What does this mean for manufacturers?
Faced with this observation, any publisher of SaaS software must improve the performance of these products in order to create value, reduce customer churn, attract new subscribers, and increase their conversion rate.
In this context, you should adopt a rigorous approach to UX design that uses a set of techniques, tools, and skills to develop ergonomic, functional, accessible, easy-to-use, and effective interfaces.
Your best decision will be to order saas application development services, but in case you’re by yourself, you should start with the UX research stage, because this is an important step in the UX design process, it allows you to identify the characters needed to create user journeys and user stories.
User Research
User research aims to create a deep and accurate understanding of the profile of your target audience, their usage, their fears, their feelings, their consumer habits, their motivations, and their needs.
Indeed, you will not be able to provide effective and functional SaaS software to your target without having a prior understanding of their behavior and expectations. Keep in mind that your software is not designed to meet the specific needs of decision-makers, but rather is designed to be used by a specific segment of users.
The purpose of user research is to collect accurate data using qualitative and quantitative research methods. These studies are based on the pragmatic SaaS experience experienced by real users in the context of natural use: office, home, public place, etc.
Qualitative methods of UX research
The result of qualitative research is subjective data based on the customer's voice (VoC), feedback, and direct user responses. This method is designed to approach the latter and deeply understand their psychology.
Here are 3 examples of qualitative research methods:
- Individual interview
An individual interview consists of establishing a direct dialogue with the participant, asking him certain open-ended questions, and collecting transparent answers about his needs, frustrations, and expectations from your SaaS.
The goal is to detect usability issues that reduce the effectiveness of your software and anticipate optimization opportunities. This technique can be performed in person or remotely, via Zoom, Skype, WhatsApp, Telegram, etc.).
- Focus group
A focus group is a discussion group that brings together several participants (on average from 6 to 12 participants) in order to collect useful data about the use of your SaaS through interaction between them. Your UX researcher is responsible for asking questions about aspects and functions of your SaaS software in order to open up the debate and give participants the floor to freely express their opinions.
This method is very useful for simultaneously querying different user profiles for a given topic. This allows you to quickly and easily get different opinions (concurring and disagreeing).
- 5-Second Test
A 5-second test consists of collecting and evaluating the first impression that the user spontaneously forms about the system. After that, the UX researcher asked relatively targeted questions to the participants.
The purpose of this test is to understand what the user was able to remember during this rather short opening. In particular, you can find out if:
- your first impression is attractive or not;
- your software meets the user's needs and provides additional value or not;
- the user wants to know more about your SaaS;
- the user remembers what action he has to perform to complete a given task, etc;
A good first impression plays a crucial role in the proper promotion of your SaaS software and, therefore, in ensuring a higher conversion rate.
Heat map
A heat map (also called zoning) is an effective way to monitor and understand user behavior during their interaction with the HMI interfaces of your SaaS solution.
This technique allows you to classify interface zones according to their importance into cold (least interesting) and hot (most attractive). This classification helps you understand the source of certain problems, such as high traffic versus low conversion rate, areas requiring optimization, etc.
On-site survey
An on-site survey is a powerful method of collecting user feedback on the effectiveness of your SaaS software. Using text dialog boxes, you ask the visitor to express his opinion in the form of a rating on a numerical scale to measure his level of satisfaction.
Low ratings are a red signal that the UX of your SaaS platform is not optimized enough and requires careful analysis to eliminate harmful anomalies.
