Not Another Guide for Recruiting UX Research Participants

My unforeseen user recruitment journey

Credit: David Travis

The ‘Not Another Guide…’ series is primarily crafted for frequently asked quesrtions from UX-related students or recent graduates, blending insights from my professional journey as a UX designer and my reflections as a UX student.

One of my most memorable school projects is Neesh, an iOS app dedicated to providing a digital affirming space for LGBTQ2+ college students. As the product caters to a marginalized group, our team prioritized running comprehensive user research, making it the most research-heavy project I’ve ever undertaken.

Given that our team consisted of three international students with limited ties to Canada and a product starting from scratch (i.e., 0 user base), our primary challenge was recruiting user research participants rather than conducting the research itself.

Here are the lessons I learned, which might be helpful if you encounter similar struggles:

1. 🏘️ Find the community: Research where your target users congregate. In our case, LGBTQ2+ college students, so we engaged with college pride societies and local queer communities. Approaching queer community organizers yielded better response rates.
2. 🛜 Meet in-person over online: might not always be the standard approach, as online platforms often offer access to a larger pool for recruiting target users. However, in our unique situation where trust barriers among strangers were higher than usual, attending in-person queer events proved more efficient in finding users and establishing trust compared to online platforms
3. 😌 Choose a comfortable spot for users: making sure users are in a comfortable space is key, especially when dealing with a specific user group. In our case, recruiting new queer student users without outing them or causing discomfort needed a delicate touch. We found that talking about the project at the right moment and in the right context really boosted the conversion rate.
4. 👩‍🏫 Get endorsement: Getting endorsements can really make a difference, especially for building trust. We tried sending out recruitment invitations in public Discord channels like the school Pride Society, but didn’t get much response, even with gift cards. But when our UX instructor posted about it in our course Slack channel, things changed. Even though it was a smaller group, we got more confirmations for our user interviews.
5. 👯 Expand your network: It’s not surprising that friends or friends of friends are more likely to say yes to your invitation. In our case, we got a lot of leads from cisgender heterosexual friends because, let’s face it, everyone knows at least one queer friend.