Many brands release similar products with similar features to solve similar problems. And while they can all do their tasks well, the one with the best user experience (UX) will always be the most successful. 

Amazon, Apple, and Airbnb outperform the competition not because they offer something unique but because they provide a superior user experience that supports user goals and tells them, “I understand your needs.”

As a software development outsourcing company, we at Relevant are constantly challenged to improve the user experience through design. So we’ve decided to summarize our experience in this area. 

This article will tell you everything about what a good design is and why it is vital for the success of any business. So, if you’re eager to develop a website, mobile app, or any other software product but still have doubts about investing in UX, keep reading. 

What is UX design, and why is it important?

Potential clients often ask us this question. The answer is simple: a well-designed interface helps meet users’ needs, provides a positive experience, and makes them happy. Satisfied users, as a rule, become regular customers and popularizers of your brand. If you don’t take our word for it, here’s the research-based evidence:

• 75% of visitors judge a website based on its visual aesthetic.
• Customers who enjoy the brand experience spend 140% more on its products/services.
• 89% of users buy from a competitor after a bad user experience.
• Good UX design improves KPIs by up to 83%.
• 70% of enterprise CEOs view UX as an essential tool for attracting, converting, and keeping customers.
• For every dollar invested in UX, brands can get an average of $100 extra revenue.
• A well-designed UX can lead to a 400% increase in a website’s conversion rate.
• Because of poor user experience, 25% of mobile apps are removed immediately after their first launch.
• Bain & Co. estimates that a 5% increase in customer retention can boost a company’s profitability by 75%.

What is UX design?

User experience design is a multi-step process of creating (digital or physical) products, comprising user research, information architecture planning, wireframing, prototyping, and user testing.

And we’re not just talking about layout clarity, sitemap and navigation intuitiveness, or other essential UX elements. The bottom line is that you can consciously influence interactions and experiences through research and careful planning. 

Intuitive UX design fulfills the brand promise and recognizes that the customers’ feelings are of great commercial importance. Therefore, you must test all ideas with real customer reviews to ensure that those who use them will like the final product. Showing how your products or services work in the real world with real people helps you create better-tailored products for your users’ needs.

What do we mean by a great user experience?

User experience aims to create a positive experience that ensures user loyalty to a product or brand. The crucial things you need to know about UX include:

• User experience is what users think and feel. People are rational and emotional, and both parties play an important role in how users perceive the product.
• The user experience depends on the context in which the product is used. To develop a great product, you need to understand this context very well. Understanding the product’s role in users’ lives is also critical.
• The user experience with the product may change over time. When people start using a new product, they may have mixed feelings. Nevertheless, they can change their minds when they know it better.

Creating a great user experience: principles to follow

Most well-designed products are developed using a user-centric approach. User researchers first identify user task flows, problems, and emotional triggers, providing information to create a proposed design solution. UX designers then use this research to make designs easy to use and satisfy the user’s emotional needs. Finally, usability experts validate designs through usability testing or evaluation studies.

A user-centric approach leads consistently to useful, usable products. The advantage is that it is multifaceted and cyclical. It’s more like a loop than a linear journey, with no end in sight. That creates a mindset of continuous improvement and iterative design that pervades design and creates a culture of continuous improvement throughout the company.

What are the benefits of UX design for your project?

The main reason many companies are in business today is to generate revenue. But if the improvement and simplification of people’s lives accompanied a greater output, it becomes an ideal combination, beneficial for both sides. Users get what they want, and the business makes money from it. 

Key benefits of UX design

We will briefly describe the top ten benefits of good UX for startups or small and big businesses. They can receive them all by investing in UX design as early as the creation phase of the digital product.

It provides the best solution

UX design is not just about the aesthetics of your website. Good UX design results from thorough user research, thoughtful information architecture, good wireframing and prototyping, regular user testing, and implementing all of these elements into your solution. It is the ability to combine your ideas and software in a way that meets the needs of your end-users.

It boosts customer engagement

Attracting customers means persuading them that your product or service is worth their money. The more intuitive the features, the easier it is to gain trust and thus increase the chances that a brand will attract users and convert them into customers.

It improves credibility

With a clean, attractive, well-designed UX, brands that feel good will hold consumers’ attention longer, earning them long-term trust. In addition, most companies that consider themselves design-driven are showing signs of success in the business goals they have set for themselves.

It helps build a brand image

Users trust big digital companies that put UX design at the heart of everything they do. For example, 56% of customers under the age of 30 would prefer to use digital banking solutions provided by Google or Apple if they were ever available. 

It increases sales

A study of over 400 companies found that the more funds a company has invested in design, the higher sales it will achieve. Also, effective UI/UX design is often a more effective strategy for increasing sales than price.

It encourages word-of-mouse

Another powerful marketing tool you can stimulate with the right UX design is word of mouth. Statistics say that 72% of customers will share a positive experience with six or more people. That’s a lot of potential customers waiting to get to know your brand. 84% of people trust recommendations from friends and family more than any other form of advertising.

It helps beat your competitors

User experience is of great value in the competitive struggle. Forrester found that when brands focus on the customer experience, they increase consumers’ willingness to pay and slow the speed at which they switch to other brands.

It improves performance

Today, almost all businesses need a cohesive interface to offer products and services for profit. A great UI/UX system can reduce errors and provide a smoother workflow for employees.

It can reduce development and support costs

Investing in good UX design can cut development time by up to 55%. Thus, involving UX designers in a project reduces costs and shortens the overall development cycle. In addition, intuitive UX design lowers support costs by up to 90%, improving self-service. That is one of the critical long-term benefits of UX design.

It provides more accurate prototyping

Prototyping aims to test design concepts and usability while limiting development costs. A well-designed UX helps create more accurate designs and layouts, saving design implementation time. By the way, 85% of UX problems can be found during a usability test with just five users.

But what is a good UX design?

As you may have noticed, top tech companies (like Google or Apple) have their approach to UI and UX design. But there is one thing that unites different methods together. Users should achieve their goals in the easiest, fastest, and smoothest way possible.

Therefore, we recommend you consider implementing the KISS (Keep it Simple, Stupid) design principle. The essence of this principle is in the development of a simple interface that even a six-year-old child can understand. 

Also, don’t forget about Hick’s law (the more options you give the user, the longer it will take him to decide).

The essential elements of UX design

Taking a UX approach to the design process helps you focus on how the product is used from start to finish rather than just how it looks.

It is the optimization of the speed of opening pages that ensures the consistency of the pages of the website and its adaptation to mobile devices. It’s also about clear visual hierarchy, using whitespace and quality images where they’re needed, including engaging calls to action, relevant headings, fonts, and segmenting key information with bullet points. All these components make your product, website, or application:

• Usable: easy-to-use app features intuitive navigation, helpful customization, and UX design patterns that take no time to learn.
• Desirable: the image, corporate identity, brand, and other design elements should evoke positive emotions.
• Findable: content should be navigable and localizable both on and off the site.
• Accessible: site or app must be accessible to people with disabilities.
• Useful: content must be original and meet your customers’ needs.
• Credible: users need to believe what you present, and poor UX reduces brand trust.

There are other subtleties of good design, and they are directly related to development. Therefore, you must hire a software development team with experience in web and app development, not just UX design.

Should I follow the trends to create a superb UX design?

Take a look around, and you’ll see that many of the most prominent digital products available today have been redesigned and use very similar, often minimalist templates. 

Interestingly, minimalism in 2022 is not just about monochrome or white backgrounds. This direction has expanded the boundaries and become brighter while maintaining the overall concept of simplicity and convenience.

The recent past was dominated by small, light-grey fonts that were too low-contrast for good readability. Now we see bolder fonts and a flat look everywhere.

Many brands have followed another 2022 UX design trend: real and big photos. Also, many companies have relied on the personalization of user experience. It is not surprising, as 72% of consumers only interact with personalized messages.

Firsthand

We asked Relevant’s designer Ivan Baloh how the UX process goes and whether it’s worth keeping up with the latest trends, and here’s what he said:

“When we think about UX design, we look at the best UX websites, study the latest design trends, check out a list of UX principles and best practices, and finally look for a way to integrate all of this into our solution with user experience in mind. To manage it, we determine who will use the product and how to create it, then improve and support it. Although all projects differ from client to client, we are always on the side of users and put their needs at the center of everything. As for trends, they are certainly important, as they are based on user preferences. However, our practice shows that users are more likely to choose the obvious and intuitive route than the trendy or brutal one. But if you still want to experiment with fashion design, prototype it, test it with users, and decide based on real feedback.”

5 top examples of best UX designs

Great UX design can look different. It could be a creative navigation system, a beautifully planned form, or efficient use of screen space. Although there are a lot of applications with great design, we will give only five good UX design examples where a UX designer has risen to the occasion.

Google

Why is Google so successful? The reasons are clever marketing, high technology, and the great UX of the Google search engine. It is the easiest and quickest tool ever created. Just type in your query and press Enter. The product has always been simple, but it has become even simpler and faster.

Spotify

Every little detail in Spotify’s UX design follows a consistent trail of behavior and appearance. Whether the user wants to hide a song, add it to a playlist, or like it, the app behaves the same way and immediately responds to the user’s action.

Airbnb

Airbnb takes UX design seriously. The company even created its Cereal font, symbolizing youth and fun. But the true magic lies in the interface design of the website and the app. Airbnb’s clean and minimal interface displays a wealth of information. Instead of just listing options to rent, Airbnb gives the user a complete overview of their next vacation.

Duolingo

Duolingo has become popular due to its cool UX design. The app combines two pieces of the UX puzzle: breaking down a long process into smaller pieces and a visual hierarchy. Duolingo simplifies everything by asking one question at a time, maintaining clarity, and reducing cognitive load. It does not overwhelm users and does not lose focus on the issue at hand. On the other hand, Duolingo’s UX/UI design allows for play with many elements and uses the law of proximity to ask clear questions and guide the user’s eye.

Medium

Some websites, such as Medium, do not offer anything other than the posted content. And one of the reasons for its popularity is directly related to its interface. Unlike most other sites that host written content, Medium’s design is clean and free of ads. There are no flashy graphic ads on the sides of articles; there are no popups that span entire paragraphs. Instead, there is a lot of white space, making for a great read.

So, how do I create a good design?

If you’re ready to maximize your strategies for creating an awesome UX, check out the tips below.

• Get to know your clients. When you collect user preference data, it will be easier to offer content that matches specific needs. You increase conversions and maintain traffic by directing your customers to where they want to be.
• Give customers what they want. According to Hubspot, 76% of consumers prefer websites that make it easy to find what they are looking for. The more complex and messy your UX is, the more likely people are to look elsewhere.
• Use colors wisely. Colors can create an immediate emotional connection with your visitors, and when used correctly, they can help improve conversions. When you use a specific color, keep in mind what message you send to your potential clients. That’s why it’s so crucial to consider the psychology of color to interest and tell your customers about your business. Look at the Relevant’s homepage. As you can see, the simple combination of black and white has a significant impact on the perception of our company. The design of our site looks urban, powerful, and intense.
• Don’t be afraid of whitespace. Proper whitespace in your design can help you guide your customers to the right information more effectively, increasing overall conversions. Since bigger isn’t always better in website design, whitespace can help create a visual distinction between data blocks and images.
• Be mindful of mobile devices. 54.4% of global online traffic comes from mobile devices. Focusing on mobile app UI design also helps with responsive design, i.e., how well web pages render on devices with different screen sizes.
• Use the right CTA. A call to action is essential if you want people visiting your site to take a specific action. Any image, link, or form on a website can grab a customer’s attention and lead to a conversion. The CTAs are in the right places on well-designed websites and don’t disrupt the page’s natural viewing experience.
• Don’t forget about SEO. Search engine optimization should be considered at every stage of your website’s development. Start with keywords and intent, then optimize and customize the results after launching the website.
• Always test! If you do this enough times, you’ll end up with the perfect mix of content and design to reach your traffic and conversion goals.

As you can see, creating a visually appealing product is easy, but it takes a lot of time, effort, and empathy to make it deliver a good user experience. Only teams with extensive knowledge and honed practical skills in creating solutions that convert customers and keep them returning will cope with this task. 

Conclusion

Why should you choose Relevant? By designing the user interface of digital products, we improve their performance and usability, simplifying the user experience. And it is our empathy for users that allows us to create utterly human-centered design solutions.

From user experience consulting to brand management, Relevant’s UI/UX design services provide you with the result to successfully bring your digital product to market.

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