Re-designing the UX honeycomb — A simple way to understand what UX really is
Let’s review some elements that make a good UX. If you do a quick search on Google for UX-related keywords, you will end up seeing a lot of infographics and images. This is one of my favorites:
To better understand the elements of UX, we need to visualize it. If you read a little more about UX, you might come across an idea from Peter Morville which focuses on something called ‘UX Honeycomb’. The honeycomb features the important elements of a meaningful and valuable user experience. However, I will suggest a more visual approach. This is my ‘UX Staircase’:
You can see the users at the bottom of the stairs. Their goals are up at the top, so the users have to climb the stairs to reach their goals. But it’s not just the goals that can be found up at the top. You’ll also notice that the business goals are up there, too. The stairs represent the user experience. Each step is an important element of UX.
FINDABLE — Findability can mean a couple of things. It can relate to the way in which users find your product and how you make sure it reaches it’s intended target. This is mainly of importance to the marketing team. Nevertheless, you can apply findability within the product by asking the following question. Do users find the information that they are looking for? Easy navigation will help people discover your product, therefore making your product easier to find.
ACCESSIBLE — When it comes to accessibility, most people think about blind or disabled users. Although there is much more to accessibility, in its purest form means that, despite having a limited way of interacting with the product (usually some sort of disability), we can still access and use the product. Now, this can mean a wide range of things. For example, there’s a lack of accessibility if you are cooking in the kitchen and you can only use one of your hands. Plus, your hands might be dirty if you’re gutting a fish or making a sauce. Another limitation would be if somebody doesn’t have a high-tech cell phone or if the internet connection is extremely slow. And of course, we can’t assume that all of our users have perfect eyesight. Just imagine your mom trying to read a letter with teeny tiny text.
USABLE — Usability ensures that the product is easy to use and appealing to the user. At the end of the day, every product is used by humans, each having their own feelings, emotions, needs, and frustrations. If a product is easy to use and engaging, people will spend more time with it. This can have a direct correlation with how the product is perceived and impact the pricing and positioning of the product. Imagine taking a trip in a standard car then later going out in a Bentley. Both of them will get you from A to B, but the experience you have during the trip is a whole other story.
CREDIBLE — To engage users, you have to build trust, and this comes down to credibility. For example, think about a payment page: If it doesn’t seem trustworthy and legitimate, you probably wouldn’t want to enter your card details. Trust is one of the most important factors in UX. Do visitors believe what you say about your product? Does your brand (and product) appear trustworthy? Credibility and trust are important in the details as well. Do users believe and trust that you have the perfect product that will solve all their problems?
USEFUL — Lastly, is your product valuable to the users? Does it solve their problem in a they would like it to be solved? This is also true for the product as a whole. Every single feature and the product’s content must convey value to the user while meeting their needs. The core of UX is to identify user needs and address them. Therefore, only design features and functionality really matter for users when it comes to addressing their needs. Everything else is just additional fluff, which has a bad effect on UX.
Back to our UX staircase. Imagine your users having to climb these stairs. It takes effort for them to scale all those stairs, so they must be committed. Also, there is an order to the elements. If users don’t find your product, they won’t know if it’s useful or not. If they can’t access it, they will abandon the whole thing. Bear in mind that the height of each step can vary. If you don’t pay attention to usability or accessibility, it’s like having a step which is too high. It’s just a step, but it could spell the end of the journey for some users.
What makes a good UX?
Three things can make good UX (in reality, it’s more than that, but let’s keep it simple). The first two things are to understand the user needs and the business goals. The third is to have a process which helps you in planning, researching, designing and developing the product. The success of UX lies in the process and the strategy you use. For this reason, I’m not going to tell you about all the different UX methods under the sun. Instead, I want to show you a whole process that you can follow. If you process is good, you will attain success.
It’s said that what sets amateurs and professionals apart is that the latter will reach the goal using a tried and true method. Meanwhile, the amateur will face uncertainty, and there will be gaps in the process. When it comes to product design, UX makes the process much more professional.
Understanding user needs is the foundation for a great product. However, sometimes it seems that the user goals and the business goals don’t align well. A simple example of this is ads. If a business makes its money through advertising income, they cannot let themselves run ads because they disturb a lot of users (as they tend to do). In this case, you have to make a compromise and find a way to not to disturb visitors (for example better ads or include some degree of personalization) and still meet the business needs.
Though, in the case of most products, it’s not that hard to align user needs with business goals. At the end of the day, the reason why we create products is to solve other people’s problems. If you solve these problems in a which suits the users, they are willing to pay for it. Everyone wins.
NOTE: This article was based on my book called the “Seven Step UX: The Cookbook for Creating Great products.” It’s a practical, step-by-step handbook dedicated to teaching you all the foundations of a great UX process. It had over 4,000+ sales on Amazon and was no. 1 best-seller in the UX category :)
If you want to learn more about UX, or just getting started, check it out! Also, let me know what you think on this topic in the comments section below!
