In the modern world Companies and Designers are seen more focused on creating better User Experience. The term User Experience is overrated. People don’t know what actually is the meaning of User Experience(UX) and its underlying responsibilities. User experience is not about creating mockups, or creating a wireframe of a product, as neither the look and feel of the product it comes under UI (Visual design). The term is vast and underlying- it contains every inch of strategies about the product success.
UX designers need to think about the definitions of success. The responsibility of a UX Designer includes the terms like:
User Interviews, Business Objective, Product Objective, Targeted User Research, Persona, Navigation, User Interaction, Analytics (Heat maps, Eye tracking..), Layouts, User Testing, User Action, Ergonomics, Underlying Psychology and Influence, Information Architecture, Content Strategy, Sketching, Prototyping, Usability, HCI, Accessibility, Readability, User Behavior, Attitude, User Involvement, Empathy Maps, User Journey Map/ Customer Journey Map
User Experience deals with the users interacting with our product and the experience they receive from that interaction. Don Norman coined the term in 90s when he occupied the role of Vice President on the Product Design team at Apple.
User experience design can iterate a particular problem from the design perspective, until the solution is the best for the user and when the user achieved their goals easily. User experience of a project can be measured by the means of Usability testing, Wizard of Oz, Googles HEART Framework etc.
According to ThinkJar Research, 55% of customers are willing to pay more for a guaranteed good experience, with the operative word being ‘guaranteed’.
Customer Experience:
CX has a broader scope than what simply user experience does. UX focuses on the end user, that is the person using the product or services but CX concentrates on the customer. In general it is the sum of all experiences an individual has in relationship to your brand, services, content, employees, interactions, products, touch-points, after sales and so on.
It is measured by net promoter score, customer loyalty, and customer satisfaction.
Forrester defines “CX is how customers perceive their interactions with your company.”
It might be measured in: overall experience, likelihood to continue use, and likelihood to recommend to others. In essence, UX is part of a broader CX, but CX contains some aspects outside of a product that UX does not.
It is measured by net promoter score, customer loyalty, and customer satisfactionSatisfaction reports, in recommendation rates (would you tell a friend about us?), etc.
The elements that comprises under the hood of CX are:
Customer care
Advertising/ Marketing
Brand voice
Sales process
Fairness of pricing
Product delivery and reliability
UX of product
Trust worthiness
Differences between CX and UX:
UX incorporates and takes care of user journey but CX is about customer journey. Person workin on enhancing customer experience are marketers and sales but UX’ers are designers, developers, technicians. CX’ers tend to survey large amount of customers involved with the company but UX’ers deals with the users using the product.
Example of good CX with Bad UX:
Let’s suppose I booked a travel ticket from a application where I am stuck in the checkout process, it repeatedly shows me error about the process not completed and minor validation issues. But after I make a call for the enquiry they responded well and now I have confirmed my payment and seating. Well this is totally embarrassing the product failed to deliver smooth experience to the user.
Example of bad CX with good UX:
Lets suppose you downloaded an app from the App store, the app works well it have clear information architecture and clear navigation. After using the app you took an appointment to the doctor for which you intended to use the app. After confirming the appointment when u reached at the clinic, you waited for an hour in a queue. This eventually created a bad impression with the brand the customer is serving from. No matter how good was the app it did not cared.
A good CX gave ability to have a pleasant communication and much friendliness between the person and the company. A customer felt positivity with the brand. User experience must always be seen in the bigger context of customer experience or it’s entirely possible that our work will be ruined totally though our work was outstanding.
How can we improve CX:
- Engage customer when we eat their time: There are times when a customer needs to be kept waiting for our officers. In such a time a customers needs their mind to make a diversion. A cup of coffee/juice with newspapers can be a good way to drive them engaging and impress our brand.
- Take Feedback: We need to make our customers feedback as easy as possible. We need to take care about their difficulties and there should be openness among the customers and the brand. The line of communication should be clear and easily.
- Feedback over Feedback: It’s good to reply to the feedback and assure them that they have no queries left with the product. A stranded customer waiting for a service may not come to you but a happy customer recommends your work.
- Multi device channel: We need to make our ways of communicating much easy providing them to contact us from any device. Statement or services like 24/7 would be awesome if possible. Instant messaging feature with existing user flow is a huge time saver for both parties.
- After sales: You should be clear that customers once satisfied about the product or takes away the impression shall come back for more. So, after sales support is needed to make them conscious we care about them.
There is difference in these two terms and are misunderstood and misinterpreted. They are two intertwined in each other which blends into what we experience and feel about the brand we use. All the areas of product and organization needs to touch the need and concern of the people directly or indirectly involved in the making. This can lead the companies and products to make a difference and stand out there.
