Did you just give thumbs down to a brand? Say hello to the empowering 'UX'

For brands to thrive in the digital age, merely doling out exemplary products and services is certainly not enough. It's the era of the user (customer) and giving a superior user experience (UX) has become an imperative formula that dictates brand success.

User experience (UX) is the field of design that organises and aligns all the interfaces of a company, such that a customer eases his way through the digital platform. Sharan Grandigae, founder and CEO of Redd, a UX design company, says UX is the best indicator of the clarity of vision of a company's promoters, the efficiency of operations and profitability of the company. "A company whose primary business interface with its customers is digital, cannot ignore getting this right, as UX can increase conversion and referrals and reduce operational costs."

Grandigae says as the success of branding is measured by brand recall, what creates recall is the reinforcement of every customer touch-point with the brand's identity. "Which is why the business card looks like the website, which looks like the ads and so on. Applications and websites are additional touch-points that are even more capable of communicating a brand's value as they have the additional dimensions of 'feel' and 'behaviour'," added Grandigae.

According to Sreeraman MG, co-founder of Fynd, "As this is the age of instant gratification, and as customers are armed with more choices and lesser patience, they form an instant opinion of the product/brand and move quickly elsewhere if the experience is not seamless.

Millennial brands like travel marketplace ixigo, fashion portal Fynd, mobile banking service Cube Wealth and digital lending company CASHe are going the extra mile to consolidate their digital platforms with a UX that is seamless and intuitive, providing customers with an immersive experience.

According to Srinivas Nidamolu, CTO, CASHe, good UX helps to onboard more customers, increase stickiness with the app and repeat business. "Customers today have high expectations from apps, whether it is the visual appeal, intuitiveness, loading time and overall experience. Apps should be minimal on cognitive overload and should not frustrate the user. For our app, the focus has been on chipping away what is non-essential and to be left with uncluttered interfaces which string together to provide a great UX. User screen flow analytics is used to understand choke points and customer drops out zones and enhance the UX. We have also made sure the menu actions and buttons are easily reachable by the thumb while holding the device in one hand," says Nidamolu.

At ixigo, a UX/UI (user interface) revamp has produced features such as a flight tracker and a fully automated web check-in that solve major travel pain points with a few taps. According to Rajnish Kumar, CTO and co-founder, ixigo, the fare predictions are upfront, ensuring the user knows exactly when to book. "Quite often, we end up telling travellers to wait a few more days before booking, thus helping them save over 40% on fares. Artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming an indispensable tool in UX design and upskilling in machine learning is presenting greater opportunities for UX/UI web developers," says Kumar.

Thanks to enhanced UX, Cube Wealth's users can make their investments in minutes through their app, says CEO and founder Satyen Kothari. "We use FaceID and other biometrics to enhance security and convenience. We experiment with blockchain to reduce deposit and withdrawal settlement times."

Fynd has designed a section in their app to reduce product discovery time. "We have been able to reduce the steps from product discovery to check out after many iterations. This leads to more 'add to carts' and lesser abandoned carts in our platform, hence more sales," says Sreeraman, adding that the superior UX has resulted in repeat orders from customers.

At ixigo, the usability enhancements and design revamp has resulted in a near doubling of conversion rates in our flights and hotels app, says Kumar. "We have increased our customer base to 18 million +. The UX/UI revamp has also resulted in an over 20% jump in the overall flight booking numbers. "

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Going ahead, to outdo competition from rivals, brands are eyeing advanced fields like applied machine learning (AML) and augmented reality.

Source: DNA Money