User Experience or UX is defined as any interaction a user makes with a product or service. The UX design takes into consideration each and every element involved that helps in shaping the experience, how it makes the user feel and how easy it is to fulfill the tasks. The gist of UX design is to build easy, efficient, relevant and a pleasing experience for the user. UX designers integrate market research, strategy, product development, and design to build user experiences for products, services, and processes. They act as a bridge to the customer and understand as well as fulfill the needs and expectations.
The importance of UX
Lately, the focus has shifted on the user centered design. This is because it deals with user needs. The designers working at website design Singapore before the user centered design would now understand that websites need to be designed differently. Gone are the days when design decisions were made on the basis of attractiveness and what the client wanted to see. The focus was mainly on the aesthetics and the brand and no care for how users would feel about it. This is because, they centered on what looked good back then, and what the clients wanted.
But now the web has changed, it has become more complex and loaded with features that they must bear great user experience design by all means. And the devices being used for browsing the websites have also expanded to mobile devices, multiple browsers, and various types of internet connections. Accessibility is also taken factor like for those with special needs and for those who don’t have broadband connections or older devices. No matter what the factors, the only way to stand in the market were the ones that were pleasing to use. Nowadays, users are taken into factor when building and/or designing websites.
What does a UX Designer do?
The designers aim to make daily products, services and technology as much user friendly and accessible as they can. They integrate design thinking to meet the user desires with technical feasibility and business viability. This can be further explained by design thinking process.
Inspiration
This stage involves understanding and observation. In this, an extensive research and competitor analysis is conducted to understand the problem or challenge completely. This also entails interviewing those or will be associated directly with the product.
Conceptualization
Then this feedback is used to determine the user goals, emotions, pain points as well as behaviors. This helps in building user personas. Then the designers consider what these personas are trying to attain with the help of a specific product. It also considers information architecture and techniques like card sorting in order to map out the user flows.
Iteration
Once the designers have ascertained the user flows, then they determine what steps the user will take to accomplish their tasks. Here brainstorming is involved for every step, by creating wireframes and prototypes for what the final product may look like. With the prototypes available, the designer conducts usability test to check how users interact with the product. This determines if the user can help designers accomplish their tasks, or if changes are required.
Exposition
The designers come up with solutions as well as they also need to present their ideas and designs for proceeding with the stages ahead.
Skills needed to be a UX Designer
You need to be:
• Adept at creating user personas, stories, wireframes, sitemaps, storyboards, and prototypes
• Able to plan and implement user testing, surveys and formal evaluations
• Able to iterate your tasks according to user testing data and qualitative feedback
• Adept with the interaction design principles and information architecture
• Able to transform goals, objectives and data into digital experiences