In the last article, I shared a simple introduction to user flow; what it entails and it’s core highlight. Today, I would be talking about how to create a user flow easily even if you have never done it before. This is going to be a practical step by step approach to help you create a user flow in minutes, so I would be using a project I worked on as a student at Perxels called ‘‘Charito’’ a charity app to walk you through the process.
First thing you want to make clear before creating any user flow is to define the objective of the product you are designing; that is, what exactly is the reason for the product - what problem is the product solving? In this case, ‘‘Charito’’ is a charity app that eases the stress of searching for charities and making donations to support charities. Understanding the problem a product is supposed to solve is very important because it helps you as a designer see things from the eyes of the user. This is going to be helpful in your entire user flow creation process as you are able to put yourself in the shoes of your user thereby walking in the path they would walk when they finally use the product.
The next step is to make a list of important features and information needed in order for users to easily interact with the product. In ‘‘Charito’’ case; that is, features such as a map, a pick up and drop off button, a donation selection screen (where users can choose to donate cloth, money or food), and charity campaigns description screen. When you put yourself in the shoes of your users and have conducted user research to understand how your users behave, their pain point and what they want to achieve; it will be easy for you to make a list of important features the users need to easily interact with the product.
After identifying important features, I created a flow outline - I chose a particular task (which was cloth donation), identified the entry point, the steps to completion and the final interaction. The process involved in donating clothes on the app include:
· Onboarding screen
· Users sign up or log in
· From the homepage the user picks a donation choice (cloth donation)
· Users navigate to the campaign screen
· From the campaign screen the user clicks on campaign and reads the descriptions
· From the description page the user clicks on the donate button and can decide to either schedule a pick-up or drop off items
· Users fill a pick-up form to schedule a pick-up delivery
In the image below is the user flow of this entire process above - simple and straight to the point.
Key Takeaway
Learning how to create user flow gave me a better understanding of how to improve the overall user experience of a product to ensure user satisfaction. Once you have figured out how to create a user flow, you’ll better understand your users and be able to design products they can easily navigate through, perform various tasks and visit the website or app again and again.
