How Data Fits into your Design Process

Make better design decisions with user behavior analytics and data.

You may not know it, but you’re already using data in your designs. When you’re running a user test or even just by observing people, you’re already collecting data. Albeit on a small scale, but it gives you more insight into your users and their behavior.

We like being creative and some designers might be afraid that numbers are a threat to their creativity. But design is about solving problems and how do you know you solved a problem without any metrics or data?

The right data might not always be available or you might not know where to start to obtain any data. But whenever you need to make a design decision or get stuck on a problem and don’t know the answer, data can help inform you and lead to better solutions.

So how can you fit this in your process? Let’s start with where to get data.

Where to start?

Whenever you’re starting a new project or start working on a feature, you want to know as much about it as possible. A few questions you can ask yourself are, what problem am I trying to solve and how? Which data do I need to look at to prove my hypothesis?

As an example, I was trying to get a better understanding of reviews and by looking at the data I could conclude that only 20% of our users interact with our current way of asking for a review. This shows there’s definitely room for improvement. But data is not always available or maybe you don’t have any easy access to it. So what to do about that?

• Teamwork — If you have a data person on your team, that’s great! Only down side is it can be tedious to align your process with another person and you don’t want to trouble someone every time you have a question. I would recommend to learn as much as you can from this person so you have the ability to find simple stuff yourself.
• Tools, tools, tools— There are many great tools out there that can help you find the data you’re looking for. Tools like Google Analytics, Looker and Leanplum. You could also run a small user or A/B test.
• The internet — If all else fails there’s always the internet with vast amounts of information at your fingertips. Almost any industry publishes a yearly survey with some kind of data.

Empower your design process

Data can really empower your design process. You can look at it as an extra tool you can use or an extra skill that you possess.

• Not sure what screen size to design to? => Look at the numbers.
• How are users using a feature now? => Boom. Numbers.
• Uncertain about what’s important? => You guessed it. Numbers.

The role of the designer is evolving, we now make design decisions based on the business strategy, growth and data. Harnessing the power of data is the next step and will help you validate your ideas more effectively.

Beware of false interpretations

A word of caution, data can also be interpreted in different ways. Case in point, A/B test results I analyzed. The test was pretty simple, some users (50%) got a prompt asking them to turn on a new feature we recently added, the other group didn’t. At first it seemed like the users getting the prompt were converting much higher, but something didn’t add up. After looking deeper into the test, it became apparent that the test was set up wrong.

The way it was set up was to track the users getting the prompt and the users that didn’t get the prompt. It didn’t take in account whether or not they actually enabled the filter, so the data wasn’t saying people that enabled this filter performed better, it was just saying people who saw this prompt regardless of enabling just performed better. The right way should have been, track the users that enable it and the ones that don’t. Always look at data with a very critical eye!

Design is about solving problems, how do you know you solved a problem without any metrics or data?

No more guessing

Whenever we come across a problem when designing or when having to make a design decision, we used to utilize our gut instinct. Now with data there’s no more guessing, we can actually validate any ideas we have. It’s more than just numbers, it tells a story.

As a designer you should be like a sponge, absorbing as much information as you can. Get to know your team, users, product and business. Data is a tool to gather even more information and to get a better understanding of what works and what doesn’t.

By mastering this you’ll not only improve your designs and user experience, but you’ll also become a better designer.

As for Data, I expect it will be used in more instances. AI is already collecting and analyzing customers’ data to provide a better experience, soon it will be integrated everywhere.