In today’s design world, everyone seems to realise the importance of UX design and perhaps no one would deny that putting users in the centre is the right thing. With such assumptions, UX designers should succeed selling their work to clients, but often the reality is different. Time and money spent in user testing often make selling UX design hard. Well, it’s not really impossible! In this article, I’ll talk about how to convince clients to invest in UX design.
1. Involve clients in the design process
We have all been through situations where interference of clients have not been very pleasant. Phrases like “Make the logo bigger” and “Put that above the fold” have become a running joke in the web design community. As a result of these few bad experiences, we start to exclude the client from the process. Phewww… Unfortunately, this often makes interaction with the client even worse.
Each iteration then becomes more important in the client’s mind, so they interfere even more, creating a vicious cycle. There has to be a better way to do this! The solution lies in involving the client in the process, rather than excluding them. A big reason for doing this boils down to psychology of clients.
2. Establish client’s expectation right from the start
For me, managing expectations is one of those things that goes back to my childhood. Whether it was how big my scoop of ice cream would be or how many vegetables I’d have to eat at dinner — my parents always did a great job of letting me know what to expect so that I wouldn’t be disappointed. Now as a UX designer, the ability to set expectations with a client is one of the most important part of my job.
To start off with I prefer low fidelity paper prototypes. The benefit of low-fi prototypes is that the clients are able to see at least a rough project framework while realising that the work isn’t done yet, and therefore not associating low-fi prototypes with the finished product.
Moving ahead, when the low fidelity prototypes are finalised, I create high fidelity prototypes. By sharing high-fidelity prototypes with clients, I’m able to validate design ideas before they’re implemented at the production stage.
I use CanvasFlip to create low and high fidelity prototypes.
3. Prove your work with UX focussed research
There’s no one magical way to create an experience that will be universally loved. And honestly that is not even the aim. The goal is to have a design that most users are comfortable using. And this is exactly what we need to prove to clients.
Quantitative data such as conversion funnels, heat map, time spent on each flow and each design screen, average interactions etc are parameters that validate or invalidate the design. Such analytics, gives confidence to the clients to trust our designs. Because at the end of the day, this is exactly what the client is interested in.
4. From the start of the project, specifications should be transparent.
While making decisions in a group chat, during a brainstorming session, or in comments on a shared document, specifications fails to get updated. Therefore, the prototype is at risk of causing misunderstanding and becoming a source of argument.
Make sure all these discussions and brainstorming sessions are noted right on the prototype itself. That’s the reason CanvasFlip not only has a comment feature on prototypes, but also on user videos. While referring to an interaction pattern of the users or pointing out a friction point, it is important to capture a note at the right moment.
5. Learn the art of story-telling
Storytelling in UX is defining the framework — an approach to defining user personas and their stories to get insights about end-users. Storytelling as a UX framework doesn’t replace detailed interaction design. However, stories help you to reflect a connection between your concept and your client’s idea. Stories can be used at different stages of UX design.
Storytelling plays an important role in how the designs are perceived.
Conclusion
Despite the fact that the term “UX” has been around for a while, it remains a challenge to prove to your clients that focusing on your users’ needs is a must and that a product’s success depends largely on UX design solutions. However, practice makes perfect. Analyse your communication with clients: decide what works well for them and what doesn’t; see how they react to your ideas and how you can facilitate cooperation.
