UX metrics are quantifiable statistics used to track, measure, and compare the user experience of a product across time. They are difficult to quantify compared to other metrics, such as sales, finance, or marketing, since they represent human behavior and attitude. Nevertheless, to satisfy their consumers, big firms like Google, Airbnb, and YouTube employ UX metrics to assess and enhance the user experience of their products.
This data is difficult to quantify, but several valuable frameworks have made it feasible, such as Forrester’s Customer Experience, which categorizes these metrics into three major categories described below:
Descriptive matrix
Descriptive metrics provide insight into what has happened, such as usability and real-time user monitoring metrics.
Perception matrix
Perception metrics provide insight into how users viewed what happened.
Outcome matrix
Based on their beliefs, outcome metrics explain what consumers did or anticipated to do. Adoption and retention performance measures are included in this area.
Monitoring accurate user metrics while your website is used
Accurately monitoring user metrics is essential to ensure the success of a digital offering. Identifying and addressing customer concerns is necessary to enhance the online customer experience. To closely track user activity, it is vital to consider data such as the number of users who have installed and activated your application, the number of sessions per day, the duration of each session (in minutes), and the customer retention rate (here are the critical customer retention rates you should know about). Using user monitoring metrics aims to understand your customers better, allowing you to make the best changes to your goods and services.
Metrics of user engagement
User experience engagement metrics reveal how people interact with your website, from frequency to volume and usage intensity. Furthermore, they provide insight into what users are and aren’t interested in, so you can make adjustments quickly and avoid mistakes that could cause them to leave.
Usability matrix
Usability metrics provide insight into user behaviors, showing how easily they can complete tasks on your website. This is the most common type of success statistic that UX teams often monitor. It is recommended to select metrics that evaluate effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction.
Metrics relating to user adoption
Adoption analytics is another crucial UX metric that looks at how quickly customers incorporate your product or service into their lives. To ascertain success, you must check if people utilize and adapt it effectively. For instance, if a million people download your mobile app but only 10 use it frequently, there may be issues with its usability and ease of use.
User retention rate
The user retention rate is the percentage of users that have stayed with you for an extended time. This indicator can tell you if your retention strategy is working. To find the user retention rate, divide the total number of users at the start by the difference between the total number of users at the end and the number of acquired users throughout the period.
Which metrics should I use in my project?
Regrettably, a standard set of measurements will only suffice for some projects. Thus, the initial step in selecting metrics is comprehending your business model and the KPIs your firm monitors. Subsequently, identify what affects your company’s bottom line and choose metrics to help you understand it. Additionally, always link metrics to design decisions. This will enable you to track changes over time and compare them to prior iterations. You’ll be able to determine if your design choices worked as intended. Lastly, keep in mind that data only displays half of the story. It can tell you what’s occurring but not why it’s occurring. Qualitative investigations such as user interviews and contextual inquiries are essential to comprehend why something is happening. Combining UX metrics with qualitative research helps you better understand how your product works.
Reason of the UX metrics score
You scored the user experience metrics of your website or web app for several reasons. Some of them have been identified below:
Alerting
UX metrics can alert you to product or service problems, acting as an early warning system. When you combine metrics with Real User Monitoring (RUM) tools, you can access precise and essential information that can quickly identify weak points, enable you to respond accordingly, and leverage your best points. For instance, you can set threshold timings for website performance measures like page load times, HTTP requests, and specific on-page transactions and be alerted immediately when surpassing these.
Context
UX metrics give context for analytics statistics. They enable you to track and map customer journeys and create correlations between user encounters, filling in the how, why, when, and where gaps.
Important UX KPIs to track behavioral UX KPIs
Behavioral UX KPIs concern users’ actions while interacting with a digital product. Behavioral metrics account for all user actions seen, heard, or inferred from what they do on the site.
The behavioral UX KPIs listed below will help a company evaluate a product’s or service’s efficacy.
Task completion rate
This measure assesses how well users perform essential activities. It assists you in determining if users can easily accomplish what they set out to do.
Task time
An absolute number, such as 3 minutes, is usually used in task-based studies, as shorter task periods are preferable when the user aims to complete a task quickly. There are certain exceptions: When the purpose is to keep the user engaged, a longer Task time, such as on Facebook’s News Feed, may be more beneficial. Still, it all depends on the work at hand; even on the News Feed, shorter task durations may be preferable if the purpose is to identify a specific event.
Navigation vs. search
Web analytics reveal what users are most interested in, from search and navigation patterns. This helps you understand how easy it is for customers to locate the information, features, or functions they want when using your product or service.
Rate of user error
The user error rate measure tells us how often users fail to complete a task, process, or activity. For instance, if 10 out of 100 employees fail task 1, it indicates that either they don’t understand the instructions or the underlying principles. This shows room for improvement in some product/service offerings regions.
Conversion rate
This is useful when a UX upgrade affects something; take, for instance, the completion of an online form, newsletter sign-up, or another task. Suppose the site modification directly impacts the number of people who convert to that particular activity, and you can measure that. In that case, you can be confident your work had an effect.
The number of suggestions
It can incorporate several suggestions to give insight into how people engage with a brand, service, or product to produce value.
It accomplishes this by displaying how frequently external websites promote your site despite its flaws (which can indicate how well your product/service is performing).
KPIs for Attitudinal UX
Understanding someone’s attitude on your website or digital property can be complicated. To assist with this, develop the following KPIs. Let’s look at some of the most popular Attitudinal UX KPIs.
The scale of System Usability (SUS)
SUS is an online questionnaire that asks about user views of a website, software program, or product.
It would help if you did not use SUS as a replacement for a user research team since you will want data-driven insights into why users rate your system negatively (e.g., queries such as “How easy was it to use?”).
Net Promoter Score (NPS)
NPS is a survey that you may incorporate at the end of your UX testing. NPS measures loyalty by asking, “How likely are you to suggest this company/product/service/experience to a friend or colleague?”
Customer satisfaction (CSAT)
CSAT scores measure how well a product or service fulfills consumer expectations. They are usually calculated by surveying customers’ overall experience and asking if they would recommend the brand/product/service to others.
Conclusion
UX metrics play a crucial role in understanding and improving the user experience of a product or service. By measuring and analyzing various UX metrics, businesses can gather valuable insights into how users interact with their offerings and identify areas for improvement. These metrics provide objective data to guide decision-making, prioritize design and development efforts, and ultimately drive business success. Moreover, UX metrics ensure that user-centered design principles are upheld, and products are relevant, intuitive, and enjoyable for users. By continuously monitoring UX metrics, businesses can constantly iterate and improve their user experience, ultimately leading to long-term customer satisfaction, loyalty, and positive business outcomes.