📄 Report | Published by Marvin | Based on survey of 224 UX and product professionals
“Research repositories are no longer optional — they’re essential to scale research impact.”
Adoption is up, but satisfaction is mixed.
While 71% of respondents use a repository, only 27% are very satisfied with their setup.
Repositories are failing to drive insight reuse.
Only 18% say their current system makes it easy for others to find and use past research.
Top challenges:
Most common formats? Notes, clips, and decks.
Video remains under-utilised. Transcription and storage are inconsistent across tools.
Scaling insight = scaling access.
Teams that get value from their repository focus on internal visibility, standardised tagging, and governance.
| Insight | What You Should Do |
|---|---|
| Repositories ≠ insight reuse by default | Design onboarding and tagging practices that match how your team actually searches |
| Tool mismatch is real | Choose platforms that integrate with your existing research stack (Zoom, Notion, Dovetail, etc.) |
| Tags need a taxonomy | Build shared language and train others — don’t expect tagging to self-organise |
| Content needs curation | Just dumping into folders isn’t enough. Highlight top insights, summaries, and evergreen findings |
| Siloed research is still a problem | Make sharing easy — build habits for reuse, not just storage |
💬 “Storing research isn’t the same as scaling research.”
This report nailed a truth a lot of us have seen in the wild: most research repositories become cluttered graveyards unless someone owns the system and keeps it alive.
As a researcher, I often see well-intended Notion spaces or shared folders that technically store data, but do little to help teams reuse insight. The biggest takeaway here is that tools don’t fix processes.
You need clarity, culture, and consistent habits to get real value from a repository.
The bit about tagging also resonated. I’ve tried systems with 40+ tags and ones with 5 — neither worked. It’s not about how many tags you have, but how searchable and meaningful they are to your team.