What is UX design and why is it important for small businesses?;

No, UX design is not a fad, not just another 'buzzword' invented by marketers to sell! The UX, abbreviation for user experience(User Experience), has entered a lot in the business dictionary in recent years. It is an essential tool if you want to grow your business online!

What UX Design is and why it matters to small businesses;

The UX design has been described as "A bridge between technology and the end user". Nouns, the UX design includes the test and the optimizing the customer and consumer experience throughout the design process of any new website or application.

Effective UX design will ensure that the site( or the application) you are easy to navigate, full of relevant information, looks great - and, the most important, encourages users' conversions to customers. To customers who will come and come back to your business why you managed to gain their interest and trust!

See, websites and applications are subject to what has been named “the rule of 15 seconds”. This is the average time an online user spends deciding whether a business will meet their needs.. If your website or application not designed properly the it is difficult to navigate then most likely the user will not return!

Obviously this is something you do not want!

You do not want to be frustrated if you cannot get the right pitch so invest in a good capo, but having users constantly leave your site means high abandonment rate. Search engines do not see this positively and downgrade your site to search results..

For a small business, every customer counts. This is why UX design is critical. You need to ensure that your website or application meets the needs of your users. Users who may return to become loyal customers. Cat’ extension, that means you need to understand - and embrace - the importance of UX design.

What is considered good and bad UX design;

Let's start with the fact that Good or bad UX design starts with knowing your ideal audience. There is a different UX for each target audience. But there are mistakes and pitfalls that can be avoided and some general guidelines that apply to everyone.

Let's see:

Good UX design

Make browsing simple – no user wants to spend hours learning how to find their way around a website or app.
Well defined selection of icons and buttons, with good distance, size and color palette that meets the current trends but also the possible preferences of your audience.
Informative, well-written and original content which is available on the screen or at the touch of a button. This content should be strict relevant with what the user is looking for.
Clear, well-placed and creative incentives for action(CTA) which do not seem very stressful
High resolution images, relevant and aesthetically pleasing, strategically placed so that they do not cover the page and do not get tired.
An identical user experience, or uses a computer browser, smartphone ή tablet.

Poor UX design

Hidden pages that require a search to be found. Patience is not a virtue that many internet users possess, not to mention almost no one!
Your application or site should be so minimal that they seem unfinished.
Content irrelevant with what your target audience may be looking for or misspelled with spelling and syntax mistakes.
Vague urges for action(CTA) or push too hard to sell without gaining the user's trust.
Low resolution images that serve no purpose for the content, fill the screen and confuse the user.
A site that can not cope with the limits of a smaller screen and is not optimized for mobile or tablet.

Your website is the face of your business and an essential point of contact with your potential customers, .’ this UX design is vital to digital marketing. Everything, from the speed of the site to the meticulous design of the user interface play a role in optimizing the user experience and finally in increasing conversions and building relationships.

Whether you are trying to improve your website, or you build it from scratch, dealing with UX can seem daunting when you do not have the human resources and resources of larger companies. But there is no point in postponing it, as this is one of the most important things you can do to stay competitive and take your business one step further..

Well, now we imagine that you understand how important is UX design even if you are hearing the terminology for the first time. But reasonably you may not know where to start and how to use that much powerful weapon to develop and evolve your brand.

To make things easier we give you a guide to help you with what moves you need to make:

The keys to UX design:

Understand your audience

It all starts with your audience. So if you want to have a successful UX design understand your audience. Who are they; What are they looking for in you?; What they would like to see on your site; How they want you to treat them when they enter your site; How they feel; They are connected with you; It may sound like a lot but if you understand your audience you have laid the most important foundation in UX design.

It is not difficult. Think that you are addressing people and you want to make them feel beautiful in your space, just as you would in your physical store.

Read this article to find out more:18+1 questions to discover the Ideal Audience of your business

Contact a specialist UX designer and learn how to contact them

Depending on whether you are building a new website or want to improve an existing one, you will either work with a web design team that includes UX or you will hire a UX designer . Trying to do it without a specialist next to you may seem like a cost-effective solution yet think long term.

You have the knowledge needed to understand how your audience works;
You can design exactly where each image will fit, text, prompt button;
The result will be satisfactory and will bring the conversions you want or you will have to rebuild it after the beginning.

If you can do it, then go ahead! If not, save time and money for someone to design it that will make it efficient and effective. The money you will give for a correct and complete design UX is an investment that will bring you much more. Caution! The fact that a web developer can write you amazing code for the site does not mean that it is UX design specialist, so choose to whom you will entrust it.

also work with someone you communicate with effectively. One way or another, you will need to work with professionals - and the success of this endeavor will depend to a large extent on your ability to communicate with them..

Do not hesitate to ask them to explain to you any terminology and abbreviations you do not understand. You want to create respect and open dialogue with them, where you can express your ideas and concerns, as well as listen to their suggestions and get to know the process. In this way, will be able to understand pyour goals and philosophy of your business. It is a creative work that emerges through meaningful collaboration.

You do not need to reinvent the wheel

UX designers already know this part. It's up to the employer (that's you) understand it as well, something that brings us back to the subject of communication.

The designer will adhere to certain principles and practices that help ensure intuitive navigation, faster loading speed and other aspects of a positive user experience. No doubt, knows how to avoid the biggest mistakes in web design and will take care not to implement any design decision that endangers usability.

What we often see happening in these types of partnerships is that designers need to convince employers that a given idea, actually, will jeopardize usability and certainly will not work as imagined. If the designer tells you that it is better to leave some things unchanged, he is probably right. Nobody says you have to blindly agree with everything the designer says - just ask him to help you understand why and how.

Learn from the adults

Big companies invest significant amounts in UX design and you can be sure they are doing it right! Browse their websites, as well as on your competitors' websites, can be a great starting point to help you find some ideas and determine which elements you want to focus on.. It helps to know what others are doing, what suits them(possibly to you) and what features you would or would not like to see on your own website.

Get your main competitors and the biggest brands in your business and, subsequently, take some time to browse their websites. There are tools like awwwards. which are incredibly useful - and free - that you can use in your research. You can search for business websites by keyword or domain, and the great thing about it is that it shows you previous versions of a website. This will help you see how they have improved over time and learn directly from them.

Find out what has the most traffic to your site

If you are updating an existing site, you will want to know how people are using it right now. Which section of your site or product is the most popular?; Is not it logical; Reinforce what is going well and change what is holding you back. Understanding how people use your site and which places they are most interested in will give you an incredible picture and direction for this project..

Do not worry – is much easier than, what would you expect. And here you will find useful online tools that will give you a lot of information about user behavior- As the Smartlook– to track how users browse the pages on your site and find out which features are the most popular.

Also the statistics your site is another very important tool that will help you design an amazing new website.

Focus on improving the conversion rate(CRO)

After all, what is required in every business is the conversion of users into customers!

Increasing conversions is the main goal of any design decision. Learn to observe your site in this regard and you will find that the whole process will be much more direct and focused.

It's not just the proper design of CTA buttons(prompt) which are critical to CRO (conversion rate optimization). Everything, from navigation to color and font selection will also affect conversions. In total, these elements will create a system that will be able to guide the visitor's attention to the final result, ie the conversion.

Therefore, one of the most essential parts of UX design is the user's journey to your site and what will push him to become a customer.

Build on customer satisfaction after purchase

As we said before, through the UX we want to build relationships and an amazing experience that will accompany our brand. To do this, however, does not mean that we end our work with the sale. UX design even includes how to thank the person who preferred us and who we want to return..and why not,to bring more people, since he will share the wonderful experience he had on our site and our business.

In fact, Customer satisfaction is a whole part of what you do after sales marketing, so do not underestimate its power!

How to take off eshop sales : 14 very easy steps

Customer Journey Mapping : turned the public into customers

What a conclusion we draw;

Contemporary marketing is now shifting greatly in behaviors, the needs and desires of customers. Modern businesses need to better understand it target market and offer a seamless experience in all its stages travel customer if they want to evolve and increase their sales. Much of this journey takes place on the business website, which means that opens doors to incredible opportunities using the site's UX.

We hope these tips help you get started. The design process involves understanding the ideal audience and their behavior, the pleasant tour, building trust and turning it into a customer. We want our customer to say: “Wow, here I want to be!”.

But it does not end here, I will you need to monitor how your site is used as soon as the project is completed. As time goes on, you will find that there may be room for improvement to offer your guests the best possible experience.

After all, that is not your goal;

If you need help with UX design do not hesitate to contact with us. We are UX specialists and we know how to help effectively and efficiently!