The ROI of User Experience

About this video:

In this animated video Dr. Susan Weinschenk demonstrates how user centered design results in significant return on investment (ROI).

Transcript:

User experience is the science and art of designing a product like a website or a software application so that it's easy to use. So that it fits the expectation that the user has for it, and so that it meets business goals.

There's a whole methodology around designing a user experience, and sometimes people ask me is it worth it to do all that work to design a user experience?

So let's talk about the return on investment, or ROI, of doing user experience work.

IEEE is a professional organization that puts out reports and does research for programmers, developers, and engineers, and they put out an article called "Why Software Fails".

Here's some interesting data from that article.

They estimate that the amount of money that is spent worldwide in information technology is estimated at one trillion dollars a year. The percent of projects that are abandoned because they are hopelessly inadequate is up to 15 percent of all projects.

The percent of revenue that goes to the IT group is five percent of a company's total revenue and up to ten percent if it's a financial or telecommunications company.

The amount of time that programmers spend on rework that is actually avoidable is 50 percent of their time.

The cost of fixing an error after development is 100 times that of fixing an error before development of the project is completed.

Of the top 12 reasons that projects fail, three of the top 12 are directly related to what we would call user experience or user-centered design work, and those three are badly defined requirements; poor communication among customers, developers, and users; and stakeholder politics.

So the kind of work that, that user experience professionals give, stakeholder interviews, user research, user testing, user centered design.

These are all things that can fix at least three of those 12 reasons why software fails.

You actually can calculate the savings or additional revenue or benefit that you get from approving your user experience in the product.

[jeffreygan]

Well said. "Any intelligent fools can make things bigger and more complex; it takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction". The best products are those that are simple, easy to use, efficient & purposeful.

[nofeareverify]

I was looking for a better understanding of the ROI of the work we do as UX designers. I believe this video explains it well with a good example. Thank you very much. I do wanna point out however that the example they use is kind of an overpromise. If you have 50 abandonments a day on your website, you'd be lucky to recoup 10-15 ($1000 - $1500 daily revenue) of those realistically which in my opinion is still worth the $100, 000 investment. There is no such thing as 0 abandonments as there are always factors beyond your control.

[ChrisMoyer]

Just when i thought HFI was getting dated. Freaking brilliant people, you nailed it with this one.

For those that questions the numbers, very good, you should. It is imperative that we measure within our specific domains and refine the user's experience accordingly. There are no one shot solutions, but even a single pass can give impressive results. Measure before and after.

~ Chris

[dividendstream]

Awesome angle and explanation of the ROI on UX Design. I often struggle defining the increase in engagement & revenue (the ROI) as a result of exceptional UX, or just eliminating bad, time-consuming, frustrating UX, and hence preventing loss/ increasing efficiency.

[imartsy]

I think this is a great video. I even like the baking metaphor. In response to sdissem, this is an example - not a case study.
1) Metrics tells us users are abandoning a site. Customer calls, research, and usability studies can give us an idea why they are abandoning the site.
2) looking at averaged individual donations
3) The fixes may not bring back the people that abandoned, but may prevent other users from abandoning

It's not about visual appeal. Usability=continued testing & improvement

[HFIvideo]

Glad you liked it Sanket, I will share you comment with the team here.

[ramirezluis]

In the development area, it is necessary to always take into account the user experience since a product can become obsolete and this is reflected in monetary losses. Otherwise as the example of baking a packet

[flipsiflipsi]

This video is still very relevant today, thank you!

[arunphartyal]

The Best Video on User Experience i have evee seen

[lugnochfin]

Just what I need to motivate UX costs - good figures, nice format, excellent measurement examples. Really interresting to check the video statistics to see where this clip is popular:
1. Sweden
2. USA and India
3. Brazil, Canada and South Africa

[Bertaable]

Pretty much the same situation here in Russia as well) Hopefully UX industry will grow as fast as digital marketing and software development in our countries so people will appreciate UX professionals more!
p.s. great video and poster. Thanks))

[sixteenornumber]

I found the IEEE article that you were referring to in this video. Regarding the section that reads, "studies have shown that software specialists spend about 40 to 50 percent of their time on avoidable rework rather than on what they call value-added work", is there any change you know what these studies are? I already emailed the author. Haven't heard anything back yet.

[gokharol]

I like the drawings! :D the explanation fits them and makes it easier to understand thank you

[twistedswami]

Great way to explain usability. I never worked with HFI, but I heard great things.

[nimitmangal]

An Eye Opener for those who undermines the use of UX

[perlielee]

hi! I know this is gold, but is there an image poster of this?

[sajucom]

HOW DO U DRAW IN SUCH A BEAUTIFUL WAY?

[HFIvideo]

@lugnochfin glad you liked it. Yes interesting about Sweden!

[saravanansakthivel]

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.
Said by: E. F. Schumacher

[HFIvideo]

Yes. The link for downloading is in the second line of the description.