5 UX Strategies for Small Businesses
How does a small business create competitive UX design without a big UX team or considerable investments? Nataly Manuylova, senior UX designer at MightyCall, shares insights for teams and companies of any size.
As humans, we’re driven by visual stimuli. Our long-term memory is populated with pictures, not words. Our imagination sparks world-changing inventions. 90% of information transmitted to our brain is visual.
For every digital product, customer experience also begins with visual impact or user experience (UX) design. Research shows that “intentional and strategic user experience” can boost conversion rates by a monumental 400%. On the other hand, if the UX design of the digital product isn’t given due attention, the company is bound to lag behind, even with the best marketing efforts.
The question of customer-driven UX design is especially pressing for smaller Software as a Service (SaaS) companies. While corporations like Amazon repeatedly choose customer experience strategies over advertising, small business is faced with a tough choice between marketing spending and product improvement costs.
Learn More: The Impact of the CXO and the Experience Economy is Bigger Than You Think
UX Strategies for Small Businesses
Lying at the intersection of technology and marketing, UX design holds incredible potential for small business. With a calibrated strategy such as the one below, even the smallest UX team can revitalize their SaaS/digital product and save thousands of dollars in development, marketing, and sales costs.
1. Define Users’ Top Tasks & Discuss Them Directly
To understand, not second-guess customers’ needs, you need to ask them questions up front. This is why every UX strategy starts with user research.
Surveys for evaluating top tasks are an important part of user research. When compiling the survey, use the checkbox format to list all product features you’re willing to develop/provide. Keep the wording concise and use the verb+object structure to demonstrate the action and the object it affects (e.g., redial a missed call). For targeted results, limit the maximum number of choices in the survey.
After analyzing survey results, the next step is to hold customer interviews via phone. While surveys define top tasks, customer interviews expand on that information. Base interview questions on the specific hypotheses regarding client needs and involve only a handful of chosen clients from your target audience. Random people or friends don’t share the tasks and challenges of your target audience. Their feedback will not be useful and may be confusing.
2. Heuristic Evaluation & Why You Need It
Heuristic evaluation is a UX method used in software design. It defines the efficiency of user interfaces and other elements of the user experience.
Heuristic evaluation is based on 10 classic principles called the 10 Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design. Here’s a brief overview.
- Visibility of system status — Keep users informed about what’s happening. If a page or app is loading, show progress.
- Match between system and the real world — Describe your product in simple human terms instead of tech jargon.
- User control and freedom — Always provide redo/undo/cancel, etc. options for users.
- Consistency and standards — Be consistent in your wording and UI patterns to avoid confusion
- Error prevention — Prevent common errors by using special element conditions or confirmation messages
- Recognition rather than recall — Don’t expect people to remember details from the previous page. Show all necessary information on the screen where it’s necessary to take action.
- Flexibility and efficiency of use — Allow advanced visitors to use shortcuts or preferences for frequent actions.
- Aesthetic and minimalist design — Decrease cognitive workload. Hide all extra information for “on demand” viewing.
- Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors — Error messages should provide the user with helpful advice on how to deal with the issue.
- Help and documentation — Although not all users read help documentation, the app must provide detailed instructions for when help is needed.
Heuristic evaluation is extremely useful for small businesses that don’t have an experienced UX specialist or outsource their UX. As long as the business is ready to pay attention to basic rules, heuristic evaluation can help a company at any stage of development.
3. Usability Testing Best Practices
UX design thrives on users and their feedback. One effective way to get that feedback and eliminate bugs is through usability testing. According to research, 85% of UX-related issues can be detected by performing a usability test on a group of 5 users.
At MightyCall, we start building information architecture with surveys and interviews. Heuristic evaluation then helps us build user-friendly interfaces. Only after these steps do we proceed to usability testing and watch how users complete specific tasks. As we’re in the VoIP industry, the task can be as simple as locating a missed call or more complicated like creating a voice menu.
For any functionality that needs to be usability tested, follow these steps for best results:
- Build the prototype around information gathered from your TA (customer surveys, interviews)
- During usability testing, focus on your TA
- Set a concrete task and goal for each test
- Measure the time it takes for users to complete a task and any troubles they experience
4. Don’t Waste Resources on Secondary Tasks
Remember the saying, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”? In UX design, trying to improve everything at once and please all your clients is a sure way to fail at everything.
UX leads should keep in mind that prioritization is their team’s top success driver. This is not always simple as small businesses may get conflicting feedback from clients and stakeholders. Moreover, some clients are more active in voicing their complaints. This can make it seem as if their feedback should hold priority over everyone else’s.
New feature development and implementation should be based strictly on the common denominator of the survey and customer interview results. Individual clients have a right to personal wishes and views about the product. But if it doesn’t work for your wider audience, you don’t need it.
By focusing on vital tasks, our UX team at MightyCall avoids wasting vital resources such as people, time, and costs. Instead, we channel our energy into tasks with maximum ROI.
5. Avoid Complicating the User Experience
Nowhere does the “less is more” paradigm strike closer to home than in UX design. The fewer elements our brain has to process, the easier it is to make decisions. Fast and simple decision-making, in turn, leads to high user satisfaction.
UX professionals have a strong tendency towards “tweaking” user interfaces and other design aspects up to the point when these become confusing to the regular user. From personal experience, I can share countless stories of users having trouble spotting “self-evident” elements like a red button in the corner of the screen because of cluttered UI.
At a time when nothing sells better than “easy” and “user-friendly”, UX designers should master the art of dozed information. Whenever in doubt, sway towards the minimalist side. Keep your main scenario simple, the text short and to the point, and images memorable.
Learn More: What Are the Top 10 Web Design Mistakes to Avoid?
Connect to Your Audience in a Personalized Way
Genuine user experience relates to your audience and proves that growth isn’t about huge investments, ingenious sales strategies, or multi-level UX departments. At its core, UX is about people connecting to people.
Smaller SaaS companies have everything it takes to connect to their audience in a personalized way. What it takes is working hand in hand with your clients’ feedback, nailing one goal at a time, and a human will to make someone’s life tomorrow simpler through the work you put in today.
