A step-by-step guide to creating a SaaS your audience will love.
As a tech startup, it is crucial for your SaaS to not only be of value to your users, but it also needs to be easy and intuitive to use. Good user experience (UX) isn't a 'nice-to-have' anymore, it's essential, and it's become a standard expectation.
Author:
Jessica Burn - UX Expert
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Designing a successful SaaS (Software as a Service) product is a challenging yet rewarding journey. It’s not just about building a great product—it's about creating an intuitive and delightful experience that users will love. A seamless user experience (UX) can make the difference between a product that thrives and one that flounders.
This guide covers:
Ideation and Market Research: Building a Strong Foundation
Define the Product Vision and Strategy: Set a Clear Path
Prototyping and Wireframing: Visualise the User Journey
User Testing and Validation: Fine-Tune Your Design
Development and MVP Launch: Bring Your Vision to Life
6. Post-Launch User Feedback and Iteration: The Journey Doesn’t End at Launch
Before we dive in, I want to highlight a very common trap that some people fall into. This trap is often what separates those who reach success quickly from those who either take much longer to get there (spending more time and money) or who never quite manage to succeed at all.
The trap:
For many, it’s tempting to jump straight from idea into development, believing this is the quickest route to success (because you’ll have the end product sooner). However, those who do this often skip crucial steps that lay the foundation and provide clear direction for their product. As a result, the chances of building a product that is confusing, frustrating, and lacks purpose are extremely high!
I’ve spent years helping teams build products and have seen first-hand the impact that following a clear, methodical plan can have on product success—versus not following a plan and spending time and money on identifying and fixing issues. Not to mention the endless debates about which direction to take!
No product is designed perfectly the first time around; it’s just not possible. Issues are often unknowingly designed into a product. Identifying and fixing them early provides the best return on investment (ROI).
“The average UI has some 40 flaws. Correcting the easiest 20 of these yields an average improvement in usability of 50%. The big win, however, occurs when usability is factored in from the beginning. This can yield efficiency improvements of over 700%.” (Landauer, 1995)
Imagine this: which scenario would you prefer?
Scenario 1: You follow a clear and well-thought-out plan that, at first glance, seems like it will take a long time to execute all the necessary steps before reaching the end goal—a product that’s ready to launch. BUT, you soon realise that the product is well-built, purposeful, and valuable. It offers an enjoyable, intuitive experience, and your audience loves it. Your user base is growing. Hooray!
OR
Scenario 2: You jump straight into development with minimal time spent on planning or building a deep understanding of your audience. Yes, you have your product in hand much sooner. BUT, you quickly find that the product is clunky, it doesn’t function intuitively, and its value isn’t clear. There’s very little engagement from your audience, and those who are using it aren’t enjoying the experience. Returning users are low, ratings are poor, and the reviews are painful to read. What went wrong? Now, you have to spend time and money investigating the issues and fixing problems that have been built into the product. This ultimately costs you more time and money than Scenario 1.
“The rule of thumb in many usability-aware organisations is that the cost-benefit ratio for usability is $1:$10-$100. Once a system is in development, correcting a problem costs 10 times as much as fixing the same problem in design. If the system has been released, it costs 100 times as much relative to fixing in design.” (Gilb, 1988)
If Scenario 1 is looking more attractive to you now, read on!
Without further ado, here’s a beginner-friendly guide on how to create a SaaS product that your users will find valuable, easy to use, and engaging.
(Please note, there is much more to learn about each of these steps to go through the process correctly and successfully. However, I hope this provides you with a baseline understanding of how to approach the development of your SaaS.)
1. Ideation and Market Research: Building a Strong Foundation
The first step in designing a successful SaaS product is to ensure that you're solving a real problem. A well-designed product won’t succeed if no one needs it in the first place.
Essentially, you need a concrete answer for this question “why would your audience care-about or buy your product?” To get your concrete answer, you run market research. Simple!
Define the Problem: Take time to articulate the specific problem your SaaS will solve. Are users struggling with disorganised data? Is there a tedious manual process you can automate? Focus on a pain point that genuinely affects your target audience. Bear in mind, at this point, this information is an assumption. You need to find out if your assumption is true. Enter market research.
Conduct Market Research: Use surveys, interviews, and competitive analysis to understand the landscape deeper and validate your assumption. Find out who your audience is, what they need, and what existing solutions might be missing. This research helps you identify opportunities for differentiation.
Create User Personas: Develop personas that represent different segments of your target users. This will help keep your product development focused on real needs and ensure you're building for the right people.
Why It Matters: Focusing on user needs from the beginning ensures that you’re not creating features just for the sake of it. Instead, every aspect of your product is aligned with solving real problems, reducing the risk of building something users don’t want. Essentially, it ensures you’re building a product based on facts, instead of what you THINK your users need (very risky territory!).
2. Define the Product Vision and Strategy: Set a Clear Path
Once you’ve validated your idea, it’s time to define what your product will be and how it will stand out.
Craft a Strong Value Proposition: What makes your product unique? Why should users choose it over others in the market? A clear value proposition will guide your design choices and help you communicate the product's benefits. Tip: Your market research and competitive analysis should give you your clear value proposition. If not, you need to repeat this step.
Prioritise Features Wisely: Not all features are created equal. Prioritise those that address the most critical pain points, balancing user needs with technical feasibility. Remember, the goal isn’t to launch with every possible feature but to focus on those that will create the most impact initially. You can always refine and add more features further down the line. By prioritising your features at this stage, it ensures you’re building something that your users value.
Why It Matters: A well-defined product vision ensures you remain focused on what truly matters to your users. This helps prevent “feature bloat,” which can lead to a cluttered and overwhelming user experience.
3. Prototyping and Wireframing: Visualise the User Journey
Before jumping into development, it’s crucial to visualise how users will interact with your product.
Wireframing: Start with simple sketches of key screens and user flows. Think about how users will navigate your product and what information they need at each step. Tip: First map out user flows of how your product will work, then create screens.
Develop Prototypes: Using tools like Figma or Sketch, create interactive prototypes. This allows you to simulate the user journey, letting stakeholders and potential users experience the product before any code is written.
Why It Matters: Prototyping helps you test your ideas with real users and get feedback early. This can prevent costly redesigns later in the development process by identifying usability issues before they become ingrained.
4. User Testing and Validation: Fine-Tune Your Design
User feedback is gold, especially before the full-scale development starts. Testing your prototype with real users provides invaluable insights into how your product feels in practice.
Conduct Usability Testing: Invite a small group of users that match your personas to test the prototype. Observe how they interact with your design and where they encounter friction.
Analyse and Iterate: Gather feedback, identify common pain points, and iterate on your design. Focus on refining the areas that caused confusion or frustration.
Why It Matters: By refining your design based on user feedback, you ensure that your product meets user expectations and feels intuitive. This saves time and resources by catching major usability issues before coding begins. Remember, it’s cheaper to change an issue in a design than in the developed product.
5. Development and MVP Launch: Bring Your Vision to Life
With a well-tested prototype in hand, it’s time to build and launch a Minimum Viable Product (MVP).
Agile Development: Work closely with developers in short, iterative sprints. This ensures that the product evolves as user feedback is integrated into the design.
Launch the MVP: Focus on delivering core functionalities that solve the most pressing user needs. Early adopters can provide valuable feedback that will guide future development.
Why It Matters: A user-friendly MVP can attract early users, provide a platform for gathering real-world feedback, and help you build a loyal user base. It’s your chance to make a great first impression.
6. Post-Launch User Feedback and Iteration: The Journey Doesn’t End at Launch
A SaaS product is never truly “done”—it evolves based on user needs and feedback.
Gather Analytics and Feedback: Use tools like Google Analytics, Mixpanel, or Hotjar to understand how users interact with your product. Complement this with in-app surveys or support chats to gather direct feedback.
Continuous Improvement: Use the insights you gather to refine and expand your product. Address user pain points, add new features based on demand, and ensure that the user experience remains smooth.
Why It Matters: By continuously iterating on your product, you demonstrate to users that you’re listening to their needs, which builds trust and loyalty. This keeps your product competitive and relevant. Ultimately, this keeps your users with you, rather than wandering off to a competitor!
Conclusion: Put your users at the heart of your SaaS product
Designing a successful SaaS product is all about understanding your users, focusing on their needs, and iterating based on feedback. From initial ideation to post-launch, every step in the journey should be guided by a commitment to creating a product that users find intuitive, valuable, and delightful.
By following these steps, you can set your SaaS product up for success and build something that makes a lasting impact in the market.
Remember, great design is never an afterthought—it's the core of what makes a SaaS product truly shine. With every decision you make about your design, ask yourself, “how does this benefit my users?”
Happy designing!
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