The ROI of UX Design: why user experience is an important investment
Every business is now a tech business. To stand out and differentiate your brand, it’s vital to invest in UX design and good user experience best practices. The Return on Investment (ROI) that good design brings for businesses is huge: User experience drives more conversions and higher engagement rates than any other form of digital marketing. A well-designed experience will help drive revenue, lower costs, help build long-lasting customers, and reach target goals earlier.
UX design helps connect users with the product or service that businesses offer — getting it right is critical to the success of a business. Investing in design early on pays dividends for everyone; users get a better product that they can engage with and fall in love with, and the business thrives. Customers return for experiences built with them in mind and actively seek to use the product you have created.
Why UX is important for your business
But what is UX? Good user experience design is about crafting solutions that work for the user and enables companies to better connect with their customers. It’s also about understanding human psychology, and behavior, along with branding and design principles. It’s about creating an environment where people feel safe, respected, and supported. It all boils down to one thing: a great user experience is critical for the success of any product.
What is UX Design, and why is it important?
UX design is a big subject, an ever-expanding umbrella encompassing various disciplines; however, it all comes down to one key idea: What will the experience be for this user?
Great UX designers create a sense of trust and credibility. When someone trusts your company, they’re more likely to buy from you or engage with your content. A well-thought-out design will also keep a person on your site or app for longer, which can lead to increased conversions.
A good UX designer will be good at making decisions that simultaneously address the business and the customer’s needs. The best way to do this? Take advantage of qualitative and quantitative data sources to understand what your customers want and need before designing their experience!
How to make sure your UX is user-centric
UX design is a process. It’s not enough to have a great idea. You need to know how to turn that idea into a product or service that people want and use every day.
Take a look at some of the big tech companies: Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon. They all have something in common — they’re focused on delivering best-in-class UX from the beginning.
But think about it: Even if you’re not as well known as those iconic brands, your company can grow by delivering an exceptional user experience! When people feel like they’re getting what they want from your business — and it works the way they expect — they’ll love you for it. And when people love you? You win!
The ROI of good UX design for your business
The ROI of UX design is huge. Detail-oriented design delivers a better product experience, encourages customer retention, drives revenue and conversion, lowers operating costs, and helps companies reach their target goals faster. Businesses can build better products that engage their users by investing in design early on.
You know a well-designed product when you see it, but sometimes you don’t. Products that are well put together and easy to use are so intuitive that they seamlessly blend into your workflow and life. Take everyone’s favorite example, the iPhone. The iPhone and the experience behind it was so revolutionary when launched because it was effortless, fun to use, and beautifully crafted from the inside out. The investment in design was evident with the first iPhone and subsequent versions. It showcases how transformative and disruptive a well-designed product can be, even when based on old technology, phones that date back to 1876. Ultimately, well-designed products are ones that people can’t put down and keep coming back for more.
Good UX drives business. A 2017 Nielsen report found that a better user experience leads to higher conversion rates, more engagement, and higher customer satisfaction. It’s also about understanding your customers and what they need. As a result, UX-focused companies perform better financially.
The Baymard Institute is one of my favorite UX resources and has a seemingly limitless well of UX design knowledge for e-commerce sites. Baymard studies and catalogs how companies can design better to provide the best user experience, leading to increased conversions and higher customer satisfaction. The key takeaway: thoughtful user experience design leads to better-performing websites and digital applications for all involved, end-users, and business stakeholders.
Wrapping it up
UX design and good user experience best practices are crucial to your business’ success. Well-designed, easy-to-use, engaging experiences connect users with a product so that they keep coming back. Great UX design doesn’t happen by accident. Organizations need to make the up-front investment in good design so that they can reap the benefits, drive their business goals further and faster, and build a customer base that will love and evangelize for your product. Investing in design pays dividends in the long run for your customers, your team, and your business. Make the user experience core of your product, invest heavily, and take the time to make good design decisions that will drive your business or product forward for years to come.
