photo from Unsplash
The significance of brands providing impeccable user experience (UX) to their customers online has been reiterated an immeasurable number of times.
You must have heard that Google promotes the rankings of websites that provide great UX, that people are more prone to converting and becoming loyal customers after an amazing UX interacting with your brand, or that maximizing UX in design, content, and copy should be a brand’s top priority.
But what does UX actually mean? Is it a quantitatively measurable notion, or a concept unattainable to define and calculate?
In this article, we’ll try to shed light on what UX is in digital marketing, and what benefits your business can yield by improving UX for your customers.
What Is User Experience (UX)?
In the broadest sense, UX refers to all aspects of the user’s interaction with a brand, product, or service. It is primarily focused on the user’s satisfaction with a certain product or service, taking into account its usability, accessibility, design, etc.
From the perspective of digital marketing, UX encompasses a person’s feelings when interacting with a brand’s online presence. This includes everything from the design of your website to the usability of interface elements.
Let’s illustrate this with an example of an eCommerce website. The quality of the site’s UX would depend on a variety of factors, such as:
- The usefulness of information your site provides (product description),
- Credibility (product reviews or customer testimonials),
- Accessibility (text-to-speech option),
- Usability (responsive design, loading speed, search, and filter features), and much more.
To ensure a seamless user experience, it is crucial for brands to prioritize the website development process, paying attention to factors such as responsive design, loading speed, search functionality, and intuitive interface elements.
Why Is UX Key to Digital Marketing Success?
Quality UX design is essential to the success of any digital marketing campaign. It helps to create an enjoyable user experience that not only improves customer satisfaction but also drives conversions and increases customer retention and referral rates. With better UX design, websites are easier to navigate and use, presenting visitors with an efficient and intuitive way to interact with the brand.
Good UX makes sure that customer preferences and behaviors are taken into account throughout the entire sales funnel. Furthermore, a positive customer experience also increases brand visibility, as customers become more likely to share their experiences and recommend a brand to others.
Is UX Measurable?
As a general concept, UX is not measurable. A website’s UX cannot be expressed as a number, percentage, or rank. However, there are UX metrics that can be measured and thus used to assess and improve your digital product’s user experience.
One can measure the quality of UX by identifying vital metrics and setting relevant KPIs that reflect how the users are satisfied with a certain digital product.
Let’s simplify this through an example. The quality of the user experience of a mobile app can be evaluated and interpreted using a variety of quantitative metrics, such as:
- The number (or share) of 5-star reviews in the app store—it signals whether users find the app useful and engaging.
- Engagement metrics, such as session frequency and length—they indicate if users spend significant time in the app, enjoying its content.
- The rate of app downloads and registrations—it reveals whether the marketing efforts work well.
- Churn rate and subscription renewal rate—they suggest user retention.
This, of course, isn’t a definitive list of UX metrics to keep an eye on, nor must all these be applicable to every app out there.
Websites, social media profiles, online tools, downloadable software, and all other forms of digital products also have a unique set of relevant UX metrics to monitor.
For websites, let’s say, you’ll want to observe organic traffic, keyword rankings, bounce rate, session length, number of pages per session, etc. On social media, you’d focus on likes, comments, shares, and saves of your posts, the number of followers, results of an influencer partnership, and more.
What’s the Secret Recipe for Good UX?
Unfortunately for everyone involved in building a digital presence of a brand—from designers and content writers to marketers and business owners—there isn’t a secret recipe for creating a great user experience.
The reason is simple: every user that interacts with your brand has a hyper-unique set of experiences, biases, and expectations.
A first-time user landing on your website from Google or other search engines may not tolerate slow loading speed or hefty price tags on your products. Yet, another first-time user coming to you after a friend’s recommendation probably won’t make a fuss out of waiting an extra second for your site to load or spending an extra buck on a proven-to-be-good product.
Data-Driven Approach to Building Quality UX
Instead of running your digital presence on hunches and assumptions, craft a UX based on educated guesses. There are numerous studies that deal with user experience available online.
For instance, your online shop’s cart abandonment rate is high. You want to improve the numbers by enhancing the UX, but where do you begin?
Start out by searching for relevant stats that may shed some light on the cause of your site’s problem. For instance, studies suggest that nearly 1 out of 5 online shoppers in the U.S. abandon their carts because of an excessively lengthy or complicated checkout process. For half of the shoppers in the UK, slow-loading web pages are the primary reason for abandoning their cart.
It’s important to note that relying on statistics won’t always help you determine the right way to improve your digital product’s UX. Therefore, if you’re not really sure how to approach the problem, your best choice is to entrust your UX endeavors to an expert.
On UX Planet, a world-renowned B2B marketplace connecting businesses with agencies, you can find and hire your perfect digital agency experienced in creating impeccable UX.
Conclusion
User experience is part of the overall customer experience, and it’s essential to digital marketing success. It can be evaluated through various UX metrics, such as engagement and user retention rates, yet there’s no single recipe for creating a great user experience.
Gathering customer feedback and studying customer behavior can help you adjust and optimize your digital product’s UX to better meet user needs and expectations. If you need help, consider partnering with an experienced digital agency—they can help you create a user experience that will eventually result in more conversions and higher ROI.
