Do not focus on tools or platforms
Do not focus on tools or platforms in the beginning of your UXR journey. First learn how to conduct user research without them. Master how to ask solid non-leading questions and interview. The rest comes from practice. Here are 6 reasons why this is critical:
ACCESS: You won’t always have access to the same tools. Access varies depending on what clients/employers subscribe to and change regularly
APPROPRIATENESS: There isn’t always time, money, or a need to use a tool. Sometimes intercepts, guerrilla testing, interviews and or data analytics are a better choice
SUITABILITY: Tools have separate functions. Don’t compare them, or prioritize learning them, until you have a specific research question, or use case, to evaluate it against
FAMILIARITY: When you master a few tools before building a solid UX research foundation you'll wind up trying to shove every study into the tools you know (because you won’t know any better)
EVOLUTION: Technology evolves. A strong methodological foundation will help you determine which approaches are best for the question at hand
PREFERENCE: People tend to prefer the method learned first — in everything. (e.g. Mac users struggle with PCs)
