Color is a powerful visual tool in both the real and digital worlds. It conveys mood, adds presence, and provides aid in distinguishing information. However, while color offers significant design advantages, relying solely on color to convey content can be ineffective.

According to the World Health Organization, over 2.2 billion people across the globe suffer from vision impairments that encompass a wide range of conditions that affect a person’s ability to perceive color accurately. This staggering statistic underscores the importance of considering accessibility when designing digital experiences. Relying too heavily on color distinctions in digital products could make it difficult for users with color-deficient vision to navigate digital products. In this article, I’ll explore some proven strategies and best practices for achieving color independence in digital products, covering topics from grayscale tests to accessible data visualization. Read More

Consumers expect seamless, user-friendly experiences, especially in mobile banking. If your banking app feels outdated or is difficult to navigate, users may quickly abandon it for more transparent alternatives, leading to lost customers, diminished brand loyalty, and a hit to your bottom line. How can banks ensure that their apps offer the best user experience?

Many banking apps suffer from clunky user interfaces, long page-loading times, and confusing navigation systems. Users, who are typically looking for efficiency and security, often find themselves frustrated when they can’t quickly complete simple tasks. Read More

In today’s always-on digital world, we’re drowning in a sea of notifications, endless scrolling, and constant connectivity. As our devices demand more and more of our attention, many of us are feeling overwhelmed and burned out.

This information overload has led to demand for digital minimalism—a growing movement that’s all about being intentional in curating our online experiences. It’s not about ditching technology altogether, but rather using it more mindfully and curbing digital addiction. But this is where things get interesting. We have the power to shape people’s experiences. Imagine apps and Web sites that help people focus rather than frazzle their nerves. This is the promise of minimalist UX design. Read More

As the digital world grows and businesses depend more on their online presence, having a solid information architecture (IA) is more important than ever. For large Web sites with lots of content and complex navigation systems, a well-designed information architecture can make the difference between a smooth user experience and a frustrating one.

In this article, I’ll discuss creating effective information architectures for big Web sites, highlighting their importance, challenges, and key principles. I’ll also look at some useful tools, the role of product engineering, and business impacts. Read More

Dogmatic UX professionals would likely cringe at this: We must sometimes set aside our prized UX processes and deliverables to do what’s necessary for our companies to stay profitable during difficult times, which many of us are experiencing in 2024. Often, what’s necessary could be contributing to processes and deliverables that feel unrelated to our professions. However, many of these other activities can serve as perfect use cases for UX professionals’ skills because we are uniquely qualified and positioned to influence various business strategies. Moreover, this is not a zero-sum situation. As we mold our skills to fit other valuable areas of expertise, we can shoehorn in our valued UX best practices and methodologies. What are some other activities that could benefit from our UX skillsets? In this column, I’ll present and expand upon the following activities:

• leading Customer Advisory Board discussions
• volunteering to conduct market research and competitive analysis
• facilitating workshops focusing on features and requirements
• driving innovation activities
• supporting internal, product-telemetry strategy and analysis Read More

With an average adult attention span that is just eight seconds, attracting and retaining customer attention can be hard. However, building brand loyalty and boosting customer retention brings many benefits. The approach an organization takes to achieving these goals is equally important.

By adding gamification elements to software products and services, businesses can enhance customer engagement by 48%. Plus, companies with gamified loyalty programs experience an increase of 22% in customer retention. Gamification simplifies customer engagement after a purchase and enhances its effectiveness. In this article, I’ll reveal how you can use gamification techniques to enhance customer engagement. Read More

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has created significant buzz—and, in some cases, panic—across industries and job roles. However, UX professionals are often in the best position to help businesses make sense of GenAI for their users.

Our UX team at ServiceNow had been fortunate to work in UX research for artificial intelligence (AI) prior to the GenAI boom. Over the last year and a half, our team has experienced an incredible journey of learning, pivots, and evolution. Therefore, we believe that we’re uniquely qualified to share what we’ve learned so far to help other UX professionals—especially those conducting UX research for AI experiences—conduct more impactful, actionable UX research that elevates the human’s role and experience. Read More

More people are turning to online content and, for 207 million content creators worldwide, this means continually coming up with fresh ideas and creating high-quality content that captivates and retains audience interest.

However, this demand puts pressure on authors to consistently produce content while maintaining high quality and navigating time constraints. With generative artificial intelligence (Gen AI) and its advancements in natural-language processing (NLP), machine learning (ML), and deep learning, content creation has become more efficient and streamlined—from generating ideas to optimizing content for better engagement.

In this article, I’ll discuss the benefits of integrating Gen AI and how it can automate and streamline the content-creation workflow, together with tools that improve the quality of content. But first, we need to understand the individual components of the content-creation process by breaking them down into AI and content creation. Read More

Despite making significant investments in technology, many organizations fail to achieve meaningful progress in their digital-transformation efforts. Seventy percent of digital-transformation initiatives fall short of their goals, often due to inadequate technology integration and insufficient digital expertise. This underscores a critical issue: outdated information-technology (IT) systems and software are holding companies back from realizing their full potential in the digital age. Read More