Ever since writing “Click!” conversion rate optimization has become an obsession. The idea is that you can encourage people to act, not through tricking or manipulating them, but by providing them with an outstanding experience.
The workshop I run on this subject is one of the favorite things I do in my job. However, as I am preparing to give it again as part of the online Amuse conference next month, I have realized there is a crucial aspect of UX and conversion optimization that I barely touch on in the workshop or the book. That is the topic of flow.
What is Flow?
We do not experience the web as a series of isolated interactions. Instead, it is a journey that flows from one touchpoint to the next.
For example, we are on social media one day when we see an ad for a company. We click the ad and visit the website before signing up for their newsletter. We flow from one channel to the next with little consideration to the transition points.
Yet as digital professionals, we don’t tend to think in those terms. Instead, we focus on one project at a time. For example, we launch a social media marketing campaign or redesign the website. We don’t consider how these flow together to create the overall experience.
That is why journey mapping and sales funnels are so important. They help us to consider the flow of the entire end-to-end experience. They help us understand the questions and objections that may stop a user from acting and exactly when these occur in the journey.
But this idea of flow doesn’t just happen on a macro level; it also happens within a website. As users navigate a website, they will have different questions, objections, and tasks in their minds at different times. Unfortunately, because we do not know what order users will view the pages, we give up providing any narrative that guides the user through the content.
How to Accommodate Flow
However, we can do more than we think we can to facilitate the user’s flow through the website. We can make educated guesses about what questions they will be asking and when, based on what they are looking at.
For example, people do not spontaneously think about privacy. They think about those kinds of things when they are going to hand over personal information like their email address. That is why when we design signup forms, we need to provide them with the reassurance they need at that point, not buried in a privacy policy somewhere in the footer.
Calls to action are another great example. We are so desperate to get people to act that we ask them at the first opportunity rather than considering when will be the best moment. For example, let somebody see the quality of your offering before asking them to act. Let them see that acting is worthwhile.
The same is true with secondary calls to action. For example, a user rarely comes to a website to signup for your newsletter. Therefore if you immediately show them a popup asking them to sign up, the chances are minuscule that they will.
Instead, it would help if you waited until they have completed whatever they came to your website to do and then ask them. Again, you will find them much more receptive if you don’t interrupt them mid-task.
In other words, we need to learn to “go with the flow”, designing to support the user’s natural journey and behavior, rather than interrupt or change it.
Practical Actions to Take
So next time you are working on a website, I would encourage you to do two things.
- First, step back and map the customer journey so you can see the big picture. Understand what the user is trying to achieve on the site and what is being done elsewhere.
- Second, think about the flow of what the user is trying to do on the website itself. Consider the questions, tasks, and objections users have and when they are considering each. Then time any calls to action to either support or, at the very least, not interrupt that flow.
I find UX flow diagrams to be a great way of understanding the user’s flow. It allows me to see what is happening on each page and understand the page’s context based on which other pages the user has likely arrived from.
I am aware this concept of flow can feel a little abstract and hard to quantify in real terms. But at its core, it is about considering the user’s journey and empathizing. Imagine what the user is thinking at each stage of the journey. Then it is about designing around that thought process, rather than fighting to interrupt or change it. Finally, as I said earlier, it is about going with the flow. If you do, you will find users much more receptive.
Until next time.
