Book Image

Exploring Experience Design

By : Ezra Schwartz
Book Image

Exploring Experience Design

By: Ezra Schwartz

Overview of this book

We live in an experience economy in which interaction with products is valued more than owning them. Products are expected to engage and delight in order to form the emotional bonds that forge long-term customer loyalty: Products need to anticipate our needs and perform tasks for us: refrigerators order food, homes monitor energy, and cars drive autonomously; they track our vitals, sleep, location, finances, interactions, and content use; recognize our biometric signatures, chat with us, understand and motivate us. Beautiful and easy to use, products have to be fully customizable to match our personal preferences. Accomplishing these feats is easier said than done, but a solution has emerged in the form of Experience design (XD), the unifying approach to fusing business, technology and design around a user-centered philosophy. This book explores key dimensions of XD: Close collaboration among interdisciplinary teams, rapid iteration and ongoing user validation. We cover the processes, methodologies, tools, techniques and best-practices practitioners use throughout the entire product development life-cycle, as ideas are transformed to into positive experiences which lead to perpetual customer engagement and brand loyalty.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
Title Page
Credits
About the Author
Acknowledgements
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Customer Feedback
Dedication
Preface

Summary


In this chapter we reached another milestone in the experience design journey. Starting with research, designers collect raw materials from many sources, and continue with analysis and synthesis to build a deep understanding of the business, product, and customer space. Then, we switched to a creative phase in which abstract constructs are iterated on until they take concrete forms. Throughout this process, designers are often guided by a design philosophy that informs their approach.

As a concept is tested, revised, and transformed into detailed prototypes and design specifications, the experience itself--the essence of the entire effort--emerges as well. When you think about it, the experience that drives the products we are enticed to purchase and love using, is in a fairly raw state throughout the concept development phase. Yet, that is when major decisions are often made regarding the final experience. The emerging experience has been validated with a relatively small number...