The art of designing a website for humans
By Rob Redding
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Understanding UX design and why it's important to your website.
Ah, it is a glorious thing when you open up a website and you are able to easily find your way around. There’s something magical about how a site can do just enough to guide you from point A to point B, without needing the floating yellow cursor that people in the ‘90s loathed.
When you open up a website, there are a few things that you want to see. You want to be able to easily navigate through the site without having to hunt down menus or buttons hidden away in corners. You want a site that’s easy to use, looks great and is responsive. You want a site that allows you to easily find what you’re looking for and have the site guide you through the process. If you’re trying to sell something, then you want people to be able to easily navigate through your store without getting lost in a maze of products or information. This is what a website should do: guide the user through it.
The unseen world of user experience (UX) design
The best sites are the ones that do just enough to get you on board, but not so much that it feels like you’re swimming in a sea of options. Ideally, the goal is to make sure that you can easily accomplish tasks on the site without having to learn how it works first.
That’s why, when we talk about the user experience, we often talk about how intuitive the navigation is - how easy it is for people to use your website.
This “magic” happens behind the scenes, before your website even launches. And, it all starts with a UX designer.
A UX designer gives websites a purpose
A UX designer is like a coach for your website. They help you figure out how to make it easy for people to use, and create an experience that’s enjoyable for them. They work with clients, developers, and other designers to ensure that the project meets the goals of all involved parties.
Websites are often a company’s first impression to customers. It’s the job of the UX designer to make sure that impression is good and to help customers navigate through the site easily.
A UX designer is an expert in user experience. They will work with the team to develop prototypes and wireframes before they start working on the final product. The goal is to create a website that will be useful, intuitive and easy-to-use. You want your website to provide a user experience that makes your customers feel confident in your brand and keep coming back for more.
The UX designer knows what people want and gives it to them in a way that’s visually pleasing but also easy to navigate. They are responsible for ensuring that the user experience on a website or app is seamless. This means that they are involved in every aspect of the design process, from sketching out ideas to final implementation. They work closely with other designers, developers and project managers to ensure that their designs meet user needs.
It's important to remember that UX design also ties into the content strategy that you want to implement. Content will generally dictate design and UX will help ensure that the content is presented in the most effective manner possible. Your content will have the greatest impact if it’s delivered in a way that respects the user’s needs and expectations.
A good UX designer is a problem solver
A good UX designer must be able to understand the needs of their clients, as well as the users who will be interacting with their designs. They also need to be creative, so they can come up with solutions that are both aesthetically pleasing and functional. It’s important for them to be able to communicate clearly and effectively with other members of a team.
They must take into account both the users and business goals, and then use their design skills to create an experience that meets both. This requires an ability to think outside the box when needed and come up with creative solutions to problems that arise. The UX designer needs to be able to look at a design and think about how it can be improved, or how best to solve the problem at hand. Then, they must clearly convey their ideas and insights to their team, as well as clients and stakeholders. They ask questions, conduct user research and analyze data to identify problems and come up with solutions. They are great communicators who can effectively convey their ideas in a way that everyone on the team understands. They know how to identify and solve user problems, as well as how to use design thinking to create solutions. They can also turn ideas into prototypes quickly and effectively.
A good UX designer is always learning and adding new skills to their toolkit. They are curious about the latest trends in UX design and technology in general.
UX design is all about real people and the real world
The purpose of UX design is to create a website that people will use and love. That’s why UX designers are interested in understanding the needs of the target audience and how people interact with the website.
UX designers are also tuned in to new trends, best practices and technologies for creating digital experiences. That’s because they know that no amount of user research will help them design a great product if they don’t understand the context in which their users live. A good UX designer understands that their job isn’t just about finding solutions, but also about solving problems for people who have real needs. They are interested in understanding how people interact with products and services, and they want to improve those interactions.
UX design isn’t just about technology – it’s also about human behavior. UX designers understand how people think and what drives their behavior. Learning more about the human mind and how it works helps them design better products that work well for people.
Creating a great online user experience for your customers requires seeing the big picture and understanding how all of the parts work together. Along the way, the UX designer will often come up with some new ideas about how things can be done differently, better, faster, more efficiently or in more innovative ways.
Testing, testing, testing
The most important part of UX design is testing. The goal of testing is to make sure that the product or service you’re designing works well for people. It’s not enough for it to look good or be technically sound; instead, you want it to actually be usable by real people who are trying to accomplish something with it. This process of testing and refining a product is what makes it better.
A UX designer knows that they cannot simply assume that a website will be successful once it is designed and released into the world. The only way to know if something works well is to get feedback from real people who are using it or plan on using it – and then make changes based on this feedback.
UX design requires test-driven development. Testing the work early and often is essential to making sure it works well for the client. This allows the development team to make changes quickly, with confidence that they will improve the user experience. A UX designer will work closely with other members of the design team, including graphic designers who create user interfaces, web developers who build websites or mobile apps, project managers who coordinate all aspects of product development and more.
It’s all about creating a better user experience
Using a UX designer on your next website project will help ensure you give your users a better experience. That’s because the process starts with users in mind. The designer gathers user feedback and then makes changes to improve the site. Your customers will be able to accomplish more without getting frustrated, and they’ll enjoy visiting your site more. That means you win too!
Before programming a new site even begins, the UX designer can help you create a website “prototype” – a model of how your site could work in the future. This allows you to test ideas before building them into full products.
UX design is a critical part of designing a new website today. It’s one of the main things that separates an “okay” website from a great one. It can be challenging to design a website that is both visually appealing and easy for users to navigate, but it’s well worth the effort. If you want your site to be successful in helping you grow and support your business, you need to make sure it’s not only aesthetically pleasing but also user friendly.
Rob Redding is the President of Redding Designs Inc. (reddingdesigns.com), a full-service digital marketing agency for the construction industry, offering web design, social media marketing, and SEO services.