How many times have you left a website or an app due to poor user experience? When you think about it, it’s not that uncommon. In fact, it’s said that 90% users or customers leave a website or an app due to poor user experience, and mobile users are five times more likely to never revisit an app or website or even abandon their checkouts last minute due to terrible user experience and user interface. 

At a time when the world is moving rapidly towards everything technology, it’s highly imperative that you build a service or product that provides the best user experience, while the user interface transports the customer or user to your world and your brand, showcasing the best of what you’ve got in store. All of this leads to a 400% spike in customer or user retention, and we know how valuable it is to retain these users. It not only boosts your business, but it helps in targeting newer customers or users (either through word-of-mouth or creating a market research based on the kind of users or customers you’ve been targeting), building a trusting relationship within the market you’re breaking into, and of course, reducing your costs involved in acquiring new customers or users. 

Keeping this in mind, we move to the next big question – What strategies can I involve in, to make this a better experience? Well, here are a few ideas and thoughts that have worked for major brands and businesses out there. 

One of the key factors is to create a user journey that is seamless and less cumbersome. Smooth, flexible and ease of access are a few things that help in creating a seamless user journey. When the end customer or user finds it difficult to access your product or service, they won’t feel the need to revisit your app or website. 

Now that you’ve done your market research, got your product moving, had a few beta and alpha tests done to see how your customer or user is responding, are you satisfied? Do you think the few test runs you’ve done is enough to retain your user or customer? We don’t think so. While the few initial tests are highly important, customer retention is all about the continued, on-going process of seeing what works and doesn’t work for your end user or customer. Your user interface and user journey is a trial and error method which is prompted by constant customer use. Modifying and re-touching a few elements of your UX UI journey can help you achieve the best results, which eventually leads to frequent users coming back and recommending the same to their peers, friends and family. This also helps us in understanding how the product or service works across various devices – imagine the horror when you realise your product or service crashes on tablets, but works perfectly fine for mobiles and laptops. You’re eliminating a complete user or customer base, which is not something you want your product or service to stand for. 

A service that is mostly overlooked, but holds a lot of importance is support. Support in the form of guiding or helping your customers or users navigate through your platform, accessibility to multiple features or sending an automated welcome email as soon as they login or sign up to your product or service, are just a few ideas that make a big difference in customer retention. A customer or user can get easily frustrated with a service or product if they can’t seem to navigate through the user journey in a seamless way. Simple user interface features such as providing prompts to guide a customer or user on how to sign in or login can be super helpful and will leave a lasting impression. Leaving little notes or suggestions in the form of popovers or overlays makes the customer or user think the journey is tailor-made to their needs and wants; prompting them to further recommend your service or product to their friends and family. Even something as simple as hosting a FAQs page or helpdesk will make the customer feel your product or service is a considerate one with a human touch, rather than being blindsided with lack of information. Speaking of helpdesk and support, it is vital to host or integrate a 24/7 support system into your user interface, for ease of access to any problem your customer or user may face.

A feature that’s been making the rounds for some time now, are ‘Lottie’. They are a JSON-based animation file format that enables you to add animations on any platform as easily as shipping static assets. They are small files that work on any device and can scale up or down without pixelation. Lottiefiles help in keeping the customer occupied with fun animations of design elements or product tidbits that can be added to your interface while they’re loading a page or product. Just a tiny elemental strategy can make a big difference in how your customer or user remembers you. 

At first glance, for any customer or user, your product or service’s design aesthetics speaks volumes on the kind of product or service you’re selling. Almost 75% of customers or users judge your product or service based on your design aesthetics. Think Apple for example – clean, understated and specific – these are just a few keywords that distinguishes Apple from other brands. Granted, the products in itself are a testament to their success, but for any customer or user out there, it’s really easy for them distinguish an Apple app or website from any of their competitors. Ensure your platform, app or website holds a specific style that is not too heavy on the user journey or user interface, and is specific to your brand. You’d much rather offer your customers or users a simple and effective interface, than overwhelm them with endless features that don’t necessarily do much. A few things to bear in mind to achieve this aesthetic goal are as below:

• Limit the number of features on your interface by accumulating them and placing them under buckets or categories, so your customers and users can make the best decisions 
• Make the specialties of your product or service visible by placing them in visible locations in your user journey. It’s important to showcase the best, to capture more attention on your focus points
• It’s said that a person can only remember 7 objects in their working memory; so try to not overwhelm your end user or customer with too many elements or features

A lot can be said about retaining your customers or users, but ultimately it’s your product or service that creates a difference in your strategy. If your product or service has made an impact in the first go, then it’s highly likely the user keeps coming back for more or even suggest the same to their friends, family and peers. All in all, have faith in your product, invest in really good UX UI designers and researchers, and just have fun knowing you’ve something of your own creation out there for people to enjoy.