As we’ve seen before, User Experience (UX) design is essential to product development. It affects brands' reputation, customer loyalty, and sales. The concept, as we know it, has been around for around three decades. Yet, it has been becoming more relevant within that time. Meanwhile, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been around quite a bit. It became a research topic in the 1950s and started in the 1990s. AI has made strides over the last few decades, becoming an intrinsic part of our daily lives. So, what happens to UX Design when we add AI into the mix? Does this mean User Experience will ever become automated? In this article, we’ll take a look at this and more. But first, let’s review these two concepts.
What is User Experience Design?
User Experience focuses on users' reactions and interactions with a product or service. The idea behind UX Design is to guarantee the final product meets the user's needs. Furthermore, it aims to provide meaningful experiences, which is very important if you want your product or service to succeed. As you may know, User Experience is vital to fostering brand loyalty. Moreover, this concept includes many different aspects of achieving a great experience. Some of these concepts are usability, usefulness, and accessibility.
What is Artificial Intelligence?
There is a simple notion behind Artificial Intelligence. That’s the fact that computers can learn based on existing decision-making examples. Some of these include speed recognition, self-driving cars, and intelligent assistants.
What are Artificial Intelligence's (AI) Features?
1. User-Centric Design. It is no revelation that UX design revolves around the user. Due to this, AI helps by analyzing data more quickly. Also, it provides hyper-personalization and dynamic testing.
2. AI-powered UX Tools. There are currently various AI-powered tools available for both UX and UI design. These tools save time, ease the creation of stunning designs, and increase productivity. Some examples include Attention Insight, Let’s Enhance, and Colormind.
3. Hyper-Personalization. AI also helps take personalization a step further. These advances can be through personalized recommendations and experiences and dialog interfaces.
4. Advanced Localization. With good training data, AI can also provide advanced localization. This feature applies to Machine Learning and Deep Learning. As a result, it makes for more scalable localization.
Artificial Intelligence and User Experience
As we’ve mentioned, Artificial Intelligence has become an intrinsic part of our lives. Pretty much every industry is incorporating AI in one way or another. For instance, it can automate processes, reduce costs, or increase efficiency. The Digital Transformation industry is no exception. Thus, AI has transformed UX. Below, we’ll focus on what AI has brought and how it has changed UX design.
What is Artificial Intelligence's Impact in User Experience?
Behavioral data is an integral part of digital services. With it, a new array of UX becomes possible, with recommendations, contextualization, or predictions. We'll list some of them while discussing AI's innovations in UX design.
● Engagement. Companies use data and algorithms daily to rank and promote content. As a result, AI is under extreme overuse. In this scenario, UX design can wisely use this information. This effect will allow them to avoid tricking users for the sake of engagement metrics.
● Discovery. This type of AI-powered UX includes recommendation systems. These systems are on giant platforms like Netflix or Spotify. On UX design, some adjustments can make them work skillfully—like Spotify removing unliked songs from customizable playlists. As a result, similar content does not appear in future playlists. Tweaking algorithms to base suggestions beyond past behavior lies within UX design.
● Uncertainty. AI —notably, Machine Learning— can include a degree of uncertainty. That's due to algorithms looking for patterns within sample behaviors. Considering it in User Experience to avoid misleading users is essential. The seamless design is a great way to go in this case! It focuses on exploiting failures and limitations to improve the UX.
● Decision-Making. Artificial Intelligence can be helpful when it comes to decision-making. Yet, it sometimes can come with a catch. An app or digital service may not have access to all users' information. Let's say a user has many accounts from different banks in a financial advisory app. In this case, it's unable to provide accurate information or well-informed suggestions. UX design comes into play by finding ways to include feedback, reflect the accuracy of the data, and let users make sound decisions.
What is User Experience's Impact in Artificial Intelligence?
● UX Through the AI Cycle. UX (and UI, for that matter) have a crucial role in the success of any AI product. Thus, User Experience must be present throughout the entire development and implementation process. Like any digital project, UX has a say in the dev process since you need to understand users' needs and wants. We’ve mentioned the importance of considering UX through the AI cycle. Now, let’s focus on its role through each cycle stage.
● Research and Discovery. As we've mentioned, User Experience is vital to know what's needed to meet and please users' needs. In this context, UX is helpful in understanding if an AI model can help with particular issues.
● Product Development. Once you know what users need, you can design an AI model. You must consider what you've learned in the previous stage. These conclusions will help you create an intuitive and functional end product.
● Testing and Iteration. After creating the AI model, you'll need to gather user feedback. As a result, developers will make informed decisions about potential changes.
● Implementation and Communication. When implementing any changes to your product, effective communication is vital. There are many users still hesitant about Artificial Intelligence. Explaining any related changes simply will ensure better reception.
Will UX Design be Automated?
Artificial Intelligence can automate and improve certain parts of the user experience. Yet, UX requires human input to understand and translate users' needs into a product. AI is becoming an important design tool to meet the ever-shifting demands. But, the truth is, it's unlikely to replace human designers. We can expect, although, changes in the role of UX designers. There was a time when developers were in charge of every aspect of a product. UX and UI designers created new fields as product processes grew. Naturally, this role keeps evolving, requiring more specialized user experience designers.
Conclusion
Artificial Intelligence and User Experience design inevitably interlink. As AI is here to stay, it is essential to know how it interacts with UX and how these fields impact each other. We hope this article has given you a clear overview of these issues and how UX may evolve thanks to the advances in AI.
