Insights Unlocked

2022 may turn out to be the big bang of the metaverse, but no matter the reality- augmented, virtual, extended or mixed- doing business in an increasingly digital world needs to begin the human experience.

This week on the Human Insight Podcast, Krikey co-founders Jhanvi Shriram and Ketaki Shriram join host Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, to share how they are putting customers first for their mobile augmented reality (AR) gaming app.

Jhanvi, the CEO of Krikey, and Ketaki, the CTO, have been featured in the Forbes 30 under 30 list, and Fast Company’s Best Apps and Games of 2020.

Krikey’s story is one of many shared in the upcoming User Tested and that will be featured in Season 4 of the Human Insights Podcast. The book was authored by podcast hosts Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, and Andy MacMillan, UserTesting’s CEO. The book is being released on February 15th, but you can pre-order it today here or on your favorite book seller’s website.

With insights from UserTesting, Krikey has surpassed more than 2 million users, saw a 45% increase in app conversions, and they are now bringing their app to new markets worldwide. 

Listen to their interview to hear how the Krikey co-founders: 

In this episode, Jennifer Lee, UX Research Lead at Wise, shares her experience being the company’s first qualitative researcher to scaling insights across the company.

Wise (formerly known as TransferWise) is a publicly-traded, London-based technology company founded in 2011. Wise is building the best way to move and manage money around the world, helping a community of over 10 million like-minded people and businesses.

Wise’s story is one of many shared in the upcoming User Tested and that will be featured in Season 4 of the Human Insights Podcast. The book was authored by podcast hosts Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, and Andy MacMillan, UserTesting’s CEO. The book is being released on February 15th, but you can pre-order it today here or on your favorite book seller’s website.

The book gives both individual contributors and executives an approachable, pragmatic playbook for stepping beyond standard business metrics and infusing real human insight into every business decision, design, and experience.

In her interview with, Jennifer tells Janelle and Andy about holding monthly UX Research 101 classes that anyone at Wise could join to learn about qualitative research. This began the democratization of the research function, as requests to get involved came from their HR/People Team, Engineering, Project Management, Marketing, Design, and more. 

In their interview, they go on to discuss: 

Join Andy MacMillan, CEO of UserTesting, and Janelle Estes, Chief Insights Officer at UserTesting, as they recap Season 3 of the Human Insight Podcast. 

And in January, Season 4 of the podcast launches with a focus on the success stories, examples and playbooks from User Tested, the new book co-authored by Janelle and Andy, now available for pre-order.

This week on the Human Insight Podcast, we interview Brent Leary, CRM industry observer, author and speaker. 

Leary is co-founder and Managing Partner of CRM Essentials LLC, an Atlanta based CRM/CX advisory firm covering tools and strategies for improving business relationships. He writes regularly for CRM Magazine and ZDNet, and is a founding member of Newseek's Expert Forum. He hosts the weekly One on One conversation series for Small Business Trends, the A Few Good Minutes livestream series, co-hosts The CRM Playaz show, and is a regular on the Gillmor Gang show on TechCrunch.

In his conversation with Janelle Estes, UserTesting's Chief Insights Officer, Leary discusses: 

Can a company actually be customer centric? Or are they just data centric about their customers?

The tension between tracking our customers and transparency of what that information is being used for?

Building stronger customer relationships

How technology is making things easier to do, except it doesn’t seem to be getting any easier to find, catch and keep good customers. Why?

You could design UX for a B2C to increase conversions. Or you could oversee UX for health tech company and, ultimately, save or improve lives.

For Andrew Frueh it was an easy choice. 

Frueh is the senior vice president of UX design at Health Catalyst, a leading provider of data and analytics technology and services to healthcare organizations. 

This week, he joins Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, on the Human Insight Podcast where they talk about: 

What metrics or KPIs does his UX team directly or indirectly influence? How does that map to his team’s strategy and purpose?

When it comes to customer-centricity and experience, what is unique about the healthcare space? How does it compare to other industries, such as retail or financial services?

Is there a difference between UX in B2B vs. B2C? If so, what are those differences?

If you're a regular listener to the show, you know Janelle asks our guests about a book they’ve recently read and would recommend.

In this episode, we’ve rounded up all those recommendations from the past year and share them with you, whether you are looking for a holiday gift, you’re planning your 2022 strategy and are looking for some help, or just want to get in some quality reading over the holidays.

Before we jump into our guest recommendations, I should also note that five of our past guests are also authors of some great books. 

Teresa Torres, author of Continuous Discovery Habits

John S. Couch, author of The Art of Creative Rebellion

 Tamara Adlin, co-author of The Persona Lifecycle

Jim Kalbach, author of The Jobs to Be Done Playbook

April Dunford, author of Obv!ously Awesome

Here are the other recommended books: 

This week on the Human Insight podcast, we interviewed Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia, Founder and CEO of Product School. 

Product School is the global leader in product management training with a community of over one million product professionals. Product School instructors are real-world Product Leaders working at top companies including Google, Facebook, Netflix, Airbnb, PayPal, Uber, and Amazon.

In his interview with Janelle Estes, UserTesting's Chief Information Officer, Carlos discusses: 

This week on the Human Insight podcast, we interviewed Teresa Torres, author of Continuous Discovery Habits. 

Teresa teaches a structured and sustainable approach to continuous discovery that helps product teams infuse their daily product decisions with customer input. She’s coached hundreds of teams at companies of all sizes, from early-stage start-ups to global enterprises and has taught over 6,500 product people core discovery skills through the Product Talk Academy. 

In her interview with Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, Teresa discusses:

This week on the Human Insight podcast, we interviewed Emily Carrion, VP of Marketing at Esper and veteran of the Seattle startup scene. 

In her interview with Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, Carrion discusses:

This week on the Human Insight podcast, we interview April Dunford, a tech executive, board member, CEO and founder of Ambient Strategy, and author of Obv!ously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It.

In her interview with Janelle Estes, UserTesting’s Chief Insights Officer, Dunford discusses: