Field Research Under Real Stakes: Mapping Friction Across the Betting Journey

In-person usability testing and ethnographic observation with real money on the line, synthesized into a journey-level prioritization framework that shaped a quarterly roadmap

Field research · Ethnographic observation · Journey mapping · Prioritization framework · Cross-team influence

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The problem

The product organization could see engagement dropping across the conversion funnel but could not agree on which friction points mattered most. Dozens of small issues were being fixed as symptoms, and the roadmap needed a defensible answer to “which of these actually costs us, and in what order?”

Method

Remote studies flatter interfaces. To see behavior that matters, I designed the study for the field: moderated in-person sessions during live events, where participants placed real bets with real consequences, combined with ethnographic observation of how they used the app alongside everything else competing for their attention. Sessions were structured around the full journey rather than a single feature, so friction could be traced upstream to its cause instead of catalogued where it surfaced.

Synthesis produced a ten-category framework scoring each issue on business impact and user frequency, which is what let three product teams with different backlogs agree on one order.

What we found

• Time-sensitive decisions broke first. 83% of participants ran into data-visualization problems at exactly the moments that required a fast decision, and the live experience rated lowest of any journey stage (5.7 of 7). Several participants said unprompted that a system lock at a key moment would send them to a competitor’s app.
• Findability compounded everything downstream. 67% expressed frustration finding content, and observation showed people abandoning multi-step flows rather than pushing through navigation friction.
• Users were building their own workarounds. Progress-tracking complaints appeared in 75% of sessions, and participants were using screenshots and outside apps to track what the product should have shown them, a reliable signal that a system, not a screen, is failing.
• Fixing the cause beat fixing the symptoms. Tracing issues upstream showed that three root problems accounted for twelve of the observed downstream complaints.

What happened

• Performance and stability work at the live-decision moments moved to the top of the next quarter’s roadmap across three product teams, with dedicated engineering allocation.
• The journey-level framing carried into the sportsbook research I now design and lead within the company’s recurring multi-day in-person research program: sessions structured around the whole betting journey rather than a single feature.

What I’d tell another researcher

The field is where the interesting failures live. A participant in a quiet remote session will politely complete a task that the same person at a crowded bar during a fourth-quarter drive will abandon in seconds. If the decisions your product supports happen under pressure, test under pressure.