Ux And Growth Podcast

What makes for an effective design review? And how should designers be preparing for them? In this episode, we sit down with Tom Greever (Author of Articulating Design Decisions) to take a deep dive on the components of design meetings, and how designers should communicate their decisions. "I've heard it likened to a Rubiks Cube, where our job as designers is to solve for all sides of the cube, but the problem that we face is that we have that developer who comes in and is like 'Oh, I want this side to be red'. We bear the responsibility of making all these parties come together and realize that, by twisting one side, it messes up the other side. And we have to work together to solve the whole cube." — Tom at 34:03 Tom’s website: www.TomGreever.com Read Articulating Design Decisions: http://amzn.com/1491921560 Tom on Twitter: Twitter.com/tomgreever Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What makes Apple’s recent customer letter on iPhone privacy so important? How will data security play into future business strategies and customer purchase decisions? In this episode, we discuss the importance of encryption, the opportunity for companies to compete on security and trust, and the ethics of experimenting with users. "I actually see that as being a trend that will come out of this. We see companies have classically competed on features, or technology, or prices. Now they're competing on design. I think another thing we're going to see companies competing on is data security and respect for their users." — Austin at 19:16 Apple's Customer Letter: http://www.apple.com/customer-letter/ Facebook study: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/29/facebook-users-emotions-news-feeds UXPA Code of Ethics: https://uxpa.org/resources/uxpa-code-professional-conduct Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: T

What is Lean UX and how does it change the way that designers work? What are the most effective ways for design organizations to be structured? In this episode, Austin interviews Jeff Gothelf (Author of Lean UX & Sense and Respond) to take a deep dive on UX in the modern workplace and the future of design. "The goal for me is to illustrate to the folks that I'm speaking with, what the new focus of digital product and service design is. And it's not cranking out more features. It's not getting more stuff out the door and in front of customers. It's having a meaningful impact on customer behavior." — Jeff at 7:54 Jeff’s website: www.JeffGothelf.com Read Lean UX: www.LeanUXBook.com Read Sense and Respond: http://SenseAndRespond.co Jeff on Twitter: Twitter.com/jboogie Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What are the most effective SEO plays today and what are the best tools available? If you're running a business, how should you build your SEO strategy and hire talent to execute it? In this episode, we sit down with SEO expert Matthew Barby to discuss the tactics that he's seeing work best and where he believes SEO is going in the future. "One link from Entrepreneur literally may be better than 1,000 links from other random websites. Because if volume mattered, we'd just build new websites every day and not care about them. They wouldn't get any links. They'd be nothing. But it'd just be a volume game. That's how Google used to work." — Matthew at 17:55 Recommended reading: Moz Blog, HubSpot Blog, ViperChill, Backlinko. Recommended tools: BuzzSumo, Ahrefs, Majestic SEO, AccuRanker, Google Search Console, BuzzStream, URL Profiler. Matthew’s website: www.MatthewBarby.com Matthew on Twitter: Twitter.com/matthewbarby Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter

What is Growth Marketing and what are the most effective ways to do it? How does content, SEO, and persona creation play into growth? In this episode, we sit down with growth expert Anum Hussain to discuss the tactics that she's seen work best in her impressive career at HubSpot, where she took the Sidekick brand to market. "While all of these companies can sort of give a leading guideline as to things that are working, if you just mimic that same playbook, with the growth mindset it's really not going to work. Within the growth mindset, it's really about what your specific users want and how they're thinking about that in the context of how they're using your product." — Anum at 7:34 Anum's website: www.AnumHussain.com Anum on Twitter: Twitter.com/anum Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What were our biggest learnings in 2015? And how can they be applied in the coming years? In this episode, we cover what we've learned about factorial experiments, namespacing, A/A experiments, placebo tests, new user experience (NUX), work culture in the tech industry (and how it contrasts to work culture in Latin America), and more. "One thing about being 100% data all the way is that you do that and you start to take out the human side of it in the first place. So you start using data so much that you forget to solve for your customer. Activation rates, conversion rates, and lifetime value. They're not customers. Those aren't people." — Geoff at 25:00 Design is not Art article: http://austinknight.com/writing/design-is-not-art/ Austin's Top Product Design Lesson for 2016: https://studio.uxpin.com/blog/top-10-product-design-lessons-for-2016/ HubSpot Culture: http://CultureCode.com Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on

How important is site speed and what can you do to improve yours? As it turns out, the average user will abandon a site if it does not load within 3 seconds. So, what does this mean for you? In this episode, we discuss the importance of site speed and the ways in which anyone can quickly improve the performance of their site. "Amazon found out that if they were to slow down their page load time by 1 second, it would cost them $1.6 Billion per sales year. But this is not unique. If you take any high traffic leading tech company on the web right now, they will have published a study very similar to this." — Austin at 4:13 Google's PageSpeed Insights Rules: https://developers.google.com/speed/docs/insights/rules?hl=en Facebook's Technology Behind Preview Photos: https://code.facebook.com/posts/991252547593574/the-technology-behind-preview-photos/ Five Easy Ways to Speed up Your Website: http://austinknight.com/writing/five-easy-ways-to-speed-up-your-website/ HubSpot's Website Grader: https://website.grader.com

Are data-driven design and copycat culture destroying creativity on the web? Are designers oppressed by terrible content and templated frameworks? Or are we all complaining in an echo chamber? In this episode, we discuss the common sentiment that everything on the web looks the same. "This is kind of a good thing. We're actually training uses on a massive scale to recognize certain design patterns. And these design frameworks, it's also important to keep in mind, kind of came along as a natural progression out of necessity." — Matt at 33:08 Design Machines article: https://louderthanten.com/articles/story/design-machines Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What makes Adobe's new UX tool, Project Comet, so awesome for designers? What are the details behind the tool and it's unique features that are aimed at disrupting the entire UX toolset? In this episode, Austin sits down with Demian Borba (Product Manager at Adobe) to get an early look at Project Comet. “In my opinion, Project Comet will change everything. Everything that you just described is Comet, in one tool. We announced Comet at Adobe MAX and the feedback has been phenomenal. It went way beyond our expectations and that's just validation that what we're targeting is right.” — Demian at 14:13 Check out Project Comet: adobe.ly/comet Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

Is a college education really a prerequisite to working in UX and Tech? Is it acceptable to copy design ideas from best-in-class companies and direct competitors? In this episode, we discuss some of the biggest myths in UX and share our thoughts on the bold philosophy behind Google's hiring process. “They're really screening for specific qualities that are much more related to results and what you can actually do, than they are to credentials. I think that this represents a huge shift in the way that we hire at the world's leading tech companies.” — Austin at 8:23 Google article: http://qz.com/180247/why-google-doesnt-care-about-hiring-top-college-graduates/ Imposter Syndrome article: http://product.hubspot.com/blog/engineering-challenge-impostor-syndrome Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What is statistical significance and why is it so critical to the success of experiments? What are some things that you can do to ensure that you're collecting reliable, true data? In this episode, we break down statistical significance and quality data collection. Plus, an update on the LinkedIn Dark Patterns from our first episode! "Ultimately, you want to be able to confidently say, 'when we do other experiments, this conclusion that we came to is going to stay the same'. Because you don't want to have to keep going back and testing the same assumptions over and over again." — Geoff at 20:47 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

We're back from INBOUND! What is it like to design and launch a site seen by millions of people every month? And how do you run the highly effective experiments that can get you to that level? In this episode, we discuss the new HubSpot.com home page and the battle-tested experiments that push sites of all sizes forward. “Many people would approach a home page redesign and say 'okay, we'll collect some data, we'll user test it, launch a design, and then we're done!' Actually, for my team, getting to the launch was about 25% of the work that we'll do before we reach another large iteration.” — Austin at 7:07 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What are the qualities and skillsets that the world's best companies look for in candidates? How can you position yourself or your company to win in the recruiting game? In this episode, recruiting expert and ThinkB1G founder Mike Gaiss shares insider tips for hiring the best talent and getting hired into the best companies. “Startups are not that interested in hiring candidates that are 'just looking for a job.' They're looking for passion, intellectual curiosity, somebody that is always trying new things. Part of that is because these companies require you to often times wear a lot of hats and pick up skills on the fly.” — Mike at 7:07 Visit ThinkB1G: www.ThinkB1G.com Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What are the differences between popups and modals? More importantly, why are they so widely used despite the fact that they're so ineffective? In this episode, we'll discuss the history of popups and modals, what makes them ineffective, and how anyone can create an effective modal with the right approach. “I always feel very warm inside whenever a modal cares about me so much that it asks for all of my personal information immediately. That's like if I met somebody new and the first thing I said was 'Hey, I'm Geoff, can I borrow like ten dollars?' I would never see them again.” — Geoff at 32:16 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

What are the best UX and Growth tools at our disposal today and what are the differences between them? How does the UX process differ from the Growth process and what should you be doing in your organization? In this episode, we answer these questions and more by giving an overview of our own tools and processes. "Because ultimately, what it comes down to is how you use that process and understand the relationship between each step of the process and each tool with that step. And if you don't know that, then you're just taking longer to get to the same result, which is an uninformed design." — Austin at 9:20 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

Why do startups fail? What are the best ways to scale up and grow your customer base? How do you test and verify new business ideas? In this episode, we're joined by Brian Balfour (VP of Growth at HubSpot) to discuss different user acquisition and growth tactics, as well as the major mistakes that all startups should avoid. "The landscape of user acquisition is rapidly changing. And it's actually changing at an accelerating rate. More and more platforms are becoming available to us and their cycle of peak effectiveness to depreciation is becoming faster and faster." — Brian at 3:25 Visit Brian's website: www.Coelevate.com Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

User Experience exists not only in the digital medium, but also in the human interactions that companies have with their customers. Personal phone calls, notes, and even tweets can be defining moments in a purchasing experience. In this episode, we discuss different ways that companies practice human to human UX. "Your user experience also exists outside of your website, outside of your product. It exists in all of the interactions that you have with your user. And regardless of whether or not you're intentionally making those interactions good or bad, they will be perceived by the customer." — Austin at 8:09 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

Onboarding is the process of introducing a user to a new software, app, website, or feature update. It is commonly cited as the most critical component to retaining users and is essential to the success of businesses of any size. In this episode, we share our thoughts and expertise on the best practices for onboarding. "One option is to make users do something that challenges them; example is Duolingo. One is 'Batman Onboarding', which means that the onboarding doesn't show up until the user needs it; example is Slack. And the third is that you simply create an intuitive product; example is Atlassian." — Geoff at 36:57 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

As technology and devices have evolved, many new trends have made their way into design. How should we think about these trends? When should we use them? What makes them effective or ineffective? In this episode, we break down everything from parallax to the hamburger menu, and discuss the right way to handle trends. "Should you take an exact carbon copy of an experience and just paste it onto your website? Is that going to have the same wow factor and is it going to be effective? I think that whenever you find yourself in a situation where you want to do that, you have to stop and ask, 'why am I doing this?'" — Matt at 34:20 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault

A shocking study published by comScore found that most smartphone users download an average of zero apps per moth. What does this mean for app developers and entrepreneurs? In this episode, we bust out the cold hard facts and take a look at what the app market really looks like. “Let’s pretend that you’re a new app that’s entering the market. The first thing that you need to do is analyze the actual market that you’re entering into. What is the problem that you’re solving? Validate that there is a need for that problem to be solved.” — Matt at 17:28 Email us: Hello@UXandGrowth.com Austin on Twitter: Twitter.com/ustinKnight Geoff on Twitter: Twitter.com/dailydaigle Matt on Twitter: Twitter.com/mattrheault