Investing in UX (user experience design) upfront can pay dividends for years to come. It’s sometimes hard for a digital agency like Cloud Construct to convince clients to invest their time and money in user experience design. The value of a high number of features in their next online product is easy to see. If a product can do more, clients are getting more for their money. It’s a direct relationship, so clients will often readily spend on the tech work (programming) needed to build in more features. Sometimes it’s a harder task to convince them to build fewer features and instead spend money on optimizing the user experience around their features

Sheer functionality is of course a big deal, but things become more nuanced when you consider the noise within which a product appears to consumers. The web is full of products, and it’s all too easy for product experiences to blur together. If a site’s behavior and user interface controls are identical to the next guy’s, users may not perceive much differentiation in value between the two options. This is where most businesses want their users to be. You want your product to stand out. You want it to be the most enjoyable one to interact with. You want users to feel an added value in using your product over the other guy’s.

This is where UX design efforts yield results. The user experience is a critical part of building any digital product. You want to come away with a solid, usable product without trapdoors and pitfalls. You also want to build a unique product that will ultimately win over users in the face of competition.

It is certainly possible for a smart group of developers and a leader with a well-defined vision to build something amazing and unique without explicitly running a process of User Experience design. Smart folks can make decisions on the fly in production and generate an awesome product. Cloud Construct has delivered some great products within these circumstances. In every case, however, having dedicated team members with an eye specifically for User Experience concerns would have helped significantly.

When we allow programmers to program, visionaries to lead in strategy, and UX professionals to obsess over user interaction details, each contributor can excel in their respective field of specialty. Yes, collaboration across disciplines often leads to innovations in experience. But the best way to guarantee that your product is going to have unique, exceptional qualities is ultimately to designate a specialist to the task. This UX specialist will ensure that your product stands out to highest degree possible.

So put a great team on User Experience for your next endeavor and watch results emerge. Believe us, it’ll prove that thought work in UX design is a great investment.

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About the Author:

Scott came to lead User Experience for Cloud Construct with a long background as a freelance consultant in UX design and development, and from stints with a number of Boston digital agencies. Scott has helped bring many award-winning sites and applications to life, and created successful web experiences across organizations from mid-sized non-profits to publishing giants, various startups, hospitals and more.