“What is user experience?”
It’s one of those questions where everyone you ask seems to have a different answer.
Put simply it’s ‘the experience your visitor has when they browse your website or use your product’.
There’s countless other explanations out there, that try and complicate this as much as possible but ‘the experience your visitors has when they browse your website or use your product’ is always at the core of them.
User experience is such a broad term, that it can pretty much apply to anything. So…
What is good user experience for an informational website?
If you have an information website then you most likely started it because you want to share information around something you’re knowledgeable and passionate about.
So you want to make your website is as simple and easy as possible to use, so your visitors end up reading more of the information you share with them.
What does that look like?
Let’s compare two versions of your website. One with poor user experience and one with good user experience.
Scenario 1) A visitor lands on your website. It’s a horrible color. Navigation is hidden or non existent. Finding the information they want is like hacking a path through a rainforest.
This visitor is not having a great experience browsing your website = Bad user experience.
Scenario 2) A visitor lands on your website. It’s a simple, clean cut design with obvious navigation. It’s easy to browse and find the information you’ve shared. The path through the rainforest has been cleared for them.
They are having a great experience browsing your website = Good user experience.
It’s not uncommon for website owners to find themselves in a conversation around ‘improving their user experience’. The problem starts when they’ve heard ‘user experience’ mentioned so many times, it feels familiar but they don’t have a crystal clear understanding of what it actually means.
Hopefully this has helped turn ‘user experience’ from another piece of jargon, into something you have a better understanding of and see as useful.
Warren Roberts
