A lightweight source-linked repository for preserving situations, observations, interpretations, decisions, uncertainty, and review dates without creating a research graveyard.
Start with the real decision
Research repositories fail when they store documents instead of decisions. Six months later, nobody remembers which sentence was observed, which was inferred, whether the source changed, or why the note mattered.
Every evidence item needs a source, a situation, an interpretation boundary, and a decision link.
A practical sequence
- Use stable evidence cards. Store source, date, customer situation, observed behavior, and consequence.
- Separate observation from inference. Use distinct fields so confident prose cannot blur the boundary.
- Attach decision history. Record what changed, who decided, and what evidence would reopen it.
- Track freshness. Give time-sensitive evidence a review date.
- Design for retrieval. Use jobs, triggers, alternatives, constraints, and outcomes as primary facets.
Keep the evidence reviewable
For every item, record source and date, customer situation, observed behavior, your interpretation, and the decision it may change. Keep observation separate from inference. Add evidence that would falsify important conclusions so a future reviewer can challenge them.
Deduplicate recurrence. Several posts may quote one announcement, and one story may be reposted across platforms. Mark shared origins before calling something a stable pattern rather than a concentrated reaction or temporary noise.
Common ways the method fails
Uploading everything. Volume without structure makes evidence effectively disappear.
Editing old conclusions silently. Preserve decision history and add a new interpretation.
Tagging only by product feature. Future questions usually begin with customer situations.
Separate research, judgment, and outreach
Public discussion can reveal jobs, language, and alternatives, but it does not grant permission for dossiers or unsolicited pitches. Decide on participation separately, follow community rules, disclose interests, and make any answer useful without a product link.
SeeVoid discovers, groups, and preserves source context. It does not decide representativeness or turn signals into automatic public posting.
End with a decision card
Write the decision, three strongest items, one counterexample, unknowns, owner, review date, and reopening trigger. Weak signals justify interviews, medium signals a page or workflow test, and heavier investment needs independent recurrence plus behavior.
Before committing, run the method on a small sample and ask whether two people could reach the same conclusion from the evidence. If not, clarify the rubric, capture the missing context, or lower confidence. Prefer a reversible action that creates new evidence over a large bet that only expresses conviction.
Stop when new material no longer changes the choice. Research should shorten the path to knowing what to do, what not to do yet, and why.
What completion looks like
Start with twenty high-value cards, not a grand taxonomy. Test whether a founder can answer a current question in ten minutes and trace every important claim back to context.
Further reading:SBA market research guide.