At its core, the Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework helps businesses focus on customer motivations rather than just demographics or product features. Instead of asking "Who is the customer?", JTBD asks, "What job is the customer trying to get done?" This shift leads to more meaningful insights into how products and services fit into real lives.

Imagine a company selling high-end coffee machines. A traditional approach might focus on income levels or coffee-drinking frequency. JTBD encourages a deeper question: Is the customer trying to enjoy café-quality coffee at home? Save time in the morning routine? Reduce spend on takeout drinks? These are all potential "jobs" the customer is hiring the product to solve.

Why JTBD Is Especially Relevant in 2025

As we move further into 2025, marketplace demands continue to transform. Customer expectations grow more nuanced, and digital experiences are evolving rapidly. In response, more businesses are turning to frameworks like JTBD to help steer product development and customer engagement strategies.

Here are a few reasons JTBD continues gaining traction:

 
• Focus on outcomes: JTBD centers around what the customer wants to accomplish, making it easier to build solutions that solve real problems.
 
• Improved innovation: By understanding customer motivations, teams can generate ideas that matter – not just features based on assumptions.
 
• Cross-functional value: JTBD helps align product, marketing, and strategy teams with a shared understanding of customer goals.
 
• Competitive advantage: As products become more similar, JTBD helps uncover unmet needs that drive differentiation.

JTBD vs Traditional Market Research Methods

While traditional market research often analyzes audience segments or measures satisfaction levels, JTBD adds another dimension – contextual understanding. It goes beyond asking, “What do customers like?” and digs into “Why do they make the choices they do?”

In that sense, JTBD doesn’t replace established tools like qualitative interviews or surveys – it enhances them. It reshapes how we ask questions and interpret data, leading to not just answers, but a stronger sense of purpose behind those answers.

JTBD Market Research Trends for 2025

 
• Pairing with AI tools to identify patterns in consumer language and behavior faster, while human researchers provide the needed empathy and interpretation
 
• Using JTBD in agile product sprints to validate and refine ideas early in the process
 
• Embedding JTBD into cross-functional planning to move from insights to execution more easily

For companies exploring how to apply customer insights in real-time, JTBD remains a flexible, time-tested way to unlock customer value – and keep that value central in all business decisions.

One of the greatest strengths of the Jobs to Be Done framework is its ability to uncover real, often unspoken, customer needs. Where many research approaches focus on what customers say they want, JTBD helps discover what they’re truly trying to accomplish in the context of their daily lives.

Looking Beyond Features to Understand Behaviors

When a customer chooses a product or service, they’re not just buying – they’re hiring it to get a job done. This mindset encourages businesses to shift their questions from "What should we build?" to "What role does our solution play in someone's life?"

For example, a fictional food delivery company might assume their customers choose them for speed. But through JTBD-based user research, they learn that many customers are actually prioritizing dependability – making sure meals arrive warm and complete, even if not the fastest option. This type of insight can transform priorities in product development and marketing strategy.

Uncovering Emotional and Functional Needs

JTBD helps explore needs on two levels:

• Functional needs: What tasks is the customer trying to complete?
• Emotional needs: How does the customer want to feel while doing it?

Say a small business owner is looking for accounting software. The functional job might be “track income and expenses,” but the emotional job could be “feel confident about taxes.” Understanding both layers helps create more resonant solutions that truly serve the whole customer experience.

Stronger Product Innovation Starts with Customer Clarity

By framing product opportunities around data-driven customer insights, JTBD empowers teams to design features or services that speak directly to real-life use cases – not hypothetical ones.

Consider this simple lens for applying the JTBD framework:

• Identify the job: What’s the task or goal the customer is trying to achieve?
• Understand the context: Where, when, and why does this job arise?
• Map existing solutions: How is the customer solving it today – and what’s missing?
• Spot innovation gaps: Where can your business add real value?

When done right, this process brings clarity across teams and de-risks product bets by anchoring them in real-world demand. It’s how beginner teams and advanced innovation departments alike can move from ideas to impact more consistently.

Why Use JTBD for Customer Insights?

The biggest reason? It brings you closer to the “why” behind customer behavior. That ‘why’ is where opportunity lives. Whether you’re refreshing a product, entering a new market, or looking for growth answers, understanding the job your customer is hiring you for is a practical – and powerful – place to start.

As SIVO Insights often sees in our research, the more directly a brand can align with identified jobs to be done, the more effectively they can meet expectations and earn loyalty. It's a strategy for driving business growth with meaning, built on clear understanding instead of guesswork.

As we move into 2025, the Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework continues to evolve, becoming an increasingly powerful tool for innovation, product development, and customer insight. Several emerging trends are shaping how businesses apply JTBD to meet dynamic consumer needs and accelerate business growth.

From Functional to Emotional and Social Jobs

Traditionally, JTBD focused heavily on practical, functional jobs – the task a user is trying to complete. But modern applications are expanding to include emotional and social dimensions. In 2025, companies are increasingly exploring how products make people feel and how they impact social identity. This helps businesses create solutions that resonate on a deeper human level.

For example, a fictional skincare brand might discover that beyond cleaning skin (functional need), customers want to feel confident on video calls (emotional need) and be seen as knowledgeable about trending wellness products (social need). Recognizing all aspects of the job leads to more relevant innovation.

Pairing JTBD with Real-Time Data and AI

While the human-centered nature of JTBD remains core, real-time behavioral data and responsible AI are now being used to validate hypotheses and segment customers by their Jobs. These tools can help identify usage patterns, environmental cues, and unmet needs faster—yet must always be interpreted with human insight to add empathy and context.

Applying JTBD Across the Entire Customer Journey

In 2025, businesses are applying JTBD not just during product design but across the whole customer lifecycle—from first consideration to post-purchase use. This unlocks new opportunities for tailored messaging, better onboarding, and meaningful support experiences.

JTBD is Driving Competitive Differentiation

• Companies that use JTBD well can uncover white space that isn't visible via traditional market research methods.
• This approach helps avoid feature-focused churn and instead drives holistic innovations that meet underlying human goals.
• It also supports internal alignment across teams – everyone from marketing to product to customer service can rally around ‘what job are we really solving?’

These trends reflect a broader shift toward deeper consumer insights and more nuanced understanding of customer behavior. For companies navigating crowded markets, JTBD is proving to be a vital lens for identifying unmet needs and creating breakthrough solutions.

Knowing when to apply the JTBD framework can make the difference between building a me-too product and creating a true market differentiator. While JTBD is versatile, it’s especially impactful in several key business situations.

You're Entering a New Market

When branching into an unfamiliar space, assumptions can be risky. JTBD gives teams a clear way to understand the underlying tasks, pain points, and motivations of target consumers—without relying on superficial data or guesswork. It guides you to the “why” behind behaviors that quantitative market research alone might not reveal.

Your Product Isn’t Gaining Traction

If you’ve launched a new offering but it’s not resonating with customers, JTBD can help uncover what's missing. Often, the problem isn't the product itself, but that it's not solving a meaningful job. Understanding those unmet jobs allows you to refine your value proposition or reposition the solution to better fit the true needs of your audience.

You’re Prioritizing a Product Roadmap

Product teams frequently struggle to decide which features or innovations to pursue next. JTBD helps remove personal bias and anchoring by identifying what matters most to users. Instead of focusing on what’s easiest to build or most exciting internally, teams can prioritize what actually moves the needle for customer success.

Signs It May Be Time to Use JTBD:

• Your customer segmentation feels too generic or doesn’t guide strategy.
• You're seeing usage drop-off but don't know why.
• There’s internal misalignment on who the customer is or what they truly value.
• You're innovating in a category with little differentiation.

Unlike more traditional methods that often emphasize demographics or attitudes, JTBD centers on behavior and intent. That makes it particularly powerful when you need to clarify go-to-market strategy, connect with consumers on a deeper level, or identify new growth pathways.

In short: if you're trying to understand why customers choose (or leave) you – and how to build something more aligned with real-life use – JTBD is a strong starting point for your market research strategy.

At SIVO Insights, we bring clarity where there’s complexity—and that includes guiding brands through the Jobs to Be Done framework. Whether you’re developing a new product, refining a service experience, or rethinking customer segmentation, our approach helps you uncover what people truly need—beyond just what they say.

Built Around Real Human Understanding

We believe in grounding innovation in human truths. Our research team applies JTBD through thoughtful, tailor-made qualitative and quantitative studies that uncover:

• The core functional, emotional, and social jobs your customers are trying to accomplish
• The barriers they face in getting those jobs done
• Where unmet needs create opportunities for product innovation and business growth

Our focus on empathy, observation, and clear synthesis ensures your team walks away with insights that are not only data-rich, but actionable across departments.

Flexible, Collaborative Approach Aligned to Your Needs

We know no two challenges are the same. That’s why we don’t offer a one-size-fits-all process. Our JTBD research can be run as full-service custom studies or paired with fractional experts from our On Demand Talent network to support your internal team. You get the right blend of skills, flexibility, and ongoing guidance.

SIVO’s JTBD services fit seamlessly into:

• Concept development or innovation pipeline planning
• User research for digital and physical products
• Customer journey mapping initiatives
• Brand positioning and communication refinement

We also help translate insight into clear, strategic next steps—with deliverables that empower cross-functional teams to make confident choices. You’re not just collecting information. You’re building alignment around where to go next and why.

JTBD is Powerful—Especially When Applied the Right Way

When done well, Jobs to Be Done research shines a light on unseen opportunity. For example, a fictional food delivery service thought customers just wanted ‘fast meals.’ But our research revealed they were really trying to solve ‘meal planning stress after work.’ That shift in framing helped spark a new line of weekly meal bundles—leading to greater retention and satisfaction.

Whether you're new to JTBD or looking to level up your research strategy, SIVO brings the curiosity, clarity, and experience to help you unlock impactful insight that drives results.