Look for clues in these areas: Revenue streams for monetization Mental model for the navigation system or transaction flow Features that simplify the experience New and interesting visual treatments and animations Improved messaging and content strategy Use arrows to point out aspects of the UX that are relevant to the solution that your team is pursuing. Explain why you’re pointing them out and what insight they offer into market opportunities. You will organize these points based on what you want the stakeholder or team to understand by the end of the brief. Findings Brief, Section 4: Cool Features from Influencers In this section, write about any cool or relevant UX features or findings about the marketplace that might not come from competitors (see Figure 5-13 and Figure 5-14). I call these types of products “influencers” because they are not in your product’s competitive landscape but could offer insight into your product’s value innovation. An influencer doesn’t even have to be an online product. As long as it has an interaction, transaction, or capability you’re trying to accomplish, it’s an influencer. Often, an influencer might have a very cool feature that could be the differentiator your product is looking for. A good example of this is how Airbnb utilized the Yelp map functionality. Yelp is not a direct or indirect competitor for Airbnb, but Airbnb saw how refining a user’s results set by zooming in and out of a map might be a useful differentiator for its subletting service. It allowed the influence, and that map feature is now a very distinctive feature of Airbnb! In the course of your research and analysis, it’s probable that you’ve already identified or noted influencers. Maybe you sighed to yourself and thought, “If only this product was more like [insert product name].” That product is most likely a good influencer. It’s also possible that an influencer inspired your original value proposition. For example, Paul the movie producer was originally inspired by Amazon’s Wish List feature. Even though Amazon.com itself would have been neither a direct nor indirect competitor to his product, the UX of Amazon could definitely influence the product in a positive direction and distinguish it from the competition. Therefore, it should be presented here in the brief in a way that is similar to the direct and indirect competition.