Article by Uma Angina.
If you are familiar with User Experience (UX) or a UX Designer yourself or have a User Experience Designer in your project team this article would make sense to you. For starters, not to get confused; the term is used in various ways UX/XD/UXD/UED they are all same.
User Xperience Design (UXD) elements can be applied to new as well to an existing application. Applications that maybe web or mobile or desktop; sometimes users find it challenging to use an application on provided front-end User Interface (UI). That means the application designed is not user friendly and issues faced by users are design related. If the project is big, chances are high that there might be few design complexities that was ignored or overlooked at initial stages of the design discussions.
No matter if the existing application is big or small, there is a need for considering the project budget and other limitations involved. User Experience designer with his team shall understand the design problems and constraints first and come to solution accordingly instead thinking or suggesting creating entirely a new design. Every UX Designer shall put these questions to selves before trying to solve existing design problem:
- What design problem currently application have?
- How similar problem is solved by others?
- Which solution best suit for our users?
Solution can be presented in the form of an idea and/or an interactive design for the user(s) needs and that design is more likely accepted if based on the feedback collected from user research and user testing.
To elaborate the above statement, shown below is the UXD process elements with an example.
Example: An existing eCommerce application’s Shipping/Payment page designed for web and mobile; issues have been noticed that impact the users in usage of the application for design not being user friendly.
1. What Design Problems currently this application page have?
Page is too long a scrolling.
Not a user friendly interface for a first time user or to an existing user.
Solution:
– Need to remove scrolling as much as possible and break the features shipping / billing / payment to a flow leading to next section once previous section is completed and with a click of a button.
– Need to structure the layout with a logo, page title, navigation links/menu, well coordinated colors, and privacy statement-terms of use on the footer.
2. How similar problem is solved by others?
Future delivery date option is required that is missing currently:
User Research data results in requesting for this feature on Shipping Address section so user can choose the desired future date for getting delivery of the order.
Solution:
– As it is impossible to track the inventory for a future date in case customer orders and cancels it, top retail eCommerce sites like Amazon.com, and Walmart.com does not offer future delivery date option instead have shipping delivery options before the checkout on their website. This eases the confusion in managing inventory and assures the user for current availability of stock to choose from.
3. Which solution best suit for our users?
Before filling the shipping/billing/payment info, Checkout screen shall ask for Login information. Assuming, user is purchasing first time on the site is less likely to register in the very beginning.
Solution:
– Checkout as guest: Shall navigate to Shipping address screen. Not all eCommerce sites allow Checkout as guest. Walmart.com does have this option.
Image courtesy: walmart.com
– Create new account: Shall navigate to new user registration page.
– Existing customer Sign In: Shall be allowed to login in same Checkout page to lower the page forwarding.
The above example is a partial post. In continuation to this post, will provide insights on ‘Presenting Design Ideas Visually’ in Part II in our next post.
