the concept stage, the opinion of over 100 of these key biomaterial stakeholders were sought via an online questionnaire, to gather information on their pain points, needs and requirements. In addition, qualitative interviews were performed to improve and better refine the picture already provided by the questionnaire. The results enabled us to establish and prioritise the sources and contents for the first technical concept and design of the solutions. Finally, we made use of an internal survey of the biomaterial experts within the project team to identify any potential new needs and requirements that were not highlighted previously.

Meta-use cases, scenarios and personas for the database and marketplace have been identified based on all the information collected during the knowledge compilation and from the findings of the above-mentioned surveys and interviews. They are currently being used as the starting point for the technical teams to build the solutions. They are incorporated into the design process of both the back-end (selection and treatment of the data that will be used by the users) and the front-end (the interactive interface that the user will use to search and visualise the data) of the applications.

However, it is unlikely that the original design will meet all user wishes and demands. BIOMATDB has therefore dedicated a whole work package to the demonstration and validation of the solutions to be developed in order to ensure that they perform as intended and serve the customers they are destined to. Once the initial design is finalised, a first internal validation will be executed on aspects such as usability, performance, and functionality. The feedback obtained will reveal the strengths and weaknesses of the solutions and bring to the fore potential areas for improvement and refinement of the systems. Appraisals of the suggestions will be made based on the importance of the requirements as well as the technical feasibility of the changes to be implemented.

The second, enhanced version of the database and marketplace will then undergo a series of iterative evaluation and design cycles, that will be based on the feedback gathered from the different external end-user groups. The demonstration and testing will be run by different BIOMATDB partners across Europe to collect inputs about the experience using the applications, the user interface and its functionality. The test users will be recruited through the networks of the BIOMATDB partners, but also by reaching out to the stakeholders identified during the knowledge collection phase. Different tools can be used to gather the feedback of the various users, such as virtual training workshops, webinars, surveys, feedback forms, and interviews. An analysis of the data received from test users will enable the identification of user patterns, feature requests, system bugs, and common issues that will be prioritised for incorporation by the technical teams into the iterative design process to further improve the solutions.