Introduction
A UX flowchart is a powerful tool to visualize the user’s journey. In the UX flowchart, the designer creates a series of screens that are easy for users to navigate. The design should be user-centered, meaning that it is geared towards providing an intuitive and satisfying experience for the user. This can also include making sure there are no hidden links or buttons that could cause frustration. Despite its usefulness, understanding and creating a UX flowchart can be challenging for flowchart newbies.
This article will provide you brief information about those UX flowcharts and step-by-step instructions on how to create them.
Overview Of UX Flowchart
What Is A UX Flowchart?
A user experience flowchart is a type of flowchart that helps visualize users' steps to complete a task or obtain a user goal on your website or app.
The path begins with the user’s entry point, like landing on the homepage and ends with the final action, like a purchase order confirmation.
Flowcharts are usually made at the start of the design process to prevent the risks of misunderstandings about design specifications and the need for reproduction.
The UX designers can evaluate and optimize the user experience more effectively with the proper visualizations. This helps increase customer conversion rates.
Applications And Advantages
UX flowcharts bring several benefits as follows:
First, a UX diagram is a perfect tool for communicating between product managers and team members.
Flowcharts help the team get a collective overview of the entire process and the members involved in each step. A crystal-clear view leads to better discussions and faster potential flaw detection processes.
Thus, the design team can effectively plan and divide the duties based on specific user task flows, context, and intent.
The UX flowcharts also assist in communication with other cross-functional departments. For instance, the marketing team can plan several campaigns to draw the visitors’ attention at the right point, increasing their engagement.
Another great advantage is the higher chance of getting acceptance from potential stakeholders. That is because the stakeholders can understand how your UX deliverables will ultimately appear and assess your product’s potential more efficiently.
How To Create A UX Flowchart From Scratch?
The simple steps to create a stunning UX flowchart are as follows:
Understand Your Target Client To Create An User Persona
The first step to designing an efficient UX flowchart is understanding your clients who are going to use the system and buy the products.
Target user research must be conducted to define the target audience, the needs, and the user behavior. After discovering why they look for your products, think about how users will access your system to introduce the proper entry points.
Note: it is necessary to have multiple flow starts if a product has more than a targeted client group. With the entry point(s) set out, you can start mapping out the next user actions on your site or app.
Create A Flow Outline
It is necessary to provide the user with the right information at the right time to optimize the engagement and conversion rate.
In-depth user research will help define what information the clients need and what actions they should take to complete their goals. So, keep digging and breaking down the user path into more detail.
Along with the client information, discuss the team's goals, such as member registration for your website.
That valuable information will help you draft your first user flow outline better. The outline should involve the three main stages: an entry point, the deliverables, and the final direction.
Define The Elements Of The User Flow
Designers deploy various shapes, connecting lines, and colors to display a unique but simple design element set within the user interface.
Each shape represents an action that a client needs to complete to achieve the goal. It also can be used to depict a thing, such as a homepage or confirmation page.
Asides from the shapes, choose the colors widely to help the reader easily identify and group the elements. Also, use color-coding rather than styling to highlight the important steps and potential user actions to make the flowchart design clearer.
One another critical thing is to position elements consistently and logically for an uncluttered design.
Note: it is a must to go through the design principles and business process management standards to get acquainted with the basic design perception, standard components, and styles. Those principles and standards help eliminate the confusion and guesswork.
Refine Your Outline
Produce some drafts based on your outline and selected design elements.
In this step, pay attention to the labels to ensure that they exactly describe what the user flow depicts. Besides, avoid using void capital letters within labels since this worsens the readability.
Additionally, keep the visual structure consistent by using the shapes and line elements for the sample purposes throughout the customer journey maps. A logical path makes the diagram easy to follow and reduces the risk of misleadings.
After completing drafts, deliver them to the other participants and internal stakeholders for feedback. Later, make suitable adjustments based on the feedback.
Use Your UX Flowchart For Better Communication
The final step in the UX flowchart developing process is to bring the diagram to life.
Ideally, the flowchart should stay on one page so the readers can envision the client path from beginning to end as comfortably as possible.
Getting visual design details on the same page is tough as each team involved will need different information types. However, try to complete this challenging UX design job because readers are likely distracted when flicking through multiple screens.
Examples Of UX Flowchart
User Flows
A user flow depicts the steps that a client takes through a website or an app. A simplified eCommerce flowchart is a typical example:
- The entry point will be landing on the product page of your eCommerce store.
- Then, the app users will view the product and its images.
- Later, they will read the product description and add it to the shopping cart.
- They might have an additional step to read feedback from other actual users if app features contain the review function.
- The client path ends when they exit your shop or confirm their purchase and checkout.
Task Flows
On the other hand, a task flow represents a specific client task within user flows. Here is a simple instance visualizing the shopping cart experience within the above user journey.
In the final step of the purchase process, users will view the chart and go to the checkout page. The opt-out step will include selecting the payment method and the shipping method.
After that, the store should move the users to the order summary page to confirm their purchase on the app screens.
