While many organizations opt to build in-house UX teams to maintain control and foster close collaboration, there are numerous scenarios where outsourcing your UX can add significant value.
Let’s explore when and why bringing in an outsourced UX team (like ours) can be a game-changer for your projects.
1. Fresh Perspectives and Innovation
As an external UX team, we bring fresh perspectives and ideas. We also offer unbiased insights and creative solutions, helping you break free from entrenched thinking patterns and explore new avenues for enhancing user experience.
In-house team can get stuck in traditional design approaches. Too familiar with organisational constraints, they might also self-censor their ideas.
External UX teams can contribute significantly to product discovery and product conceptualisation. And working in collaboration with external UX teams or consultants like us can lead to novel ways to solve persistent problems.
2. Access Specialised Expertise
Outsourcing allows you to tap into UX talent pool with specialised skills, e.g. designing forms or dashboards. You can also gain access to their knowledge like research insights they have gleened from spending considerable number of years designing application systems for lower socio-economic profiles or fitness apps.
An outsource team can also bring advanced knowledge, e.g. of security-focused design and regulatory compliance which may be critical to your app's success even though they may not add much to the aesthetics of your app.
3. Cost Efficiency
Building and maintaining an in-house UX team can be costly, especially for startups and small businesses operating on tight budgets. Outsourcing provides a cost-effective alternative, allowing you to access top-tier UX talent without the overhead costs associated with full-time employees, such as salaries, benefits, and office space.
For example, by hiring an external UX team, a startup can allocate their limited resources towards marketing and product development while still achieving a professionally designed, conversion-optimised website.
4. Rapid Testing of Ideas
Often, clients have a backlog of 'ideas' accumulated over months. It would be too costly to divert in-house teams to test these ideas.
An outsource team like ours can dive into your idea backlog and quickly test ideas using 5-day Design Sprints and help you to collect information to decide if any of them are worth exploring further.
Aside from discovering the feasibility of ideas, external UXers can also gather information from your internal teams to gauge the feasibility of each idea.
5. Manpower Augmentation
Outsourcing offers the flexibility to scale your UX efforts up or down based on project demands. Whether you're launching a new feature, conducting extensive user research, or undergoing a complete redesign, an outsourced UX team can augment your manpower without the long-term commitment of expanding your in-house team.
For example, a rapidly growing SaaS company with fluctuating UX demands as they introduce new features and expand their user base can hire an external team to augment their core team. This scalability ensures that the in-house team is not overstretched and product development stays on track.
6. Focus on Core Competencies
Outsourcing UX design allows your internal teams to concentrate on their core competencies, such as product development, marketing, and business strategy. By delegating UX tasks to specialists, you ensure that each aspect of your project receives the attention and expertise it deserves.
For example, when you want to overhaul your online touchpoints, it might make more sense to outsource instead of diverting their internal developers and marketers. This separation allows your in-house teams to maintain focus on enhancing backend functionalities and executing marketing campaigns, while the outsourced UX team delivers a seamless and engaging user interface.
Outsourcing your UX team can be a strategic advantage when executed thoughtfully. It offers access to specialized expertise, cost savings, scalability, and fresh perspectives, among other benefits. Whether you're a startup aiming to launch quickly, a mid-sized company seeking specialized skills, or an established organization expanding into new markets, an outsourced UX team can provide the support and innovation needed to elevate your product’s user experience.