UX is More Important than Aesthetics in Singapore

The ideal is creating effective user experience as well as balanced and beautiful visual design.

The key to every design project is to bring good user experience. At the beginning of a project, the most important is to understand the service requirements, design the flow, realize the functions. Beautiful UI(User Interface) design can be surely icing on the cake.

Most of the time, just designing a perfect looked interface is not enough for users to use it properly. Usually, designers trend to consider things from the designer’s view, while we need to serve the user, the product will be used by users, so it is essential to have user involved and think on user’s view. The purpose of User Experience(UX) is to enhance customer satisfaction and sales by providing the largest ease of use, benefit and enjoy for users. The meaning of a product existence is its functions. At the same time, aesthetic is also of big importance. Well, polished interface by visual design can greatly attract potential customers. It brings the first impression to the user, and build the direct connection between user and product. UX is important than aesthetics, UX comes first, and aesthetics second.

What is usability?

“Usability rules the web. Simply stated, if the customer can’t find a product, then he or she will not buy it.” –Jakob Nielsen

According to the most famous usability expert Jakob Nielsen, Usability is a quality attribute that assesses how easy user interfaces are to use. He also states that usability has five attributes: ease of learnability, ability to remember, efficiency, error rate and user satisfaction.

Usability is the keyword of web survival. If a website is not easy to use, people leave. If it is not interesting, they leave. So, what is the magic that will keep them in your system? The issue about learnability is not the time actually. It doesn’t matter how difficult your website design is, the user will learn how to use it in any way if they spend enough time. The important thing is why should they spend that much time to learn it? What is their motivation? What is the thing that attracts them to the product?

Imagine how difficult to include new users into your system before they close it if they do not understand quickly. You have just a couple of seconds before users click the “close” button. Right in that moment user experience steps into the concept.

What is user experience (UX)?

“An experience is a story, emerging from the dialogue of a person with her or his world through action” – Marc Hassenzahl

User Experience is the effect on the user which is left by the product. It is an emotional interaction starting with a feeling while usage. It is basically about what we feel and what we remember after using the product. UX can be academically summarized as every aspect of the interaction between the user and a product, service or company (Nielsen & Norman, The Definition of User Experience). UX is not just creating a fancy interface, but creating an experience through a device. Experiences are meaningful events through which not much knowledge gained.

The root of experience is feelings and emotions. What users see when they look the product? What they feel while using it? What they remember after using? What comments they make about the product? All these questions constitute the concept of User Experience. UX researchers mainly look for the answers to these questions. The leading attracting force is always the design of the product and design has two important pillars; aesthetics and functionality.

Importance of aesthetics

“Good design is the most important way to differentiate ourselves from our competitors.”-Samsung CEO Yun Jong Yong

Aesthetics is one of the dynamics of experience. It is the visual interaction and attractiveness which make a connection between user and product. But can it really affect the users’ choices? There are opposite opinions about the importance of aesthetics. While one group is supporting that it has a high effect on user experience, another group totally tends to dismiss the importance of aesthetics.

The reason for that is simple. Beautiful things create positive feelings. These feelings move people towards the beautiful one over other options. Donald Norman, the UX expert, says that beauty is important; beauty in the environment, actions and products that we buy and use. “Beauty and brains, pleasure and usability-they should go hand in hand.”

Importance of functionality

“Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. The design is how it works.” –Steve Jobs

It is primarily necessary to analyze the problem correctly to be able to create a successful product. A product can only exist as long as it fulfils the user’s needs. Just like every product, every interface is created to solve a problem. Every interface is different and all of them create their own design framework according to their most critical tasks. The vital thing is to make these tasks accessible and notable for users. This designates the functionality of a website. Even the best functionalities can be useless if it cannot let users know it is there or if it is too clumsy which makes people avoid seeking.

In conclusion

Aesthetics and functionality, need to be combined and given the same importance in order to give a good experience to users. A poor visual design can disaffect users easily and they never learn the inside functionality of system or interaction design. Contrary, a beautiful design motivates people to learn and understand the system easier and it brings a good functionality.

As Robert Rodriguez says “When you take technology and mix with art, you always come up with something innovative.” Aesthetics and functionality together is a true combination of a good design which users desire to experience.

Detail information, please refer to user experience design: aesthetics or functionality? – ToKnowPress, I extract some paragraphs from this article.

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http://user-experience-in-sg.hatenablog.com/entry/2017/12/15/122206