Mixed Reality — Kate Crotty

Quick summary

We ran a 20-week product-market fit study on a global technology company’s portfolio of mixed reality wearables across the US, UK, South Korea, and Japan. The report became the foundational document for the client’s XR team, the head of XR directed the entire org to read it, and the study converted into a multi-year program.

Read this study for

An AI-fluent research practice

A zero-to-one product approach

Product portfolio strategy

Organizational influence

Collaborating with global vendors

The engagement

We were engaged by a longstanding tech client to run a product-market fit study on their organization’s portfolio of mixed reality wearables.

This project was particularly important for two reasons:

1The relationship. We’ve run several studies with this client over the past five years. Just before this one was scoped, she moved into a senior leadership role in XR and this would be her first large-scale study in this position. The success of this work would establish her visibility and standing across the organization. (and it did. The head of XR directed the entire org to read and familiarize themselves with our report, and it became the foundational document for the XR team)

2The stakes. Defining product-market fit for this suite of devices, for the first time in several years, would help push the organizational bet forward. That’s why the team invested: significant budget, dedicated teams, and senior leadership involvement throughout the entire journey from scoping through execution.

The program in numbers

Study duration

Markets

Survey respondents

In-home ethnographic sessions

Remote sessions

Diary studies

United States United Kingdom South Korea Japan

The mixed reality spectrum

A continuum of devices that blend the physical and digital worlds in different ways.

More immersive More ambient

Immersive headset

Fully encloses your view, blocking out the physical world.

Spatial viewer in-between

See-through displays that overlay digital content on your surroundings while keeping you present.

Smart glasses

Lightweight and subtle. Adds glanceable information to what you’re already doing.

Virtual world Blended experiences Real world

What we set out to answer

Mental models and form factor

How people understand AR/VR technology + the integration with AI, the value they expect from them, today and tomorrow, and how that shifts across the range of form factors.

AI as an accelerator

Where the devices’ distinct inputs and worn-on-the-body form unlock value in AI-enabled experiences that other devices can’t, and where people’s comfort thresholds and barriers to adoption sit.

Fit with the existing ecosystem

For each form factor, which of the devices people already own it replaces versus enhances, and what drives that.

Social comfort and trust

How people navigate the social dynamics of wearing these devices around others, and what builds trust versus damages it.

Adoption drivers and barriers

How all of the above shape what pushes people toward, or holds them back from, adopting each form factor.

New and current use cases

How people around the world adapt these devices, focusing on the use cases they rely on today and the new ones they invent for themselves.

Our timeline

Frame Discover & generate Evaluate at scale Storytell

W1 W5 W10 W15 W20

Holiday pause

Discovery & diaries

Create study collateral Recruit participants Virtual interviews Diary study, n=15

In-home sprints

Procure & ship devices KR UK US

Survey

Design & program survey In field Analysis

Synthesis & storytelling

Final synthesis Deliverables, video & shareout

Virtual sessions were conducted with users across the US. Ethnographic sessions were conducted at participants’ homes in Seoul, London, and New York. The survey covered the US, UK, South Korea, and Japan.

The methods

Every round of research informed the next

Method 01

Virtual interviews

n=20 remote one-on-ones · US

Designed to answer: how people currently think about smart wearables, their routines, mental models, and the words they use for them.

Cohorts: active users of current devices · early-adopter “intenders”

Carried into method 02

Hypotheses, cohort definitions, and the in-home discussion guides.

Method 02

In-home ethnography + diaries

n=30 in-home · n=15 diaries

Designed to answer: how the devices actually live in people’s homes, what they replace, what they sit beside, and where they get abandoned. Prospective buyers lived with mailed devices for two weeks before our visit.

Seoul London New York

Carried into method 03

The use cases the survey would rank, grounded in observed behavior.

Method 03

MaxDiff + TURF survey

n=3,252 · measured features, value propositions, and propensity to purchase

Designed to answer: which use cases carry value at scale, for whom, and what a buildable first feature set looks like.

US UK South Korea Japan

Carried into the report

The product-market fit understanding the whole engagement was scoped to deliver.

AI in the workflow

We used an image model to generate scenario storyboards of use cases to test with users virtually and in person
We used it to organize inputs from every workstream and shape our findings into the use-case list the survey would rank
We used it to simulate analysis methods and weigh which would answer our survey questions best

The quant method

We designed our survey to center around this formula:

Form factor for use case in context, because it offers a differentiator others can’t.

Our core learning objectives:

Which features to prioritize

Ranked with MaxDiff, then cut to a buildable set with TURF.
What makes them valuable

Read from cross-tabs of differentiators and enablers on value scales.
What blocks adoption

Barrier ratings cut by segment, read against open-ended feedback.

How we built the survey

We built the survey by cross-functionally aligning three key inputs in a shared spreadsheet: top use cases from our qualitative research, our core hypotheses, and the client’s critical user journeys. Through this process, we established 32 distinct use cases across nine features.

One of the nine, as an example

Get in-the-moment guidance

Recipe steps while cookingForm correction mid-workoutTurn-by-turn on a bike trailA blind-spot alert while cycling

We broke each feature category into use cases like these, and those were what people traded off. MaxDiff ranked all 32; TURF found the smallest set that reached the most people, and that helped inform our PMF understanding.

What it produced

A product-market fit insights report

What the report contains

A human-context frameworkHow people fit these wearables into daily life, mapped by what the body is doing and the mind is focused on.
Opportunity areas and value propositionsWhere each form factor wins, what each device should promise, and to whom.
A comfort-and-adoption modelWhat comfort means for something worn on the face.
Value-fit spaces and design themesA set of spaces each device occupies, and the principles to carry into product and experience design with these in mind.

In the field

We brought the XR cross-functional team into the field with us

Engineers, product marketing managers, and UX researchers from the client’s team joined the fieldwork alongside us.

Every field team ran as a pod: one Deloitte researcher to two client observers, plus a live translator in Korea. Everyone had a job: camera operator, notetaker, debrief lead.

Each week we ran a debrief workshop to work through what the in-home sessions were teaching us, while the fieldwork was still running.

Every field team ran as a pod

1 ×Deloitte researcher

2 ×Client observers

+Live translator

Korea sessions

Everyone had a job

01Camera operator

02Notetaker

03Debrief lead

AI in the workflow

We used AI for the mechanics of synthesis: organizing our master notes, tagging themes, sourcing quotes, tightening sentences
However, it couldn’t bring the story together in a way the business would respond to: how these devices live in people’s minds, fluid, shifting with who you are, where you are, and what you’re trying to do. We built that framing ourselves, in partnership with our lead client

Lessons

Clarify when you need native or culturally embedded participants

When we were in the field, there were a lot of logistics to manage, and one we didn’t see coming was getting the right participants. In Korea, we showed up to people’s homes and, on several occasions, they turned out to be expats. To course-correct, we got on late-night calls with our US-based vendor to figure out how to quickly find native Korean speakers who were actually culturally embedded and fit our criteria. We had to navigate all of this with our client in the field, on a really tight timeline. Every in-home session had to happen within four days.

Bring clients in the field when you can

One of the most valuable things we did was bring the cross-functional client team into the field with us. By the time we got to synthesis, they’d already watched people use these devices at home, so they were turning what they saw into product decisions on their own. And because they’d been there themselves, they carried the findings back into the org and made the case first-hand.

The core team · full time

Project Manager & Insights Lead my roleDay-to-day project management, study design, facilitation, analysis, project plan
Design StrategistMental models, frameworks, product implications
DesignerVisual reporting and storytelling

Leadership · part time

Program LeadershipStrategic direction, client relationship
Engagement OversightDeliverables against scoped objectives

Part four

Our impact

Product teams across the organization now plan against the value framework we defined.

The XR function now influences roadmap decisions at the GM level.

The team audited its product requirements documents against the framework and consolidated its critical user journeys in the follow-on sprint.

The client signed a two-year, sole-source research retainer with Deloitte to continue the program.

Following engagements

The program is continuing!

Second engagement — activation sprint

After the study, the client commissioned a six-week sprint to put the frameworks to work: product requirements documents audited against the value framework, critical user journeys consolidated, and a long-term experience vision organized around end-to-end journeys.

Third engagement — new form factor (currently scoping)

Understanding the market opportunity of a new form factor using conjoint analysis.