A lot of times, when people hear that we practice User Experience Design, they respond by saying, “Excellent! So you guys must produce a lot of these flashy type sites. We want our site to be real flashy and exciting too!” Well…that’s not really what we do. If the context of the website calls for something flashy (e.g. a site to promote a new amusement park ride or a car manufacturer’s site), then sure, we would produce something appropriate to achieve that user experience. But in most cases, developing GREAT user experience is…pretty simple.
Perhaps the confusion lies in the word “experience”. Often, when we talk about having great “experiences” in our daily lives, we associate the term with being awed or dazzled beyond a typical experience. For example, if you had a great experience at a restaurant, chances are it was an experience beyond your normal expectations. With user experience design, however, the idea is to provide an experience close to what a user would normally expect. One of the core tenets of good user experience design is to adhere to established web standards and conventions, and to not stray too far from users’ expectations. The reason we advise keeping site features and functions simple, and rather normal, is to minimize user confusion and maximize ease of use. That’s why in the field of User Experience Design, the gauge of good design is often measured on how “usable” a site is…not necessarily how awe inspiring or unique the experience is.
This doesn’t mean we like creating simple boring websites. In fact, we are passionate about crafting engaging web experiences that keep users coming back. We do this by prioritizing site design that is simple to use, easy to understand, and intuitive.
Books we recommend on this subject is “Don’t Make Me Think” by Steve Krug and “Laws of Simplicity” by John Maeda.
