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The value of good user experience

By Mike Gough, 14th June 2011

Following on from the success of the UX HK event in February and building up to UX Australia in August we wanted to bring the topic of User Experience into focus and explore the value it can add. ‘User Experience’ is the interaction users have with a product, system, service or brand and getting it right is often the difference between success and failure.

There are many different approaches that can be taken to define & deliver the perfect user experience, it is not easy to get right and more often than not it is also difficult to persuade project sponsors that the effort is worth the investment.

But we recently had a great demonstration of how much value a good user experience can add with the Expat Explorer tool, developed for HSBC.

Since 2008 HSBC has conducted the world's largest annual survey of the expat community to uncover their motivations, fears, perceptions of life in their host country and thoughts on their future. The survey is completed by over 4000 expats across 100 countries and has provided some very interesting insights over the years, highlighting trends across three main categories; economics, experience & offspring (raising children abroad).

The challenge in the past 2 years has been getting people to really engage with the results and using them to deliver value back to the community in general and to the bank.

Historically the outputs were consolidated into PDF reports on the three categories and made available on the HSBC International website for download, with specific quotes used across different platforms by the bank or picked up by the media.

But for general consumers and busy expats, having to read through 3 lengthy PDF reports just wasn’t going to happen so engagement was low; a new approach was required, one that really considered the user experience to present the findings in an engaging way.

The Expat Explorer tool was born......

The tool presents the large amount of data in a fully customisable way allowing users to engage with it how best suits them, through a combination of infographics, data tables, articles, videos, case studies etc.

When we were first considering different ways to present the data, the overall customer experience was our primary concern; we knew we had to take a holistic approach, considering the various journeys & entry points, as well as the tool itself.

We rebranded the various social media channels built up around the survey (Twitter, YouTube & Blogspot) and combined with the traditional routes from banners, site links and ‘share’ links the users have many routes into the content and ways to interact.

The end result was a complete overhaul of the way the results of the survey are presented into an immersive and engaging tool and surrounding content.

The tool had more users in one month than the previous year's results had in 6! It was accessed from 120 different countries in the first week, with 750,000 tweets in 10 languages, was shared across multiple social media sites and drove 1 in 6 users to the HSBC International website.

The success of the tool highlights the value of a well thought through holistic strategy for user experience. If you make something that works for the users you are much more likely to meet your business goals by default!

That brings in to sharp focus how important the many conferences held around the world are to spread the word and develop the thinking around user experience, UPA, CHI, HCII, IXDA, IWIPS and more, especially in developing markets such as Asia. Perhaps even more impactful in these markets than the larger more corporate conferences are the more grass roots gatherings, such as UX HK & UX Australia.

HeathWallace has been involved as attendees and sponsors of the UX conferences for a few years now and the positive impact on the community from all perspectives (practitioners, agencies, clients, students etc.) is fantastic. The inaugural UX HK in February this year was a great success which lead to immediate planning for UX HK 2012 (http://uxhongkong.com/). And UX Australia (http://www.uxaustralia.com.au/), now in its 3rd year, goes from strength to strength.

UX Australia (23rd – 26th August 2011 sponsored by HeathWallace) covers topics from behavioural analysis, mobile, multi channel delivery, UX fundamentals, UX strategies and much more in a series of presentations & workshops. There is still time to register, so having seen how a well thought through user experience can massively enhance the results from digital projects why not get involved.

If Australia is a little out of the way then keep your eyes peeled for related events in your area (UX London has also been running since 2009) or contact us to find out more.

If you are an expat and interested in taking part in the survey for 2011 you can from the link: http://bit.ly/iGTEHt.