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The foundation of a strong outcomes story is to start at the end.¹ Very early in the process, sit down and write the story you’d like to be able to tell once your product is on the market and thousands of people are using it. This could literally be a story—a helpful approach can be to write an imaginary press release or magazine article about your successful product and highlight what it has accomplished. If you’re more visual, create a storyboard or journey map that illustrates an ideal user experience with your product over time, including the indicators that the product is working. Invite others on your team, or your clients, to weigh in on the story so that it captures all of the most important success metrics.

At some point, the story can be formalized into an outcomes plan. One way to represent this plan is as an outcomes logic map, a document that shows the types of outcomes your product might produce over time. The outcomes logic map is a tool used in program evaluation research. One reason why it can be so powerful for digital products is that it considers how a product gets implemented and used, not just whether it’s effective in isolation. Data like click metrics, bounce rates, and drop-offs don’t just show usage; they can also help designers understand how their product is being used and make adjustments that improve outcomes.

Figure 2.1 shows a generic outcomes logic map without the information filled in. The word “logic” refers to the fact that each measurement should logically connect to the others in the sequence. There’s a concept in psychology called the mechanism of action. That refers to anything that facilitates an outcome happening. For example, if the outcome is lower body weight, the mechanisms of action might include physical exercise and changes to diet. You’ll want to identify mechanisms of action for the outcomes in your story. Measuring them will give you a way to test whether your product is doing what you expect it to do, and make adjustments if not. You’ll include mechanisms of action on your outcomes logic map as links between people using your product and the results they eventually achieve.

DIAGRAM BY AIDAN HUDSON-LAPORE.

FIGURE 2.1 At a high level, an outcomes logic map describes the data that should be available over the lifespan of a product to understand whether it will achieve its intended results.

This map gives a visual indicator of what types of things to be measuring at different periods of time. If your measurements at these points suggest that the product isn’t meeting your goals, it’s an opportunity to dig deeper and figure out why not. Plotting outcomes over a timeframe also helps set expectations about when to determine whether or not a product works. It doesn’t make sense to say a language learning program is unsuccessful if its users aren’t fluent in Greek after three weeks of use, but that same data from people who are three-year veterans might be more meaningful.

Your first attempt at an outcomes logic map will not be perfect. That’s okay. The critical thing is to go through the exercise so that your design process is organized and focused. You can and will update your outcomes logic map as you learn about your users and their needs, both during your design process and after your product is in market. But without a basic map in place at the outset, it will be difficult to know what questions to ask and what key performance indicators to build toward.

Here’s how to create an outcomes logic map.