You’ve probably heard of atomic habits, the small actions that lead to a big change. Atomic research works the same way.
You don’t need massive studies to get valuable feedback. It suffices to capture one clear insight at a time and ensure it doesn’t get lost.
One quote.
One user need.
One moment of confusion.
One workaround that reveals a missing feature.
Want to make your findings easier to use and harder to ignore? This guide will show you how to do it by breaking down research into its smallest, most useful parts.
And if you want to stop losing insights and build better research habits, create a free Marvin account. Our AI-native customer feedback repository is here to make atomic research easier and more effective.
What Is Atomic Research and Why Product Teams Rely on It
Atomic research is a method for collecting and organizing user insights into small, reusable pieces. Each piece (atom) is a single point of evidence. It might be a quote, a behavior, or a note from an interview.
With this method, you don’t wait until a study ends but rather capture atomic insights as you go. Consequently, you build knowledge one piece at a time, from the very first user session.
Product teams rely on atomic research because it makes insights easier to find and use. It complements the different stages of the UX research framework, from planning to post-launch testing.
And it offers multiple benefits:
- Accelerates decision-making
- Eliminates repetitive research
- Maintains user feedback close to design and development
If you’re working in sprints, managing multiple features, or scaling a product, atomic research is a lifesaver. You build a flexible, living library of what users said and did.
And that keeps your product grounded in real needs, not guesses.
How to Break Research into Atomic Insights
In the early days, people built atomic research libraries by hand. You’d review recordings, jot down quotes, tag them yourself, and link everything back to the original session. It worked, but it took forever.
But with a tool like Marvin, you can capture atoms in real-time and after the interview. That turns what used to take hours into a much faster, smarter workflow.
But whether you do it manually or with tools, atomic research involves a few key steps:
1. Choose a Session
Don’t try to extract insights from five sessions at once. Start with a single interview, test, or support call.
When you know you’re only going to tackle one session, you have the mental space to notice. Details such as the speaker’s tone, pauses, or moments of surprise will pop. And your findings will be more revealing.
2. Review and Highlight
Watch the session or read the transcript. Highlight anything that feels meaningful.
At this stage, look for friction, delight, confusion, or strong opinions. If it makes you pause, it’s worth a closer look.
3. Create One Insight Per Moment
Write down each highlight as a separate insight without grouping ideas. Keep it short and focused.
For example, a user might say, “I didn’t even notice the Save button. Then, I thought my changes were gone.”
Instead of writing it as one grouped insight, split it into:
“I didn’t even notice the Save button.” > Visibility
“Then I thought my changes were gone.” > Expectations
4. Add a Summary and Source
Write a quick summary in your own words. What was the user trying to do? What does this moment show? Then, link it back to the clip or transcript.
Anyone reading a summary should be able to trace it.
5. Tag for Reuse
Add tags that describe the insight. These can include features, emotions, tasks, or stages in the journey.
Equally important, ensure that your team becomes familiar with all the tags you’re using. That makes insights easier to find and reuse later.
How to Organize Atomic Research in a Central Hub
Your research needs a home. To build it, you can use Notion, Airtable, or Google Drive and simply:
- Create a table
- Copy in user quotes
- Tag them by feature or emotion
- Link back to the text or video source
This setup is inexpensive and flexible. However, it’s not built for speed or scale. It takes time to maintain and is not so easy to search through. Plus, your insights can still get lost in the noise.
That’s why Marvin is a better alternative for organizing atomic research in a central hub. It gives you three powerful ways to manage user interviews and extract atomic insights:
- Upload and analyze past interviews: If you already have recordings, upload them into Marvin. It will run qualitative analysis (including thematic, emotional, and trend analysis), add tags, and pull insights from it.
- Run live interviews with full support: You can conduct the interviews yourself while Marvin handles the automated tagging and notes. All the notes will automatically link to video timestamps for later reference.
- Let Marvin run interviews for you: Use our new AI-moderated interviewer to run qualitative interviews at scale. You’ll get rich, open-ended feedback from dozens (or hundreds) of participants, along with real-time insights.
Each of these workflows feeds into Marvin’s UX research repository, a centralized, AI-powered hub for all your qualitative data. It’s fully searchable, easy to organize, and built for collaboration.
Within minutes of adding your data, you can:
- Uncover insights with instant transcriptions, auto-notes, and summaries.
- Use the Ask AI tool to find answers before you’ve tagged anything.
- Generate detailed, in-depth reports with the Deep Research function.
- Update your stakeholders automatically with customizable research newsletters.
Whether working alone or across teams, you always know where to find what users actually said.
Want proof that a great repository can change how your team works? Download our latest State of Research Repositories report to discover the massive impact repositories have on team efficiency.
How to Create a Repeatable Workflow for Atomic Research
With a repeatable workflow, you can follow the same process, whether you’re running one or twenty research sessions. It helps you avoid postponing analysis, forgetting to tag, or writing long UX research reports nobody reads.
Here’s how to do it:
Step 1: Prep Before You Press Record
Know what you’re trying to learn. Create a discussion guide to stay focused during the session.
If you’re using Marvin, you can build this guide right into the platform. That way, you’re ready to stay on track and mark key points as you go.
Step 2: Run the Session
Focus on the user, not your notes. Use Marvin to record and transcribe the session for you.
With livestreaming and telecast, you can even invite your team to attend the interviews from a virtual backroom. They can watch without impacting the session and gain their own valuable insights in real-time.
Step 3: Review, Tag, and Extract Insights
Once the session ends, Marvin can automatically transcribe, tag, and analyze what was said. Let it surface themes, quotes, and moments tied to user emotion or friction.
From there, review the highlights, confirm accuracy, and save the tagged moments as atomic insights.
Each tagged quote, once verified, becomes a usable building block.
Step 4: Store It in Your Hub
Add your insights to your research hub.
If you’re using Marvin, all tagged atoms are already stored, searchable, and grouped by tag, user type, or theme.
If you’re working manually, maintain a consistent format to prevent any information from getting lost.
Step 5: Share and Reuse
Wrap up by sharing what matters most. Maybe it’s a highlight reel or a handful of quotes that answer your project manager’s burning question.
Either way, you don’t need a long report. Just pull the atoms that support your next move.
How to Integrate Atomic Research into Product Development
When you build atomic insights into your process, you design based on what users actually said and did. You move faster, reduce rework, and make better calls, especially when timelines are tight.
Here’s how to integrate atomic research into product development, step by step:
1. Use Atoms in Sprint Planning
Before a sprint starts, review relevant atoms for the feature or flow you’re about to build. Pull quotes about past pain points, friction, or unmet needs. Share those with your team to ground the work in real user feedback.
For example, if you’re redesigning onboarding, surface atoms tagged with “confusion,” “onboarding,” or “first-time use.” Use these to shape your goals and prioritize fixes.
2. Validate Early Ideas with Atoms
If a new feature idea comes up, search your atomic hub to see if users have talked about it.
Maybe someone asked for it. Or someone hacked their way around the lack of it. Use those atoms to decide if the idea has real demand before you commit resources.
3. Support Decisions in Stakeholder Meetings Using Atoms
When you’re making a case to your PM, designer, or engineer, show the atom, not just your opinion.
Pull a quote. Share a clip. Back up your recommendation with something a user actually said to build trust fast.
4. Guide Design with Real User Language
As you wireframe or prototype, revisit atomic insights that show how users describe their goals. Use these to inform labels, CTAs, and flows, drawing directly from their words.
Voice of the customer frameworks are particularly useful at this step. They help you turn raw quotes into structured inputs that shape your UX decisions. The result? A product that feels intuitive before users even learn how it works.
5. Close the Loop Post-Launch
After you ship, track new feedback and store it as fresh atoms. This product feedback loop keeps your knowledge base alive. It also helps you see how user sentiment shifts over time, especially if you’re iterating fast.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Finally, some atomic answers for the most common atomic research questions:
What Makes an Insight Atomic?
An atomic insight is small, self-contained, and tied to a specific user moment. It includes a quote or observation, a short summary, context tags, and a source link.
Because it stands alone but connects to a bigger picture, an atom is easy to find, understand, and reuse across teams.
How Is Atomic Research Different From Traditional Research?
Traditional research often ends in long reports that go unread. Atomic research breaks findings into bite-sized, searchable insights.
Instead of summarizing everything at once, you build a living library of user truths. All captured in real-time, reused anytime, and perfect for agile teams that move fast and iterate often.
What Tools Help Manage Atomic Research?
Marvin is built for atomic research. It records sessions, creates transcripts, tags key moments, and stores everything in one searchable hub.
For broader research support, you can also use Notion for planning, Miro for visual mapping, or Airtable to manage study logistics. Still, Marvin keeps your insights alive and actionable.
Why Should Product Teams Invest in Atomic Research?
Atomic research gives your team on-demand access to what users said. It saves time, prevents duplicate research, and helps everyone make decisions grounded in real user needs.
Over time, it builds a reliable memory of user feedback that fuels smarter, faster product development.
Conclusion
When you break down your research into small, clear, reusable pieces, you give your team the power to:
- Act fast
- Stay focused
- Keep user needs in mind
Atomic research is a smarter way to build products without digging through old decks or having to guess anything. Instead, you develop a growing system of real, actionable insights.
If you want to build that system without adding more to your workload, start with Marvin. Create a free account and turn every session into a ready-to-use set of atomic insights. Fast, searchable, and always linked to the source.
