UX Talk – Designing for Love & Money – Video and Slides

In this UX talk at the Fluxible conference, I explored the battle between love and money as it applies to products, organizations, and even our own careers. Over the past 20 years, I have developed strategies to deal with this problem, both as an individual contributor and as an organizational leader. Regardless of where you happen to work, or in what context, it’s an unavoidable issue that every designer must face and resolve.

UX Conference Video

UX Slides

Outline

• My journey
• Overview
  • Designing for Love
  • Designing for Money
  • Product Challenges
  • Organizational Challenges
  • Career Challenges
  • Closing Thoughts
• Designing for Love
• What the user experience with your product really is about.
• Creating value
  • Everything
• Does their love matter?
  • Perceptions of warmth and competence produce feelings of admiration
  • Admiration corresponds to increased willingness to buy
  • High admiration gives way to awe
  • Awe leads to insane loyalty
• How insane?
  • Perceptions of warmth and competence produce feelings of admiration
  • Admiration corresponds to increased willingness to buy
  • High admiration gives way to awe
  • Awe leads to insane loyalty
• Does their love matter?
  • Perceptions of warmth and competence produce feelings of admiration
  • Admiration corresponds to increased willingness to buy
  • High admiration gives way to awe
  • Awe leads to insane loyalty
• Love helps you grow
  • Net Promoter Scores (NPS) explained 20-60% of the variation in organic growth rates among competitors
• How do you design for love?
  • Enable memorable, delightful experiences
  • Obsess over the details and small touches
  • Consistently solve pain; don’t cause it
  • Be real, be human, be warm
  • Listen, observe, & use data to improve
  • Make it hard for people to hate you
• Designing for Money
• Someone else is handling that
  • “For four years we have offered the synchronization service for no charge, predicated on the hypothesis that a business model would emerge to support the free service” 
Todd Agulnick, co-founder, XMarks
• Revenue cheese
• Inappropriate revenue
• Creepy revenue
• What the user experience with your product really is about.
  • I feel dirty
  • Advertising can feel dirty
  • Crippleware feels dirty
  • Hidden fees are dirty
  • It doesn’t have to be that way
• Bake it in
• Good profits
  • Fred Reicheld defines “bad profits” as earnings that come at the expense of customer relationships
  • In the airline industry, it’s estimated that 50% of customers feel coerced, misled and ill-treated
    JetBlue only charges for a 2nd checked bag
  • “Analysts like to remind us that we leave over $100 million on the table every year for that policy.” 
- Joel Peterson, Chairman, JetBlue Airways
• Virtuous cycle ecosystems
• What the user experience with your product really is about.
• How do you design for money?
  • Design for love first, but…
  • Design revenue options into the experience
  • Harness the power of money
  • Encourage good behavior
  • Discourage bad behavior
  • Don’t be evil
• Product Challenges
• Where should UX live?
  • Agile and design ideation
  • Perceptions of ROI
  • Time pressure and validation
  • Design not always quantified
  • Designers aren’t vocal enough
  • Knowledge and understanding
• What the user experience with your product really is about.
• Product strategy
  • Intentionally design for engagement and harmonious revenue
  • Make monetization enhance the experience
  • Buy time for the creative process
  • Earn a seat at the table, speak the language
  • Quantify that design drives success
  • Control your design destiny
  • Organizational Challenges
• Where should UX live?
  • Perceptions of UX
  • Where UX lives
  • Ever-changing org models
  • Support from your boss
  • Involvement and influence
• What the user experience with your product really is about.
• Organizational strategy
  • Have UX report as high as possible
  • Control your organizational destiny
  • Turn Design into a profit center
  • Own Design projects and engineering
  • Make HR and PR your allies
  • Meet frequently with your detractors
• Career Challenges
• The path for designers
  • Choosing the right career path
  • Politics, politics, politics
  • 70% will eventually manage others
  • Yet 95% said they enjoy designing
  • Join companies, leave bosses
• Be careful…
• Design your career
• Design founders
• What the user experience with your product really is about.
• Career strategy
  • Intentionally design your career
  • Choose your boss wisely
  • Keep what you love (design!)
  • Stay relevant and differentiated
  • Find powerful and connected mentors
  • Recognize and seize opportunity
• Closing Thoughts
• Design is your instrument
  • Design for love to be memorable
  • Design for revenue to control your destiny
  • Design your organization to have influence
  • Design your work to be successful
  • Design your own career to be happy
• Thank You