How Design and Content Lead to Stronger User Experience

Design and content are essential parts of the user experience. They can be in the form of videos, written copy, interactive experiences and much more. With this in mind, design and content are crucial to delivering a better user experience.

After all, good design is great for business, while good content means good user experience. Here’s how they play a strong role in user experience and how it enhances UX.

The Role of Design and Content in UX

If design and content don’t meet users’ needs, then the platform has no purpose. Most users today carry less time, more distractions and high expectations. Therefore, relevance and usefulness should be top priorities for all businesses, making the user front and centre of content and design strategy.

When users land on a website, they evaluate it based on these steps:

• Uses design and functionality to determine whether they should stay or leave.
• Scans for answers and relevant information.
• Chooses to move forward with a call to action.

Users often make their first impressions only within a few seconds of visiting a website and most leave within 20 seconds if the content and design don't meet their needs. That’s why high–quality design and content are critical. It can create a huge positive impact on the user’s experience.

When you create a better user experience, it’s not just better for the user. You can get more traffic results in return when your content qualifies as helpful based on Google’s latest update.

Here are some ways good design and content lead to a better user experience.

1. Drives Engagement

Good content and design lead users to explore a website further. Content and design should give the user a good idea of what to do or where to go, acting as instruction with a clear call to action.

In turn, you can influence the user’s journey and how long they will engage with your site.

Good content and design can drive user engagement by producing high-quality content and a good user journey. By combining copy and visuals, you make the platform seem trustworthy, giving you a greater chance of converting.

And the more you improve your conversions, your recurring revenue can double, even when you have the same number of users and prospects.

2. Provides Personalisation

Users expect you to tailor your product to them. Otherwise, they will abandon the site for other platforms that do offer personalised design and content. That’s why personalisation is crucial when implementing UX into a product.

Personalisation allows products to fit into a user’s established routine where the UI (user interface) becomes invisible. For example, consider your account on Netflix or Hulu. Once you sign in, your UI is based on your interactive behaviour, boosting the relevance and creating a good user experience.

3. Enables Clarity

UX design is about putting users first. Therefore, a product must have clear navigation to protect the experience. Good design and content can influence decision-making and where users should take action.

When writing with intention, content can be good enough to close the gap between context and design. Though you should craft design easily to avoid friction, you need written content to maximise the experience.

4. Appeals to the Human Emotion

Design and written content play a part in appealing to human emotions. Through the use of words and visuals from a creative standpoint, it allows users to feel the brand’s purpose. Plus, it influences how they think when users engage with your product or service and why you are the differentiator.

To appeal to human emotions, you often need a compelling story that needs to feel inclusive. Therefore, you must focus on your target audience through visuals and language that range widely to any user.

How to Get Started With Design and Content

Using a content-first design approach, you can make it successful when your team has a strategic workflow. Here’s how you can make that happen.

1. Define a Strategy

Your strategy should align not only with your business’s goals but also with the user's needs. To get into this focus, ask yourself what users need to know. What would they want to know?

Essentially, it would help to put yourself in the user’s shoes. Yet, once you determine the answers, you ensure you create a strategy that balances all three solutions. Then, you can start considering the design elements that help your messaging pop.

2. Define Your Content Creation Process

Once you have a strategy, it’s time to define your content creation workflow. The process will involve:

• The scope of the project, placing the content needs first, then moving to design.
• Determining the deliverables.
• Establish deadlines that work for designers and content creators.

You may also consider stakeholders in the process and how they will collaborate in the design.

3. Map the Journey and Test Messages

Now that you have a high-quality strategy and processes intact, you can start creating your message, which includes:

• Creating a purpose for each page based on the customer’s journey.
• Decide what message you need to convey overall.
• Creating outlines and content for each page.

In addition to creating the message, you’ll need to test it by placing it in front of your audience. Gathering their feedback at this point will help you cut back on trial and error and customise your messaging further.

4. Finalise Content and Then the Design

After determining the layouts and messaging for each webpage, you can finalise the content and design. However, you must keep tweaking your messaging and design to determine what works best for your audience.

A one-time test isn’t going to give you final results. It’s best to keep monitoring and find out what you can do to improve.

Make an Impact With Design and Content

You can never define the user experience with design alone. It takes content to engage users, appeals to their emotions and provides clarity. With these in mind, take a minute to assess your content and design — and mark which areas you could make improvements. Speak to one of the team and see how we can help you with design and content!