As digital platforms advance, customers have come to expect exceptional online and mobile experiences. According to Justin Mifsud, the founder of Usability Geek, 88% of users are unlikely to return to a website after a poor user experience. Furthermore, PWC reports that one-third of customers may abandon a beloved brand after facing such problems.
Your users’ experience with your website or app shapes their perception of your business. Any flaws in the User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI) could negatively impact your company. With so much on the line, how can you ensure your website or app doesn’t fall victim to these trends?
This is where a user experience audit comes in handy. In this article, we’ll share our expertise on this topic and provide beneficial tips and recommendations for quickly identifying and fixing potential issues.
What We’ll Cover:
- What is a UX Audit?
- What does a UX audit consist of?
- When to Conduct a UX Audit?
- Important Issues that can be Solved with UX Audit
- Business Benefits You Get from UX Audit
- Why We Recommend to Get Professional UX Audit?
- What will be the Ultimate Outcomes of UX Design Audit?
- Bottom Line
Before we dive in, let’s take a moment to brush up on our understanding of UX audits.
What is a UX Audit?
A User Experience (UX) audit is a methodical review of a website, mobile application, or any digital product to evaluate its usability and user experience. It is typically conducted by UX experts to identify and resolve usability issues that impact user journey and hinder the product’s success.
A User Experience (UX) audit is a systematic examination of a website, mobile app, or any digital product to assess its usability and overall user experience. Usually carried out by UX professionals, it aims to uncover and solve usability problems that affect the user’s interaction and obstruct the product’s success.
A UX audit provides product managers with critical insights into the product’s strengths and shortcomings, along with a comprehensive checklist. This enables the UX team to make knowledgeable choices and put into action practical suggestions that cater to user requirements.
“UX provides tools and methods that bring insights about people that help
organizations avoid arguments, breakups and flirtations with competing suitors.”
– Per Axbom, co-host, UX Podcast
What does a User Experience Audit Consist Of?
Conducting a UX audit involves a thorough review of your site’s usability, accessibility, navigation, and overall design.
Some key aspects to consider during the audit include:
- Broken links
- Inconsistencies in Design patterns—typography and colour.
- Navigation consistency and functionality across devices and pages
- Old content
- Customer journey mapping
- Load time and resource utilization
- Digital Usability and accessibility
- Heuristics evaluation
- Branding and messaging consistency
- Review Product Design with Business and User Experience Goals in Mind
- Traffic, engagement, bounce rate, conversion rates, retention, and sales analytics
- Legal compliance (GDPR, CCPA, etc.)
After completing a UX research, auditors create a UX audit report that includes practical suggestions for addressing any pain points or improving the product. This report provides comprehensive feedback that can be used to enhance the user flow and improve the overall quality of the website or a mobile design.
While a UX audit outcome may not solve all of your problems directly, it can help you answer some critical questions and discover issues that are affecting the quality of user experience, such as:
- Where exactly do users struggle with navigation and functionality?
- What do the data reveal about the behavior and needs of our users?
- What changes can be made in website design or an app to improve the customer’s experience with the product?
- The exact point at which users leave your website
When to Conduct a UX Audit?
There are a few key scenarios where a design audit can be particularly useful. For example:
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- When you’re introducing new feature, major updates or changes to your product
- When you’re experiencing a decrease in user satisfaction or engagement
- When you’re simply looking to improve your design processes and identify areas for growth
- When SEO and digital marketing professionals need an audit to succeed in their strategies
Essential UX Audit Outcomes You Shouldn’t Miss
If you are looking to improve your product’s user experience for your customers, a UX audit is the perfect place to start. User experience (UX) is a crucial aspect of any website or application, and it can help improve engagement and conversion rates for businesses.
However, not every UX design is perfect, and there are often issues that can arise over time. That’s where a UX audit comes into play, helping stakeholders identify and solve these problems. Whether it’s slow loading times, poor navigation, or confusing layouts, a UX audit will help you in addressing essential issues that could be impacting your website performance.
By examining these key areas, you can make necessary changes that will benefit both your customers and your business, ensuring a positive experience for everyone involved.
1. Incorporating UX reviews leads to enhancing the product’s overall usability
– Your website or application will become more user-friendly with a smoother and more intuitive navigation experience.
– You will see more website visitors reaching their desired outcomes through subscriptions and purchases.
2. Your conversion rates will increase significantly with UX audit results and recommendations
– A comprehensive audit will reveal critical insights into how you can optimize your CTAs and achieve better results.
– You will be able to boost your sales and conversions with expert recommendations on creating effective wording, proper placement and sleek user experience design for maximum impact.
3. Creating accurate personas and user scenarios
“Projects with personas have an ROI of up to 4x more than projects without them” (Source: Forrester)
– Sara Kremer, senior user experience architect, Eventbrite
– Refine and enhance the quality of your user personas.
– Gain insight into why some website users may not see the value in your product.
– Improve your communication skills with potential customers and turn them into paying clients.
Top 7 UX Audit Benefits
A UX audit can significantly improve your digital marketplace.
Research from Jacob Nielsen shows that investing 10% of your development budget in UX can yield an 83% increase in conversions. And that’s not all. Various studies suggest that customers are willing to pay more for the experience qualities that matter to them.
According to PWC’s research, 43% of consumers prefer convenience, 42% would pay more for a friendly, welcoming experience, and 65% of US customers prioritise a positive brand experience over a brilliant commercial.
1. Redesign Your Product using Solid Reliable Data
A UX audit ensures your design decisions are based on real data, uncovering the areas of improvement considering the root cause of your product issues.By examining metrics such as sales data, traffic, engagement, competitive analysis, user research, and usability heuristics, UX audits factor in your business objectives, helping you identify opportunities for improvement.
2. Gain Unbiased Product Perspective
Working closely with your product may make it challenging to discern its strengths, weaknesses, and areas for enhancement. This is where the expertise of a UX auditor becomes invaluable. They offer a new perspective and insights that are crucial in optimizing your product’s performance and elevating the user experience.
3. Provide Value that Your Customers Want
It’s common for businesses to have assumptions about how their users interact with their product. However, these assumptions may not always be accurate.
This is where a UX Audit can help.
“If you want to offer products or services that have value for your customers, you
must first make the effort to understand what customers consider valuable.”
– Jan Jursa, author of UX Storytellers
By conducting an audit, businesses can gain a deeper understanding of their users and their needs, bringing them back to the forefront of their product design.
With a user-centred approach, a UX audit report helps businesses understand how well
their product meets user goals, identify common user errors, and assess compliance with
industry standards like Nielsen heuristics.
4. Reduce Time and Money Spent on Development Work
A fundamental rule of successful design is identifying the problem before finding a solution. A UX audit report identifies areas for improvement and provides a UX improvement roadmap, along with suggestions to help guide you through the redesign phase with the necessary additions and features, allowing you to begin the development process right away.
“The value of UX is not wasting time and money developing the wrong solution.”
– Jeff Humble, lead UX designer, CareerFoundry
This approach prevents wrong decisions and ensures that your product moves in the correct direction – saving you time and money on costly programming work.
5. Improve Profitability and Customer Satisfaction
Implementing suggested changes can have a significant impact on your company’s bottom
line. Not only will you reduce costs, but you can also increase profits by improving your
value proposition and communication.
Streamlining the purchase process and making your product more intuitive can increase
conversion rates. Additionally, happy customers results to higher Net Promoter Score, lower churn rate, and can even lead to an increased number of referrals.
6. Improved Conversion Rates
When it comes to boosting conversion rates, nothing beats a well-executed user experience (UX) audit. By prioritising the real needs of your users and optimising their interactions with your website, you could see a reported increase of 30-75% in conversions.
7. Save Time by Fixing Existing Product Design Issues Instead of Redesigning
Fixing problems in a product design is often quicker than starting from scratch. While a redesign might seem like the best option, it can be time-consuming and potentially delay development.
By addressing specific issues within the existing product, the design can be improved
without requiring significant investment in time or resources. This approach saves time and
ultimately benefits the project’s timeline and budget.
Why Choose Professional UX Audit to Achieve Your Business Goals?
Running your own audit might seem like a cost-effective solution, but it’s unlikely to provide the most accurate results
UX is a wide and complex discipline that requires time and effort to master. It requires dedication and persistence to acquire the necessary knowledge and skills.
Another reason is, as a product developer, bias can have a significant impact on the success of your product. One important reason for this is the natural tendency to favour what you have created. Your backstory with the product may cause you to view it through a certain lens, making everything seem logical and easy to use.
However, it’s critical to consider the user experience from a fresh perspective. Being able to approach the product as a clueless user can help overcome bias and improve the overall user experience.
To ensure unbiased results, hiring professional UX design auditors is crucial for businesses. This measure guarantees that the audits are conducted objectively and without any conflict of interest. Thus, third-party audits help maintain the credibility and integrity of the UX audit process.
What will be the Ultimate Value of UX Design Audit?
1. Your website or app will feature an intuitive flow that is clear and easy to navigate.
2. You will have content, images, and CTAs that directly align with your customers’ wants and needs.
3. You will have more user engagement, whether it’s providing contact information, subscribing to your newsletter, or making a purchase.
4. You will be able to improve your marketing communications based on accurate data-driven customer personas.
Bottom Line
If you’re finding it difficult to meet customer expectations with your product, a UX audit is the perfect solution for you. Not only do these audits deliver tremendous benefits, but they can turn around the course of your business if done correctly with the right team. Don’t let setbacks weigh you down in the fast-paced IT industry. Take advantage of this opportunity to provide pure value to your audience through an effective UX audit.
How can Revival Pixel Help with Usability Audit?
Our usability audits can assist in enhancing your business website or mobile app, and aligning it with the needs of your visitors. Our usability evaluation process varies depending on the audit goals, existing user requirements, and limitations. To ensure the best possible user experience, we use a range of components and methods such as:
– Personas building
– Heatmaps, Scroll Maps, and Click Maps Analysis
– A/B Testing and Split Testing
– Form and search log analysis
– Links audit
– User Testing
– Navigation Testing
– Performance testing
– Wireframing and prototyping
Need a UX Audit for your Website or App?
Revival Pixel’s Usability Testing methodology, built on years of experience and best practices, is designed to elevate your brand experience and maximise your investment in customer-facing channels. Our design and development team guarantees that your brand will receive the best possible care.
Contact us to schedule your consultation.
