Disclaim: I’m not a UX expert, I have no expertise in this field, I’m just an observer trying to do things right.

What is UX, actually?

UX, as I understand, is the experiences the users have while interacting with one product, from the moment they get to know it, during the serving time, until they decide to quit using it for real. The product here might be a mobile app, a website or just a book. Experiences might be understood as simple as loading the homepage or as complex as making a purchase online. It relates to the feeling of the users while performing the task with the product, if they feel right, it’s easy, comfortable, satisfied and secured, etc, then it’s the good UX. If it’s not, you are fucked.

Why does UX matter?

Business is all about interacting with people, no matter what you are doing and it happens everywhere. It’s just that simple because doing business is making money. Where does money come from? Is it from a cat, a bull or a fox? Hell no, you are trying to get money from the others’ pocket. Can you do business without interacting with anyone? Meh

Unless you are living on Mars and somehow manage to read this by an accident, you are interacting with people every day. You can say “Yeah, I interact with people but not to make money, I just get along with them”. Sure, you might be right, you aren’t doing business, but you still have to care about the others feelings, thoughts while talking to them, right? Even when you don’t care about the others, at least you will spend time feeling yourself, so that’s the UX, your own UX.

People are trying to follow the trends with many rules for the best UX and apply it immediately on their products but sometimes they forget to understand the core element of UX: the users. They forget to consider the context.

Speed matters.

Fast is better slow, we all heard that. Time is gold, I know. I understand that everybody is always in a rush and they want everything around them to catch their speed too, the engineers of a website want that too. They always try to optimize the site to help it load faster. This is good. But is it worth exchanging 0.01 second for an extra step? I once heard this conversation from an engineer: “You see, with this technology, we can increase the site speed down by 5% so the loading time will be reduced by 0.2 seconds per step. but we have to add one more step here…”

I was like, wtf? Is that how you think about time and speed?

Then he explained, “That makes it feels faster” No, I feel shit. The only thing I care is how long does it takes to get my shit done, that’s it. If it gets me to click one more time, it’s like I’m late for one more year on a marathon. So please don’t.

Where the hell is the booking button?

The customer service representative was talking patiently on the phone, giving the instruction on how to make the purchase to a 35-year-old lady: “Yes, the green button on the top of that”, “Then please fill out all your information” “You have to scroll down a little bit, then you can see it”, “still not, it must be there, please look carefully”.

Then the girl turned to me: “It seems like every time I talk to our customers, I have to tell them clearly where the booking button is or they will be having a hard time finding it.”

Every single time, I mean, it’s supposed to be there, in front of them. It must be the first thing they encounter. So, what’s wrong with it? Why do users have to find it as in a hide and seek game?

Then I found out that the button was there just because it fits the layout and the overall design would be so nice. Hell, yeah!

Yesterday, I went to see the doctor. While I was busy looking for the room number, I tripped and almost fell down on the floor. Then I looked down, there was a small step right under my feet. How the hell a step is put in the middle of the hall without any warning sign or notice? I was so frustrated.

To be updated every day.