How (Great) Design is Ignored

I often hear this suggestion, that the visual design of an experience doesn’t really matter or isn’t that important in comparison to the user experience.

This sentiment suggests that success awaits you right around the corner if your process consists of you solely homogenizing your efforts strictly into user experience. That is to say; research, wireframes, iterations, what your product offers, MVP, etc.

I actually agree with this a little bit. These elements are very important to valid end results. However, this school of thought often also suggests–that if your product and/or service, is easy to use and useful to your audience then you have checked all the boxes. That you can be done. Check the trends, slap a pretty sticker on it and call it good. It suggests that if how it looks, feels and moves doesn’t innately matter to your client/audience then you shouldn’t bother. I couldn’t disagree more with this sentiment because it’s not the client or audience’s job to care about those things to begin with. It’s the designer’s/art director’s job. And it’s their job to make their audience care.

And of course, there’s the contrasting view; that there are millions of yes, beautiful but not innately functional mockups or concepts out there. Maybe on sites like Dribbble or Behance, that perhaps don’t solve any “problems,” by outputting an actual product.

It’s easy to say an experience needs to be refined and considered but difficult at times to recognize the depth at which research should be conducted.

It’s easy to say “now go make it pretty” to your design team (which is very unhealthy), but difficult at times to appreciate what a robust and thoughtful visual execution can bring to the table. Especially for those not familiar with design processes.

In the end, who do you think is actually right? Where do you land? Focus more on UX and maybe we can do some visual stuff later? Vice-versa?

My opinion? Neither. I personally find each view–when subscribed to exclusively, extremely misleading. As well as particularly toxic to people newly entering the design profession. And for clients newly learning about a design process.

I don’t think I’m making a leap by suggesting that currently, most tend to lean towards striving for great UX practices and falling on whatever visual trend is current, if that. This is an issue because actual success is ultimately driven not by one specific practice (research, user experience, design, development, etc.) but by a healthy implementation of each of these categories. Each one, coexisting and creating an eco-system.

There’s also this Game of Thrones-esque, race to establish “who is king:” “Content is king, experience is king…the user is king.” So on and so forth. Not really productive, there are no kings or queens. Just players.

In creating exclusivity in a product’s design process–you end up falling flat eventually. This is because you’re disregarding, however significant, a component of the process and purposefully being shortsighted. Not to mention being unappreciative of every aspect of the design discipline. This substandard, inconsiderate effort, inevitably spills into the end results and may yield unexpected consequences.

Here’s a scenario:

Consider for a moment, if car manufacturers cared exclusively about how a car worked. Not how it sounded or looked. But only about how the driving experience served the driver and its passengers.

In that scenario: “Who really cares what the vehicle looks like right? They can all look and sound the same! After all, people want cars that work well don’t they? That sells cars doesn’t it? So why bother. Why invest time into the aesthetic side of it? It saves us so much time and money not to. Let’s just make sure it has a modern build and good paint.”

Sounds like a fantastic concept right? Less cost, time and seemingly equal impact.

Here’s Another Scenario:

In this hyper-utilitarian world, if one day, someone comes along and suggests “Well why don’t we try to make these cars beautiful…?”

They strike gold. Because consumers can make motivated decisions not only by palpable, quantitative data and a well guided experience but additionally with the aid of unrequited, honest emotions.

When all is said and done, what actually happens is manufacturers end up combining the two and landing somewhere in the middle. All for a functioning, yet attractive end result that most importantly, people want to spend their hard earned money on. Sure there are concept cars, but in reality different car manufacturers design and consider the visual side of their vehicles just as much as they do the performance and efficiency side. They have brands and voices to uphold.

The best real world example I can think of this relationship, is my girlfriend. She would love to have a Mini Cooper. Not solely because of the price, gas mileage or resell value, But because it’s cute. It provides intrinsic value, it feels cool.

It’s easy to think as a designer that everyone in the world is as pragmatic and logical as you are. But they aren’t. We can talk all day about Human Centered this or that, but the fact of the matter is. Humans feel things.

The value of great visual design

We as humans often associate sentimental and intrinsic value with not just people and pets, but also with objects, memories and experiences. Even vain things like furniture, jewelry, devices, as well as particular encounters with loved ones, friends and family.

As designers, to willingly ignore this phenomena of general human experiences is (in my opinion) an absolutely detrimental, incredibly novice and ill-informed mistake. Especially when this philosophy is implemented in plenty of other for-profit creation processes know to us (see below). It’s an oversight that could be preventing very fruitful end results. Results, such as loyalty, consistency, recognition, value association and more that are easily accessed, if just diligently appreciated, considered and implemented.

I often find the best created experiences, interactive or otherwise (cooking, art, furniture, technology, film, writing, etc.) have clearly implemented all appropriate nuances available to their discipline. They don’t ignore or downplay any facet of their experience in any way, nor do they downplay their visual presentation or any other factors. This is to offer what is truly the best possible experience, because every knowledge base is implemented for the end delivery.

Aside from maybe some artistic expression, a film is never going to behave like “well we have a script, no need for any type of setting or visuals let’s just get actors to read it somewhere cool and hip.”

You’ll never walk into a world renowned hamburger restaurant and their hamburgers look like sloppy fast food burgers.

I find it a little disconcerting that so much energy today is invested into figuring out what “delights” users. Suggesting that delight is this new concept, unique to design. In the meantime, much of visual design has been distilled down into inconsequential, unrecognizable and trend following. These questions of delight have been thoughtfully answered by other disciplines before us. Yet, there’s a mentality associated with the correct way of achieving a successful, particularly digital, design product. As such, it’s often approached with a binary, ‘this or that’ mind set. As opposed to accepting, navigating and implementing each component. A successful design product or experience, wholly requires attributing proper efforts and resources equally, to deliver value as an end result.

That means no skipping anything. Not research, interviews, user experience, testing visual design and art direction, client input, a validated dev process, anything. By knowingly putting more effort into one area over another, that is a conscious acknowledgment that the end result is not going to be solid. In other words, provide less value. (If that’s your goal then that’s okay I suppose…I imagine that’s an ethical issue for you to grapple with.)

Where is this coming from?

I recently read an article written by a Creative Director whom I respect, Paul Wood as do I respect the work of his agency. It was a brilliantly written argument, around what it takes in today’s world to define and deliver a brand to the world. A large suggestion is that the experience and actions of a brand are what accounts for its effectiveness in reception. I agree with this.

In support of this, an example in that article was that Spotify, would still presumably be hailed and utilized as a great destination for music and a household name, because of its great experience and access to music. That it really doesn’t matter so much how it looks with the experience at the helm. I can agree and disagree with this to some degree, but in the end if I had to choose–I have to go ahead and disagree completely. If not for any other reason, than for the very crippling one: credibility. Credibility gets users in the door and keeps them there when other, equal or better services arrive on the coattails of this great experience.

But this is obvious. We know that a professional looking website, application or mobile experience clearly waives the medal of credibility. So why don’t we value it more? Well to be fair, this is also a little arguable, considering some popular websites and apps are trending towards steep minimalism. Michael Horton at Swarm in NYC refers to this trend as “Complexion Reduction.” (A good read I suggest checking out his contrasting viewpoint.) After all, we don’t need super poppy obvious brand colors and special buttons for a unique visual experience. Still, the visual elements should certainly be considered thoughtfully and not tossed to the side or ignored.

Uniqueness vs Trendiness

In addition to credibility however, there’s uniqueness. Which I foresee becoming especially important in this world of flat everything and UI kit for anything. Brands, old and new are trying now more than ever to stand out in a rapidly changing social and digital landscape.

Part of a designer’s job is to identify and be aware of trends. However, it’s not just a designers job to advocate for and push towards these trends. It’s very easy to fall into this pace of “keeping up” but that’s exactly how you become irrelevant in the long term. Because where is the innovation in that? What end-goal are you working towards? Just matching everyone? No brand wants to just match everyone. Not small brands and not global reaching brands. It’s also a designer’s job to stay ahead.

We know this industry of popular applications is adopting this hyper minimalistic thing. We know they are ignoring elaborate visual design practices. So if we know the industry is going this way, why on earth would we as designers tell our colleagues and clients–at least the clients that are brands who want to stand out among their competitors…to follow these trends?

Should we not be telling them to go in another direction? One that is still of course informed by trends but inspired by and aiming towards innovation. They are all in competition to get past one another, not to play catch up with each other. Samsung doesn’t want to be exactly like Apple, they want to beat Apple.

So yes, they offer varying and sometimes similar experiences. But they also look, feel and move completely differently. On purpose. Ignoring this simple fact exhibits a misunderstanding of what brands are capable of and are trying to communicate about themselves.

Finally, I think when all parts of this design eco-system work together, instead of devaluing one another, better products get made and users have an easier time making decisions. As well as making purchases. Even if those decisions aren’t logically defined in a user-flow.

The process of creating just about any experience for a human to engage with, (again, interactive or not) often requires different ingredients to make that experience a reality. Ultimately, creating a successful experience, does not mean so heavily valuing one specific ingredient that you in turn, disregard another. This is especially the case when designing interactive experiences. The same way you wouldn’t conclude that a car can have a great driving experience yet be completely average looking–you shouldn’t conclude the same for any interactive experiences you design.

What if all of our food made at home or ordered at restaurants (especially ordered at restaurants), came out as perfect little pragmatic trendy cubes– instead of the beautiful, appreciation worthy things that people work so hard to turn them into?

Thanks for reading
- Darien

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