Giving in to my inherent desire for discovering new insights, I stumbled on yet another industry report on UX, this time from Loop11. They have produced an insightful 24-page document about the outlook on UX in 2018, and I wasn’t surprised to see Service Design redefining UX as the methodology for improving the overall customer experience. Consider the following data:
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- 28% consider UX as referring to all the touch points or experiences a user has with a product, service or interface.
- 14% simply described UX as the ‘user experience’, sometimes going on to mention contact points or interactions.
- 13% believe UX refers to the emotions and attitudes a user displays or feels about a product, service or interface.[/perfectpullquote]
The respondents are alluding to an approach to map & improve the “touch points” or services integrated with an overall customer experience strategy. In which, the ‘service’ supports a user’s emotional context of the experience during a product’s lifecycle, but also in enabling a structured framework to redefine those intangible experiences that a customer would likely endure, before, during and after experiencing a product or a service. I have briefly covered this concept on this blog where I have spoken about incorporating a 360° strategic outlook “which includes a product’s physical & environmental aspects besides UI”. As digital transformation brings automation and companies look for social innovation, designers need to broaden their UX mindset by not just embracing the functional aspects but also by connecting with various other fields of activities that would indirectly complement the desirability factors of a product or service.
Service Design is a cross-disciplinary practice which combines numerous skills in design, management, and process engineering, in developing user-centered business models that are empathetic to user needs. In other words, it helps to improve and deliver intangible services aimed at remodeling customer experiences.
