The Myth of No. of Clicks
In today’s ever-changing art world, product and UX designers may find it difficult to keep themselves up-to-date with the newest design trends. Sometimes people start following them blindly, without knowing the actual science or logic behind it, leading to terrible user experiences.
Good designs need a lot of research, talent, and creativity, costly for smaller companies. If you consider good designs as expensive, then you must know the cost of evil designs.
In my last company, I always used to have discussions on this topic with my mentor. She was one of the best UX Researchers that I have ever met, and she always spoke against the concept of data analytics without qualitative analysis.
Reading data from google analytics, focusing just on the user clicks, and considering it as a single source of truth is the worst thing that a Product Manager can ever do.
Apparently, this has become one of the most common discussions nowadays. In 2001, Jeffrey Zeldman, an American Web Designer, suggested that all the information be available on a website within three clicks. Furthermore, after 13 years, in 2014, Marissa Mayer, then CEO of Yahoo, said,
“Once you are in the app, is it two taps to do anything you want to do? If not, time to redesign the app”.
Still today, in 2020, you can hear people talking about no. of clicks without even digging deep down into the core issues of their high bounce rates. What is more fascinating is that if we take some time to look at the data, it shows us that the number of clicks has absolutely nothing to do with the product’s success. I think it has become the easiest way for a non-designer to criticize designers’ hard work.
You might also disagree with me when I say that more clicks for the users do not result in higher drop-off rates or increased dissatisfaction. Disagree, eh? I can see that dissented look on your face. Let me explain with an example :
If you have ever shopped on Amazon, you must have noticed that they ask you almost three times about your order, payment details, and address. Did you find that irritating? To give you the benefit of the doubt, let us assume that it annoyed you but did you stop shopping on Amazon solely because of that? I guess, “no.”
Moreover, surprisingly, no statistical shreds of evidence can prove this widely held belief as accurate. When deciding about the number of right-clicks for a task, it solely depends on the requirements regarding complexity, security, and usability.
Furthermore, in Amazon’s case, it is more about the customer’s final consent to avoid any hassle to change an address after the order is placed or, in the worst-case scenario — to cancel it. Moreover, once we start looking at clicks through this lens, we will increase conversion, reduce task time, and increase customer satisfaction.
On the other hand, fewer clicks might create enormous business teams' problems as it directly impacts customers’ decision-making. I remember, when Uber Eats was launched in India, they had the same UI design as their cab booking app, and they tried to adjust everything on a single page, which hid the delivery address and bill amount on the second fold of the screen. Because of that, I had to cancel my order three times and never used that app again. That day, I truly understood the famous quote’s meaning,
“The first impression is (definitely) the last impression.”
To counter this argument, people always provide examples of recruiters who do not have enough time to evaluate a candidate’s portfolio or a website. Those should be designed in minimum clicks. My counter-argument is that unless the candidate has a broken user story or has multiple irrelevant pages to reach his detailed project page, 2 more clicks cannot cost him that job.
Yes, it can be irritating sometimes, but helping your user navigate as per your business goals and intentions is not related to more no. of clicks. The designers must have that talent to hit a bull’ eye and should design flawless user-flows.
Moral of the story?
Let us stop counting clicks, and instead, we should focus on human psychology. We should zero in on how our users want to use our digital platform. The less experience they have, the higher the risk and the stranger the situation, and the more stress the task entails.
Because once we start limiting the clicks, that single page starts to look like a directory: a list of every option, tiny font, and random order. Our user might feel like he is looking for a needle in a haystack, which is not the experience that we are hoping to achieve.
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