Behavioral and attitudinal UX metrics
There are several UX metrics that digital experience professionals can use to evaluate performance. We can break these down into three categories:
Behavioral UX metrics (what users do)
Behavioral metrics are measures of what people do (vs. what they think or feel). Some examples include:
Abandonment rate: the ratio of the number of abandoned shopping carts to the number of initiated transactions
AOV (average order value): Total revenue divided by the number of checkouts
Conversions: Number of people who complete the goal (i.e. purchase)
Conversion rate: Number of sales divided by the number of visits
Pageviews: Number of people viewing a particular page
Problems and frustrations: Number of unique problems identified and/or participants who encounter a certain problem
Task success: Did your users reach a specific page or achieve a specific goal? (i.e. join a webinar)
Time to complete a task: The average amount of time it takes for someone to complete a task
Attitudinal UX metrics (what users say, feel)
Attitudinal metrics are where we ‘quantify’ traditionally unquantifiable data around what users say and feel about an experience's beliefs and intentions.
There are many different ‘scores’ on the market that will assign a number to attitudinal data, using various methods. They’re crucial in helping you build a bigger picture view of the attitude shifts in design changes.
Examples of attitudinal UX metrics include:
CSAT (customer satisfaction score): Ask anything from one single question to a full-length survey. Results are measured as a percentage
NPS (net promoter score): Helps you measure loyalty based on one direct question: "How likely is it that you would recommend this company/product/service/experience to a friend or colleague?"
SUPR-Q (standardized user experience percentile rank questionnaire): An eight-item questionnaire for measuring the quality of the user experience
SUS: (system usability scale): A standard measure of usability that allows grading of the usability of any website or system
TPI (task performance indicator): the confidence score a user has in their answer after completing a task (scored out of 100)Attitudinal websites do get a mix of qualitative and quantitative data for your UX measurement program, but not always the exact behavior that’s happening. They’ll only tell you how a user feels about the change—not the change in behavior that it’s caused.
Attitudinal metrics can help quantify feedback data for your UX measurement program, but not always the exact behavior that’s happening. They’ll only tell you how a user feels about the change—not the change in behavior that it’s caused. This is the benefit of collecting and analyzing both behavioral and attitudinal data. This brings us to...
Composite UX scores
Choosing UX metrics isn’t a 'one or the other' decision; nor do you have to juggle several metrics when reporting on UX success. There are composite UX scores that combine various measurements—both attitudinal and behavioral—to create one, easy-to-communicate score.
Google’s HEART framework is an example. It’s a composite UX metric that combines the following metrics:
Happiness
Engagement
Adoption
Retention
Task Success
