Jun 9, 2023 | UX Design |
Accessibility is increasingly coming to the forefront as a central element of user-centred design.
It is no longer enough to simply create a visually stunning website or application. Rather, UX designers must consider the needs of all users, including those with disabilities or limitations.
Hence the goal of UX accessibility is to create a product that is easy to use and navigate for everyone, regardless of their abilities or circumstances.
In today’s article, we’ll explore the importance of accessibility in user experience (UX) design, types of accessibility issues, why UX accessibility is essential, and best practices for UX designers to follow. We shall also examine examples of accessible design in UX to illustrate how this concept can be implemented in real-world scenarios.
What is accessibility in UX?
According to the Oxford Learner’s dictionary, accessibility is essentially how easy something is to reach, enter, use, etc.
In the UX/UI context, accessibility is the measurement of a user’s ability to utilise products/services, and the extent it can ease the process where the user can achieve their objectives.
So, for the most part, accessibility in UX design revolves around designing products that can be used by as many people as possible, regardless of their abilities. This means creating products that are easy to navigate, understand, and interact with, for example, using assistive technologies, like screen readers, Braille displays, or voice recognition software.
By doing so, UX designers can ensure that everyone, regardless of their abilities or circumstances, can use and benefit from their products.
Types of accessibility issues
There are several types of accessibility issues that UX designers need to be aware of, including:
- Visual impairments: Visually impaired users may have difficulty seeing or distinguishing certain colours, shapes, or patterns, reading small text or focusing on specific page areas.
- Hearing impairments: People with hearing impaired may have difficulty hearing audio cues or spoken instructions and require captions or transcripts for multimedia content.
- Motor impairments: Users with gross/fine motor issues may have difficulty using a mouse or keyboard and may require assistive technologies, such as speech recognition software or eye-tracking devices, to navigate a website or application.
- Cognitive impairments: Users with cognitive impairments might not easily understand multiple instructions, or may face difficulty navigating complex interfaces.
Why is UX accessibility important?
Creating a product that is accessible to all users has numerous benefits not just to the user but to the business as well.
Here are a few reasons why UX accessibility is essential:
- Enhanced user experience: An accessible product is easy to navigate and understand, making it a more enjoyable experience for all users. By considering the needs of all users, UX designers can create a product that is intuitive, efficient, and user-friendly.
- It expands the market population: A WHO report showed that 15% of the world’s population will be excluded from a product or service if accessibility design is not taken into consideration.
UX designers can therefore tap into a larger market population by creating an accessible product. This includes users with disabilities or limitations, as well as older users who may have age-related limitations.
- It is ethical: Creating an accessible product is simply the right thing to do. Everyone deserves equal access to technology, regardless of their abilities or circumstances. And by designing with accessibility in mind, UX designers can ensure that they are not excluding any group of users.
- It is often required by law: In many countries, including the United States, creating an accessible product is a legal requirement. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), for example, mandates that all websites and applications must be accessible to people with disabilities.
- Better SEO rankings: Search engines rate accessible web apps and sites highly. Technologies such as screen readers are easily discovered by SEO and provide an advantage to the website that employs them.
- Public relations: Designing with accessibility in mind is a great way to enhance a brand’s reputation of inclusivity.
UX accessibility best practices for UX designers
Let’s explore some effective strategies that UX designers can follow to ensure that their products are accessible to all users.
1. Provide text alternatives for non-text content
Ensure that all non-text content, such as images, videos, audio or text alternatives. For example, insert image alternative text (alt text/image alt tags) or video captions and transcripts to enable users to understand the content without relying on sound.
2. Use descriptive link text
Descriptive link text is important for users with disabilities who use screen readers to navigate the web. This text conveys the purpose of the link, unlike generic text like “click here” or “read more”. An example of descriptive text is “read more about our product features” rather than “click here for more information.”
3. Create clear and consistent navigation
UX designers ought to use clear and concise language for navigation and ensure that it’s consistent throughout the website or application. This is critical as it will make it easier for users with disabilities to navigate the site and find the information they need.
4. Ensure that colour is not the only means of conveying information
Colour blind users may be unable to access information conveyed solely through colour. UX designers should ensure that it isn’t the only means of conveying information by using patterns, textures, or labels to help users with these disabilities access the same information as others.
5. Use a clear and easy-to-read font
UX designers should choose a font that is legible and an appropriate size for users of all ages while also considering the contrast between the font and the background colour. High contrast will make it easier for users with disabilities to read the text.
6. Provide alternatives for multimedia content
Multimedia content such as audio or video can be a barrier for users with auditory impairment and visual impairments. UX designers should ensure that users have alternatives available, such as captions or transcripts, to make the information accessible to all consumers.
Incorporating accessibility into the design process from the very beginning is ideal, but it can be challenging for internal teams to manage all aspects on their own. Partnering with a UI/UX design agency can bridge this gap. Their team can collaborate with your UX designers to ensure accessibility considerations are seamlessly integrated throughout the design process, leading to a more inclusive user experience.
7. Make sure the website or application is keyboard-friendly
Some users may not be able to use a mouse or touchscreen. UX designers should ensure that all functionality on the website or application can be accessed using a keyboard, including navigation, forms, and other interactive elements.
8. Allow users to customise the experience
It is vital to provide options to allow users to customise their experiences, such as font size and contrast. This will make it easier for users with disabilities to use the site or application.
9. Test the website or application with assistive technology like AI and VUI
Using assistive technology, such as AI-powered screen readers or voice recognition software, is a great way to test the website or application and ensure it’s accessible to all users. These will enable people with auditory impairments and the visually impaired to access information with the same level of accuracy as other normal users.
10. Use consistent components
Using consistent components throughout the website or application makes it easier for users with disabilities to navigate and use the site. These can include consistent colours, font styles, and navigation elements.
11. Device-independent design
Employing device-independent design allows users to operate the functionality through various inputs as their abilities permit. Enabling users to interact with the product with various device. For example, mouse, keyboard, voice user interface and others.
Examples of accessible design in UX
To better understand the importance of accessible UX design, let’s look at some examples of accessible design in UX.
Captioning and transcripts for videos: Adding captions and transcripts to videos makes them accessible to users who are deaf or hard of hearing, allowing them to understand the content without relying on audio.
Image Credit: https://www.w3.org/WAI/media/av/captions/
Alt text for images: Adding alt text to images helps users who are blind or have low vision understand the content of the image. Screen readers can read the alt text aloud, giving users a better understanding of what’s being shown.
Image Credit:https://robpowellbizblog.com/image-alt-text/
Consistent and clear navigation: Providing consistent and clear navigation throughout a website or app helps all users. However, it is especially helpful for users who use screen readers or other assistive technologies to navigate. It is also helpful for users with cognitive disabilities.
Colour contrast: Ensuring that there is sufficient contrast between text and background can make it easier for users with low vision or colour-blindness to read the content.
Bad colour contrast vs good colour contrast
Keyboard accessibility: Ensuring that all the functionality of the app or website can be accessed via a keyboard is important for users who are unable to use a mouse or other pointing device.
Conclusion
Accessible design is an essential aspect of user experience that prioritises inclusion and usability for all individuals, regardless of their abilities or disabilities.
By following the aforementioned practices and incorporating features like colour contrast, clear language and assistive technologies, UX designers can create products and services that are more accessible and user-friendly.
As illustrated by the examples discussed in this article, accessible design not only benefits individuals with disabilities but also improves the overall user experience. And this can ultimately lead to greater success and satisfaction for businesses and organisations.
With technology continuing to evolve, UX designers need to constantly prioritise accessibility and innovate ways that promote inclusivity and equal access for all users.
Reach out to us at Netizen Experience for Accessible UX Design Services for your next project!
Jun 7, 2023 | UX Design |
Technology is advancing at a fast rate, exemplified by the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning algorithms that are evolving to understand and interpret the most complex of natural processes.
In fact, AI is arguably the hottest topic in UX design currently. But it’s not just exciting to learn about and explore, it has real business potential and applicability.
However, the overarching question is: how can designers fully exploit AI in their day-to-day UX design work?
This post will take an in-depth look at what AI is and why it’s crucial for designers. It will also provide tips on how to innovatively use AI and what challenges lie ahead with this technology.
What is AI in UX?
Before we go any further, let’s define AI.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) refers to specialised computer systems that can perform repetitive or unique tasks that usually require human intelligence. These include learning, problem-solving, decision-making, and language processing.
AI is a multi-faceted field encompassing various sub-disciplines, such as machine learning, natural language processing, robotics and computer vision.
AI systems can be iteratively trained using substantial amounts of data and algorithms to programmatically recognise repetitive patterns, make predictions, and automate decision-making processes.
Common examples of AI applications are virtual assistants, image and speech recognition, medical diagnosis, autonomous vehicles, fraud detection, and many more.
Overall, the goal of AI is to create intelligent machines capable of working autonomously, adapting to new situations, and performing tasks efficiently and accurately.
In the UX (user experience) context, artificial intelligence technologies can be leveraged to enhance and personalise the user experience of digital applications and products.
For example, AI can be utilized to analyse user behaviour and preferences in order to provide personalised recommendations and insights based on users’ search history to improve the user experience by predicting what a user is likely to do next.
Advantages of using AI in UX design
Personalisation and Customisation
AI can help create more personalised experiences by leveraging user data and machine learning algorithms to tailor interfaces to individual users.
This can include personalised recommendations, content, and navigation based on a user’s previous behaviour, preferences, and interests.
Improved user testing and feedback
AI can help UX designers to conduct user research and testing more efficiently and accurately.
For example, AI-powered tools can programmatically analyse user feedback, behaviour, and interaction patterns to provide insights that can inform design decisions.
This is an important step in the process of creating a product because it allows you to see if your ideas are working as expected, and if changes need to be made before launching it publicly.
If there’s an error that needs fixing on your site or app, then AI can also be able to tell which fields need more attention than others based on how often users visit them during testing sessions conducted by researchers.
Streamlined design processes
AI can help streamline the process of designing content, user interfaces, experiences and products.
AI is especially useful when it comes to designing for mobile devices.
With so many people using their phones as their primary computing device for accessing information on the internet and engaging with brands, it’s imperative to make apps as intuitive and easy-to-use as possible.
AI helps UX designers to create efficient and streamlined user experiences.
It does so by automating repetitive tasks, like form-filling, and providing intelligent recommendations to help users make more informed decisions. This helps save users time and effort, reducing their frustration and confusion.
For example, designers can exploit various AI algorithms based on historical patterns in user data to create flow diagrams, and even develop wireframes from a flowchart. In practice, once an artificial intelligence intelligently understands the context and the user flow, it can programmatically generate complete wireframes for an entire app.
Subsequently, the UX designer will only need to customise or edit the wireframes to meet the unique product requirements.
New possibilities for design
AI is facilitating innovation in UX design by enabling designers to exploit machine learning algorithms to create new forms of interaction, like gesture-based controls. Or to devise new forms of visualisation and feedback like augmented and virtual reality experiences.
AI UX design tools
There are a number of AI-powered tools that can facilitate the UX design process, such as:
Attention Insight
Attention Insight is a deep learning platform that predicts changes in visual attention of users to improve conversion rates, and achieve better product performance and user-centric design.
This AI-powered tool can help to uncover websites’ usability issues to enable designers to easily understand the elements that are most noticed on their websites.
Uizard
As a collaborative AI-powered design tool for non-designers, Uizard can quickly transform sketches into artboards to allow them to expeditiously build clickable interactive prototypes.
Thus, enabling them to visualise and communicate concepts, turning theoretical ideas into reality.
ChatGPT
ChatGPT is a groundbreaking AI tool that can aid designers in generating ideas for user research or even get design inspiration with its ability to generate content basis text prompts.
ChatGPT can also help UX designers to create user-friendly and engaging content for different digital products.
Let’s Enhance
Let’s Enhance is a unique automated AI-driven image upscaler and fixer that leverages super-resolution technologies based on Deep Convolutional Neural Networks to improve image resolution without quality loss.
AutoDraw
The AutoDraw AI-powered drawing tool enables users to turn their sketches into clip art. Using machine learning, users can draw anything with a few strokes, in minutes.
Examples of AI in UX design
Chatbots and virtual assistants
AI-powered chatbots and voice assistants can provide users with a more natural and intuitive way to interact with digital interfaces. They can also help improve accessibility for users with disabilities by providing alternative ways to navigate and interact with interfaces.
Predictive analytics and recommendations
AI can help UX designers predict and anticipate user needs, and even behaviours based on data analysis. This can help designers create more effective and engaging experiences that meet the needs of users.
Voice and facial recognition
AI can also be used to automate certain aspects of the user experience with facial recognition and voice assistants that can interact with users in a natural language. Or even perform routine tasks like scheduling appointments or ordering products.
Adaptive interfaces
Adaptive interfaces are essentially user interfaces that change dynamically based on users’ preferences, behaviour, and the context in which they’re being used. These interfaces are designed to provide users with more personalised experiences, making it easier for them to achieve their objectives and complete tasks more efficiently.
Challenges and considerations of using AI for UX design
Ethical concerns and data privacy
The most overarching concern about AI in UX design relates to privacy and security.
Since AI algorithms are designed to collect and iteratively analyse large amounts of user data, there is an inherent risk that this data can be misused or stolen.
UX designers are advised to work closely with cybersecurity experts to ensure that user data is continuously protected and users are informed about the data being collected and used.
Overreliance on AI
Artificial intelligence is disruptive, and its potential is unfathomable. However, it poses a risk of UX designers’ over-reliance on it, thus risking the possibility of bias and discrimination.
AI algorithms can easily perpetuate and amplify existing biases, leading to discriminatory or unfair experiences for some users. As such, UX designers must always consider, for example, using diverse training data sets and testing algorithms for bias.
Need for human-centred design
Human-centred design is critical in UX design because it ensures that the end-users are at the centre of the design process.
AI can be exploited to create more efficient and effective design solutions, but without a focus on the needs and preferences of users, the resulting design may not be successful.
Human-centred design revolves around understanding the needs and behaviours of users through research, then incorporating those findings into the design process.
While AI can automate many aspects of the design process, such as generating layouts or colour schemes, it should not replace human creativity and intuition.
Human-centred design helps ensure that the end product is tailored to the exact needs and preferences of users, rather than solely based on machine-generated insights.
Concluding remark: What is the future of AI in UX design?
As we get to a permanent state of ubiquitous computing, AI will only ingrain itself in our daily lives more, revolutionising the way we interact with digital products whilst offering new opportunities for innovation.
Nonetheless, UX designers and product developers will still need to continually navigate the intricate and rapidly-evolving landscape of AI technology.
As we have seen throughout the blog, AI can be used to make the design process more efficient. It can help with data collection and analysis, which can save you time by avoiding tedious manual tasks.
Furthermore, AI can be used to make the design process more accurate.
Using AI in this way means that you won’t have to spend hours manually creating mockups or laying out wireframes—AI will do it for you.
AI can also help with delivering better results faster than before.
Overall, AI can play a significant role in improving the user experience by providing more personalised, intuitive, and efficient interactions between users and digital products. However, when it comes to UX design, it is vital to use AI in the right order (by avoiding the challenges mentioned in the article) to make it beneficial to the design process.
Reach out to us at Netizen Experience to learn how to use AI for your UX design project!
Jun 2, 2023 | UX Design, User Experience, User Testing, UX Guide, UX Strategy & Planning |
In today’s dynamic and fast-paced technology landscape, it’s exceedingly challenging to maintain UI/UX design consistency, especially with multiple teams working on the same product.
Fortunately, in a manner akin to financial audits, UX audits allow design teams to evaluate their products to identify consistency, continuity, accessibility, and usability issues.
This article aims to cover all the basics of UX audits and how they can be exploited to improve the user experience of a product.
What is a UX audit?
Sometimes referred to as a usability audit, a UX audit is a quality assurance (QA) procedure that systematically assesses a digital interface to deliver an in-depth report on potential usability limitations.
The gathered insights can be leveraged to make recommendations for enhancements based on user research and UX heuristics.
UX audits employ different empirical methods to offer heuristics-based recommendations for user-centric enhancements to boost conversions.
What is the objective of UX audit?
UX audits are typically recommended periodically whenever an organisation implements new functionality, or its users report pain points in the user experience.
UX audits help identify and fix common UX issues while measuring success metrics, like bounce rate, revenue growth and user retention.
For the most part, a UX audit helps answer the following questions:
- Where do users experience challenges in understanding navigation or a new capability?
- What does the data communicate about users’ behaviour and their needs?
- What can be potentially modified on a website or an app to improve its overall business performance?
Who should do a UX Audit, and when?
Generally speaking, organisations without a dedicated UX team should consider performing a UX audit periodically. This is because those with in-house UX teams are most likely continually evaluating their products and optimising the user experience.
In fact, companies with in-house teams usually conduct UX audits as part of their quality assurance process whenever they release a major product update or product redesign.
So, companies without dedicated UX teams should always schedule periodic UX audits to ensure their products meet business and user experience objectives. Or to uncover pain points that they might not have been aware of.
However, for the most part, conducting a UX audit largely depends on the size of the business entity and the resources that are available.
Nonetheless, it is recommended that an external team of auditors conducts the UX audit to ensure that the report is as objective as possible.
During the UX audit, the auditor will systematically measure, test, assess and analyse the following elements:
- Broken links
- Usability and accessibility
- Usability heuristics
- Design system inconsistencies—fonts, colours, patterns, etc.
- Layout and hierarchy inconsistencies
- Outdated content
- Traffic, engagement, conversion rates, retention, and sales analytics
- Customer journey bottlenecks and roadblocks
- Branding and messaging
- Review product design against business and user experience goals
Benefits of conducting UX audit
The key benefits of conducting a UX audit are:
Improved user experience
Products underpinned by a comprehensive evaluation and understanding of UX typically deliver an improved user experience.
A successful UX audit can also help companies improve their products by identifying areas where they could improve customer satisfaction and increase user adoption rates.
It’s also useful for helping them understand how different groups of people use a product differently—and what needs to change in order for everyone who uses it consistently to feel satisfied enough that they want more from it (or recommend it).
Increased engagement and retention
The insights gained from UX audits can provide an overview of challenges and pain points from a wide range of disparate user perspectives. These insights can then be used to optimise the product to improve user engagement.
Better conversion rates
Conducting a UX audit will allow you to evaluate how users interact with your product to improve conversion rates.
For example, the areas users find convoluted or confusing, and how they respond when something doesn’t work as intended. This information can be used in the design process so that future iterations are more user-friendly and intuitive for consumers, improving the conversion metrics.
Competitive advantage
UX audit findings are typically analysed and organised into a digestible report which contains key insights and recommendations based on the audit exercise.
These insights can be aligned with the company goals to gain a competitive advantage by delivering high-quality customer experiences across all touchpoints (for example, e-mail marketing campaigns, social media posts and even website content).
UX audit methods
There are several different methods to conduct a usability audit, for example:
- Observation: The most common method is observation, where the UX auditor sits down with stakeholders and watches them use the product or service in their environment. They can also use an observation checklist or questionnaire.
- UX maturity survey: A UX maturity survey involves team members across a company answering questions about their product’s UX capabilities, awareness and understanding. Consequently, the responses from the survey are employed to gauge the organisation’s level of UX maturity (i.e., capacity and desire to effectively execute user-centric design).
- Usability test: A usability test is employed to collect user feedback on what users find confusing or difficult about a product or service. A usability test involves answering questions like “How easy was it for you?” and “Was this functionality intuitive?” while using the software under test (SUT).
- Workshop: A workshop with key stakeholders is typically conducted to align business objectives and critically understand target users as well as their journeys and pain points.
- Proto-persona: Proto-personas are developed leveraging the insights from stakeholder workshops and user observations to direct user-centric outputs.
- Heatmaps: Heatmaps are typically used to visually represent users’ interaction with a company’s interface. For example, heatmaps that document the number of clicks performed on an interface, or scroll maps that record users’ movement as they scroll down a company’s digital product.
Generally, most UX audit methods involve some form of metrics and materials gathering. This helps in the validation of results, data organisation, review of trends, reporting of findings and the creation of evidence-supported recommendations.
What’s included in a UX audit?
A UX audit is a process that includes a list of questions, guidelines and tools to help you understand your website’s user experience. It can be employed by anyone who wants to improve their website’s usability and accessibility. The following are some examples of what might be included in a UX audit:
User research and feedback analysis
User observations are performed during a UX audit to gain a full understanding of how a product is being used by real users to identify user requirements and pain points. Principally, this exercise to derive user observations ensures that the UX audit is evidence-led and user-centric.
Usability testing
Usability testing in a UX audit involves iteratively examining user interaction data to determine the UX design’s impact on, for example, user flows and navigation.
Usability testing, for the most part, ensures that UI components and design patterns meet user experience objectives and branding guidelines.
Heuristic evaluation
A heuristic evaluation methodically compares a digital product to industry usability standards to identify areas for improvement. During a heuristic evaluation, UX auditors evaluate a product whilst looking out for any heuristic issues using Nielsen’s usability heuristics as a benchmark.
Accessibility evaluation
Accessibility evaluation exercises revolve around ensuring a digital product is inclusive for all users. During an accessibility evaluation, auditors evaluate whether the colour palette, fonts, and components inclusively serve users with visual impairments. Or even whether the product enables users to flexibly switch between dark/light modes to accommodate users with sensitive eyesight.
Performance evaluation
This type of evaluation aims to identify any performance issues whilst customers interact with your products, and then make changes accordingly. You should also be able to determine whether or not these performance issues are affecting satisfaction or adoption rates for key features within the products.
How do you conduct a UX audit?
There is no standardised UX audit methodology, as most companies and UX professionals might approach it differently. However, the most common, depending on the product’s complexity, goals and scope, are:
Setting business goals and objectives
The first UX audit step is usually understanding the organisation’s motivation and goal for its digital product being audited.
This stage involves conducting stakeholder interviews with individuals at the organisation with a vested interest in the product. For example, product managers, software developers, marketers, and/or customer service representatives, etc.
Define user personas
The next step is to get to know your users by creating user personas. In practice, user personas are essentially fictional users created by UX teams to better understand their customers.
Fortunately, some organisations may already have user personas informed by data gathered through surveys or other customer touchpoints.
Understand user objectives
The next stage is typically turning the user personas and insights into user flows. These user flows will help establish the user’s objectives across different parts of the product whilst describing their steps to get there. This process will consequently help to identify where a user might encounter usability challenges.
Collect and analyse data
This stage typically involves tracking the product’s performance to provide indisputable, quantitative data about users interacting with the product, and even understanding what they’re doing while using the product.
Complete a heuristic evaluation
UX auditors take insights garnered whilst creating user personas and assessing user objectives to try to accomplish a series of tasks to meet their objectives. Throughout the heuristic evaluation process, they take notes and screenshots detailing each user challenge or pain point encountered.
Document findings
After heuristic evaluation, UX auditors compile the findings and make recommendations to the organisation or broader team. This single UX audit report should possess insightful analysis and practical recommendations to guide the future development of the digital product.
Make recommendations
As already mentioned, UX audit findings are usually condensed into a technical document that concisely relays results to the client as well as a series of actionable recommendations, with detail on how each recommendation can be implemented to meet business objectives.
UX Audit checklist
To have an effective UX audit exercise, your UX audit checklist should tick some of the following boxes:
- The business should have both long-term and short-term UX goals.
- Have a clearly defined, regularly reviewed UX strategy with goals, a vision and a plan.
- The organisation should have a high level of understanding of UX.
- The organisation’s leadership team should have a high level of understanding and support of UX.
- The business’ key values should be consistently communicated across user touchpoints.
Conclusion
UX audits are a great way to improve your product or service.
UX audits should be treated as health checks that help you identify areas that need improvement and ensure they are addressed before they become a problem for your users.
A good UX audit will also help you get feedback on the design of your app from real users, which is an invaluable resource for any business owner or designer.
If you’re serious about improving your product or are planning to introduce new functionality, we recommend conducting user research or hiring a third party to thoroughly evaluate your product or application. However, if you decide to conduct a UX audit yourself, consider the following:
- Using a questionnaire to gather information from your users.
- Using a checklist to gauge the usability of your product or service.
- Checking customer satisfaction with the product or service, and making changes if necessary
- Not reinventing the wheel but focusing on the most important usability elements.
Reach out to us at Netizen Experience for UX audits for your next project!
May 23, 2023 | UX Design, User Experience, User Research, UX Strategy & Planning |
Creating user-centred design is vital in UX/UI development because it ensures that the end product is intuitive, and meets the needs and expectations of the target audience.
In practice, a user-centred design approach revolves around iteratively gathering feedback and insights from users throughout the design process to inform design decisions.
And thus, increase customer satisfaction, loyalty, and engagement.
One critical component central to delivering effective user-centred design (UX design) is a user needs assessment.
In this article, we shall delve into user needs assessments and the role they play in gathering information about users’ needs, preferences, and pain points.
We shall also unpack how they help UX designers to inform design decisions and help devise designs that meet the user’s expectations and ultimately increase their satisfaction.
What is a user needs assessment?
User needs assessment is the process of gathering and analysing data to comprehend the end-user’s requirements, preferences, and pain points. Subsequently, this information is utilised to inform design decisions and produce user-centred designs that meet the user’s expectations.
In practice, a user requirements assessment can be conducted throughout the design process, from concept to launch. In fact, assessment of user requirements can take many forms, including surveys, focus groups, interviews, card sorting, and A/B testing. The choice of method depends on the project’s objectives, timeline, and budget.
For instance, a user needs assessment is particularly useful when redesigning an existing product or developing a new one. In such cases, user needs analysis helps identify the gaps in the current product, understand what the users want from the product, and design features that meet their needs.
What is user-centred design?
User-centred design is a design approach that places the preferences, needs, and pain points of the end-users (and their context) at the centre of the design process.
It involves gathering data on the above needs through a user needs assessment and using that data to inform design decisions, in the most effective and efficient way possible.
Fundamentally, the ultimate goal of user-centred design is to create a product that meets the user’s expectations, increases their satisfaction, and provides a positive user experience.
Benefits of conducting a user need assessment
- Increased user satisfaction: UX designers improve user satisfaction and outcomes by employing insights derived from a user needs assessment into how users interact with the product in order to create products best suited to them.
- Reduced development cost: Creating items that work for the users’ purposes lessens the necessity of making expensive UX alterations and modifications in future. Thus, reducing the overall cost of development in the long term.
- Increased market success: UX designers can maximise their market potential and differentiate themselves from other businesses by leveraging user needs assessment data to formulate goods and services that respond to users’ requirements.
- Improved user engagement: User needs assessments can enable UX designers to design products that better foster user engagement. Additionally, it can help encourage some users to become more involved in and committed to the product by letting them participate in the design process.
- Better alignment with business objectives: When UX designers comprehend user needs and preferences, they can create products that align with the broader business strategy and objectives.
- Reduced risk of product failure: By conducting user needs assessments, designers can identify potential issues early on and design products that are more likely to succeed in the market.
- Improved brand reputation: By creating products that are user-centred and meet user needs, companies can build a positive brand reputation and increase customer loyalty.
Methods of needs assessment
Here are some key methods typically employed to conduct a user needs assessment:
Surveys
Surveys are a common method of user needs assessment that involves asking a set of standardised questions to a large group of people. They can be conducted online, by mail, or in person and can be used to collect both quantitative and qualitative data on user needs, preferences, and behaviours.
Focus groups
Focus groups usually involve bringing together a small group of people to discuss a specific topic in depth. They are typically moderated by a trained facilitator and can be used to collect qualitative data on user needs, preferences, and behaviours.
Interviews
Interviews involve one-on-one conversations between a researcher and a user. They can be conducted in person or over the phone and can be used to collect qualitative data on user needs, preferences, and behaviours.
Card Sorting
Card sorting involves asking users to organise a set of cards (with each containing a piece of content or functionality) into groups that make sense to them. The results can provide insights into how users expect to find and navigate through information, which can inform the design.
Photo by Polina Zimmerman
A/B testing
A/B testing is essentially a method of comparing two different versions of a product or service to determine which one performs better. Users are randomly assigned to either Version A or Version B, and their behaviour is measured and analysed to determine which version is more effective at achieving the desired outcome.
How to conduct a user needs assessment to create user-centred designs?
To effectively conduct a user needs assessment to create user-centred designs, one can take the following steps:
Step 1: Identify the purpose and goals of the user needs assessment:
During this step, determine the objectives of the user needs assessment and the questions you intend to address.
Step 2: Identify the target user group:
Define the target user group, which could be current or potential users of the product or service.
Step 3: Choose the appropriate user needs assessment method:
During this step, ensure to choose the most appropriate user needs assessment method based on the project’s objectives, timeline, and budget.
Step 4: Recruit participants/Respondent recruitment:
Identify and recruit respondents who meet the criteria for the target user group and are willing to participate in the evaluation.
Step 5: Conduct the user needs assessment:
Administer the evaluation method, such as surveys, interviews, or focus groups, and collect data on user needs, preferences, and pain points.
Step 6: Analyse and interpret the data:
During this step, extensively analyse and interpret the user data collected during the user needs assessment to identify patterns, trends, and key insights.
Step 7: Develop user personas:
In this step, build user personas based on the data collected during the assessment, which represent typical users and their needs, goals, and behaviour.
Step 8: Use the findings to inform design decisions:
Apply the knowledge gained from the user needs assessment to inform design decisions and create a user-centred design that precisely meets the needs of the target users.
Best practices for effective user needs assessment to create user-centred designs.
Best practices for user needs assessment ensure that the design process is focused on meeting the needs of the target audience.
In essence, best practices help to establish a framework for the user-centred design process that is based on research, data, and user feedback, whilst taking into account the needs and preferences of the target audience.
Some of the best practices we recommend to achieve effective user need assessments when creating user-centred design are:
- Engage users as early as possible in the design process to ensure that their requirements are considered throughout the process.
- Avoid leading questions: Ask users neutral queries that do not elicit a specific response. This ensures that the responses are objective and precise.
- Select appropriate evaluation methods: Select the method or combination of methods that best fit the project’s objectives, timeline, and budget. Consider employing a combination of techniques to obtain a deeper understanding of user requirements.
- Recruit a sample of representative users: Ensure that the user group is representative of the intended user group and that the sample size is sufficient to yield insightful results.
- Use open-ended questions: Utilise open-ended queries to elicit detailed and sincere user feedback that can inform design decisions.
- Provide a relaxed and comfortable environment: Create an environment conducive to comfort and relaxation during user requirements assessment to encourage users’ candour and openness.
- Conduct ongoing assessments: Conduct ongoing user requirements assessments throughout the UX/UI design process to ensure that the design satisfies the changing needs of the intended audience.
- Collaborate with stakeholders: Include all relevant stakeholders, including designers, developers, marketers, and product managers, in the user requirements assessment process.
- Use data visualisation tools: Use data visualisation tools to help make sense of the data acquired during the assessment and to clearly and concisely present the findings to stakeholders.
- Validate findings: Validate the user needs assessment findings by verifying design decisions with users throughout the design process. This ensures that the final design meets the requirements of the intended audience.
By leveraging the above best practices, UX designers can ensure that they’re using proven methods and techniques to gather user feedback and analyse and interpret this feedback effectively.
Thus, ensuring that the design process is collaborative and inclusive for all stakeholders involved in the user-centred design process.
Read and explore more on UX Design insights.
Conclusion
In summary, user needs assessments play a critical role in creating user-centred designs. By iteratively engaging with users to gather their feedback, UX designers can create products that meet the needs of the target audience and can be adopted and deployed effectively.
As we also noted, this process may help to improve product usability, functionality, and overall user experience, leading to augmented customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Overall, conducting a user needs assessment is an essential step in creating user-centred designs that meet the needs and preferences of target users.
By doing this, you can ensure that your designs are truly user-centered. This will not only lead to a more successful product but also a more positive user experience. For companies that may not have the internal resources to conduct a comprehensive user needs assessment, partnering with a UI/UX design agency can be a valuable solution. Agencies have the expertise and experience to guide you through this crucial stage of the design process.
By religiously following the few steps outlined in this article, designers can gather valuable insights into user needs and preferences, which can inform design decisions and improve product satisfaction, market success, and brand reputation.
From card sorting to A/B testing, there are various methods to choose from depending on the project goals, timeline, and budget.
In conclusion, by investing in user needs assessment, designers can reduce the risk of product failure and gain a competitive edge in the market.
For companies without the internal resources, partnering with a UI/UX design agency or utilizing our user research services can be a valuable solution to guide you through this crucial design stage.
Reach out to us at Netizen Experience for user needs assessment for your next project!
May 21, 2023 | UX Strategy & Planning, Case Studies |
In today’s digital age, user experience (UX) plays a pivotal role in shaping the success of products and services.
To create exceptional user experiences, businesses must gain deep insights into their target audience’s needs, preferences, and behaviours.
UX design is crucial to creating products that are user-centred, intuitive and enjoyable to use. As such, it’s important for businesses to understand their customer’s problems and expectations, and then tweak their products to optimise the user experience.
This is where UX research strategies come into play, allowing companies to uncover invaluable user insights that drive informed decisions.
The blog aims to emphasise the importance of UX research strategies with the help of two case studies from South East Asia (Neitzen’s clients).
What is UX research?
UX research, or user experience research, is a process of understanding user behaviour, and motivations in order to design and improve products, services, or systems so that they meet user needs and expectations.
This means the goal of UX research is to provide insights into how users interact with products, services, or systems and to identify opportunities for improvement.
UX research can take two forms, including qualitative research methods such as:
- Contextual inquiries
- User interviews
- Card sorting
- Usability testing
- Field studies/diary studies
- Focus groups
- User persona creation
- Tree testing
- Heuristic evaluation/UX audit
The second form involves, quantitative research methods, such as:
- A/B testing
- Surveys and questionnaires
- Digital analytics
- First click testing
- Website intercepts
All these methods are used, sometimes in tandem, to gather data and feedback from users throughout the design and development process. This can further be analysed to identify patterns and trends in user behaviour, needs, and motivations.
For more details on UX research and methods, read here.
The importance of UX research
User research is a systematic approach to understanding users, their behaviours, needs, and preferences.
By delving deep into it, businesses can gain valuable insights that drive the design and development of products and services that truly resonate with their target audience.
UX research ensures that user needs are at the forefront. This, in turn, leads to intuitive, user-friendly interfaces, enhanced satisfaction, increased customer loyalty, and, ultimately, business success!
Here are some key reasons highlighting the importance of UX research:
Understanding user needs
By conducting user interviews, surveys, and usability testing, UX researchers can uncover user pain points, preferences, and goals. This knowledge feeds the design process and ensures that the final product or service meets user expectations.
Designing user-centred experiences
By involving users in UX research early on and throughout the development cycle, designers can incorporate their feedback and insights to create user-centred experiences. This will help you create products and services that are more intuitive, easy to use, and relevant to the target audience.
Identifying usability issues
By observing how users interact with a product or service, UX researchers can pinpoint areas of confusion, usability issues and bottlenecks. This way, designers and developers can make iterative improvements and create a more seamless and enjoyable user experience.
Validating design decisions
UX research provides a data-driven approach to design decision-making. By testing design concepts, prototypes, or wireframes with real users, researchers can gather feedback and validate design decisions. This reduces the risk of making assumptions and ensures that design choices are grounded in user insights.
Enhancing conversion and engagement
A well-designed user experience can significantly impact conversion rates and user engagement. UX research helps in identifying barriers to conversion, optimising user flows, and improving user engagement so that researchers can make informed recommendations to enhance key interactions and drive desired user actions.
Mitigating risk and reducing costs
Investing in UX research early in the design process helps identify issues and nip them in the bud. This allows organisations to mitigate risks, reduce costly redesigns, and avoid negative user experiences that could harm their reputation and business outcomes.
UX Research Tools
To create exceptional user experiences, UX researchers rely on a variety of powerful tools to gather data, analyse interactions, and make informed design decisions. The insights they gain regarding user behaviour, preferences, and needs are a great asset in optimising their designs accordingly.
In general, these tools can be broadly sorted into the following categories:
- Active Research (Ex. Usability testing, specialised testing, surveys)
- Passive Insights (Ex. Analytics, A/B testing, automated feedback)
- Insights Management (Transcription, research repository, note-taking)
- Design (Wireframing, brainstorming, prototyping)
- Research Ops (Scheduling, recruiting, payment)
Check out our list of UX research tools and their benefits.
What is a UX research strategy?
Even the best team needs a plan that funnels their efforts into the right places.
A UX research strategy outlines the goals, methods, and approach for conducting user research and provides a framework for systematically gathering insights, including checkpoints, objectives and best practices.
Let’s look at a step-by-step plan for developing your own UX research strategy.
Step 1: Define research objectives
Clearly articulate the goals and objectives of your research. Involve any stakeholders and organisational leaders in the discussion so that you can identify what specific insights you aim to gain from the research, and how they align with the project or business goals.
Ensure that your objectives are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART).
Step 2: Conduct market research
Apart from finding out the target audience and market demand for your product, the most important element of UX research is cataloguing the field’s best practices. Not only will a well-defined set of principles keep your team’s progress consistent and on track, but it will also ensure that the data collected follows an approved ethical and methodological standard.
Step 3: Allocate resources
Consider the resources needed to execute your research strategy. Determine the required budget, form a research timeline, and start assembling a team for respondent recruitment, research activities, data analysis, and reporting. Ensure that you have the necessary tools and technology in place to support your research efforts effectively.
Step 4: Research, iterate, repeat
As you conduct research and gain new insights, iterate and refine your strategy accordingly. Incorporate feedback and learnings into future research efforts to continuously improve the effectiveness of your UX research strategy.
Netizen’s UX research case studies in SEA (South East Asia)
Case Study 1- Insurance company in SEA
An insurance company in SEA was seeking to digitise its product customer journey but faced several challenges with its mobile sales kit app. For example, policyholders and agents were unable to use the digital tools provided in that app with the ease and efficiency they’d anticipated.
As the company has recognised the need to engage with these stakeholders–including business managers, agents, and policyholders–in order to develop products that met their expectations, we were tasked to tackle these challenges.
After carrying out user research to engage with agent panels and understand their workflow, we gathered feedback to guide how the internal tools should be designed and tailored to their needs.
This approach enabled us to identify user pain points and areas for improvement in the agent experience, gaining insights to further improve the product app.
Not only that, we also conducted usability testing to consistently engage with policyholders while testing new concepts, prototypes, and service flow for the customer app.
Our user research strategy, including user testing, helped identify areas for improvement and ensured that the app is user-friendly and intuitive.
In conclusion, our approach to digital transformation for the insurance company involved a continuous process of engagement with the users and feedback gathering from all stakeholders.
By understanding the needs of agents and policyholders, we were able to create targeted UX research strategies and design digital tools that meet their needs and expectations to provide a positive user experience.
Case Study 2- Private Sector Bank in the SEA
A renowned private bank that relied on its website for banking services needed to compare the UX performance between the existing and new versions of its website’s design before launching to its large customer base of 10 million registered users.
As such, we were tasked to analyse the UX performance of the new design as well as to create UX research strategies to make any improvements that were needed.
One of the technical challenges for this project was that the new design prototype was only accessible via the bank clients’ network, making it impossible for us to test the prototype online.
To solve this issue, we shifted our user research approach and conducted it in person at clients’ offices instead. Our next UX strategy in order to better analyse UX performance, was to conduct usability testing to get insights on the new design’s usability for the customers compared to the existing website design.
Further, to further improve quality assurance and deliver a better experience for the users, we made sure to conduct usability testing on both desktop and mobile, since different platform users tend to have different user experiences.
Continuous usability tests were conducted over many weeks, and insights were fed to the design team for continuous design iteration and improvement.
Our systematic UX strategies and implementation helped manage the risk of launching a defective user interface, which could have caused major embarrassment for the bank and frustration for millions of users.
By continuously testing and iterating the design, this private bank was able to ensure that the new website design was user-friendly and met the needs of its customers before launching it to its large customer base.
Conclusion
UX research is a critical component in creating user-centred and intuitive products. By understanding user behaviour, needs, and motivations through qualitative and quantitative research methods, businesses can optimise the user experience and meet user expectations.
In the realm of user experience (UX) design, the use of effective research strategies is paramount to understanding user needs and preferences.
This blog explores the world of UX research strategies, specifically through our captivating case studies from South East Asian Countries. By delving into the proven UX methodologies, we uncover how UX research drives informed design decisions and transformed the way businesses create digital experiences.
Reach out to us at Netizen Experience for creating UX research strategies and planning for your next project!
