Mastering Discoverability in Design: Unlocking User Engagement

How much time do you take to interact with the product to know whether the functionality is really correct? Whatever you indented in your mind and whatever you are taking as a product, how does it match? Are you able to do it in one second? Are you able to do it in a minute? Are you able to do it after five minutes? If the time is really high, in order to recognize that this product is intended to do that. Like let's say, okay, this is a cup for drinking water. It takes just a second for somebody to really understand. Maybe you can drink tea. But if the time is really high, then the interface is definitely back. I'm going to tell you there is something called discoverability. You're going to learn how this has been perceived in the world of design, how it is brought from a scientific background as a research and coming into the graphical user interface and why it is influencing a lot of companies like Amazon, Apple by creating a user engagement. Okay, in this video you're going to see that before explaining what is mean by discoverability, I wanted to give you a live activity. Okay? Take a product in front of you, any product. It could be a physical product, digital product, that's up to you. And then try to pause this video and write down the four functionalities of it. Three to four functionalities, whatever you are seeing in that. Okay. And then think about what did you observe in the initial stages of choosing this product? Like let's say you would have bought from the shop, Amazon, Flipkart, anything. What was your expectation? What is the reality when you're using this? Is that reality expectation matching? And when you're continuously using it, is it steely still retained? How did you first discover whether this is exactly the mouse? This is exactly the cap, this is exactly the pen which I've intended. And then I thought this would write this way, but the reality was different. So I hope you have did this activity and written. Okay, I trust that tell you guys the way in which you see a product and way in which it is comes out is little different. Okay, let's understand what happened before when we choose the product. Okay. Like let's say you would have thought that this is for a mobile stand. Maybe that's for also used as something else. The purpose could be different. It could be used as a pen stand, it could be used as a tablet stand. So anything what happened in your brain is actually trying to discover something whether it's okay for you or not. How do you discover that this is the exact function, this is exact requirement. What I got, okay? This is exactly called Discoverability. The ease in which the user can find the new feature or a functionality of a product is called Discoverability. Whether you were able to do it successfully, then the designer has made the justice. If you're not, it's a poor design. Okay, so that's the thing. The live activity has been done. I hope you would have taken notes. Okay, you can share with me in this video. I'll be going through each of your notes and giving you feedback. Don't worry. Okay, let's talk about digital world, because a lot of people are talking about digital world. See, earlier it was only line of commands and coding and programming. Over the time the graphical user interface came in 80s 90s. But until unless Don Norman, who is the designer of everyday things guy who really made this into a proper terminology called discoverability and then made it a difference. Okay, before that it was called a graphical user interface. People are using Coral Drop Photoshop at that time, they will know this GUI term. Okay, Right now it's not like that. The more interface voice from a tactile extended reality where you find air tap buttons. Interface has gone beyond. But the fundamentals remains the same. Are you able to discover this button is for this function? If it is yes, then the discoverability is super in that product. If it's taking time to understand, the designer has made a lot of mistakes. Let's say if you're using a voice Note in your WhatsApp. If you're not able to understand this is for recording the voice, you fail that this is for voice, then you should understand. Okay, I can record it. I can swipe up to make it hold for some time in order to speak for one minute. How the designer is able to communicate that through in this interface by choosing the right elements, right color, right texture, right depth and how the user is able to perceive it in her in his head. That is the success of a discoverability. What is your expectation? What is your seeing? What is your experience? It should all match. Then the discovery gets a feedback. Then it's a successful product. This is about digital interfaces, but let me give you a small scientific background about it. There is a cognition to first understand it. When we see this as a product, we understand this is for Toaster. Here is an image taken from Don Norman's example. What he classically gives. Here is the bread comes out. Here is the button, here is the up down. So people get a clarity in that this is how the bread comes out, this is how the button is. Then the product has been made A successful justice. Imagine if people have not seen this bread toaster in your country, in your region, in your village. Probably. If you're designing this for the first time, will you be able to design perfectly for them? If yes, then you understood what is discoverability. Anybody could replace in this design world. Okay. But if you're not congruent and strong in this basics topic, your design will not have so much of quality in making. Design is not about making some buttons. In Figma and Adobe XD design is way more different. It's about the problem solving ability. Let me give you some clarity in this. How it happens inside the brain. People perceive it first perception. This looks like a round. Can I turn this? They discovered that's the functionality. Okay, I can use this turn button to adjust my fan. See? And then cognition. Then they're thinking in the mind whether it will work or not. How does it work? Okay, round means should I press it or should I rotate it? Cognition. And then they take action and then they get feedback. Normally it's perceived as PCA. Perception, cognition, action. And when you take a neuroscience background, because anything if it is connected to brain, anything, it's connected to behavior. Anything is connected to design. These three things circle around in order to make a successful product interface. With ignoring these things, you cannot really design a proper interface. Okay, let me give you the cognitive background of it. See, when you design something like very difficult, too much difficult to discover. People get a cognitive bias when load. Have you seen product with so much of icons in the one screen, 20 icons, 30 icons. It's very difficult, right? Fairly cognitive load explains how the human brain really functions. We are only talking theory, guys. Let me show you a real time fact. It can improve their performance by 50%. You need to understand this. Have you seen some of the learning management systems and applications? The average course completion rate in Coursera and udemy is only 4 to 5% less than that. If the user interface is not discoverable enough proper and get the feedback, people will not engage in that platform for a longer amount of time. Okay. There are multiple other factors to it, but this is a major factor. 50% of the user performance comes down. Eye tracking Studies shows that 86% of the user fails to find the critical information when not designed in a proper way. 86 is very huge. Imagine when you're designing a website screen. It all matters. So that's the very reason we are explaining this kind of things now. Neuroscience is very interesting. Guys, what is this really going to do in my product design, in my user if the user is engaging for a longer time in your application, in your product, in your interface, if they are saying they're installing like let's say Facebook for the first time, if they're able to discover this is the page for posting. If they're able to discover this is a page for commenting. If the post is successful, if somebody is liking it and commenting, then they'll feel the dopamine hit. Then they'll see wow, I did it. That is the success. What you get as a measure of a successful discoverability, that's called a dopamine hit. Okay? Your brain focuses on that. If your user engagement is very bad, you will not get a positive user experience. Same goes for the visual processing. See your neuroscience research found that brain processes 60,000 times faster than a text. That's why people prefer icons, text illustration and all these things to really attract the people. If it's not done in a systematic way. I think you know this guy, he was the guy who was talking about Don Norman, okay, So I have to credit this guy because he's genuinely discovered this discoverability in his 90s and 95 when he was a cognitive scientist at Apple Behavioral lab. And then he understood how this can be mapped into the needs and wants of the user in order to make them discoverable. So study chef showed a lot of patterns how the usability could be revealed for this. Okay, A forester research found that whatever you invest in ux design in $1 it comes as 100% return. So imagine guys, in India a lot of industries are investing in ui, UX and product design across the globe I would say. But in India Every year 1 lakh designers are created, vacancies are coming. The point is every industry is feeling the importance now. It's not about the technicality and the functionality of the product, it's about how usable it is. See companies that invest in user centered Design have shown 228 percentage improvement than their competitors in the last 10 years. Let me tell you, the vacancy in which a designer is facing is very, very. And that makes it even more clearer that designers are really really needed. It's not only the UI designers or the UX designers, the graphic designer and a product designer. We are a problem solver using our techniques, what we are doing as a product. If you think that in the mind then this kind of terminologies will go very easy inside you. If you think I'll only do some graphics in Photoshop, Photo Figma, Adobe hd, this will look like a very alien topic for you if you resonate with what I told now type out in the chat of the video. Yes, I resonate with you. I know you're watching this video from a different part of the country, different part of the world at a different time zone. But I have a resonance like if you are resonating I can able to feel that if you type out in the chat. Yes, people are really getting this because when I interact with students they don't go into this level of basics to really make an interface or a product design like this. Many people miss it out. No colleges teaches you syllabus from discoverability, findability, searchability, affordance, all these things. It's your responsibility to understand how the users are feeling how you can make it even more better. I hope this video would have got a clarity and let me tell you guys, freshers and mid level designers are needed most in the industry now. I told you there are 1 lakh vacancies in design. If you learn things rightly and project yourself rightly and pitch to the people rightly Industries wants you more than you want them. Okay. So the. So the vacancy and the and the opportunities. What is there in front of a designer in this current world before three years is very different. So I wish you all the best to take these concepts and take it into getting results and let me know what you think about this in the video. Take care. All the best.