User Experience Design
"User experience" encompasses all aspects of the end-user's interaction with the company, its services, and its products.
User Experience is the teams' responsibility
Typically, Designers are the point person for the user experience, but the whole team takes responsibility for it. By making the user experience the teams' responsibility and priority, we are able to create a consistent and intuitive experience across all of the features and products they are designing and building.
We ensure a quality user experience by:
- Designing for user flows rather than individual screens.
- Writing interface copy that consistently follows the tone of the brand.
- Providing immediate and constructive feedback to users after them performing an action
- Paying close attention to details in microinteractions.
- Establishing and using a Design System that communicates a consistent visual guide to users while using our products.
- Designing for accessibility to all potential users.
- Thinking through the unhappy path: empty states, error and loading states, edge cases
Testing User Experience with Usability Tests
Usability tests are the most effective way to test a product's user experience. Continuous testing verifies that the product and team are focused on creating a great user experience for the product.
We've found that having a testing plan is the best way to consistently run user interviews and usability tests during the project. A starting point for the project's interviews and testing should be biweekly. This sets the expectation that interviews and testing are needed and the team should discuss if that plan will work for their individual project. Testing should always accommodate users and project needs.