Research Script Templates

These UserTold.ai study templates cover onboarding, activation, churn, pricing, and feature validation.

These are illustrative templates, not customer research results. Treat them as starting points. The best script names the workflow, expected behavior, common failure points, and the exact Evidence you need before creating a Finding.

Choose a task and questions first

Study	Participant task	Neutral debrief question	Evidence to review
Onboarding	Set up the product until it feels ready for a real task.	What did you expect at the step where you stopped?	The stopping point and the participant's explanation.
Activation	Complete one workflow until its output is useful to you.	What made the result useful, or what was still missing?	The output and the stated first-value boundary.
Pricing	Find a plan for your real situation; stop before purchasing.	Which information did you need to decide?	The plan comparison and interpretation of limits.
Feature validation	Use the feature for a recent task you actually needed to do.	How would this fit with what you do today?	The outcome, existing workaround, and tradeoffs.
Switching	Reconstruct the last decision to try or leave a tool.	What changed that made you look for another option?	The trigger, alternatives, and decision story.

Use only questions justified by the observed episode or the participant's answer. Keep purchase, invitation, or other consequential actions out of a research task unless the participant intends to perform them.

For each template, set the goal, review the Invitation and recording disclosure, target the relevant pages with Visibility, and test the complete Study yourself. The Quickstart covers installation. Study Design covers script configuration.

Onboarding template

Use when a new user is trying to understand setup, account creation, or first configuration. Start with a neutral task: “Set up a workspace for your next project. Stop when you believe it is ready to use.” Follow with questions about what they expected and what they needed to continue.

The configuration below shows the same structure. On the planned debrief, realtime_analysis enables a running evidence summary of preceding activity. Customize the task and context for the actual product; do not ship the example's assumed setup flow unchanged.

{
  "version": 2,
  "goals": [
    { "id": "first-setup", "description": "Identify where new users hesitate before completing initial setup." }
  ],
  "segments": [
    {
      "id": "intro",
      "mode": "speak",
      "title": "Intro",
      "speak_text": "Please complete setup as you normally would. I will stay quiet while you work."
    },
    {
      "id": "onboarding-observe",
      "mode": "observe",
      "title": "Complete onboarding",
      "instruction": "Create your account and reach the first usable project screen.",
      "conductor_context": "Expected flow: account details -> provider connection -> project creation -> confirmation. Watch for repeated navigation, docs visits, and uncertainty around required credentials.",
      "max_duration_s": 420
    },
    {
      "id": "onboarding-debrief",
      "mode": "talk",
      "title": "Debrief",
      "experimental_capabilities": { "realtime_analysis": true },
      "talk": {
        "goals": ["first-setup"],
        "system_prompt": "Ask about the moments where the participant paused, backtracked, or used docs. Ask what they expected and what happened instead."
      }
    }
  ]
}

Activation template

Use when the team needs to know whether users reach first value.

• Start with one speak instruction that defines the goal.
• Use observe for the actual activation task.
• Debrief the first moment the user believed the product became useful.

Good activation prompt:

Complete the workflow until you have something you would be willing to use or share with your team.

Good evidence:

• first value reached or not reached
• page where the participant stalled
• workaround used to continue
• quote explaining what value they expected

Churn-risk template

Use with users who stopped using a workflow or downgraded usage.

Recommended sequence:

1. talk: capture the last concrete time they tried the workflow.
2. observe: ask them to repeat or reconstruct the workflow if possible.
3. talk: ask what they did instead and what would have changed the outcome.

The key evidence is the substitute behavior. Churn is often explained by the workaround the user adopted after the product failed them.

Pricing template

Use when buyers hesitate, misunderstand limits, or cannot map plan details to their use case.

Recommended observe instruction:

Choose the plan you would recommend for your team and explain out loud what you are considering.

Recommended conductor_context:

Watch for plan comparison loops, repeated FAQ visits, uncertainty around usage-based charges, seat or team limits, or whether their usage pattern fits a plan.

Follow with a talk debrief that asks what information was missing at the decision point.

Feature validation template

Use before or after shipping a feature to learn whether the workflow solves the intended job.

Recommended sequence:

1. talk: ask about the recent job or trigger.
2. observe: have the participant use the feature for that job.
3. talk: ask whether the result would replace their current workaround.

Strong validation evidence includes:

• the user's existing workaround
• where the feature fit or failed
• the final output they expected
• whether they would use it again without prompting

Continue with a focused guide

• Investigate onboarding drop-off.
• Research pricing comprehension.
• Identify the need behind a request.
• Analyze completed interviews.

Turning templates into Findings

After Interviews complete, review Evidence by workflow area and create Findings only when the source moments support a potentially meaningful pattern. A single confusing quote can be useful context; repeated struggling moments in the same workflow may support a Finding, but product triage still decides whether it becomes delivery work.

Next step

Pick the template that matches the product risk you are investigating, then adapt it with the field-level guidance in the study design guide. If the Study produces related Evidence, use from interviews to issues to review a Finding and decide its next step.