We’re used to thinking about UX (or User Experience) design as a visual way to plan and optimize for users, and most commonly we see UX as a key initial step in product design and website design and development. The Big Idea is that without proper UX design and testing, we can’t really build or market products users will love. UX designs are often wireframes or flow charts that help us envision the path a user will most often take in using our product or site and what the roadblocks might be that could prevent purchase and, ultimately, customer loyalty and brand advocacy. The Customer is most often the primary user, but there are other users in the sales, marketing and support of our products.
How can good UX make it easier for us to market, sell and support our customers?
PRODUCT DESIGN
Good UX is a hot topic because there are so many new products launching every day and because the competition is fierce in nearly every product niche. While products themselves must fill a real need consumers will pay for, and they must be reliable and competitively priced, the real battleground is over user experience. How easy is it to learn and use this product? How intuitive? If there are questions or a desire to gain expert level knowledge, how easy and accessible are those resources?
As Rick Wise, CEO of Lippincott, says, “By looking beyond the product to take a broader view of customer issues and activities around the product, companies can find new ways to address unmet needs, create talk-worthiness, and fuel differentiation.”
I won’t dwell on product design, because this is the use case everybody thinks about first for UX design.
