User experience

While usability refers above all to the cognitive and operational aspects of the individual's relationship with the website interface, user experience studies and attempts to improve the emotional aspects of that relationship. techwadia

But in projective terms, the concept of user experience goes much further. It is a multidisciplinary approach that proposes integrating into an organic vision focused on the user the different elements that intervene in web design: from engineering associated with usability to content design, passing through information architecture, graphics , etc.

From this point of view we would be talking about a conscious attempt to give a real entity in the digital world to the paradigm shift that meant decades ago to put the customer at the center of the communication universe, where the product had traditionally reigned.

Starting from the broader vision of this discipline, we can say that its scope is made up of four main focuses of interest:

1.            The brand

2.            Usability

3.            The funcionality

4.            The content

It is clear that none of these elements alone can make the user experience positive . That is why this discipline deals with power relations and value balances between them, and how to generate commitment through gratification understood in a deep sense.

Peter Morville identified seven facets in which user experience can be broken down with a diagram titled “user experience honeycomb”, and named them as attributes of a website:

1.            Useful

2.            Usable

3.            Desirable

4.            Findable

5.            Accessible

6.            Credible

7.            Valuable

Morville explains the facets of the user experience as follows:

1.            Useful . As professionals, we cannot be content with coloring within the lines drawn by managers. We must have the courage and creativity to ask ourselves if our products and systems are useful, and to apply our in-depth knowledge of the trade and environment to define innovative solutions that are more practical.

2.            Wearable . Ease of use is vital, and even interface-centric human-computer interaction methods and perspectives don't exhaust all dimensions of web design. Simply put: usability is necessary, but not sufficient.

3.            Desirable . Our demand for efficiency must be tempered by an appreciation of the power and value of image, identity, branding and other elements of emotional design.

4.            Findable . We must strive to design navigable websites and searchable objects, so that users can find what they need.

5.            Accessible . Just as buildings have elevators and ramps, websites must be accessible to people with disabilities (more than 10% of the population). Today the common good and ethics are imperative. Finally, they will be law.

6.            Credible . Thanks to the Web Credibility Project , we are beginning to understand the elements of design that influence user trust and the credit they give to what we say to them.

7.            Valuable . Our websites must add value to our customers. When it comes to nonprofits, the user experience must advance the mission. When it comes to business, you must contribute to the bottom line and improve customer satisfaction.

For his part, Jesse J. Garret  proposed in his diagram “ the elements of the user experience ” ( 2000-2001 ), a systematization of the levels or phases of the development of a website until reaching the interface design, and of the terminology used to name the tasks and elements that make up the process. Garret understands the design process as a process of building experiences.