What You Need to Know About Website UX and Why It’s Important to Your Small Business

Digital marketing jargon is unlikely to be your favourite topic of conversation, but UX is one term you should get a basic understanding of. This particularly applies if you are in the process of getting a new website developed.

The reasons for this are simple – and it takes zero jargon to explain them.

UX impacts on the performance of your website which means it also impacts on sales in your business, profitability, and return on investment.

As the above are topics are likely to be of much greater to interest to you, here are the basics of UX, including the things you should be talking to your website developer in Auckland about.

What is UX?

UX is an unnecessarily complex abbreviation for the term User Experience.

In other words, when a website developer or marketeer talks about UX, they are talking about User Experience.

What is User Experience, though?

Website User Experience covers a wide range of things. Here are some examples:

• Does the website load fast?
• Does the user find the website visually attractive?
• Does everything on the website work
• Are there things on the page that distract, annoy, or frustrate the user?
• Does the content on the page live up to the expectations of the user?
• Is it easy for the user to find what they are looking for on your website?
• Is your website straightforward to use? For example, is it easy for website users to contact you? If you have an e-commerce website, it is safe and easy for users to make a purchase?
• Is there a natural flow to your website and/or clear cues to the user as to what they should do next?

How UX Ties in With Your Objectives

It’s easy to see how UX ties in with your objectives. For example, if your website takes an age to load, it is offering a poor user experience. As a result, a proportion of users will leave which translates to lost sales.

Functions on the website not working, content elements that are distracting, and websites that users don’t find appealing are also reasons that visitors may choose to leave without doing anything further. This means more lost sales as well as a direct impact on both profitability and return on investment.

What Can You Do About UX?

Your website’s User Experience is largely the responsibility of your website developer. For example, your website developer will create the navigation elements, including menus, that make it easy for users to find the information they are looking for.

Your role involves ensuring User Experience is high up on your developer’s priority list.

In other words, has your website developer thought about all the questions above and are they taking a User Experience-focused approach to building your site?

The other way you can help improve the User Experience of your website is to listen to the advice of your developer during the design process.

For example, a developer might put a content element in a specific location to improve the User Experience. Examples include the formation of the menu, the location of calls-to-action, and the location of your phone number.

So long as your website developer has UX knowledge and experience, you should listen to their advice.

Think About Your Own Internet Experience

Finally, consider your own internet experiences when thinking about UX. You will have encountered websites that you couldn’t wait to leave, or which caused you frustration. Make sure users don’t end up with the same opinion of your new site by focusing on UX.