The ROI of Content Design
Sometimes numbers are your friend.
Someday, you may need to get executive buy-in to hire a Content Designer (or UX Writer or Content Strategist, depending on what your org calls it). You’ll find that some stakeholders respond to stories, some to best practices, and some to metrics.
While it may seem self-evident that our work has value, in the past it was tough to find data quantifying the business value of our work.
But recently, industry experts started publishing more stats. So I started collecting them.
Here’s a list of the ROI metrics I was able to find. I hope you find it useful.
1) Content strategy raises net traffic 56% for Facebook
In the foreword to Kristina Halvorson’s book Content Strategy for the Web (page xii), Sarah Cancilla reports that her work on a specific content module at Facebook resulted in a 56% increase in traffic to that content and 6 million more users engaged in finding friends. Here’s a short excerpt:
2) Content design increases task completion for the UK government by 88%
In an article from 2018, Sarah Winters reports on content design work that turned a 100% failure rate (0% completion) into 88% completion.
3) Content design at Microsoft boosts product NPS, task completion, and usability
In an interview with Larry Swanson, Kylie Hansen, Director of Content Design at Microsoft, reports that her team was able to measure the following impacts of content design:
NPS increased 8 points
44% of task failures solved
usability increased 92%,
unquantified improvements in numbers of active users and retention
4) Removing one button brings in $300 million more revenue
Sometimes, removing elements of a design is the most effective tactic. Jared Spool writes that removing an unnecessary button from a checkout flow resulted in 45% more sales for his e-commerce client ($300 million revenue in the first year).
5) Expedia gains an extra $12 million for simplifying a form
Similarly, Expedia found that removing an unnecessary form field resulted in an additional $12 million in revenue.
6) Customers don’t buy for lack of needed content
Not only does good content design bring in more revenue; the inverse is also true. Bad (or lack of) content design costs organizations money.
From the UK, CSM, The Magazine for Customer Service Managers & Professionals, reports that "one in three have acted on their frustration by abandoning a purchase because they couldn’t find the information they needed."
7) Bad content design costs Citi $500 million
This is a real gem. Due to the absolutely horrifying UX of its software—including cryptic field labels and a warning modal that provided no useful information—Citi’s operations team mistakenly transferred $900 million to creditors. Of that sum, $400 million was voluntarily returned. As for the other $500 million, a court ruled that the creditors could keep it.
Your turn
These are the ROI metrics I found by scouring the Internet, talking to folks, and researching content design.
What about you? Do you have metrics that belong on this list? Let me know!