User experience, or UX, is the overall experience of a person using a product such as a website or app. UX isn’t limited to the visual interface of your product. It’s a concept that encompasses the entire journey a person takes.
Take for example a simple search on Google. You’re presented with a logo and a search field. Now imagine that every time you searched on Google it took 15 seconds to get a result—you’d no longer be able to instantly get an answer to your question. Your experience with Google would be dramatically different.
How your visitors engage with your website should be an evolving priority for your business. UX is important because it solves a need for your audience. Getting them from point A to point B in the fewest steps possible with the least amount of struggle should always be the goal. Additionally, a meaningful user experience allows you to define the journey on your website that are most conducive to business success.
In a recent study from Forrester Research, a well-designed user interface could raise your website’s conversion rate by up to a 200%. A better UX design could yield conversion rates up to 400%. Put simply, the metrics speak for themselves.
Planning the UX journey
When customers come to your site, you have only seconds to influence them. Investing in UX optimization is necessary to quickly gain trust, brand recognition and ensure user retention. In the case of MF Fire, we wanted to ensure the customer journey on both mobile and desktop were streamlined to:
- Introduce the product line.
- Inform the customer of the benefits of their products.
- Provide simple product customization tools.
- Checkout.
Clearly understanding why customers come to a site and what they need works in favor of both the audience and the business. Customer journey mapping is a widely used and impactful technique that can help you improve products, marketing, UX, and merchandising decisions.
Where to start UX improvements
You don’t have to be a UX pro to at least start a plan for improvements. Before your designer opens up Photoshop, start with a simple list:
- Understand: Define the problem first. You need to understand clearly what are you trying to solve.
- Research: Instead of just searching Google ask your audience. There are many available tools to do a survey and collect ideas from users.
- Audience: Now that you have some data about your users, what they need, what they expect. The next step is segmenting that audience. The purpose is to create reliable and realistic representations for reference.
- Sitemap: Based on your audience, break out the sticky notes and assemble a map of what those segments may be looking for. How can they make it from point A to point B in the least amount of resistance?
- Create: Now that you have a stronger understanding of your goals and how your customers may engage with your website it’s time to start some wireframes and composing that fantastic UI.
Having a rough outline of the above is a big step forward before designing anything. If you need help with that journey we’re here to help!