Don’t forget the value exchange

Too often, businesses forget that the only reason people choose them is because their’s an almost equal exchange of value.

Your customers pay a fee and you provide a service.

What tends to tie businesses into knots is when they forget how much time or effort or energy their users are willing to expend.

Consider something as simple as an onboarding flow.

If your instructions are too difficult to dicipher or the process is too arduous to complete, it can cause many users to give up.

Not because they don’t want what’s on the other side—they do. But because by making it more difficult than it needs to be, you can easily change their perceived appraisal of the trade.

Alternatives abound, after all—they’re a click away. And if it starts to feel like they’re giving more than they’re receiving, no force in the world is going stop them from suspecting that they’re right.