Is User Experience [UX] Becoming Customer Experience [CX]?

In the 1990s, Apple VP of Product Design Don Norman defined UX as "all aspects of the end user's interaction with the company, its services, and products." UX is a broad, and wide-reaching process teams use to create meaningful and relevant experiences. Broad and wide-reaching mean everything from branding, product design, packaging, marketing, usability, and functionality are tuned to deliver solutions to customer problems.    

"A product is more than the product. Any product is a cohesive, integrated set of experiences. Think through all stages of a product or service – from initial intentions through final reflections, from the first usage to help, service, and maintenance. Make them all work together seamlessly.

- Don Norman  

Harley Manning, VP of Research at Forrester, defines customer experience as "How customers perceive their interactions with your company." Customers are only sometimes users. When a VP of Marketing buys software to be used by thousands of employees, they may or may not use it. That example illustrates how UX and CX wrap together because if the software has poor UX design and employees don't use it, the VP's CX suffers. 

We’ve noticed a few differences in mindset, personality, and process between UX and CX, including:  

• Backgrounds
  UXers tend to have technical, design, or psychology resumes, while marketers and customer service backgrounds define most Xers.   

• Focus
  Users focus on improving sales and profits via ad campaigns, marketing, and customer service to create a stronger brand. In contrast, UXers focus on usability as their path to the same increased sales and profits ends.

• Vision
  CX looks at every customer experience nook and cranny, from acquisition channels to exit pages and surveys, while UX looks at particular apps, software, or web designs.   

• Industries
  While CX is spreading, retail, travel, and hospitality are where the term helped map and create loyalty programs based on experiences, while digital products use UX.    

• Survey Says
  Both groups use surveys to inform their efforts, but CXers tend to survey large groups asking big questions, while UXers want to know how smaller groups use their designs. 
  
  
   

Both UX and CX use research to achieve objectives even if their backgrounds, approaches, and methods differ. Trends such as the Internet of Things (IoT) push UX and CX closer because, in a multi-channel world, customers want a seamless experience where every touchpoint supports and enriches the experiences. The days of having one price online on a smartphone and another in your store are over.

I’m a graphic designer whose UX designs help our marketing and sales team craft rich customer experiences even as their feedback informs my next design. I think bottom-up, looking to create images and designs users find helpful. In contrast, the marketing and sales team uses research and data to craft messages, content, and branding to convert visitors into customers. So, you can see how UX and CX meet in the middle because we have the same result.

I'm a fan of the functionalist design school, particularly former Braun product designer Dieter Rams. Dieter's ten principles of good design create simple benchmarks for any product, service, or software:   

Good Design Is:  

• Innovative.  

• Makes products useful.  

• Is aesthetic.  

• Means products are understandable.  

• Unobtrusive.  

• Honest.  

• Long-lasting.  

• Essential to every detail.    

Dieter's last principle carries special meaning because it's easy to over-design, overthink, and make products from apps to scissors harder instead of easier to use. My UX design goals are to enhance, simplify, and create beautiful things people love, so remembering to use as little design as possible is something I think about a lot.

If you've never had a twenty-pound salmon fly by your head at Pike's Fish Market in Seattle, you're missing more than you realize. The wisecracking fishmongers at Pike's Place Fish Market make fish fly. Their owner John Yokoyama is so famous he's written When Fish Fly, a motivational book his team will gladly toss from their stock in the back and sign if you remember to duck.

Here's how LA Times writer Christopher Reynolds described his visit to Pike's Place Market:

Some locals grumble that the market has become too touristy, especially when the cruise crowds shuffle through in summer. But I didn't hear visitors complaining. Instead, most seemed busy basking in the market magic, which isn't magic. It's highly curated capitalism.

I love "curated capitalism" despite Christopher’s slightly snarky use because the phrase describes what we do now – we create highly curated capitalism. And that curation means the distinction between UX and CS may soon lack a meaningful difference if that sounds like I'm hedging my answer with a "yes and no" welcome to my and our world.