Sales Loves MarketingUser experience (UX) is how a person feels about using a product, website or service: whether it is easy, useful and pleasant. The ISO 9241-210 standard describes it as a person's perceptions and responses that come from using, or expecting to use, a system, product or service.
What does user experience include?
Don Norman and Jakob Nielsen of the Nielsen Norman Group define UX as every aspect of the end user's interaction with a company, its services and its products. That makes it wider than two terms it is often mixed up with:
- User interface (UI) is the screens, buttons and layout. It is part of the experience, not all of it.
- Usability is how easy an interface is to learn and use. It is one quality that feeds into UX. See usability factor.
A clean pricing page still gives a poor experience if the plan a buyer needs is missing, or if sign-up breaks on a phone.
Why does user experience matter in sales and marketing?
For many B2B buyers, your website and free trial are the first contact with your product. Every bit of friction, such as a long demo form, a slow page or an unclear next step, is a reason to leave. That is why UX work and conversion rate optimization overlap so much.
It also touches SEO. Google says its core ranking systems use Core Web Vitals. Other page experience factors, such as mobile-friendly design and intrusive pop-ups, don't directly lift rankings, but Google still advises fixing them because they make a site more pleasant to use.
How do you measure user experience?
Use both behaviour and opinion:
- Behaviour: task success rate, time on task and errors in usability tests. Engagement and retention in your analytics.
- Opinion: satisfaction surveys and Net Promoter Score.
- Speed and stability: Core Web Vitals. Google counts a page as good when Largest Contentful Paint is 2.5 seconds or less, Interaction to Next Paint is 200 milliseconds or less and Cumulative Layout Shift is 0.1 or less, at the 75th percentile of visits.
Google's HEART framework, published by Google researchers in 2010, is a useful checklist. It groups UX metrics into Happiness, Engagement, Adoption, Retention and Task success. Teams first set goals, then pick the signals that show progress, and only then choose metrics.
How do you improve user experience?
- Start from the tasks people come to do, not from how the page looks.
- Watch real users try those tasks. Short usability tests show problems that analytics can't explain.
- Remove steps and fields that don't help the user.
- Ask sales and support which questions and complaints come up most.
- Test changes with an A/B test before rolling them out.
An example from B2B marketing
A software company sees that many visitors open its demo request form but few send it. Usability tests show the form asks for phone number and budget before explaining what happens next. The team cuts the form to the essentials and adds one line on what the call covers. The page now does the job the visitor came for.
Read more in why UX is important and why measuring user experience matters.
Related terms
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between UX and UI?
The user interface (UI) is the screens, buttons and layout a person works with. User experience is broader. It includes the interface, but also whether the product solves the problem, how fast it is and how support and billing feel. A polished interface can still give a poor experience if the product doesn't do what the user needs.
Is user experience a Google ranking factor?
In part. Google says its core ranking systems use Core Web Vitals, which measure loading, responsiveness and visual stability. Other page experience aspects, such as mobile-friendliness and intrusive pop-ups, don't directly improve rankings, but Google still recommends them. Relevant content always comes first.
How do you measure user experience?
Combine behaviour data with what users tell you. Watch task success, errors and time on task in usability tests, use analytics for engagement and retention, and run short surveys for satisfaction. Google's HEART framework groups these into happiness, engagement, adoption, retention and task success.