Balance between user experience design and lean Design

What's more important to you: is it to create products with a killer user experience to attract users? Or is it possible to create products that can satisfy users and seize a large market share as soon as possible?

If the user experience of a product is very poor, the user will not use it. However, if the product is a pioneer in the market, the user will be willing to try it out and give feedback on practical suggestions. People have been trying to balance the confrontation between experience and time. Therefore, we feel that we should use a better framework to think about this problem: experience design or lean design, it depends on the stage of the company (or product. Of course, this is just a framework, and everything still needs to be combined with your actual situation. If you feel that you can successfully bring the product to the market by taking full care of this article, it is a pity that this is not possible.

Which has a higher priority? Experience and run

Experience

Good products share some common features: Excellent user experience. Good products not only meet people's needs, but also bring additional surprises to them. They give users the clearest navigation and the most concise process, and users can use them easily and intuitively.

Of course, these are all theoretical. In fact, there are very few products that can provide such a perfect experience. We often discuss the product UI, priority features, processes and navigation, frameworks, prototypes, and so on. User Experience refers to how users use products, how users perceive products, and how users view products. The definition of user experience is so broad that it is a major framework.

Run

The second design method is called lean design, that is, the so-called minimum viable product (MVP ). A core idea of lean design is to launch products that can basically meet the requirements of functions, quickly seize the market, and carry out high-speed iteration through user feedback.

Many lean design supporters think that this method can truly get feedback from users, so as to truly meet user needs. They generally think that you cannot understand the real needs of users before they have real users. Obtain basic knowledge and communicate with each other as required, and then seek real user needs through real user behavior. Through some small tests, you cannot really grasp the user's needs. You just want to control your users. Most users always like to try new products and give up the current trend.

Now let's go back to the product itself. The following three questions need to be considered for any product:

Commercial

Although there are many successful examples of lean design, for example, Dropbox has become a product with a valuation of 1 billion in four years. However, lean design often implies the minimum commercial (MVB), which may lead to slow growth in revenue and traffic. Of course, the product value often requires a long period of accumulation. In fact, the commercial value of the product is very rare for rocket growth. But whether it's slow growth or rocket-like growth, the real important thing is: can this product be profitable.

Implementation

Commercialization is only part of the product. Next we need to assess whether our resources, funds, and technologies can support the implementation of this product. However, many people often ignore this problem, but the product cannot continue to develop without solving the problem.

Demand

Finally, the product must meet the user's needs, so that the product talents have the minimum value (MDP ).

Mongoron Walter (author of Emotional Design) thinks that even in lean design, the same user experience is the key to demand: "At the beginning, the focus of products is on ease of learn and ease of use, however, after a while, when there are a large number of products in the market, what will make your products stand out? The answer is personalization. All features can be added, but your product must have a unique personality first.

The following are some suggestions on how to deal with lean design and user experience in each stage of the product. The product stage determines the weight of user experience or lean design.

The design depends on the path, that is, the preliminary sketch may limit future development, unless you can give up everything and start again. However, this approach is often not desirable. More likely, you will choose to integrate new content into the original design. Therefore, reducing the uncertainty of a product as soon as possible helps to create a successful product.

This means that it is a suitable strategy to spend limited resources to focus on solving a real demand. Simple design, reasonable functions, and correct development direction. The core work of the next stage is to optimize functions and improve user experience. Laura Klein believes that MVP (minimum viable product) is not an excuse for poor products. MVPs should be able to learn and optimize constantly, but from a bad product, except for people who do not like bad products, you will not learn anything else.

Generally, the product has three major market stages:

Technical stage-a little User Experience + a lot of lean Design

Objective: To set up a team and understand market requirements

Key factor: Focus on the minimum available products, focusing on product feasibility (including commercial and technical ). You cannot focus on user experience because you have no practical users. You know who can use it, but you don't know who will use it. Draw a product prototype as much as possible, and draw out from the prototype who needs it, who uses it, and how to use it.

Success Criteria: users outside the trial group want to use it

Function stage-Limited User Experience + Less lean Design

Objective: To solve the most important functional problems based on existing or expected user needs

Key factor: Starting from users' decision-making and emotions, you want users to have confidence in your products? Or do you want them to be curious? At the same time, pay close attention to the updated functions of competitors. Do not expect to get anything before the product provides the correct functions and experience.

Success Criteria: users can express their experiences and feelings about the product.

Experience stage-optimize user experience as much as possible + avoid using lean Design

Objective: To study what users are doing when using products

Key factor: do not add unnecessary features, find out the real pain points of users, and think about how to retain customers. Study user experience design from around the world and apply this knowledge. Strive to create a product that truly conforms to the user experience design.

Success Criteria: reputation and viral marketing among users

User experience design vs lean Design

In fact, these two design methods are not totally opposite. Their core is the same: user-centered design. The sooner you meet your needs, the better the product will be. Users don't care how you build a product or how much you pay. They need a good product. The following describes two methods by simulating a new application.

User experience design:

1. Understand users, problems, and projects: people need an application that turns a week's recipes into a shopping list.

2. Analyze users and competitors: Build a map of user roles and experience, and analyze competing products to find out the market and user pain points of the shopping app,

3. Design.

4. Search for users: Find the core audience and perform a trial. This is often an underestimating step, which may lead to product failure. Theoretically, this type of attention testing should be conducted at every stage.

Lean Design

1. Observation and Brainstorming: Observe the relationship between the user's shopping content and their dishes, and focus on the areas that can change the shopping experience.

2. Minimal viable product: get feedback from the trial users and design an application that converts menus to shopping lists.

3. Collect feedback and iteration: Maybe the shopping list is not really a pain point for users. What users need is to find a suitable recipe simply and conveniently. Find key user needs and start from here.

Lean user experience is an attempt to integrate the two methods.

The first key point is that we want to take the user experience as the goal at all stages of the product, or even when launching the product as soon as possible. In this way, with the establishment of the importance of user experience, the design will become more and more humane.

The second key point is to collect many other feedback from users. Of course, this does not mean to please all users. Time, capital, team management, and users are all important considerations.

Balance between user experience design and lean Design