Sourced participants for product testing, consulting work, and independent research
Created a centralized, opt-in panel of over 2,500 vetted UX professionals
Took recruitment from pain point to streamlined process with one tool
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Maria Rosala, Director of Research at NN/G
Nielsen Norman Group (NN/G) isn’t just a UX consultancy, it’s an industry pillar and research powerhouse.
Director of Research, Maria Rosala, bridges operations and hands-on research. She leads process governance, tools training, and thought leadership – keeping UX studies running smoothly across a diverse set of topics and target audiences.
NN/G’s research spans three domains:
Finding niche populations for these three distinct needs was incredibly time-consuming and not always fruitful.
“We’d get a lot of professional testers and couldn’t screen deeply enough for specific criteria. Even when we used recruitment agencies, the turnaround was slow and samples were geographically skewed.” – Maria Rosala, Director of Research, NN/G
With growing demand for their research and education services, NN/G needed a way to:
Maria and her team found that User Interviews offered a rare trifecta: participant quality, speed, and cost-efficiency. To meet the demands of both broad consumer studies and high-expertise UX research, NN/G set up custom panel infrastructure using User Interviews’s Recruit and Hub tools in tandem. This hybrid approach allows the team to move fast without sacrificing participant quality or research rigor.
With Recruit, NN/G can quickly source niche audiences from the User Interviews panel thanks to deep targeting, behavioral screeners, and hands-on support from recruiting coordinators
“It’s incredibly helpful that we can go beyond demographics and target based on behaviors – like tools people use or their experience level.” – Maria Rosala, Director of Research, NN/G
For customer research, Hub houses a carefully managed, opt-in panel of 2,500+ UX and product professionals, recruited from NN/G’s training programs and events. Rich participant profiles and admin-controlled workflows help the team segment effectively, avoid over-contacting, and standardize research practices across the team.
“We’ve built a repeatable, well-governed process using Hub. It helps us keep things fair for participants and consistent for researchers.” – Maria Rosala, Director of Research, NN/G
This hybrid recruitment approach powers everything from diary studies, to accessibility testing, and usability feedback on NN/G’s own product lines. Whether the need is niche or broad, with actual users or lookalike audiences, User Interviews helps NN/G match the right participants to the right studies – fast.
“Using User Interviews is way more cost-effective than going through a recruitment agency – especially for studies that need niche participants.” – Maria Rosala, Director of Research, NN/G
Since switching to User Interviews, NN/G has significantly reduced time-to-launch for research projects and improved participant relevance across both broad and niche studies. Stakeholders receive higher-quality insights faster, and the team operates with greater internal alignment.
They no longer worry about participant fraud, screen-out errors, or ghosting. The User Interviews platform handles the heavy lifting and guarantees qualified matches.
Switching to User Interviews has helped NN/G:
🚀 Speed up studies with reliable, quick recruiting
👥 Reach niche participants for a diverse range of research needs
💸 Reduce costs vs. traditional research agencies
🧠 Improve data quality with better vetting and robust screening
🧩 Standardize governance with a scalable, admin-controlled panel in Hub
“The participant quality is consistently high. It’s rare that we get someone who clearly lied on the screener – which used to be a common issue with other platforms and agencies. Plus, If a participant isn’t a good fit, your team actually follows up to understand what went wrong. ” – Maria Rosala, Director of Research, NN/G
With plans to expand their training offerings and continue shaping the UX field, NN/G sees User Interviews as a critical part of their research infrastructure. For a small team tasked with tackling some of the biggest questions in UX, partnering with a fast, trustworthy recruitment engine isn’t just nice, it’s necessary.
Schedule your demo and see us in action today.
