Research Domain Skill Skill

Entry point: /faion-net — invoke this skill for automatic routing to the appropriate domain.

Research Domain Skill

Communication: User's language. Docs: English.

Purpose

Orchestrate all research and discovery activities for product/startup development. Coordinates 2 specialized sub-skills for comprehensive research coverage.

Context Discovery

Auto-Investigation

Check for existing research and product context:

| Signal | How to Check | What It Tells Us | |--------|--------------|------------------| | .aidocs/product_docs/ | Glob("**/.aidocs/product_docs/*") | Product docs exist | | market-research.md | Glob("**/market-research.md") | Market research done | | competitive-analysis.md | Glob("**/competitive-analysis.md") | Competitors analyzed | | user-personas.md | Glob("**/user-personas.md") | Personas defined | | constitution.md | Glob("**/.aidocs/constitution.md") | Product defined | | Landing page | Glob("**/pages/index.*") | Positioning visible |

Read existing assets:

Check landing page for current positioning/messaging
Read constitution.md for product context
Check any existing research docs

Discovery Questions

Use AskUserQuestion to understand research needs.

Q1: Research Stage

question: "What stage of research are you in?"
header: "Stage"
multiSelect: false
options:
  - label: "Exploring ideas (no specific direction)"
    description: "Generate and evaluate new ideas"
  - label: "Have an idea, need validation"
    description: "Test if idea is worth pursuing"
  - label: "Committed, need market intelligence"
    description: "Understand market, competitors, pricing"
  - label: "Building, need user insights"
    description: "Understand users for better product"

Routing:

"Exploring ideas" → Skill(faion-market-researcher) → idea-generation
"Need validation" → Skill(faion-user-researcher) → problem-validation
"Market intelligence" → Skill(faion-market-researcher) → competitors, TAM, pricing
"User insights" → Skill(faion-user-researcher) → personas, JTBD, pain points

Q2: Research Focus (if market intelligence)

question: "What do you need to understand?"
header: "Focus"
multiSelect: true
options:
  - label: "Market size (TAM/SAM/SOM)"
    description: "How big is the opportunity?"
  - label: "Competitors & alternatives"
    description: "Who else solves this problem?"
  - label: "Pricing benchmarks"
    description: "What do customers pay for similar?"
  - label: "Industry trends"
    description: "Where is the market heading?"

Routing:

"Market size" → tam-sam-som-analysis
"Competitors" → competitor-analysis
"Pricing" → pricing-research
"Trends" → trend-analysis

Q3: User Research Type (if user insights)

question: "What user insights do you need?"
header: "Insights"
multiSelect: true
options:
  - label: "Who are my users? (personas)"
    description: "User profiles and segments"
  - label: "What problems do they have?"
    description: "Pain points and frustrations"
  - label: "What are they trying to achieve?"
    description: "Jobs-to-be-done, goals"
  - label: "Would they pay for a solution?"
    description: "Willingness to pay, value perception"

Routing:

"Personas" → persona-building
"Problems" → pain-point-research
"Achieve" → jobs-to-be-done
"Pay" → value-proposition + pricing-research

Q4: Evidence Standards

question: "What would convince you the research is solid?"
header: "Evidence"
multiSelect: false
options:
  - label: "Quick directional insights"
    description: "Enough to make a decision, move fast"
  - label: "Backed by data sources"
    description: "Links to research, reports, data"
  - label: "Primary research (interviews/surveys)"
    description: "Talk to real users/customers"

Context impact:

"Quick" → Web search, secondary research, fast output
"Backed by data" → Include sources, citations, methodology
"Primary research" → Interview guides, survey design, synthesis

Architecture

faion-researcher (orchestrator)
├── faion-market-researcher (22 methodologies)
│   ├── Market sizing (TAM/SAM/SOM)
│   ├── Competitor analysis
│   ├── Pricing research
│   ├── Trend analysis
│   ├── Niche evaluation
│   ├── Business model planning
│   └── Idea generation
└── faion-user-researcher (21 methodologies)
    ├── Persona building
    ├── User interviews
    ├── Pain point research
    ├── Jobs-to-be-done
    ├── Problem validation
    ├── Value proposition design
    └── Survey design

Total: 43 methodologies across 2 sub-skills

Quick Decision Tree

| If you need... | Route to Sub-Skill | |---------------|-------------------| | Market Intelligence | | | Market size (TAM/SAM/SOM) | faion-market-researcher | | Competitors & gaps | faion-market-researcher | | Pricing benchmarks | faion-market-researcher | | Market trends | faion-market-researcher | | Niche evaluation | faion-market-researcher | | Business models | faion-market-researcher | | Generate ideas | faion-market-researcher | | User Understanding | | | User profiles | faion-user-researcher | | Pain points | faion-user-researcher | | User motivations (JTBD) | faion-user-researcher | | Value proposition | faion-user-researcher | | Interview questions | faion-user-researcher | | Problem validation | faion-user-researcher | | Survey design | faion-user-researcher | | Full Research | | | Complete product research | Both (sequential) |

Sub-Skills (2)

faion-market-researcher

Focus: Market & business intelligence

| Capability | Methodologies | |------------|---------------| | Market Analysis | TAM/SAM/SOM, market sizing, trends | | Competitive Intel | Competitor analysis, competitive intelligence | | Business Planning | Models, niche eval, risk, distribution | | Pricing | Research, benchmarking | | Ideas | Generation, frameworks |

Files: 22 | Location: faion-market-researcher/

faion-user-researcher

Focus: User research & validation

| Capability | Methodologies | |------------|---------------| | Personas | Building, segmentation, AI-assisted | | Interviews | Methods, analysis, at-scale | | Pain Points | Research, validation | | JTBD | Framework, motivations | | Validation | Methods, problem-solution fit | | Value Prop | Design, canvas |

Files: 21 | Location: faion-user-researcher/

Agents (2)

| Agent | Model | Purpose | Modes | |-------|-------|---------|-------| | faion-research-agent | opus | Research orchestrator | ideas, market, competitors, pains, personas, validate, niche, pricing, names | | faion-domain-checker-agent | sonnet | Domain availability verification | - |

Details: agent-invocation.md

Research Modes (9)

| Mode | Output | Sub-Skill Used | |------|--------|----------------| | ideas | idea-candidates.md | market-researcher | | market | market-research.md | market-researcher | | competitors | competitive-analysis.md | market-researcher | | pricing | pricing-research.md | market-researcher | | niche | niche-evaluation.md | market-researcher | | personas | user-personas.md | user-researcher | | pains | pain-points.md | user-researcher | | validate | problem-validation.md | user-researcher | | names | name-candidates.md | market-researcher |

Core Workflows

1. Idea Discovery

Context → Generate Ideas → Select → Pain Research → Niche Eval → Results
Sub-skills: market-researcher (ideas, niche) + user-researcher (pains)

2. Product Research

Parse Project → Read Docs → Select Modules → Sequential Execution → Summary
Sub-skills: market-researcher (market, competitors, pricing) + user-researcher (personas, validate)

3. Project Naming

Gather Concept → Generate Names → Select → Check Domains → Results
Sub-skill: market-researcher (naming)

Details: workflows.md

Quick Reference

| Topic | File | Description | |-------|------|-------------| | Navigation | CLAUDE.md | Entry point, when to use | | Agents | agent-invocation.md | Agent syntax, modes | | Workflows | workflows.md | Research workflows | | Frameworks | frameworks.md | 7 Ps, JTBD, TAM/SAM/SOM | | Methodologies | methodologies-index.md | Full index |

Output Files

All outputs go to .aidocs/product_docs/:

| Module | Output File | Sub-Skill | |--------|-------------|-----------| | Idea Discovery | idea-validation.md | market-researcher | | Market Research | market-research.md | market-researcher | | Competitors | competitive-analysis.md | market-researcher | | Pricing | pricing-research.md | market-researcher | | Niche | niche-evaluation.md | market-researcher | | Personas | user-personas.md | user-researcher | | Pain Points | pain-points.md | user-researcher | | Validation | problem-validation.md | user-researcher | | Summary | executive-summary.md | Both |

Integration

Entry Point

Invoked via /faion-net when intent is research-related:

if intent in ["idea", "research", "market", "competitors", "naming", "personas", "pricing"]:
    invoke("faion-researcher")

Sub-Skill Invocation

# Market intelligence
invoke("faion-market-researcher", mode="market")

# User research
invoke("faion-user-researcher", mode="personas")

# Full research (sequential)
invoke("faion-market-researcher", mode="market")
invoke("faion-market-researcher", mode="competitors")
invoke("faion-user-researcher", mode="personas")
invoke("faion-user-researcher", mode="validate")

Next Steps

After research complete, offer:

"Create GTM Manifest?" → faion-marketing-manager
"Create spec.md?" → faion-sdd
"Start development?" → faion-software-developer

Rules

Sequential execution - Run agents ONE BY ONE (not parallel)
Sub-skill routing - Market topics → market-researcher, User topics → user-researcher
Source citations - All research must include URLs
Data quality - If not found → "Data not available"

faion-researcher v2.0 Orchestrator with 2 sub-skills Total: 43 methodologies | Agents: 2 | Modes: 9

Agent Skills: Research Domain Skill

Install this agent skill to your local

Skill Files