User insight is getting left out of product and UX decisions

Too many companies— 45%—are failing to properly integrate user research into the full product development lifecycle, despite this being a clear business growth lever.

In some organizations, our surveyed UX professionals are unable to demonstrate their impact on the finished design:

43% of organizations don’t have processes in place to make design and UX decisions based on feedback.

These companies are leaving users out of critical investment and product decisions, and that means they’re not getting the full benefit of their UX investment, and worse still, missing out on the financial gains of using real UX insights to shape their products and services.

These results are all the more surprising given that companies that integrate UX into the product development process see significant, measurable gains on key business metrics.

By margins of 30+ points, digital experience teams that consistently integrate user research in product development report a positive impact on customer satisfaction (80% to 50%) and brand perception (76% to 45%), compared to those that don’t.

On critical metrics that impact the bottom line—retention, conversion, and revenue—the teams that integrate user research in product development are roughly twice as likely to outperform those that don’t.

Our results highlight how critical it is to embed UX research throughout the product development life cycle. From the beginning, UX research enables you to gain assurance about your solution, tweak ideas based on viable feedback and transform good ideas into great ones.

Having a deeper understanding of the what, why, AND how of your users will also help power an insights-driven culture.

Truly customer-centric organizations have UX embedded in the culture. Every decision and priority is insight-driven from the top-down, with the user given a voice in the boardroom.

As Google's philosophy states:

"Focus on the user and all else will follow."