Design, Refine, Succeed: The Impact of Iterative Thinking

Speaker A: Welcome to Results by Design UX Insights for Business leaders. The podcast that dives deep into the world of UX design strategy and insights. Tune in, take action, and design your way to success.

Speaker B: Hi, I'm Craig and I'm, um, Michael. And we're your hosts for the Results by Design podcast. How you doing, Craig?

Speaker C: I'm doing great, thanks. How are you doing, Mike?

Speaker B: I'm doing really good as well. Man, it is such a nice day here in Seattle, wouldn't you say?

Speaker C: I agree, I agree.

Speaker B: Yeah, especially with all the rain we've been having. Love the sun. Uh, well, okay, today's, uh, topic is something we see all the time. Uh, companies investing in a one and done UX project or product, uh, design effort where they launch something and then wait months or even years before making the next move. So we're going to talk about why that approach is risky and how continuous improvement and iterative design lead to better business outcomes.

Speaker C: All right, I love this topic. Well, let's start, uh, with what we often see. Uh, you know, a company brings in a UX or product team, uh, they invest in research, design, development, they launch the product and then, um, they stop. So no iteration, no follow up. From your perspective, Michael, why do you think that happens?

Speaker B: A few reasons. Uh, first, there's the belief that once you've done ux, you're done, like it's a one time exercise or something. Second, uh, internal teams might not have the structure or resources to support ongoing UX and optimization. And then third, you know, leadership often assumes that the big investment upfront is enough to sustain success over time.

Speaker C: Yeah, I think those are spot on. And what ends up happening over time is user expectations shift, the market trends evolve and competitors adapt faster. Meanwhile, your product starts to feel outdated or doesn't perform as well as it could. And the reality is there's daily care and feeding required to keep your product fresh.

Speaker B: Exactly. And by the time companies decide to invest in UX again, they're playing catch up instead of, you know, staying ahead.

Speaker C: Yeah, that's a great point. Well, let's talk about why iterative design isn't just a UX design or a UX best practice. It's really a business strategy.

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Uh, continuous improvement is, uh, a business's competitive advantage. And when you build iteration into your product's life cycle, what you're doing is you're identifying usability issues before they even become major problems. And this reduces costly redesigns down the line. And, you know, you adapt quickly to customer needs, market shifts and New tech, um, all the while you're improving conversion rates and engagement over time. So to be frank, if your customers are providing valuable input about your product, uh, or your service, and you're not acting on that feedback, you probably shouldn't even be in business. Or you may not even last long enough to be in business anyway.

Speaker C: Yeah, I agree, I agree. That's a little tough love right there, Mike. But it's true. You know, companies that invest in iterative product design see higher returns on retention rates, lower churn, increased revenue. Companies like Amazon, Google, Airbnb, you know, they don't just launch a product and walk away. They're constantly tweaking, testing and improving.

Speaker B: Exactly. And you don't have to be a tech giant to do this. Well, uh, even mid to large enterprises can apply smaller strategic improvements over time, uh, rather than waiting years for a full redesign. In fact, by going through this continuous process, you may be able to avoid a full redesign altogether since you are just continuously molding your product along the way.

Speaker C: Yeah, that's a great point. Well, if you're a business leader listening right now thinking this all sounds great, but we don't have the time or budget to always be redesigning things, how do we get them to shift their mindset?

Speaker B: Mhm. The good news is you don't need constant full redesigns like I just said, which is super costly anyhow. What uh, you just need is an iterative framework. And you know, here's how companies can integrate continuous improvement into their UX strategy. One, you know, start by implementing regular user feedback loops. And this can be as simple as um, having monthly user testing, uh, analyzing customer support tickets, or just tracking behavior analytics. Um, if you have that set up.

Speaker C: Yeah, you're right, you know, seeing if you're seeing patterns like customers abandoning certain workflows, that's an opportunity for iteration.

Speaker B: And two, uh, you know, you need to adopt a uh, data driven mindset. Uh, treat UX decisions like product decisions. Instead of guessing, use data to determine what's working, what's not and where to focus those improvements.

Speaker C: Yeah, you know, a B testing, heat maps, session M recordings, continuous optimization of your journey maps should all be ongoing, not just a one time project.

Speaker B: A third point is, uh, you need to prioritize small high impact changes so you don't need a uh, massive budget. Sometimes really small tweaks like simplifying a checkout process or just refining a form can drive major improvements.

Speaker C: Yeah, that's right. Instead of big risky overhauls, make incremental adjustments and measure their Impact by benchmarking the experience first and then implementing the new change and testing again.

Speaker B: And the fourth and last thing is build ux uh into your product strategy. UX shouldn't be an afterthought. It really needs to be part of your product roadmap so that iteration is planned, um, and not uh, a reactive thing.

Speaker C: Yeah, 100%. The best companies have cross functional teams working together. Product design, engineering and business all aligned on improving their user experience. And when you have this type of internal alignment, you can do some very special things together. Well, let's ground this all in real world. Example. Um, Mike, could you share a case where an iterative approach made a big difference?

Speaker B: Sure. As you know we uh, spent many years uh, partnering with Mattress Firm as their external UX team, uh, working in lockstep with their product team and there was no shortage of issues uh, on their e commerce site which uh, really complements their brick and mortar stores. What we did was regularly prioritize and then reprioritize opportunities as both business and market conditions changed. Uh, really keeping a delivery schedule aligned to their two week development sprints. Over time we were improving the digital uh, experience incrementally, one feature at a time, one sprint at a time. Optimizing the product search and discovery experience to providing clear product information and decision points and ultimately streamlining the buy flow. Uh, we also audited the post purchase experience as well, identifying the friction points along that journey from purchase to delivery. And the results from that audit were then prioritized based on customer impact and implementation effort, making it ready to be taken in with other priorities that were in flight.

Speaker C: That's a perfect example. They didn't opt for a large scale redesign, just targeted data driven improvements that kept the product competitive.

Speaker B: Exactly. And this is why UX can't be uh, a one and done investment.

Speaker C: Yeah, so true. You know another example from our time with Mattress Firm that I really love was their willingness to experiment. You know, after we earned their trust by helping them achieve significant improvements in their purchase flow and product detail pages, they asked how can we help people feel like they found the right mattress with so many options to choose from online? So we did some scrappy research, uh, our team did uh, to find out how salespeople in the store help customers select a mattress. And then we designed and built an online mattress finder wizard that customers would provide inputs to about how they sleep, you know, on their back or on their sides, the size of mattress they prefer, you know, Queen king, twin, uh, the firmness that they prefer and we use visual cues and iconography to minimize the friction. And then once completed, the results screen showed the recommended mattresses based on their inputs like filtered results. And if they clicked on any mattress they would go to that product detail page. We quickly prototyped that mattress finder and Mattress Firm AB tested it on the uh website and found that it increased conversion by over 50%. So this was not a full scale redesign but a self service experience that solved their big problem by thinking outside the box.

Speaker B: Craig, that's a great example. I almost forgot about that. Uh, these you know, targeted solutions to you know, really specific challenges are great because you can really fence uh, in the scope and the approach we took on the project was uh, very iterative and user centered. And I remember the team creating a prototype and testing it with customers learning and iterating throughout the process. And Mattress Firm was exceptionally good at testing post launch. Uh, they had some really great A B testing tools uh, and a general program in place.

Speaker C: Yeah, I think that's a great example of having a culture of innovation and a focus on the customer and willingness to experiment. And that all came together for matches Firm to create a great result. Let's wrap it up with some key takeaways based on what we've been talking about. First, think of UX as an ongoing process, not a one time event. You know, your digital uh, product, your website, they need to be thought of more as a product than a project when you're working on them. Second, you don't have to break the bank. Small strategic tweaks can deliver big results. I often think putting constraints against your experiment help with this. So if you set a budget and you set a goal and then challenge your team to work toward that goal within that budget, I think you'd be surprised with what you could accomplish. Build iteration into your roadmap. Treat UX as a continuous part of your business strategy. Mike, what do you think?

Speaker B: 100% agree to uh, all those points.

Speaker C: Well, that's it for today's episode. If you enjoyed the conversation, please like and click subscribe and join us next time as we explore m more innovative approaches to enhance your products and services, optimize customer interactions and ultimately drive success for your organization. Tune in, take action and design your way to success. We'll see you next time.

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