Good User Interfaces Drive Business Value

Apple has rightfully been credited with paying extraordinary attention to the usability of their products. Their phones and tablets, for example, are crisp and beautiful and speak immediately to the Apple brand. Many of us stop there, though, when we think of usability. We think of it as a pretty interface that is nice to have if you have the time and money to invest. What many of us fail to consider is that usability goes beyond the look and feel to how you provide the user what he or she wants precisely when he or she wants it. And, good usability design has significant, tangible business benefits in relation to application software, including:
  • Improved conversion rates. A significant reason potential customers fail to convert is because they get frustrated with the process. The simpler and more intuitive it is for customers to do what you want them to do, the more they will actually do it. Sure, that sounds obvious, but complicated buying processes exist all around us.
  • Higher retention. Users who are comfortable with an interface are likely to use that product longer and to drive more revenue.
  • Higher referrals. Users who like an application’s interface are significantly more likely to recommend that application to friends and family.
  • Lower training and support costs. Applications that are intuitive require less investment in training and on-boarding of new customers as well as requiring less customer support infrastructure.
This is not to say that we should all run out and do user testing with thousands of customers in order to refine our user experiences. It does mean, though, that a judicious investment in usability upfront can often be a differentiator for software products that not only results in a stronger brand, but also with immediate, tangible benefits.

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