An Empathy Map externalises what a team knows about a user segment across four quadrants: Says, Thinks, Does, and Feels. It creates shared understanding across teams and exposes gaps between what users say and what they actually experience.
After user interviews or observation sessions, before defining the problem or designing solutions. Works well in workshops where teams need alignment on who the user really is.
- Define the specific user segment you are mapping
- Draw 4 quadrants: Says / Thinks / Does / Feels
- SAYS: Direct quotes from interviews — what do they say out loud?
- THINKS: What occupies their mind that they might not say?
- DOES: What actions and behaviours do you observe?
- FEELS: What emotions, anxieties, and aspirations do they experience?
- Add Pains and Gains below the quadrants
- Identify gaps — what do you still not know?
A free-tier user SAYS: 'I don't mind ads.' THINKS: 'I resent being forced to upgrade.' DOES: Closes and reopens the app to skip ads. FEELS: Mildly irritated but too habituated to switch. This reveals the real problem — the gap between stated tolerance and actual friction — and points to conversion strategies beyond just price.
A surveillance analyst SAYS: 'We get too many false positives.' THINKS: 'If I miss a real case, my career is at risk.' DOES: Batch-dismisses low-scoring alerts without reviewing them. FEELS: Overwhelmed and anxious every morning. This exposes that the real problem is alert fatigue and fear — not a surface-level feature request for better filtering.
- Filling the map with assumptions instead of real observations from research
- Conflating SAYS and THINKS — what users say and what they genuinely think are often very different
- Skipping FEELS — the emotional layer is often the most actionable quadrant
- Gamestorming — Dave Gray
- Continuous Discovery Habits — Teresa Torres