What is in a user persona template? Why are they absolutely essential to an effective UX design strategy?

Think back to kindergarten when your teacher told you that everyone’s special in their own way. As much as adulthood tries to tell us otherwise, it’s actually true. 

Each person you encounter has unique wants, needs, thought processes, and problem-solving methods. This is why there’s no way to create a digital product that solves the needs of every person on the planet.

We’re all too complex for a catch-all solution that works for everyone. But, with a good user persona template, you can find out how to satisfy the needs of a specific audience.

A user persona puts a human face to the data used to build digital products. They help designers visualize the person using the finished product and create solutions suited to their abilities. But what kind of information does a user persona template cover?

What’s in a User Persona Template?

• The basics
• Goals
• Pain points
• Personality
• Scenarios
• Quotes
• Fun facts

What is a User Persona?

A user persona is a fancy way of saying a profile of your intended user. It contains different sets of information, from basic demographics to nuances or quirks. When you use all that info as a guide for building your product, you can find a way to cater to your target user’s most basic wants, needs, and instincts.

Pretend you’re buying a gift for someone. Think about how much easier it is to shop for your best friend instead of that uncle you only see once a year during the holidays. That’s because you understand your best friend on a deep, emotional level (which helps you find a gift that’s super meaningful to them).

That doesn’t mean you have to take your user out for beers to get to know each other better (unless you want to…we won’t judge). But you need to go straight to the source to find out who they are and how they solve problems.

Read more about UX personas in our blog!

UX Personas vs Buyer Personas

This one’s for our marketing friends…

Another term you’ll probably hear used interchangeably with user personas is buyer personas. And it’s easy to see why the two get confused. A buyer persona covers all the same ground, but with a different end goal (sometimes).

The endgame of a buyer persona is to get customers that closely match the profile to buy the product. For example, if your company sells hard seltzers, you probably wouldn’t tap into a scotch enthusiasts club to figure out what your next delicious, fruity flavor should be. 

Instead, you’d probably survey the customers at places that sell lots of White Claws (nightclubs, beach bars, etc). That’s not to say there aren’t scotch drinkers that enjoy the occasional seltzer, but you’ll want to cater to your most frequent, loyal customers.

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With the vast digital marketplaces online and an e-commerce store for every product under the sun, your buyers can ALSO be your users. This is why you’ll see the two terms used interchangeably so often.

Let’s say your brand of handmade, craft ingredient seltzers isn’t sold in most big box retail stores. You’ll need to figure out how to market your brand to your target demographic and come up with the easiest way for them to buy your product online. This is where these two personas become one.

The Value of User Personas

As a UX design agency, we love user personas because they give us insight into what we don’t know. Since we aren’t experts in the fields our clients come from, we rely on heavy research to build our user-friendly designs.

We can understand quite a bit about industries and best practices from talking with our clients. But we find out everything we need to know about creating the product itself from user personas.

User personas have a huge impact on the success or failure of digital products. In fact, according to this recent marketing blog, user personas made websites 2-5 times more usable than before.

When you understand how the user thinks and how they go about achieving their goals, you can tailor your product according to their needs and get rid of pain points before they become big problems.

Now, you probably think this means that all you have to do is some googling to create this fictional person, right? HECK NO!

UX design without robust user research isn’t UX design at all. It’s just design for the sake of design. And the biggest part of that user research is the face-to-face time you get with the user!

The feedback you get from user interviews is the heart and soul of your product — the human touch that technology needs to resonate with real people.

So, say it once more with feeling…A user persona is not a replacement for user interviews!

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What's in a User Persona Template?

A user persona template dives deep into the traits of your future users. Instead of just focusing on their basic information or buying habits, you see what makes them tick. Not every user persona template covers the same ground, but here are a few ideas to help you build one.

The Basics

Probably the least interesting ground to cover, but important nonetheless. Every user persona template should establish some basic demographic information like:

• Name
• Age
• Occupation
• Location
• Marital Status
• Family Life

This quick snapshot of your user doesn’t get super deep but it gets the wheels turning. It lets you imagine what their day-to-day life looks like and the role digital products might play in it.

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The Goals

We all have hopes, dreams, and aspirations for ourselves. You probably can’t help your user become the next President of the United States, but you can certainly help them by creating a digital product that helps them accomplish smaller goals and tasks.

Your mission is to find common goals and jobs to be done amongst your target demographic and narrow down which ones are attainable with your product.

Let's say some potential users we interviewed were single women in their late 20s living in a major metropolitan area. Some of their goals were unique to them, but there were a few that overlapped:

• I want a promotion at my job by this time next year.
• I want to travel the world and make interesting new friends.
• I want to find a way to make data entry less boring at work.
• I want to get VIP access to the exclusive club that opened downtown.

Now, you probably can’t help these ladies with that special promotion or get them into the hot new nightclub. But, depending on what kind of company you work for, you can probably create a product that streamlines data entry or finds cheap flights to anywhere in the world.

An effective method of shaping out persona goals is to treat it like the user is “hiring” your product to help them complete a job. Why should they choose yours? The job that needs to be done using your product should be an exact match for the user’s needs.

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Pain Points

No matter how much your users have in common, that doesn’t mean they think the same way (or follow the same path to reaching their goals).

For your product to serve its purpose for the user, you need to consider the roadblocks they may encounter along the way. Ask yourself: What keeps the user from accomplishing their goals?

Let’s go back to our late-20s career girl. Data entry is easily the worst, most time-consuming part of her day. But why is that?:

• Outdated technology
• Bad mobile experience
• Complicated data integration
• Repetitive entry

Think about how your product could fix these problems, speed up the process, and make her more productive at her job.

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Personality

How does someone’s personality affect their problem-solving skills? And how can you use those nuances to guide your product design? Pay attention to how the user behaves when you interview them. 

Were they ready and willing to give their open and honest feedback or were they sugarcoating everything so they didn’t sound too harsh? Were they more focused on ease of use or the look and feel of the product?

Building your product around these aspects will make the user feel like you’re catering to their most basic instincts, making it much easier to incorporate the product into their everyday lives.

• Introverted vs extroverted
• Left-brain vs right-brain
• Active vs passive
• Analytical vs impulsive
• Ambitious vs modest
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Scenarios

The circumstances around the reason that a person is using your product play an important role in user psychology.

For example, the desktop version of your product could be a dream to use. But if the mobile version was an afterthought and the user is ALWAYS on the go…that could pose a big problem.

Carefully consider when and where your target users are interacting with your product and how they are feeling while using it.

Looking at our 20-somethings career girl again, we already know she’s dreading the tedious data entry at her job. You may not be able to change how she feels about the task, but you can certainly empathize with her feelings and cut down on as many steps as possible.

Similarly, how might she feel while looking for flight prices to her dream destination? Excited, nervous, curious? How can you amplify those positive feelings and reduce the negative ones?

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Quotes

You can glean a lot about a person from their self-reported personality traits, but quotes let you see those traits in action.

Quotes are the best supporting information for your personality profile because they give you a sense of how your future user thinks and communicates. The more unfiltered the quote, the better.

Take a look at this quote:

“I just want to buy something. Why do I have to log in? Why do I have to find a stylist? I just want to buy the damn thing.”

Is the quote harsh? Maybe. But does it give you a clear picture of the type of user that frequents your product and what they’re thinking while using it? Oh yeah, it does.

Repeat after us again…Negative feedback is still usable feedback!

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Fun Facts

Because we’re all about making UX personas fun here at CreateApe 😉

The info listed so far gives you a pretty clear picture of what your user is like and how to cater to their basic instincts. However, there’s nothing wrong with getting a few extra tidbits of information for a more intimate view into their everyday lives.

Fun facts are also a great icebreaker during user interviews. Talking about themselves and their favorite things will make the user feel more comfortable during their interview and less hesitant about sharing their thoughts and opinions.

• Myers-Briggs type
• Brands they love/hate and why?
• Astrological sign
• Hobbies
• Favorite movies/TV shows
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So, How do I Build a Template?

There are plenty of premade user persona templates online covering all this information (and then some). We also have a CreateApe-approved version you can download here!

User Persona Template by CreateApeDownload

With all these ideas and pointers, building your own user persona template is a breeze! Face-to-face time with your future user is invaluable when creating an effective digital product. So use that time and the information you gather to your full advantage.

Remember that user personas are a small portion of your UX design strategy, and there are several moving parts when bringing a digital product to life.

Want some help creating a user persona template for your specific project? Need a guide for building your UX design strategy? Start a project with us today!

Sometimes the best way to recognize and make up for our mistakes is to laugh at them first. That’s what the sub-reddit /r/assholedesign is for, to call out the UX and industrial designer that insists on making people’s lives harder. Almost everyone’s been subjected to the great feat of simply trying to cancel your account only to be met with a thousand step procedure or a technological design that just complicates or confuses the process. That’s why this sub-reddit hits the mark.

As an offshoot of the popular sub-reddit /r/CrappyDesign that features everything from signs, advertising, and third grade projects gone wrong, /r/assholedesign has over 400,000 subscribers who delight in the humor of “designers who know exactly what they’re doing…but they don’t care because they’re assholes.” The site serves as a place to shame bad design varying from architecture, packaging, and web interface.

Some of the posts will have you wondering what the conversation was like in the design meeting. I can only envision “Ah, let’s make it harder by adding three steps, or better yet, let’s make the unsubscribe button invisible!”

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According to the moderators, “satire is ridicule of asshole design techniques” and the amusement of posters reveals exactly that. Not only does it intend to amuse, but the sub-reddit reveals dark patterns in design, “tricks used in websites and apps that make you buy or sign up for things you didn’t mean to.” These patterns have implications for society, but also for the future of design.

This guy is definitely a subscriber of /r/assholedesign:

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Doesn’t everybody love a classic dark pattern?

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We need this type of sub-reddit because sometimes, even professionals need a reminder of what and what not to do. Anyone with an iPhone 6 or above feels this struggle when trying to listen with their headphones and charge their phone at the same time (that’s some serious “asshole” design).

Although framed in a comical way, /r/assholedesign reminds us that looking at our failures in a UX/UI community allow designers to focus on designs that make the experience better, and not worse, for the user. Laughing at our mistakes and old designs help us grow as a group of professionals. We’ll be the first to admit that sometimes a lesson needs to accompanied with a good laugh.

Make the most of your online product with a UI/UX evaluation.

Designing with a specific purpose in mind is a fast track to profit, especially when you know what needs to be fixed. We’ll take a closer look at how Amazon used a UI/UX evaluation to make millions from one seemingly minor change.

At this point, we’re sure everyone’s well aware of the now larger-than-life corporation dominating the online marketplace, but there’s a reason why the company saw an 18,233% increase in online sales across their first 20 years.

Amazon built themselves through informed decision-making by constantly performing UX evaluations on their own site. They focused on improving where they believed it mattered the most and continued to enhance in a constant growth cycle.

Their logo, for example, underwent two drastic iterations before the one we see today. They completely redesigned and expanded upon their site over 15 years. Though this isn’t the focus of this success story.

Around the middle of their growth, Amazon decided to change a single button. This change required the insight given by numerous UX evaluations to point them in exactly the right direction.

They performed four key steps when evaluating their site, and it’s the very same process CreateApe uses when conducting UI/UX evaluations:

• Research
• Analysis
• Recommendations
• Planning
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Research

Much like most things, Amazon wasn’t perfect. They had a massive problem regarding their checkout process, but the issue wasn’t apparent at first – the corporation merely noticed something was causing customers to abandon their carts.

Amazon decided to look a bit further into why they were experiencing such a high bounce rate around checkout.

This stage of the UI/UX evaluation revolves around the gathering of information. The goal is to learn about the users, competitors, and potential usability issues to get the best possible idea of where to start analyzing.

Think of it like a map. At a glance, it’s just a myriad of lines that offer too much information to go by. However, if you have a destination in mind, you can focus on a specific area and avoid data overload.

The research process is, by far, one of the most important aspects of a UX evaluation because it focuses your attention on what needs to be done.

Analysis

By working with UX consultants and tools like Google Analytics, Hotjar, and Usability Hub to turn that initial concern into insight, the now multi-billion dollar company noticed a glaring issue regarding the aforementioned process.

During the middle of Amazon’s lifetime, people would generally treat them like any other website. Some users just didn’t want to create an account, so why force them? The site unknowingly perpetuated the problem by bringing up a menu, requiring the user to log in or register during checkout.

A substantial amount of people were lost due to them forgetting login information or outright not wanting to create an account.

Especially around the early stages of online ordering, requesting user information often led to first-time shoppers abandoning their carts. Not to mention Amazon noticed roughly 160,000 “forgot password” page results each day.

For perspective, this was back in 2009 and roughly three stadiums worth of people had problems daily.

Online shopping has increased by around 800% since then. With 2.14 billion online shoppers now in the mix, the stakes are much higher to get things just right.

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Thinking back to the map example, imagine this step as connecting the dots between two locations. You now have a better idea of where you are, and you know where you’re going.

Moving forward, Amazon now knew where to go, and so they went.

Recommendation

If you were in Amazon’s shoes, what would this problem look like? 

A several-million dollar corporation wanted to fix a menu to make sure potential customers don’t abandon their carts.

Amazon could’ve gone about solving this in almost any direction they wanted. If they thought it was necessary to redesign the entire website, then that’s what they would’ve done.

However, it was up to the decision-makers to listen to the advice given by UX consultants, and the UI/UX evaluation process provided those recommendations in order to solve the problem as effortlessly as possible.

These recommended alternatives are based on the insight created from the analysis process. To reiterate, Amazon could’ve chosen to do any number of things to fix this problem. They took the recommendations of those with industry experience to see which process could fix it most effectively.

Imagine this step as choosing the path forward on the map. At this point you know the start, the end, and now you’re finding out the best way to get there.

To get from point A to point B, the company listened to their UX consultants.

Planning

The pros made the recommendation to change just one word.

All they did was replace the “register” button with “continue” on the same menu that popped up on checkout.

The seemingly minuscule change allowed users to complete a transaction without creating or logging into an account, resulting in a drastically increased engagement rate as users wouldn’t abandon their carts as often.

This surgical replacement of a single word in a button would result in a $300 million increase in yearly revenue.

On the map, we’ve arrived at our destination in the most efficient way possible.

Where To Start With Your UX/UI Evaluation

The UI/UX evaluation process exists to put your site on the right track.

For example, our partners at DigitalPosition hired us to optimize and fix their website. Even with the request being fulfilled in Q4, the website saw a 133% increase in overall success. Their conversion rates had reportedly skyrocketed, resulting in a strong end to 2021.

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With that said, we make it our mission to research the best possible methods, and move forward with a clear goal in mind to make your website the best it can be.

Every site has aspects of it that can be fine-tuned or even entirely redesigned, but ultimately it’s up to you on how to proceed. Perhaps you don’t need an entire overhaul, and your million-dollar button is just waiting to be found.

Or on the flip side, maybe a total redesign is just what your site needs.

We have the industry experience, specialized tools, and tried-and-true processes in place to prove which would work for you.

CreateApe offers you a broad, yet focused view of your project through actionable ideas to enhance your product with proven data in mind and your success in hand.

Without something to back up an idea, the design is created for the sake of design, and CreateApe can put purpose in your website with user-backed data that speaks for itself.

It’s a jungle out there, and we’ll be your guide.

Gamification in UX is exactly what it sounds like — incorporating game mechanics into your digital product! It’s steadily growing in popularity, but what makes it so powerful? And why are so many web/app designers rushing to gamify their interfaces?

Think back to elementary or middle school. Maybe you had a teacher that liked to play review games with the class before a test. Did they want you to cut loose and have fun? Or was there an ulterior motive?

The International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education shows that gamification increased retention by 12% and overall performance by 7%. If you add an incentive (tangible or intangible), you're giving someone extra motivation to participate and improve. In layman's terms, people are more receptive when they're having fun!

Gamification is a great way to ensure a pleasurable UX because the interface focuses on positive reinforcement. When used right, it holds the user’s attention, helps them understand the interface’s function, and boosts your brand’s identity and reputation.

Whether your product is learning-based or not, you can incorporate game mechanics into non-game products in subtle and clever ways. Let’s look at the concepts behind gamification in UX and how to use them to create a user-centered experience.

Goals

UX is all about the user's goals. If they are trying to learn a new skill, book a hotel room for the weekend, or browse your e-commerce store, they have goals they want to accomplish with your site. Interfaces with an excellent user experience are aware of the user's goals and have easy, creative ways to solve problems.

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Competition

Humans are competitive by nature. A UX that taps into our primal instinct is a surefire way to keep your user engaged. For some, competition motivates them because it satisfies a need to win. If they can win within your interface, they walk away feeling gratified. Healthy competition encourages users to improve and often excel past their initial goal.

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Progress

Motivation drives us to achieve our goals — and knowing we are progressing helps fuel that fire in us. It helps when users know they are on the right track to completing their goals. If they know they’re getting better each time they use your interface, they’ll feel inspired to come back.

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Reward

Gamification inspires loyalty and lets you give back to your users! Rewards (real or digital) are a tangible way to let users know they overcame a challenge or completed a goal. If you offer a reward, you give them the extra push to complete their journey and become repeat users.
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Conclusion

Games transcend demographics by appealing to our natural desire to have fun! If you’re a 14-year-old boy playing Call of Duty or a 60-year-old woman playing Words with Friends, we all enjoy a good game. 

By building your site or mobile app around the concepts behind games, you elevate your user experience into something far more enjoyable.

When you’re planning out your interface, think about how you can incorporate game elements to make your experience interactive. It could be something as simple as giving your user a “Top Fan” badge or a challenge to unlock a new feature. 

Give your user something to aspire to while using your product!

Need some help gamifying your website and mobile app? Our apes are on standby and ready to play! Start a project with us today!

This week we wanted to share a great article from the desk of our founder Alessandro Fard. Read on to learn more about user experience storytelling.

Isn’t it bananas how fast Apple releases a new and improved product every quarter? Ever wonder why they are even able to sell those new products so rapidly after just launching the last one? What makes consumers go back for those new and improved products? Hint: it is not the advertising of words that Apple spends on; it’s the experience that keeps the consumer coming back for more.

I mean think about it, you get a new phone with an amazing camera on it and you think that it is the best of the best in the world, but then Apple comes out with an even better phone than yours and all of a sudden you need to see for yourself how the grass is greener! Apple doesn’t need to dazzle you with words, you just know and expect that the newer product will be even better. Each. And EVERY. Time!!!!!

Welp, ladies and gents…that experience, that expectation, that innovative mindset, and branding is what marketing has evolved into. You can thank Apple for setting that bar so high…jk! ?

But in all honesty, marketing is no longer just a play on words and creative campaigns. It has converged into a massive beast that we like to call experience.

Marketing Then v. Now

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Back in the 60s a brand’s communication strategy was separate from the design of the product or service. Today, both branches collide, collaborate, and produce the product and design together for a successful service or product launch. As a result, products and services must deliver engaging stories, deepen customer engagement, and organizations must structure creative teams differently in order to grow revenues.

Alongside these changes is the task of delivering the experience to multiple platforms within a network of multiple brands. Whereas in the 60s you really only had the TV, radio, or newspaper as your communication channels; nowadays there is that plus websites, social media, blogging, stories, videos, podcasts, and more. The complexity can be challenging and intimidating when marketing for every platform, but it also gives organizations great tools to get creative and collaborate with their team about the product or service, and an even greater experience for their diverse audience.

Calling Allllll Teams!

So what should teams look like if not separate anymore?

As my peeps at UX Magazine so nicely put it, “marketing and product teams need to work more closely. Copywriting and story teams need to collaborate with user experience teams. Likewise, interaction and interface designers, rooted in human need and usability, need to work in integrated ways with marketing and advertising creatives.”

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In other words, everyone works with everyone. Don’t separate your teams, as difficult as it can be to have everyone stirring the same pot, it is what makes the difference in your campaign strategy because it will be so uniquely progressed through multiple layers, professionals, and creative mindsets.

I want to encourage you to switch it up and take the challenge of team collaboration beyond designated branches. It will greatly impact your product or service to more meaningful, relevant connections with your consumers.

10 Paradigm Shifts to Part With

What you create is more important than how you create it.

There are so many tools to get you to the finish line of designing a masterpiece, each and every one to ease the process. That being said, keep in mind that the tools or methods you use don’t matter as much as the finished product does. Don’t try to dazzle your clients with how fast your turnaround rate is, take your time to create something that matters beyond what has been requested of you.

Your brand must be built around a meaningful idea, not the other way around.

Everyone is branding themselves these days on social media, but a true brand begins with a meaningful, purposeful idea. Don’t let the filters, grids, and logos drive your brand, but instead the mindset and goal should be the focus. What is the meaning of this brand? Why is it important to consumers? What does it feel/look like long term?

Maximize the benefit of your brand.

Dive deep into the benefit of your product/service brand. People want to know why your service or product is necessary and what it will help them achieve. Don’t just settle for the best on the market, because let’s face it…there is always better out there or the next best upgrade. Truly conveying why a product/service is going to benefit a consumer is the best way to maximize your brand. Apple doesn’t claim to be the best cell phone in the market, they capitalize on what the cell phone features and the type of consumer that would love it.

Own your craft, don’t settle for average.

Take the time to own your craft, focus on those small details that set you apart from the rest, choose to make the experience one that keeps consumers coming back again. Chances are if they’re coming back, they’re likely to share that to other consumers creating that domino effect that can happen through well crafted design.

Charm them with simplicity.

Less is always more. Charm can be extravagant, but those grand romantic gestures in movies that are way over the top–yeah those aren’t a win in design. Think about the speed of life lately, everyone only has a few minutes to do things, the faster, easier, and simpler the better when it comes to interface and design flow.

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Continually assess your strategy.

With technology shifts and social media trends changing on what seems like every day, it is important to reassess, improve, and reinvent what you’re delivering to your customers and the methods you are using to do so. I like to take some time at the end of every month to assess what worked really well, what could be improved, and what was a bust.

Update only what is necessary and keep what is working.

I know it is redundant considering number 6, but assessing and changing the version are really two separate parts. Version upgrades and updates can both increase or harm your customer base. Consider all personas when updating what is not working, and also when deciding what is working. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!”

Remember social media goes both ways, beware of creating bad rapport with clients.

If you’ve been to high school you know the role that social media plays in destroying and raising ego. Needless to say, it is all too easy for consumers to completely defame a company or any entity. The best way to mitigate that is by ensuring that the client/consumer doesn’t feel fooled or wronged through faulty promises/products. Don’t create crap that creates crap!

Keep the core brand promise.

Let’s face it, sometimes we get too creative and lose sight of the central truth that a brand was developed for. We want to create art that impacts without considering the impact itself to be the core truth about a product or service. In my experience it is far better to create around a central truth, than to create and then try to apply that truth to what you magnificently created.

Be a trendsetter, not a copycat.

It was true when your mama told you, and it’s still true today. Stand out means not blending in. Blending in means copying what’s being done. There is not one client design that is similar to another in my portfolio, and for good reason. I truly believe that every product or service has something unique to offer, and it’s up to me and my team to find that out. Thinking outside the box is truly an art that I’ve come to master and love. The more personalized the better rapport with clients, the better experience with consumers, the better product design, the clearer the focus, and so on..

Create the Experience

In order to create the experience and succeed in branding, both product development and campaign marketing teams must work together, collaborate, and reinvent the experience to match the story and core brand. We’ve come a long way since the 60s, but the main thing has always been the main thing, tying them together into a story that results in a positive experience for consumers is the trend…and it looks as though it’s here to stay.

Addicting apps can launch any company into the limelight. But what makes an app addictive?

We might not all be attached to our smartphones, but we’ve all been sucked into an app at some point. Whether you're scrolling through your social media feed or swiping to find your next grand romance, none of us are immune to it.

The most addicting apps use the brilliant strategy of designing for our natural behaviors. They cater to our deepest desires to be entertained, educated, challenged, supported, or included.

Apps are everywhere because they are extremely lucrative digital products. Besides giving the user an easy way to accomplish a goal, they can make any unknown company a household name.

So, if you’re thinking about adding an app to your line of digital products, stay tuned. We’re going over the psychology behind addicting apps and how to create one yourself (with the help of a killer UX design team, of course)!

What Makes an App Addictive?

We all have needs, and the purpose of UX design is to ensure the needs of a certain audience are met. But what about our wants? 

Wants and needs intersect quite a bit. For some users, it's hard to draw distinctions between the two. For example, how many times have you ordered takeout from your favorite restaurant on Uber Eats because you were super hungry?

You NEED to eat, but you wanted pizza or Chinese food when you had perfectly good groceries in your fridge (but we’re not judging…).

Plenty of apps cater to our needs and help us accomplish our goals, but we don’t always use those in our daily lives. The most popular apps like TikTok, Candy Crush, Tinder, Spotify, and Uber Eats help us feed our desires every day.

Truth is, our wants motivate us just as much as (and sometimes more than) our needs. The most addicting apps realize this and are designed around our behaviors. As psychologist BJ Fogg said, “Put hot triggers in the path of motivated people.”

Using Behavioral Design To Keep Your Users Hooked

Fogg’s theories behind addictive mobile apps were heavily influenced by Aristotle. He recognized our natural urge to seek patterns along with the feeling of accomplishment when we connect the dots. Fogg applied these ideas to building software and developed a new design method called Behavioral Design.

The Fogg Behavior Model gives designers a clear formula for designing addicting apps:

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All three of these elements must align to influence the user’s behavior. If the desired action from the user does not occur, then it’s safe to say one of those elements is missing.

This model is super helpful in understanding human behavior in the real world. But, when an app is designed with these elements in mind, designers can create a truly immersive experience that keeps users scrolling for hours on end.

Now that we know what makes an app addictive, let’s look at a few fun, habit-building elements you can incorporate into your design.

How To Make Addicting Apps

So, what’s in the secret sauce of an addicting app? Why do people get sucked into a TikTok black hole until 3 AM? How do apps like Shien convince budget fashionistas to drop money on a new wardrobe haul every month?

You may not notice these design elements every time you open your favorite apps, but companies incorporate these subtle features into their interfaces to keep their users coming back for more.

Get To Know the User Through Onboarding

The average smartphone user has about 40 apps on their phone, but they only use 18 of them regularly. Why don’t they return to those apps after the initial download? An engaging onboarding experience might make all the difference.

Since it’s the user’s first impression of your company, onboarding should never be an afterthought.

The app’s onboarding experience needs to set the tone, show the user around, and demonstrate how you’re tailoring everything to their interests.

You can take a few different approaches to your onboarding process. But no matter which route you choose, your goal should be to gather as much relevant information about your user as possible while building excitement and interest in your product.

But you don’t want to overwhelm the user with too much information. Focus on highlighting core features and (if they’re in a rush) allow them to skip the less critical steps.

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Grab Their Attention With Push Notifications

In the olden days, people would get daily updates on the latest community happenings from the local newspaper. Top news stories, horoscopes, movie showtimes, the funnies…yep, they were all there.

Treat your users as a community wanting instant content updates. But instead of waiting for the daily newsletter, you can deliver the content they’re looking for straight to their phone with push notifications.

Push notifications are a great way to bring users back to your app even when they weren’t planning on using it — especially when you tailor your suggestions based on their activity.

How many times could you not resist reading an interesting Reddit thread while you were working? What about that serotonin rush you get from a “like” on Hinge? Push notifications demand the user’s attention and make your app hard to ignore (within reason, of course).

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Immerse the User With an Infinite Scroll

Your favorite social media apps have already mastered this. 

An infinite scroll creates what feels like an endless stream of content. It tricks the user into staying on the app longer because they’re bound to find something that piques their interest if they keep scrolling.

The longer the user stays on the app, the more you can learn about their interests. Using an algorithm to pick up on user behaviors helps you personalize your experience further after onboarding. 

Yes, the infinite scroll is addictive in concept alone. But remember: Your users have lives outside of your app. If they get TOO sucked into the experience, they can lose track of time, miss out on sleep, or feel anxious about the content slipping under their radar.

TikTok, an app with one of the most absorbing infinite scrolls, has great reminders for the user when they’ve been scrolling for too long. It’s a smart way to show the user that you care about their well-being, encouraging them to find a balance between the digital world and the real world.

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Reward the User With Gamification

Competitive or not, we all love games. They’re a great way to pass the time — making us feel challenged yet entertained.

The best thing about games is that their patterns can be applied to any kind of app to motivate the user. We in the UX field call this “Gamification”.

Some of the most addicting apps today use gamification elements for everyday tasks. The Starbucks app is a popular example because it rewards their most loyal customers for getting their daily coffee (as if Starbucks isn’t already addictive enough).

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Gamification doesn’t always have to include a tangible reward. Apps like Duolingo incorporate leaderboards to trigger our competitive side. Even if the user isn’t a competitive person, moving up the leaderboard makes them feel good about their progress in learning a new language. 

Feed the User’s FOMO Through Mounting Loss

Users will eventually tire of your app or outgrow the need for it. Us humans are fickle creatures and our interests are always shifting. So, how do you stop them from abandoning the app entirely for the next new thing?

You may have heard the term “mounting loss” in the context of business or financial situations, but it applies to digital products too. Basically, the more you use an app, the more you lose when you delete it.

This means that all the data you collect about the user, along with their images, messages, gamification points, coupons, etc. goes away and cannot be recovered.

To many users, this may be enough for them to not delete the app. But you might need to give them a little extra incentive to stick around. Discount codes, a free premium membership trial, or an account freeze gives them a reason to return when their attention goes elsewhere.

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Make Your App Impossible To Put Down

An addicting app can do wonders for a start-up, a Fortune 500 company, or anything in between. It’s all about understanding human psychology and applying it to your digital product design. 

Empathize with the user’s wants and needs, motivate them to achieve their goals, and make the actions they need to take as clear as day.

On top of everything, the app still needs to be easy to use! Cut out roadblocks, simplify navigation, and make it accessible for those on the go.

When you take all these factors into account and test with your users to get the final sign-off, you’ll have an app that’s sure to become a sensation.

Got an idea for an addicting app that just can’t stay in the drafts? Our digital product design team can help you make that thought a reality. Start a project with us today!