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Have you used WordPress or Squarespace lately? These are companies with such a high focus on UX – yet I find myself writing this very text in my notes app, because the text editing UX is just better.
When we build something that relies on content, such as a website, an e-learning app, etc., we have to make sure to provide the absolutely best content creation UX, or otherwise we impose a partially painful process on our users/clients. They will eventually stop keeping the system alive, feeling like the investment wasn't worth it.
Think about how to create a short TikTok video versus how to edit a video with DaVinci and then post it on YouTube or your own blog. When we take the idea phase and factors like artistic aspirations out of the equation, it's clear why people just use the simpler tool.
In addition to the network/platform effect, I'd argue that ease of creation is one of the biggest growth indicators for a product that relies on content.
"Hey, I've built this cool website for you, but in order to change something, you'll need to study this system for two weeks, be careful not to accidentally hit the 'this breaks everything' button, and you can only use it on your desktop."
I had this with my wife, who's a tremendously great cook. She wanted a place to put her recipes, so we set up a WordPress page with a recipe plugin. The process of writing down a new recipe was so draining that she never really used it, and the project died.
So what do we do about this?
We found a great recipe management app for iOS! It comes with a wonderful UX to write down recipes directly on the phone, and it has a functionality to export the files in a JSON format. Bingo! So I've built the recipe blog around that.
Similarly, I might build a tool to use my note-taking app as the source for my blog, because otherwise I'm sure I won’t continue writing my blog and will post on Bluesky instead.
That's to say: please build interoperable systems.
Your highly specialized app is twice as valuable when you offer a way to reuse the content elsewhere (with an API, or at least data export). Similarly, your clients will love to continue using their known apps, so we should try to incorporate them into the processes rather than reinventing the wheel.
Not sure how to simplify your creation process? Or how to incorporate a simple solution into your workflow? Hit me up, I love to help!