Using Flow is good for business

Consumers are looking beyond branding messages for experiences that live up to the hype. If your product doesn't deliver against its promise, potential customers will reject it. That's a risk that no business wants to take.

The user-centred design (UCD) approach makes sure that user needs are clearly represented in your projects. This guiding force increases team efficiency and reduces risk.

4 key business benefits of UCD

Benefit 1: Increased revenues

The better the user experience offered by your product, the more users will choose to use it, and buy it, over the competition. It worked for Microsoft Excel back in the 1980s when it ousted Lotus 1-2-3 as industry leader. It worked for Apple, late to market with the iPod but now the market leader thanks to their user experience. And it works for e-commerce sites like Amazon.com, where buying online can take just one click.

At Flow, we're proud of the results our UCD projects have achieved.

• We've helped The Early Learning Centre increase online sales by 30%
• We've helped The Guardian increase traffic by 55%
• We've helped Standard Life exceed business plan targets by 75%

Take a look at our case studies.

Benefit 2: Greater customer loyalty

With the right user experience, customers become loyal - they stick with your brand and they tell their friends. This reduces customer acquisition costs dramatically. Nokia phones attract loyal, repeat customers by delivering a great user experience. Nokia's reputation for ease of use is almost legendary, and it's in users' minds as they make a purchase decision. Nokia's market share: 36%. Its biggest rival is at around 20%.

The strongest brand of all, though, is Google. It has topped the Interbrand Global Brand of the Year survey since 2002 - not by advertising, but by delivering innovation and user experience successfully. As the New York Times says, "Google has a near religious quality in the minds of many users."

Benefit 3: Reduced customer service costs.

This is a no-brainer. If your products are easy to use, fewer people will need to call you about how to use them. Customer service and support calls are expensive to handle, and reducing the number of calls can be a big cost saver.

Migrating customer service from call centre to web is another key cost-cutting strategy for many businesses. But customers will only move online if they find the service easy and convenient. In 2005, a Forrester report identified that improving the user experience of web-based self service was up to three times more effective at moving customers to online than any other strategy.

Benefit 4: Reduced project costs and timescales.

This one can come as a surprise. UCD involves iterative design, user research and usability testing - all of which take time and money. So how can adding these to a project save you money?

• UCD builds clarity and consensus within your stakeholder group. By bringing in facts about user behaviours and needs, you can focus stakeholders on an objective goal: customer satisfaction. This means fewer misunderstandings, fewer U-turns, stronger management support and less time wasted.
• UCD reduces expensive change requests. Research shows that up to 80% of change requests on a software project can be caused by "unmet or unforeseen user requirements". Change requests are expensive and slow during development, and changes after launch are even worse - up to 100 times more expensive than getting a feature designed and implemented right first time.

Making a return on user experience

To get a return on your investment, you usually need your customers to adopt your product in large volumes. This will only happen if the product delivers high levels of customer satisfaction.

All too often products are delivered cheaply, but they don't deliver customer satisfaction and they don't achieve large volumes. That leaves the product owners with a shortfall in revenue, and some expensive reworking to do - or a failed project.

The lesson is clear: Time to market is only a small part of the total equation. Time to volume is what matters for the bottom line. UCD projects deliver high levels of customer satisfaction, meaning that you reach high volume more quickly and reliably than with other tactics.

It's an efficient, low cost, low risk approach to delivering a successful user experience.