How (and why) to improve your product with Emotional Design

Happy Tuesday!

The story goes something like this, there was an automotive engineer who believed the most important aspects of a car were the mechanics - engine design, fuel efficiency, safety features and things of this sort. Not all that surprising coming from an engineer. But when he drove the car, he didn’t talk about the mechanics. Instead he couldn’t stop talking about the feeling of the steering wheel, the stitch work of the seats, the sound of the engine as he accelerated and so on. This isn’t to say that the mechanics didn’t matter to him, but what he remembered and told others was how the car made him feel.

A great designer designs for the emotions they want the user to feel. And this month I’ll be writing about how to improve products with emotional design. As you can see below, there are a lot of feelings you can design for. 🙃

Excerpt from Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things

“In the 1980’s, in writing The Design of Everyday Things, I didn’t take emotions into account. I addressed utility and usability, function and form, all in a logical, dispassionate way — even though I am infuriated by poorly designed objects. But now I’ve changed.…We scientists now understand how important emotion is to everyday life, how valuable. Sure, utility and usability are important, but without fun and pleasure, joy and excitement, and yes, anxiety and anger, fear and rage, our lives would be incomplete.” — Don Norman

(Buy the book: Amazon)

Diving Deeper: Free People

When I was redesigning Free People’s website, the two emotions I wanted to evoke were inspired and excited. Here’s why and how I did it:

To feel inspired 🤩

Free People is an inspiring brand on it’s own. And a big part of fashion is self-expression but one of the challenges our customers were having was styling their outfits. So how could we inspire our customers to find the right products? Throughout the shopping experience we included things like curated shops, product recommendations, “Shop the Look” and photos of how our customers styled their outfits. The ability to add products to your cart in this way went beyond inspirational photography to actionable inspiration.

To feel excited 😄

The average cart abandonment rate across all eCommerce websites is about 70% (!!!). So the desired emotion for checkout was excited. Free People had always done a great job of building excitement during the shopping experience, but checkout was seen as the place to push for simplicity. While I’m a big advocate for simplicity, checkout experiences need personality. So we added the visuals from their shopping cart - reminding the customer what they’re spending money on and supporting limited editing of the cart. As well as bringing excitement to the order-confirmation screen, celebrating the purchase with animations and making it easy to track their order.

So, take the time to understand your user's emotions. People feel before they think.

Next week I’ll be talking about first impressions and how to design a homepage that sets you up for success. Subscribe now!

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✨ Things Worth Checking Out

• The book I’m currently reading, which has been quite thought provoking: The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas G. Carr

  Favorite quote so far, “What the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. Whether I’m online or not, my mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski.”

• A great post about change, ambiguity and pride: Rat Race Withdrawals: Ongoing sabbatical reflections

• Great advice on how to embrace constructive criticism and incorporate suggestions to improve your designs: How to receive feedback like a pro (via LinkedIn)

• A silly AI tool to make silly cards: Silly Robot Cards

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Until next week,
raika

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