What is UX Design?
I have to admit — finding a simple way of explaining what UX Design is, and what we do UX Designers, has been a struggle. This bothered me. A lot. Not being able to fully communicate one of my passions felt like a great failure.
What is it again what you do?
How I explain it at a party after the first beer 🍺
Imagine two products that are quite similar in function. User experience design is what makes you choose one product over the other, tell your friends about it and choose it again the next time.
How I explain it at a party after the second beer 🍻
Imagine a product or service that you like. User experience design is what makes you enjoy that product or service.
How?
Say you use Apple Music instead of Spotify. There is most likely a reason for your preference and that is what we as UX Designers strive to understand. By doing this, we can offer you the best possible experience while using the app. It may be which songs or artists are available, or that it has some functionality that Spotify doesn’t. It’s doing something for you better than Spotify can, and that is why you choose it.
What does UX Design for you?
Imagine you’re going on vacation and you want to purchase plane tickets. You visit an airline’s web page and start the booking process. All is going well — up until the payment process. This particular airline doesn’t support payments using Mastercard, which happens to be the only card you have. Disappointed, you leave the site and continue your search elsewhere. As a UX Designer for this airline, I would strive to find out why you left us and in what ways we could improve your experience.
Nerd mode 🤓
The goal of UX design in business is to “improve customer satisfaction and loyalty through the utility, ease of use, and
pleasure provided in the interaction with a product. In other words, UX design is the process of designing (digital or
physical) products that are useful, easy to use, and
delightful to interact with. It’s about enhancing the experience that people have while interacting with your product,
and making sure they find value in what you’re providing.
UX Design is an empathically-driven practice crafted to solve human and business problems, and remove obstacles and
friction from a user’s desired goals—hopefully delivering delight in the process.
Facts