What is it?

The user experience (UX) is what it sounds like. It is the overall experience of the person using a digital product such as a website, computer or mobile application, especially in terms of how easy and friendly it is to use.

Why is it important?

UX is important to a company because it tries to fulfill the end user’s every need while they are using your digital product. By the ease of navigation that your website allows the user, the increase in the positive experience they had by interacting with your company and ultimately increase in conversions to achieve set goals.

The UX Design Process

For website designers, there is a comprehensive design process to create the optimal user experience.

Information architecture (IA)

At the base of creating an ideal user experience for you consumers – first, developing the information architecture will help your team organize the necessary content in a way that works best for your user. IA consists of the development of sitemaps, categorization, and navigation of the website. This involves looking at both at the bird’s-eye view of how a user will (generally) interact with the site, but also the details of how every piece of content needs to be organized.

After your team has been able to determine the structure and navigation of the site, it will then be transformed in to user flow diagrams or wireframes, which act, essentially, as the blueprints of the site that highlight the structure, hierarchy and flow of information.

User Research

How do you put this all together? Conducting user research to understand who the users are, is a vital step in creating the architecture of your website. This will allow your team to organize all items of your site in a manner that is important to your user.

Questions to consider when developing the architecture of the website:

• Who are the users of this website?
• What are they searching for and need solutions for?
• How will they use the information provided on the website?
• How would they like to get this information, and when do they need it?
• What do they want to get out of interacting with the website?
• How does delivering the information visitors are seeking also meet your business objectives?

The basic foundation and needs of your website needs to be curated through the information architecture phase of the UX design process that ultimately creates a website structure that creates a good user experience and meets business objectives.

Thoughtful Website Mapping

Now that your company has done its research on your consumers and developed a persona for your audience – using that data you can start to develop the site map that will help navigate your user through your site to achieve the desired outcome.

Your company through its research has done an important step that helps understand what the user wants to see and what motivates them. It becomes crucial to translate the qualitative data that was collected and translate it to a well-thought out website that incorporates all those data points collected.

Navigation and the hierarchy of information should be driven by the research collected from your consumers. What do they need to see first? What header names are drivers to keep them on the page to lead to conversions?

Web developers should be methodical and thoughtful in the development of their site. Relying on the needs of the company solely will only lead to unfavorable outcomes. By putting the consumer first – how do the priorities of the company intertwine to create your company’s authentic voice?

Creative Context

The wireframes are complete and now it’s time to create the visuals that will be appealing and intriguing to the user. Engagement and education are two key points to integrate in to the overall design of your website.

With average attention spans of 7-seconds, every page needs to grab your consumer’s eyes to keep them on your website to convert in the manner needed – as the user will not always come to your site from the main page. Not only does your company need to be visually appealing to keep  a user on the page, but it needs to be able to educate your consumer when they choose to stay because the average consumer wants to know very specific aspects of your company and brand. However, one can fall in to the trap to over stimulate and over communicate – this leads to a delicate balance, all while keeping your company’s voice in the mix and not create content that consumer just wants to hear – they will see right through that!

Testing of Website

This not only involves thorough testing of the website to make sure every link connects to the correct destination, but that submission forms work, ecommerce and payment processing are connected and secure, and your website view on a mobile device is legible and condensed accordingly. A testing phase of your website is incredibly important because as you make your page live for the public, any issues or “bugs” that occur can hinder your ROI and conversion rate.

Continuous Review

Although your site may be up and running with no issues, there are items that need to be reviewed on a continuous basis. Through reports you will see: traffic, click-throughs (from promotions on other channels – emails, social, etc.), conversion through submission forms and ecommerce, and a full user journey through start to finish. These analytics will provide much needed information to either update pages of your website through design, copy or how the page is linked, highlight certain products, or what pages can be condensed. Pending the traffic of your site, these reviews may need to be monthly, quarterly, or bi-annually, but should not be a “set it and forget it” item.

All the components above can help your company develop a well-thought website that can fit the needs of your consumer, with keeping the needs of your company just as important. Your consumers will tell you a detailed story as they journey through your website – but, being able to watch and listen to what they are telling you will help guide the development of truly optimal user experience.

Consulting with Colleen Eakins Design, we can help aide in the creative development of your company’s website to reach your goals.