Beyo Global 2019 Round-Up

I know, I know. We are already almost 3 weeks into January. It has been a few non-stop busy months which means writing a round-up for 2019 can only happen now. Better late than never.

2019 was a great year - 18 countries with 16 new stamps on my passport and in-depth interviews with 260 people (in 10 different languages).

Chui Chui Research Speaking Compilation 2019.png

I started the year spending two weeks in Hong Kong working with a multinational financial service company for a new product proposition validation and design project. With a good balance between (1) Time, cost and quality of output; (2) Tactical and strategic actionable output; and (3) Close collaboration with the local teams, we efficiently came up with a clear strategic direction on what the new product proposition should be and how it fits into the business as a whole in Hong Kong. We set a clear design direction on what this new product would look like, considering users’ experiences and business requirements.

Next, through a venture capitalist, I was invited to work with a health and wellbeing startup. They had a business concept and needed to identify product and market fit to stand out in the crowded, competitive market. With the aim to launch globally, they asked for my expertise to help define their initial key product strategy and business direction which could be extended and scaled internationally (whenever it makes sense commercially). After talking to doctors, medical staff and women (who will be the main target customers for this product), we found a clear product, business and design direction which not only would work in the NHS-specific UK market (their first key market) but also one which could easily be adapted to the medical system of different countries.

Finance and health topic aside, moving into a fun and entertaining field, Spotify was one of our key clients in 2018. We worked with the Growth team to identify product features and opportunities for three countries (two pre-launched markets and Japan) through understanding their media consumption, behaviour and experience.

We must have done pretty well as various stakeholders in the organisation have then been recommending us to different teams within Spotify such as the Premium team, Proposition team, Conversion team, Subscription team and Marketing team.

Throughout 2019, we continued to work with these teams in nine other markets including Poland, Latin America (Brazil and Mexico) and MENA (Saudi Arabia, UAE and Egypt). Through a combination of user research approaches, we looked into what subscription models would work best in these markets within their context, what payment methods are most appealing and commonly used for an audio streaming service, how best to communicate and promote the uniqueness of Spotify in each market and what partnerships would be commercially beneficial.

Not just on the consumer end, I’m also thrilled to support the Spotify Creator team in understanding the needs, tools and journeys music labels and distributors in different countries are currently experiencing. It has been fun and interesting to learn about how the music industry works behind the scene.

In summer 2019, we visited several music labels and distributors in Asia (e.g. Bangkok and Tapei) in which the trip included me having my first earthquake experience. The insightful and actionable output we delivered was then fed into an agile process to create an MVP product. We are currently in the planning stage to bring it back to the field and continue conversations with music labels and distributors in more countries. I look forward to our further collaboration with the Creator team in 2020.

Chui Chui - Interviews with music labels and distributors in Asia 2019

With my experience in working with Marriott International for more than 10 years as one of their global experts, travel and hospitality have always been one of the industries I very much familiar with. In 2019, I worked with St Giles Hotel Group, a Malaysian own company with hotels in different tiers globally (it was great to be able to offer my expertise to companies from my home country). Started as a family business, the company wanted to offer the best possible experience not just for their customers but also their employees. After a series of interviews (international and local customers as well as with their staff at different levels), by combining with their business vision, we came up with not only ways to improve their customers’ end-to-end experience and staff’s retention, but insights for the planning of their loyalty programme and re-branding efforts.

On a similar note, I also had the opportunity to work with Real Journeys, another family-owned travel company which is one of the most successful and well-respected tourism companies in New Zealand. We helped them understand the experience and travel behaviours of their local and Chinese travellers, and provided them with actionable steps to improve their websites, marketing approach and overall offline services.

As part of my five weeks trip coming to the end of the year, I also went for a quick trip to Shanghai for RS Components, a global trading brand of Electrocomponents to explore the needs and journeys of buyers and engineers within an organisation. This was a part of a big project for a website redesign.

We wrapped up 2019 with a big project with an international technology health service provider. With the funding from the Gates Foundation, we headed out to Kenya and Rwanda for 3 weeks to visit medical staff and patients at their homes, hospitals and health centre. We listened to 58 stories and observed the living conditions/context of 45 houses in rural and urban areas of both countries. We talked about their HIV, TB and/or Mental Health journeys: the traumas they went through, the stigma they experienced, the challenges in managing and coping with their conditions and more. The aim of this project was to identify appropriate and sustainable ways to help people in developing countries to prevent, manage and take care of themselves and friends/family around them. There are already many (unsuccessful) attempts aimed to use digital to solve health issues in Africa. We, therefore, wanted to use the insights we gathered to ensure the solutions we recommend, design and develop not only will fit within the context of the people’s living situation, but also their overall medical system so it would be beneficial, it would grow and be successful long term.

Health-related field research in Kenya and Rwanda 2019

Despite this project was both emotional and physically challenging, it was one of the most rewarding projects I’ve ever done on many levels, personally and professionally. I believe the delivery of this project is not the end, but the beginning of something bigger.

Leading into 2020, we also venture into the realm of games, involving culturalisation within games design and development.

On top of all these exciting projects, other highlights were the invitations to speak in conferences and events such as UX Live Conference and IxDA London. The final talk of the year was at Google HQ for the B2B Marketing Summit event co-organised by SearchStar and Google, with me being the only external speaker.

It was also my pleasure to be interviewed by the Awkward Silences podcast about international research and culturalisation (If you're interested, you can listen to it on Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gQ-XZe9 or Apple podcast: https://lnkd.in/g3zAJpt). I thoroughly enjoyed the interview.

Speaking at B2B Marketing Summit at Google HQ

I love the work we did and delivered. When I started Beyō Global, I aspire to work on products and services which are meaningful and could have positive impacts on people’s life (e.g. health and financial situations) and experience (e.g. music, travel). In 2019, not only we are proud of the quality of work we delivered alongside our local teams in all corners of the world, we were able to support companies and businesses which have positive intentions, missions and visions.

I would like to thank all the lovely people (clients and local teams) I worked with, and grateful for the opportunities as well as the relationships and friendships we curated in 2019.

I look forward to yet another good year in 2020, continue working with companies and clients that I’ve already worked with, and initiate collaborations with new clients for even more exciting and meaningful culturalisation projects.

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If you’re interested in hearing more about any of the work mentioned, want to explore growth and opportunities for your business in different markets or would like me to run workshop or speak in conferences (or events or in your organisation), feel free to get in touch.