User Experience Case Studies That Emphasize Simplicity

*Simplify your product design — borrow familiar patterns* Last week I wrote that simplicity is a competitive advantage. But what does it mean for a product to be simple? Simple products are immediately familiar and usable. When I pick up a knife or a cup, I never have to think to myself, “how do I use this?”. That sense of familiarity is what we wanted for WhatsApp too. We wanted to make sure our users wouldn’t feel like they needed to learn how to use the app, but could just start calling and messaging. We had to ask ourselves — what will make this product familiar to billions of very different people around the world? Well, the only thing we really knew about all those potential users is that they had a phone. So we matched the patterns of the phone’s operating system, because we knew the user would know them. If Android normally had an floating action button in the bottom right, that’s where WhatsApp would put its button. This meant WhatsApp would feel familiar even if you've never actually used the app before. We also used consistent patterns throughout the app. I’m not talking about anything fancy — just things like “triangle button = you’re going to send a message; arrow = not going to send yet.” That consistency quickly built a sense of predictability and control for users. Of course, this was really limiting in lots of ways! There were lots of interesting interaction patterns that we couldn’t use because they weren’t already intuitive to all our users. The question I always asked was “where would the user naturally put their thumb? Put the button there.” If you’re watching a Hotjar recording, you can see where someone pulls their mouse, or where someone’s eyes track in qualitative research. Users are telling us where they expect to find something — put the button there! For another industry example of how familiar patterns make hard things feel easy, think about all the new genAI chat bots. This is wildly complicated frontier technology. How is it possible that hundreds of millions of consumers could pick it up overnight? Because even though these AI systems are built on complex foundations, they borrow a messaging interface that we’ve all been using for decades. That familiar interface means that everyone can use this amazing tech without needing to learn anything new. One shortcut I always think of when designing a new product is: what other apps or physical products are my users likely to be using? Are there any patterns I can borrow from those to make a new product automatically intuitive? If a user normally swipes right to dismiss notifications, can swiping right dismiss new alerts inside my product instead of making the user find an “x” to tap on? Making these small gestures familiar can add up to making a whole product feel more simple and intuitive, instead of like yet another new thing to learn. (For regular updates in this ongoing series about product, leadership, and scaling, subscribe to amivora.substack.com!)

In 2008, Best Buy added a button that made them $300 million. Here's what happened: Best Buy's online store was losing money. They were forcing customers to create an account before checking out (peak 2008 e-commerce UX). This was the era of "junk drawer" UIs - when executives demanded every business goal be crammed into the interface, whether it made sense or not. Enter Jared Spool's UX firm with a simple idea: Add a "Continue as Guest" button during the workflow. The result = 45% more customers completed their purchases. But there's a deeper lesson here about the "Simplicity Curve": 1. Uninformed Simplicity - Where most of us start - Barebones UI, essential features only - Often mistaken for "good design" 2. Informed Complexity - Where Best Buy was stuck - Cluttered UIs trying to do everything - The "junk drawer" phase - Where most enterprise software lives 3. Informed Simplicity - Where Best Buy landed - Understanding when to show vs. hide features - Letting craft elevate product - The "Continue as Guest" sweet spot Most designers and companies get stuck in informed complexity. They keep adding features, thinking more is better. But the path to better products isn't about adding more - it's about understanding deeply enough to show less. This is why I push back against "design thinking" idealism. The goal isn't to craft the best software. It's to craft a great value proposition for your customers. And sometimes, that means removing a signup form and adding a simple button. If you're constantly battling feature-factory conditions, my upcoming course on making UX design decisions drops next week. Grab it here: https://uxdecisions.com

Microsoft paid $200M for our email app. But their one request after signing changed everything. Here's the untold story of our startup exit: In 2013, we spotted a massive gap in the market: professionals juggling personal Gmail and work Exchange accounts. They switched between apps constantly. No elegant solution existed. We built ONE beautiful app to handle both, with a radical principle: "Everything must be possible in 3 taps or less." We obsessively tracked every interaction: • Counting taps to reply • Steps to schedule meetings • Clicks to find attachments Our relentless focus on user experience paid off. We even landed two 3-letter federal agencies as clients through In-Q-Tel, their investment arm. A $1M+ contract. Then Microsoft came calling. The acquisition moved fast, landing at $200M. But they had one non-negotiable condition: We had to terminate our government contracts within 90 days. Then came the biggest surprise. During closing, Microsoft sent us one file: The Outlook logo. "Can you rename the app to Outlook?" We thought we'd be helping build Microsoft's future email apps. Instead, they wanted our exact app, just rebranded as Microsoft Outlook. The results were staggering: • Day one: 3 million users • Three years later: Several hundred million monthly active users We didn't try to reinvent email. We just made it feel effortless. Every decision focused on reducing friction: • Fewer taps • Faster actions • Simpler workflows That's what Microsoft really bought - an obsession with user experience. Today, millions still use the same tab bar we designed on a whiteboard 8 years ago. The lesson? Simple problems, solved exceptionally well, create massive value. You just have to be willing to sweat the details. Even if it means counting every tap. Want to master the founder mindset and build better? Join Founder Mode for free weekly insights on startups, systems, and personal growth: https://lnkd.in/gSjjvzt9

Steve Jobs taught me the most powerful growth hack. It literally 10x’d our growth and retention.. When we launched Willow Voice (now used daily by thousands of professionals and growing 50% m/m), we did 3 things that shaped our product: 1. We manually onboarded our first 100 users. Even though Willow is a consumer app, every single user had to book a call with us to sign up. We guided them through the onboarding flow we had already built, just to watch how they interacted with it. It was incredibly painful at times. We CRINGED as people got stuck on the same screens, clicked the wrong buttons, or used the wrong settings. Users would do the exact opposite of what we wanted them to do. But those painful moments gave us priceless insight. Instead of guessing why users churned, we watched it happen live. We fixed edge cases quickly, simplified confusing flows, and learned exactly where friction lived. Those early calls probably saved us MONTHS of wasted dev work. 2. We obsessed over simplicity. Most people are BOMBARDED with text, buttons, and messaging everywhere they go. The winners are the products that cut through the noise. After watching users, we started stripping things down. What’s truly essential? What’s just noise? Every screen of Willow’s onboarding is now obvious, easy to understand, and broken down into simple steps. Simple isn’t easy to build, and it requires saying no to a lot. But it pays off. 3. We fought feature bloat. It’s tempting to say yes to every feature request. But satisfying everyone means you satisfy no one. We learned this early. Steve Jobs once said: “Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.” With Willow, we focused on making the core experience of voice dictation incredibly simple and intelligent. Everything else (transcripts, style matching, dictionary terms) was designed to work automatically with minimal friction. That’s why our users love us: we’re the simplest and most intelligent dictation experience on the market. Willow understands your writing style over time, unlike other dictation tools. And that simplicity matters even more because voice dictation historically sucked. Built-in dictation is inaccurate. Older solutions are slow and expensive. We're building AI-powered voice tech the right way to cut through the clutter. If you want people to love your product, focus less on more and more on clear and simple. Try out our onboarding at Willow (refined after 100+ onboarding calls) and tell me what you think in the comments?