What is UX Design?

 


What is UX Design?


Let's start with talking about what UX design actually is UX stands for user experience and  the wikipedia definition of design is to plan the construction of an object activity or process basically how something looks and works so UX design or user experience design is to plan how something looks and works to make the activity of using it easy and enjoyable there are three main factors in UX design first it must meet the user's needs it must also be easy to use and easy to learn and it must give the user control and freedom and as an added bonus it should also surprise and delight let's look at these in a bit more detail the first factor is meeting the user's needs this mean that whatever the user came to do using your product or service you must make sure that they're able to achieve that outcome as an example in an online food delivery service the user has come to get food delivered within a certain time so simply put this first factor means that you deliver on those needs and the person gets the food on time to their house the second factor is that your product or service is easy to use and easy to learn going back to the food delivery example this means that you would find it easy to browse and find the food you want put in your address specify the time and complete the order and the easy to learn part means that even if you've never used this service before you know exactly what to do and it's just as easy as though you've done it 100 times the third factor is that the user should always have control and freedom in the process in the food delivery example again this means that they could change their mind about the food or even cancel or reschedule during the process and the added bonus factor number four surprise and delight in the food delivery example this might mean getting a free voucher for your next order or that the delivery person greets you with a warm smile and a thank you for using their service something that really makes you feel special and want to use that product again. The core of UX design is that it's all about the user products that don't have good UX design aren't taking the user's needs into consideration  taking into account the user's needs and motivation and giving them a great user experience leads to more exciting and valuable products and services the reason why businesses all over the world are starting to realize the value of  UX design is because when you give users a good experience they're more likely to share and come back and use your service again and again we've been talking about good UX design and bad UX design but what does that really look like in the real world to put this in a context we're all familiar with think about microwaves when was the last time you were at someone else's house and tried to use their microwave and couldn't quite figure out exactly what you needed to do think about all the different ways you can interact with microwaves there are buttons and dials and knobs and digital screens and it can be hard to figure out how to achieve the simple task of  heating food when you don't know exactly how to use the device that's in front of you this is what we're talking about when we say bad UX design conversely let's look at an example of good UX design take the humble toaster its simple function is to heat bread into toast just the way you like it making toast is a really simple activity but it can be an imperfect eye when the bread isn't toasted quite enough you usually need to guess how long to put it back in for this is where great UX design comes in where the UX designer has understood the frustrations and needs of the user and invented a button called just a bit more this removes the element of guesswork for the user and creates a delightfully successful experience Don Norman is one of the founding figures of UX design and he also shares a great example of good versus bad UX design indoors think of how many times you've tried to open a door only to realize you are pushing or pulling in the wrong direction most people blame themselves when this happens thinking that they should have known which way to push or pull the door but UX design tells us that this isn't the user's fault it's the fault of the person who designed the door if a door has a handle that you can grab it's telling the user that it's meant to be pulled but what we find is that some doors have a handle even when they're supposed to be pushed these doors are called 'Norman Doors' because Don Norman first coined the term when using these doors as an example of bad UX design if we were to apply good UX design to a door we would first assess whether the door was supposed to open inwards or outwards and then give the user the correct mechanism to perform the right action it's frustrating for people when we try and open a door only to realize that we're doing it the wrong way  but when businesses have websites and digital products and their users don't know what to do or how to achieve their goals it can have a huge negative business impact that's why UX design is such a lucrative and in-demand career path at the moment now you've heard some examples from me i'd love to hear in the comments what experiences of bad UX design you've had in the real world let's look at some of the steps that are involved in UX design typically there are five fundamental steps which are understand analyze ideate validate and iterate we'll cover these steps in more detail in future videos but to go through them quickly understand is about understanding the user's needs motivations and goals analyze is about interpreting data and research into a clear direction id8 involves generating ideas and finding ways to solve users problems validate is the step where UX designers test their new ideas with real people and iterate is where the UX designer goes back through these stages and continuously improves and develops a product or service over time So let's look at some of the things a UX designer does day to day to tie it back to the five steps i just mentioned in the understand stage a UX designer will conduct research and interviews to really dig in and understand the frustrations and motivations in a user's behavior in the analyze stage they formulate data derive insights and assess patterns and trends in the ideate stage they'll start turning those insights into concepts and often bring other people in to work with them to generate ideas in the validate stage they'll create prototypes to quickly test their ideas and run experiments with real users and customers the iterate stage is more of a mindset where they'll go back and repeat these stages in a cycle in order to have continuous improvement  so hopefully I've given you a better understanding of what UX design actually is it's an incredibly.

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