As web designers we have become infatuated with the term “user-experience”, why wouldn’t we? Designing for the user and their experience is the way it should be, user first, right? But we don’t necessarily believe that is where we should start or where the majority of the focus should be. The “user-experience” should be a part of a larger experience, an important part, but just a part. There are many facets that go into creating a successful website, the brand experience is really the summation of these parts. Brand experience and creating for it is something often taken for granted and even missed.
Brand experience isn’t a term you hear often, not one I believe ever said during any typical “web design conference”. It isn’t a new term and we by no means coined it, but it is vitally important; it is the starting point of our process. Brand experience is everything, it is the essence that is the entity that you are creating for; its message, tone, style, constituents, objectives, service, product, customer service, packaging, positives and negatives – as well as so much more. You are designing for that essence, for that brand experience; and ideally a great brand experience has a tremendous focus on their user-experience.
When designing for “Evian” for example, you are not designing for people who drink bottled water; you are designing for an organization that sells bottled water to people -- there is a bit of a distinction between the two. When designing for Evian, you have to capture that essence of the organization; an essence that is so much more than simply bottled water and the people who drink it. Is all bottled water created equal? Deer Park and Poland Spring might or might not say so; but Evian firmly believes not. Evian is more than simply bottled water, it is elegant, sophisticated, French, pure and perfect – the descriptors of the product are derived from the essence of the brand. The objective is to design for that essence; that style, that tone, that messaging first and foremost; those descriptors are of the brand essence, not of the consumers of the product.
In design, everything starts with the brand. The objective is always to design for the essence, message and style of a brand as it relates to the summation of parts; of which user-experience is very much a part.
Geof Harries
March 6th 2009
Hmmm. I see your point, but just wanted to raise a flag.
I believe, in some ways, the very notion of branding, at least in the traditional communications sense, is losing relevance. A carefully crafted message, tone, style, packaging, etc. is helpful to get customers to notice a product or service, but once those communication lines are opened, what’s next? More communications? Nah.
Customers need something to talk to companies about; something to use and experience. A suggestion for this is what the company is doing to continually improve their product or services for customers. If the product or service is being enriched for the sake of customer usage, then that’s user experience.
I guess it could all be rolled into “brand experience” but I still wouldn’t downplay the greater importance of user experience, especially in the long-run.
Martin Ringlein
March 6th 2009
Thanks for the insight Geoff; I think you make some good points.
I think the notion of branding hasn’t changed much in the past 100 years, but the marketing and promoting of brand messages have surly altered significantly. The brand experience is typically a constant, it is the many facets that compliment the brand that are ever changing, always helping to support and reinforce the brand essence.
The idea of the BMW for example doesn’t change from marketing campaign to website redesign to varieties of advertisements. The essence of BMW remains a constant and all of those supporting elements are supportive (or should be) of that brand essence. If BMW were to ask for a website that helps better appeal to the early retirement demographic, we don’t start by designing for older drivers; we start by embodying the essence of BMW first and tailoring that experience to better appeal to a particular demographic, optimizing the message if you will. But the design starts with the essence of BMW first.
Michael Dick
March 6th 2009
Designing for the brand experience is very important; Martin hit’s it right on the nose in this post.
I produce my best work when I completely feel and understand the brand before starting. When I understand the brand experience, I am able to capture that emotion/feeling and put it to Photoshop a lot easier.
From my view, both brand and user experience go hand in hand. A brand can only take someone so far emotionally, once a user/customer gets that far it’s up to the user-experience to finalize the whole experience, and bring brand and user experience together as one.
I think most large companies fail when bringing their brand online because they don’t design around their overall brand experience.