This week in class we saw some examples of user experience: the good, the less-good, the downright ugly. After Meena shared the article “10 UX Design Trends You Shouldn’t Overlook in 2015“, I started to think that user experience (UX) was the most vital component of internet-based marketing, and that all websites and online platforms needed to be “pretty” in order to be successful. While an aesthetically pleasing site can influence users’ attitudes towards a specific company — a halo effect, in my opinion — it definitely does not dictate, or show a causal relationship, to company success (exception: design/creative-heavy industries).

Allow me to illustrate one example I came across recently. In another UBC course I am taking, Mergers & Acquisitions, one case study spoke of Berkshire Hathaway, an American multinational conglomerate holding company involved in diversified industries such as insurance (GEICO), retail (The Pampered Chef), clothing (Russell), and more. Warren Buffet is the current Chairman, President, and CEO of this massive company, and Berkshire Hathaway has experienced a compounded annual growth rate of 19.7% each year from 1965-2013. Talk about a success story.

But take a look at a screenshot of their current website.

“WHAT???” was instinctively my first reaction. I thought: “This doesn’t look like a market-leading conglomerate, it looks more like they finally realized it was past 1995 and that their website should be updated to include a fancy GEICO logo”. I found this quite hilarious actually.

This example slapped me with the “divide” between functionality and design. Although UX usually wants to incorporate both, in some cases it’s probably not necessary to have a perfect balance. In COMM464, I am looking forward to exploring and learning more about UX!

References

• Yadav, A. (2015, February 25). 10 UX Design Trends You Shouldn’t Overlook in 2015 – Usability Geek. Retrieved September 24, 2015, from http://usabilitygeek.com/10-ux-design-trends-2015/
• BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY INC. (n.d.). Retrieved September 24, 2015, from http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/
• Berkshire Hathaway. (2013). Berkshire’s Corporate Performance vs. the S&P 500. Retrieved October 4, 2015, from http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/2013ltr.pdf