Sell the iceberg
Making people aware of UX and its importance is tough. Therefore we should tell them more about the UX iceberg!
Making people aware of UX and its importance is tough. Therefore we should tell them more about the UX iceberg!
One of the big issues we, as UX designers, have is that no one sees the big iceberg underneath the water but only the small top of it above the water. Therefore, I would like to introduce the UX iceberg today! I'm your host, Chris, and this is the UX Globals Podcast!
As everyone can relate to the top of the iceberg, I will start with that. The iceberg is generally everything our clients and users can see as a result. It can be a complete webpage, video, app, product, service, or any other solution you can think of. The big issue is that everyone can sell these final results. Today, everyone can go online and create a webpage with an online-creator. The results are, however, always, and I want to stress that. It is not only often but always the case that these websites have a horrible user experience! Everyone can clearly understand and feel that these websites are not well made - especially users can! And there are also some agencies out there that sell this kind of stuff. They sell the top of the iceberg without its foundation. These results will not add any value to their clients! Think of it that way. What happens to the iceberg top when it has no foundation underwater? It will sink. And it is the exact same with websites that have no foundation but only a final result.
But what is the underwater basis for a webpage or other solutions? It is everything of the UX-workflow before the implementation. All the tasks of the analysis, prototyping, and design phase will build the iceberg's foundation for our solution. The moment we skip the analysis phase, and it is unclear which target groups we are creating for or where our competitors are located compared to us and what our users' wishes and needs are, the ideas for our solution can be thrown into the bin before we start implementing them. Once we have collected ideas from our users for a solution, we can begin with prototyping with a first concept. This prototyping phase is also something a client and user will never see, and if they have never experienced this approach, they will never know its value as all of this is hidden underneath the water.
With the design phase, it is different. Clients and users will get to see it, so it is part of the top of our iceberg that can be seen. But part of it is also hidden underneath the water. The key to a good visual design is to evaluate it with the users of a solution.
But how can we sell it to our clients? As an agency that is doing a proper job, we can simply tell our clients the iceberg story, too. Tell them why their current website does not work or why many agencies deliver bad results and show them that many steps have to be made before we can begin implementing an excellent solution. You are the one agency that can create remarkable experiences and does not create an iceberg top that is not able to swim.
Join the UX Globals Community on Facebook, and remember to always keep pushing! Have a good one!
