Websites can do so much it’s easy to get carried away with the possibilities. But your priority must always be what your user experience (UX) should be.
Our digital specialist, Sam, is the expert on the different types of user journeys and which is ideal for your project.
‘Put your best foot forward.’
Sam’s shoe salesman analogy says it all.
If you were a lifelong shoe salesman, you’ll probably be very excited to talk about shoes. But users navigating a shoe website don’t necessarily want the backstory and lore behind footwear – usually they’ll just want to quickly select their product!
So, nail down your users’ needs. What experience do they want or need to have?
If you fail to align the experience you provide with the experience your users want they will ‘click off’ your site. Research shows that each year, users’ behaviour is less and less patient. The need to address this process is paramount to the success of your project.
Some clients want their website to generate conversions. Perhaps they are launching an exciting new initiative and want people to register. Other times, a client may want their website to educate, for example, if they have written some research and want a website to host it.
The goal to either inform or generate conversions will lead to two very different user flows.
Birmingham Digital Futures: Focus on conversions
Birmingham Digital Futures (BDF) is a group of organisations dedicated to evolving the digital skills capability amongst young people in Birmingham. As such, it was important to allow many opportunities for schools and businesses to get involved.
Sam designed the BDF website with this in mind, factoring in many CTAs across the site that pointed towards registration links or e-mail forms. This conversions-focused website did exactly what the client needed.
Good Enough Care: Focus on research and reading
It’s likely that a different approach will be needed for research-driven projects. Good Enough Care asked Creative Media to showcase their research in a simple and accessible way. Their ‘Child Neglect Tool’ comes with a lot of information, so it’s important that readers can get right into the main content. In this respect, the navigation of the website is crucial; information and links must be clearly signposted.
Academic papers and the option to ‘Download Tool’ are presented in a straightforward way. Pages which are heavy on text are elevated with visuals. Read the full story on Good Enough Care.
What are the tools you can use to map out websites?
Once it’s clear what the user experience should be, the next step involves mapping out the user journey. Initial questions may include: Which pages should link together? What is the hierarchy of the site? What level of personalisation is ideal?
Sam will start planning the user journey with digital tools including FlowMapp and Adobe XD (which are used to prototype the site and page structure). These tools can allow the client to collaborate with us and other stakeholders on the user experience, which will shape the final product. This also allows us to collaboratively develop page content before the design is tied down, which is a very efficient workflow. Think of this stage like ‘pre-production’ in the video workflow. The more thorough and complete this stage, the better the final deliverable.
If you want to know more about collaborating with us or just want to know more about our digital offering, please get in touch.
