A New Approach Required to Meet User Expectations & Unleash Your Digital Potential
Transform or lose customers
Companies must satisfy sophisticated digital users with multiple devices who have a familiarity with life-on-demand, whether catching a taxi with Uber or expecting next-day delivery for the most obscure orders on Amazon. The complicated processes and convoluted experiences of the past have been simplified. This simplicity has disrupted the environment many businesses operate within.
Older platforms have user-facing interfaces that are now severely out of step with how they are used. Consumers now have the flexibility to easily find alternative choices based on their experiences and needs. They can look at their options and create their ideal combinations of product, channel and brand. They are making decisions based on what is easy, efficient and emotionally engaging. Companies must understand this in order to retain their users and attract new ones.
Users control engagement
Your users do not think about which device they are using to transact. They expect touch points across all channels to be aware of their previous engagements with your brand, making best use of the capabilities of the device to perform relevant functions within each channel. Users are now subconsciously judging the efficacy of each touch point with your company; against not only your competitors, but also their experience across all digital platforms.
Designing for the Sophisticated Digital User
The sophisticated digital user is judging you, asking:
‘How seamless was the experience?’
‘How intuitive was it?’
‘How did it make me feel?’
‘How effective was it?’
‘Is it done better elsewhere?’
The landscape of the Digital Economy means you need to treat seamless user experience across channels as a business priority:
Focus on how users actually behave
A focus on user experience is a focus on the way your users actually behave in their real lives. A banking or travel customer may begin an interaction online, but then switch to the contact center, before finally visiting the branch or office. There has to be a common connected platform to support this journey that prevents users having to explain the context all over again.
Data now drives the experience
The connected, data-enabled world means new and emerging behaviors, with expectations of a fully connected journey. It is the persistence of data across channel interactions that helps deliver seamless user experience. Digital products need to be personalized and tailored to changing individual needs and contexts in real-time, putting a productive user experience at the forefront of business priorities.
Put users at the center of your process
Putting users at the center of your digital transformation agenda means focusing on what they want from your software, not an internally-focused agenda around what is available. Understanding users and their relation to the business means achieving a real understanding of the context and motivation for their engagement into your process. Only then can you make them a part of that process, to make your investments more useful to them.
View my full white paper on Seamless User Experiences here: http://bit.ly/1Iib1Wj
