Customer Experience and User Journey

As a product designer, it’s important to consider the entire customer experience and user journey when designing a product. A positive customer experience can be the key to gaining and retaining customers, and a smooth user journey can make or break a product’s success. A positive customer experience can result in customer loyalty, increased sales, and positive word-of-mouth marketing. Customers are more likely to recommend a company to others if they have had a positive experience, and they are more likely to continue to use a company’s products or services if their experience has been satisfactory. A negative customer experience can lead to customer churn, negative reviews, and a damaged reputation.

The HBR article “Welcome to the Experience Economy” sheds light on the difference between a product, a service and an experience. It is important to understand the thought process when a user spends their resources on purchasing a product or service. They hope to make the most of the ‘economic value’ they can derive from this. Goods are simply produced and services are provided but an experience is something that has to be thoughtfully curated to meet user needs. An excellent example of this is Dyson. The company specialising in vacuum cleaners when moved to the business of offering personalised hairdryers and curling products offered demo stores for potential customers where a trained technician would help you use the product and find the appropriate attachment to the styling head to see what works best for the customer. This has help popularise the product to a great extent.

Dyson Demo Store

Another thing customers value more than personalisation is time. It is necessary to streamline the journey wherever possible. Instead of the traditional method of calling a restaurant to make a reservation, they now have websites or applications where this can be done easily through a mobile or desktop interface.

To create a cohesive and effective user experience that helps to build brand loyalty and drive business results, we have kept in mind the below:

1. Consistency: consistent design elements and language throughout the customer journey to create a cohesive and recognisable brand experience. This includes using consistent typography, colour schemes, imagery, and messaging.
2. Visual Hierarchy: Use visual hierarchy to guide the user’s attention and emphasise important information. This can be achieved through the use of contrast, size, and placement.
3. User-Centered Design: Design the customer journey with the user in mind, considering their needs and preferences. This means making sure that the user can easily accomplish their goals, minimising frustration and confusion, and providing a seamless experience.
4. Accessibility: Design the customer journey with accessibility in mind, ensuring that it is usable for all users regardless of their abilities. This includes using clear language, providing alternative text for images, and designing with colour contrast in mind. This is most important in the prototyping stage.
5. Emotion: Consider the emotional impact of the customer journey on the user. Use design elements such as colour, imagery, and tone to create a positive emotional response and reinforce brand values.

Post creation and lunch, ‘iteration’ should be used to continually iterate on the customer journey, using user feedback and analytics to improve the experience over time. This ensures that the customer journey remains relevant, effective, and engaging.