ARTICLE
5 ways to ensure a human-first approach to digital experiences in pharma
Looking for tactical direction you can apply to your next healthcare research project? These principles ensure you’re taking a human-first approach to UX.
by Robbi Shamlian, Head of UX, C Space, Sammy Mason, Associate Director, C Space Health, and Allie Dautrich, Insights Consultant, Escalent
This is the second blog post in a two-part series that explores user experience (UX) research using behavioral science (BeSci) as our North Star.
In our last post, we set the record straight on UX research misconceptions common in pharma. In this installment, we provide tactical direction you can apply to your next healthcare research project. The following five principles ensure you’re taking a human-first approach to your digital UX work. They are based on 25 years of working directly with customers and brands to design world-class experiences.
1. Put the customer-inspired need at the core of your digital experience.
The customer should be a central part of the process, not an afterthought. To ensure a seamless digital experience, it’s critical to account for the entirety of the patient journey, including the online experience. And don’t let your own biases influence your view of the customer’s experience. Before kicking off any research project, take a step back to consider what pre-conceived notions you might be unknowingly bringing into the research. Then, check them at the door.
2. Consider the audience you’re designing for.
Demographics like age, condition type, disability and mental state may influence your customers’ needs and how they interact with digital. This is especially true in the healthcare space where stakes are high, and it’s vital to launch research with the user’s needs, preferences and vulnerabilities in mind.
While it’s crucial to account for the voices you are hearing from, it’s equally important to consider whose voices you might not be hearing from and what this could mean for the product’s success. For example, if you only test a product using in-depth video interviews, you’ll miss out on hearing from people not comfortable sharing their thoughts in this setting. Similarly, if you only field research during business hours, you may not hear from people who work full time. C Space’s DEI ThinkTank recommends carefully considering your research approach and methodology is one way to ensure you capture more voices.
Demographics may influence your customers’ needs and how they interact with digital. This is especially true in the healthcare space where stakes are high, and it’s vital to launch research with the user’s needs, preferences and vulnerabilities in mind.
3. Keep your healthcare messages and experiences simple.
The healthcare space and processes are notoriously complex. But your customers shouldn’t have to shoulder that burden. Keep information and content digestible. Understandability and usability are critical when it comes to the healthcare space, as digital barriers can be even more detrimental to the consumer when it’s their health insurance or treatment on the line.
4. Encourage customers to make experiences their own.
In research, we often hear directly from users about the desire to customize a product to meet their personal needs. This reflects the “Mere Ownership Effect,” according to which people give great value and attachment to something
once they establish personal ownership over it. Realistically, there’s a limit to what can be customized, but it’s always worth exploring what users would want to tailor to get more value out of the product.
5. Speak your customers’ language when designing optimized experiences.
Use language that is specific to your target user’s needs. With HCPs, this means having a deep understanding of their therapy areas. With patients, this means mirroring the language HCPs use with them to provide a consistent experience. Keep in mind that patients will have varied levels of health literacy.
Here’s a brief, real-world example from the digital mental health space that brings these principles to life:
One of our healthcare clients created a digital solution to provide patients and their healthcare team with longitudinal data to enable informed discussions about patients’ mental health. The solution aimed to facilitate the relationship between patients and their HCPs. Working closely with patients, we ensured that the right features and level of information were present within the app, and the UX was easy and intuitive. Through exploratory work, we discovered that it’s challenging for patients to track what triggers a mental health set-back and decide what strategies they should employ to cope. With this digital tool, patients can learn more about their behaviors and patterns, while HCPs can leverage these details to make adjustments to their patients’ treatment and care.
This is a prime example of conducting research with your core audience to create and ideate with your customers every step of the way.
