A UX consultant can analyze your Web site’s current user experience, which takes time and requires expertise, then make recommendations for UX design changes. Once these changes have been implemented, you’ll see many improvements on your site and higher engagement with customers.
UX Designer Versus UX Consultant
If you need help with your Web site’s user experience, should you hire a staff designer rather than a consultant? These roles are actually quite different, so you must make sure you’re choosing the right person for the job. The UX consultant should have both UX design and research skills and can take a deep look at how your Web site can be improved. The staff UX designer is likely to be more focused on creating designs and work on long-term solutions for the site.
Benefits of Using a UX Consultant
Why should you hire a UX consultant to help you with your Web site? There are lots of reasons you might want to look into using a consultant:
- better sales—This is the main reason why companies hire a UX consultant. If customers have a poor experience on your ecommerce store, they’ll go to your competitor instead. This is something that you can so easily avoid by using a UX consultant to identify any issues with your site and make recommendations to rectify them. Once you’ve implemented the changes they’ve proposed, you’ll see a lot of improvement in your sales numbers.
- fewer complaints—Customer complaints are always going to be something you’ll have to deal with—no Web site can be 100% perfect. However, if you want to reduce customer complaints you should hire a UX consultant. “A consultant will be able to tackle issues that cause complaints before they even happen,” says Debra Harman, a UX writer at Research Papers UK and Writinity. “When they do this, you’ll see a drastic decrease in complaints, so you’ll be able to focus more on other aspects of the site.”
- saving resources—Designing and maintaining a Web site always requires a lot of resources. As a business owner, you want to minimize how many resources you use and decrease your costs. You can hire a UX consultant to optimize your Web-site user experience. The consultant could conduct research to provide better information about what’s working well and what you need to change.
- improving ROI—Your UX consultant can also help you to determine what metrics are giving you relevant information and which aren’t. Once you know this, you’ll be able to start increasing your return on investment (ROI) and investing in the right resources.
- better conversion rates—With a UX consultant checking your site and suggesting improvements, visitors will get what they want when they come to the site. That’s going to lead to better conversion rates for your business.
- better usability—By hiring a UX consultant, you can ensure that your site is much more usable overall. When your site is user friendly, makes sense, and is easy to use, you’ll be much more likely to convert your sales leads.