You must have seen the following video on user experience and interface design.
If your reaction is, “Huh? User experience design? It’s a video about the technology generation gap,” you’re also right.
Beyond the laughs, the video powerfully illustrates how critical user experience and interface design can be for anyone building an app or a new product.
If your users cannot easily accomplish their goal in a way that makes them feel positive and successful, that’s a UX/UI design fail. Your app or product will probably be unsuccessful at delivering on its promise.
The many faces of interfaces
Interfaces weren’t born with the internet - or even with computers. Take a look around the room you’re sitting in. What “dumb” devices do you need to interact with in order to get what you want?
Here’s an example you’ll find in just about every home or building you visit:
This is a device you interact with to get water. The interface in the image consists of two knobs and a spigot.
Good user experience and interface design means that I can walk up to the faucet and get the water I want with no complications.
What would you call a faucet that had the cold knob on the left side and the hot knob on the right? Or a faucet with a spigot but no knobs (before faucets with sensors became popular)?
Bad interface design. The user is going to turn the wrong knob, or stand there, baffled, for the amount of time she could have gotten 10 cups of water from a regular faucet.
Bad experience design. At best the user will feel the faucet wasted her time. At worst, she’ll sue the faucet manufacturer for a burn caused by hot water coming out when she expected cold water.
Your app or product is likely significantly more complex than a faucet.
Let’s take a look at some examples of where app user experience design succeeded, and some where it failed, and the practical takeaways we can learn and use.
User acquisition: graphics programs
If you’re a designer, the more options and intricacies a design program offers, the better, since you need tools and you know how to manipulate them to get a better final product.
If you’re a non-designer who wants to make good-looking graphics, however, options and intricacies are going to leave you wanting to cry.
A keen awareness of the desired user experience for non-designers is what has made graphics program Canva so successful. Take a look at this user interface:
Image source: Canva
Now, just for the sake of comparison, check out the UI of GIMP, a great open-source graphics design program that is decidedly not for people who “just want to make a nice-looking image.”
Image source: GIMP
In addition to their clean, intuitive interface, Canva enhances the user experience by providing even simpler ways to make stunning images. Just click on Templates, and you’ll get a whole array of customizable templates made by Canva’s professional design staff.
The result? Crazy growth. 15 MILLION users in under 7 years.
Great UX/UI design from a team of designers for a graphic design program which delivers on its promise by understanding that their users require ease and simplicity with professional results. That’s... meta.
Takeaway: don’t skimp on your UX/UI design because… if users don’t fall in love at first sight, believe in your promise and get results, you are unlikely to get a second chance.
User satisfaction and retention: virtual try-ons
Acquiring a user is one thing. Retaining a user is another.
Turning a one-time user into a long-term user depends on great user experience design. Your app or product needs to meet expectations and enable your user to achieve their goals, delivering on the promise - without friction.
A virtual try-on app that enables you to see how you look in different outfits or accessories before you buy sounds like a winning idea - but everything lies in the execution.
Image source: Warby Parker
Warby Parker’s virtual try-on app using AR to let you view frames on your face in real-time is a winner, with a 4.9 star rating (from 155.2K raters). Why?
Source: Google Play
Heard that?
“Best implementation of this feature I have ever seen.”
“Load quickly.”
“No lag.”
“As easy as swiping left or right.”
“Get a great idea of how they will look in real life.”
“Also just kinda fun.”
And all that was in just ONE review. What else could you want?
In stark contrast, this virtual clothing try-on app succeeded in acquiring lots of users… of which many may have became former users. Some of the complaints:
Users can’t easily get their photo on? A frustrating user experience does not bode well for retention.
Source: Google Play
Yikes. If the purpose of the app is to try on clothes that you’re considering buying, and there is no clear way to buy the clothes afterwards, that’s a UI fail because the promise remains unfulfilled.
And here’s a UI/UX fail of a different nature:
Source: Google Play
Maybe the app was intended to draw an exclusively female user base. But from the reviews it seems as though that wasn’t entirely clear from the get-go, causing frustrated user expectations.
Takeaway: don’t skimp on your UX/UI design because… when users “try on” your app for size, they should want to take it home, not put it back on the shelf.
Scalability: telehealth
COVID-19 has given telehealth a big push, but it’s been growing for years. Telehealth’s big promise is accessibility and scalability. Reach more patients (because it’s more convenient for them) at lower costs (because you ostensibly need less human staff and physical facilities). In order for telehealth to deliver on its promise, the user experience and user interface must be both engaging and effective.
Omada Health, a digital care program for chronic illness prevention, is a great example of telehealth UX/UI done right.
Omada’s goal is to help people at risk for chronic illnesses, like type-2 diabetes and hypertension, to reduce their risk through sustainable behavior change. The technology backing the program is a one-two punch of behavioral science and data science. But great technology doesn’t guarantee a great user experience; that requires researched, deliberate design.
What experience does Omada want to give its users? Practical information, personal encouragement and group support. To those ends, Omada gives users a personal health coach and places them in a group of people who are working on similar things so that they can all support and encourage each other. It’s an enveloping “we care about you and you can do this!” experience.
Omada’s user interface is an effective conduit for this experience.
Image source: Omada Health
The interface is easy to understand, and the important actionable items are right on the home screen. Access to the user’s support groups, personal coach, informative lessons and a progress record are one intuitive tap away.
Omada’s investment in UX/UI design has paid off - the proof is in the numbers. Omada Health already has 14 peer-reviewed studies backing up its efficacy at helping patients improve their health and reduce their likelihood to develop diabetes or hypertension.
Without proper UX design, however, telehealth programs will inevitably drop the ball on the ostensible goal of telehealth: helping their patient base.
One notable fail in American telehealth has been lack of accommodation for the non-English-speaking population. Sixty million people in the United States speak a language other than English at home, and 22% of those people say that they don’t speak English well, or don’t speak it at all. Many telehealth program portals, however, were not designed for non-English speakers. In one example, while a portal had Spanish-speaking doctors available for patients once they signed up, the sign up page was only available in English.
Takeaway: don’t skimp on your UX/UI design because… if users have difficulty using your app to get the results they want, it will fail to deliver on its promise, and damage (or entirely preclude) your success.
An ounce of UX design is worth a pound (or a ton) of users
Launching a new app or product is a complex process with plenty of moving parts. It’s easy to overlook or write off user experience and user interface design, but I encourage you: DON’T. It may make all the difference between stunning success or facepalm failure.
Even if it’s a faucet.