How Podium Democratizes Research Insights

Research is only as valuable as its reach. Every researcher knows the importance of sharing insights.

But democratizing research findings is easier said than done. Traditional approaches like sharing insights through presentations, though widely adopted, aren’t effective and often fall short.

The product team at Podium tried a new approach. Rather than just presenting the findings at the end of the project, the team decided to invite and collaborate with the stakeholders right from the start. 

We recently sat down with Pat Johnson, Senior Product Marketing Manager at Podium to learn more about the approach and how it helps Podium to democratize research insights.

Building a Library of Customer Knowledge

In qualitative research, if you trace back the origin of insight, you’ll end up with an interview recording. That’s where the actual research begins, so that's where the product marketing team at Podium decided to involve their stakeholders. 

Pat prefers using Grain to record and share customer interviews with product managers and other stakeholders—in a shared library. Here’s how. 

When a customer interview ends, Pat opens the Grain recording to tag and share it with the Podium workspace library—a library that’s shared among the Podium team. On the other side, product managers go to the workspace library and use the tag to follow the latest interviews and insights. 

“We are constantly conducting interviews with customers and prospects to gather product/market insights. After those interviews end, I tag them immediately to make them more accessible and digestible for my teammates who may want to review them.”

- Pat Johnson, Senior Product Marketing Manager, Podium.

Collaborators and stakeholders also leverage Grain to listen to relevant research interviews and catch up on the insights—on their schedule. This way, the team cuts back on meeting time and gets the information they need anytime. For example, one of the PMs at Podium listens to customer interviews in Grain while he goes on a walk.👇  

Collaborating Over Insights

PMs and PMMs at Podium use clips from recordings, aka Highlights, to draw attention to specific moments and enable other teams to hear them for themselves. 

“Seeing what other people highlighted in their interviews is super beneficial for me. For example, when someone’s talking to a customer about the roadmap, they can create a highlight capturing the customer’s excitement and reaction. I can quickly review the call and determine if it's worth following up with that customer to pull together a case study about their experience with our products.” 

By allowing everyone to collaborate over the interview recordings directly, Pat and others ensure that stakeholders have a chance to experience customer feedback first-hand and eliminate the “game of telephone.”

In addition, Pat and other team members save a lot of time using highlights—as there’s no need to watch hour-long recordings unless you’re synthesizing the qualitative data. Pat agrees, “Sometimes, someone is inevitably missed on a meeting invitation, or can't make it. Having Grain makes sure that everyone has a chance to review and comment on the contents of that meeting. It keeps us on the same page when calendars get busy.” 

Driving Better Decisions using Customer Insights

The team at Podium built an easy-to-use, searchable repository of user interviews—enabling collaborators and stakeholders to access and use the customer knowledge to make better decisions.

Your user interviews are no different. They contain a treasure trove of insights, feedback, and product ideas—that are currently inaccessible to your stakeholders. Try Grain to record, organize, and build a library of customer knowledge.