Market Research

[ghost]

Has market research been carried out on the Time app concept? (Where can I find this @nelsonic?)

@katbow I noticed you use Toggl. What do you think of it? Are there any glaring problems with it? Anything that could improve your experience using it?

[nelsonic]

CC: @harrygfox

[katbow]

Things I like about toggl:

• Options to give reminders if you stop tracking time (which I do often). Can decide when you want these reminders (eg. after 5 minutes of not starting timer)
• Can set my workday for when I want the above reminders
• One click start & can choose to describe the activity or not
• If I do forget to track time, I can add it in manually

Things I don't like:

• Usually it is set for a 25 minute timer and an alarm goes off at the end, but sometimes it inexplicably goes on endlessly until I stop it manually.

I don't really use it by clicking to start the timer on an issue/PR on GitHub, but I can see this being useful for a lot of people. I think it would be useful for me too actually, but I default to starting it from the same place every time.

[sohilpandya]

No Apple Watch App for Toggl. Just Sayin

@markwilliamfirth you'll find some more focused (apple watch only) set of testing results in some of the issues in learn-apple-watch-development

• Research Existing Time-Focussed Apple Watch Apps learn-apple-watch-development#3
• Timely (iOS + Apple Watch App) learn-apple-watch-development#9
• Hours Time Tracking (iOS + Apple Watch App) learn-apple-watch-development#5

Hope it helps. 😊

[harrygfox]

Toggl

I loved toggle too, but it's too drab for my liking anymore. Also I couldn't STAND the constant reminders when the timer wasn't running. Having to type out what I'm doing every time I start the timer (native app) meant that I would not do it or just repeat the previous one even if it wasn't actually that related to what I was doing.
The massive boon of Toggl for me was being able to start a timer on my phone and then stop it on my computer either natively or via web app.

Now Then

Since @iteles introduced this one to me I've really taken to it. I love the automatic colour-coding of tasks and subtasks, starting and switching between a nice compressed menu of tasks with one tap is MASSIVE. A Menu of tasks altogether is friggin great - No more scrolling through lists of my own gibberish to find the task that I'll be continuing right now - I can very quickly find an accurate name for the task I'm working on. If my task doesn't exist it's very quick to make a new one. same with a subtask.
I also absolutely LOVE the graphs / calendar views of when I did what and for how long. KEY for invoicing and generally understanding how I've spend my day.

---

Having tried to do it for a while now I realise my priorities with time-tracking are

• Useful Data Visualisation and export
• One-tap (or as close as can be) start / stop / switch tasks
• Web AND Mobile integration (maybe a PWA)

[innov8tor3]

Apologies for butting in, and maybe preaching to the converted, but www.meetup.com is a great place for doing live market research - aka rapid testing - to obtain live feedback, which I believe whole heartedly is key to early stage App prototyping.

This particular event is huge, and it would be surprising if some prior and at event networking didn't uncover someone with market knowledge about Time and Tracking Apps:

https://www.meetup.com/ProductTank/events/238557846/

Another great place to find folk is on angel.co, especially where they have a twitter profile, as some are more outward looking, and will actually come and meet folk who make contact. There's also a great market search facility, which could help find who is working on comparable Apps.

I'm based in London, UK, and had some good "meetup" results previously, combined with folk on the London Open Coffee meetup group. An email question there about what App folks use for time tracking might yield some answers from a - mostly passive - audience of 10,000+. (Just needed better products myself to show them, but that's a longer story ...)

Sorry if this is all old hat ...

[innov8tor3]

Something else I wanted to mention was the Apps Junction meetup, which allowed folk to show case Apps in development live, and look for audience reaction.

Those running it were mostly interested in larger Dev work, and were really prospecting for business. But the idea has merit in itself, and possibly Google might be persuaded to allow folk space to put up a more consistent version that was focused on the audience needs, not the suppliers'.

Would also be great to have an App that does this, to avoid the cost and hassle of finding premises, and I reckon I could put up a really simple wire frame if anyone was interested.

Mainly off topic here, I know, but love to see a branch on this subject, since market research is an area too many startups leave to chance and random good luck.

I was also looking at import.io as a way of checking out audience discussion on any subject - I was looking at invoice factoring - but it could equally apply to Time Tracking Apps ...

Yes, it's an itch of mine, a passionate itch ...

[nelsonic]

This "research" issue is unfocussed and has zero screenshots of what we actually want to capture: UX.
Closing. (will re-open a new one with precise instructions for how to share research)

[nelsonic]

GOTO: dwyl/product-ux-research#34