Looking at the popularity of user experience design, the need to diversify UX designer skills is essential. It’s a broad field that requires various skill sets, and it becomes vital for a UX designer to master all these skills.
The role of a UX designer is to ensure users have the best possible experience when using a website, app, or any other digital product. To do this, you need to have many different skill sets under your belt.
A UX design job title can be misleading because it sounds like it only involves user experience, but in reality, it involves much more than that. Some designers might have specific knowledge in particular areas of UX and other basics related to the field.
When it comes to the job, UX designers are in high demand as companies continue to recognize the importance of user experience in their products.
Usually, they combine research, data analysis and visual design to create websites and apps that users want to use.
In this blog post, we will look at those skills you should have as a UX designer and why they are essential for success. More specifically, we’ll be discussing the following nine skills:
Before knowing about these skills, it is crucial to know
Why Are UX Design Skills Important?
As we’ve mentioned, the UX design field is growing rapidly. Newer and more exciting opportunities are being created almost every day.
However, the demands are getting higher because of the users. They should have a good experience when they use the website or app, and it will make them feel as if they are using it every time. The primary reason behind this is to create a positive experience for customers that will for sure build a loyal audience and generate leads for the company.
Let’s understand this with a scenario.
Imagine users visiting an app or a website for a specific action. for example, let’s say it’s shopping if the user faces complexities before accomplishing it. Do you think that users will revisit your application?
For sure, they will be eager to give negative feedback about it.
In the world of the internet, it’s important to remember your competitor is just away from one mouse click.
According to a report, It takes about 0.05 seconds for users to give an opinion about your website and that determines whether they will stay or leave the site.
When it comes to User Experience, any website’s first impression is its design which should be always taken into consideration.
As per a Marketing Survey, it says 57% of internet users won’t recommend a business with a poorly designed website on mobile.
This means a website without mobile responsiveness and poor design fails to provide an optimal user experience. And looking at today’s competition, not even a single company will expect to lose their website visitors.
Every business or brand wants to stay a step ahead of its competitors. When user experience is a matter of concern they are ready to spend more on it and of course, they will love to hire skilled UX designers on their team.
Looking at the scope and demand of user experience in recent times, it becomes important for anyone willing to grow their career in this field to have these UX designer skills.
9 Technical Skills For UX Designers:
#1- Research on User Persona:
Research is a vital part applicable to any field. Without in-depth research on user personas, it’s difficult to build an appropriate UX design.
A persona can be said as a fictional character that is based on research that collects information about the target audience. It includes data like buyers’ personas and identifying multiple parameters like demography, user behaviours, reaction, and motivation.
Designers use these personas to create a mental picture of the brand’s ideal customer. Even personas are very useful in the design process because they give designers insights about their users that they might not gain from any other sources.
A persona can be imagined as a real person with a name, an occupation, and a specific set of goals and needs. Each persona should have a name, occupation, and goal. A UX Designer use this persona data as a guide for the design process, including decisions about the functionality or features of an app or website.
#2- UX writing:
Suppose, you have the prettiest app or website in the world, but if it’s hard to navigate. Do you think users will ever visit it? No.
UX writing is about creating a positive user experience by making navigation and language simple. It is the process of creating content and text that is intuitive and easy to understand.
It includes every visual feature present on the interface. Starting from the fonts, icons, and microcopies to buttons and menu bars. And it’s the UX designer who takes care of those.
That’s why it’s one of the essential skills in UX design.
#3- Wireframing & Prototyping:
Before moving to the mockup design stage, a UX designer must start with wireframing.
It is the process of laying out the site’s structure and functionality.
Wireframing is the imagination made on the appearance of a website before it’s built. Or else, it can be said to be the blueprint of a website.
A UX designer should draw the blueprint of an app or website before building it so that the developers have an idea of what they’re working with.
By drawing a wireframe, it becomes simple to visualize the different aspects of a product, such as a user flow, the number of pages, the placement of different elements, and the general look and feel of your app.
#4- Information Architecture:
With the rising competition, users are the priority for any business. They will keep coming back if you create an experience for them. The users love to use any app or site that is simple and relevant to them.
As the user journey is getting more intense, businesses spend a lot of resources on building websites or apps that are easy to use.
Information architecture (IA) is the structural design of an application or website. It defines the way information is organized, structured, and applied to meet the goals of functionality and usability.
An information architect organizes information, structures it logically, and applies visual elements to improve its usability.
#5- Visual Plan:
The visual plan comes next to our list of essential UX designer skills.
It is a creative, sketchy way of visualizing the app or website that is under development. This helps to develop a creative and innovative strategy for that app.
Visual planning is a creative process and the designer should have creative ideas in his mind. It helps sketch out the user flow, navigation, and placement of different elements.
This is a great way to create a strategy for the app you are building and think creatively about how it should look and function.
The design industry is getting more competitive with each passing day. As a UX designer, you need to keep yourself updated with the latest trends and skills to stay ahead of the competition.
#6- Client Examination and Convenience Testing:
One of the major parts of the UX design process is making sure the design is meeting the user’s needs and expectations. There are a few methods used to do this.
Client examination is one among them. This is where the UX team arrange a meeting with the client and discusses their goals for the project and what they want their users to experience.
Another method is convenience testing. This is when the design is shown to real users and gets their feedback.
The goal of both of these methods is to make sure the design is meeting the user’s needs and expectations.
#7- Application Development:
Application development is the process of developing the application after the design phase is done.
Although, UX designers aren’t involved in programming, a basic idea about coding languages like CSS, and HTML. JavaScript would help a lot.
Understanding coding scripts will help you collaborate actively with the development team and coordinate the software functions with visual components that you need to engage users.
#8- Analytics:
It becomes crucial for a UX designer to have analytics skills to check the success of an app or website.
Analytics is used to track data which is important when it comes to understanding how the product is being used by the customers.
It can also be used to track which parts of the product are being used more frequently and which parts are not being used at all.
For example, if you are designing a website, you can track how many people log into the site each day, how long they stay on the site, what pages they visit, and what paths they take while navigating the site.
All of this data is valuable for tracking the success of your design and can also be used to improve the design in the future.
#9- Mockup & Client Stream:
The last but not the least essential skill is creating mockups and client streams.
The mockup is the design of an app or a website that you have created. It is like a rough sketch of the final design.
Even though your mockup might be the end product, it helps communicate with clients.
Wrapping Up
Although it’s a challenging career, it’s rewarding as well. It requires creativity, problem-solving skills, and the ability to understand people.
If you are interested in pursuing a career in UX design, you must have a passion for solving problems and a willingness to learn new skills. With these 9 essential UX designer skills, you can kick-start your journey as a UX designer.
If you think you have all the above skills and looking for an opportunity to start your career in UX designing, then Gloify give you the chance to begin.