A recent, highly amusing post by fashion watchdog Diet Prada featured how Chanel was going the Hermès way. From its equestrian-themed runway show to elevating its pricing, and creating a quota system for its bags, Chanel is seemingly shadowing the strategy that made Hermès what it is today.

The question is, why? To answer this in the simplest terms, desirability is a highly coveted quality for any brand to have, and Chanel is no exception.

The 2008 Nielsen Norman Group Conference in Amsterdam outlined four levels of User Experience to be -

1. Utility
2. Usability
3. Desirability
4. Brand Experience

Out of these, the first 3, i.e., Utility, Usability, and Desirability fall under the purview of UX design. For a product to fulfill Utility, it needs to be useful to the user, possess a purpose that is acceptable to the user, and meet user needs. The next two steps, Usability, and Desirability are where things get a little complicated. Let’s take a closer look.

A usable product vs. a desirable product

If only we’d get a penny for each time someone used UX and usability interchangeably! Usability is the next quality to follow Utility. For a product to be termed usable, it has to be simple and intuitive to use, users have to like the way it looks and functions.

Now, many tend to also assume that a product having utility (that is, it fulfills user needs/ is useful to the user) and usability (is very intuitive and seamless) is the pinnacle of user experience design. And it does seem reasonable, at least on paper.

However, this clearly isn’t enough — not in the least. Because thanks to the overall progress in technology, we’re living an elevated lifestyle where these qualities in a product are a given. Today’s users expect more from a product’s UX, and products that transcend the basic utility and usability are the ones that leave an everlasting impression.

Let’s roll back to Hermès — the primary reason behind their hefty price tags is that most, if not all of their products are handmade by dedicated craftsmen. Handcrafted luxury is Hermès’ main game. This is what takes them so long to manufacture their highly coveted handbags, for instance, and justifies the exclusivity, the long waitlist, and of course, the price.

What places Hermès head and shoulders above its competitors is the quality of desirability. Every product across sectors and categories has competitors. In the case of Hermès, it could be Chanel, Gucci, or even Louis Vuitton. Products from all these brands are more or less likely to be at an equal standing in terms of utility and usability. However, what sets a product apart from the rest is the significant difference in desirability.

Up until lately, consumers could simply walk into a Chanel store and purchase its classic flap bag, but that is about to change. Bloomberg News now reports that a customer is only allowed to buy a single bag in one go. They must also wait two months before making another purchase, and can only buy one with features different from the first. In New York, there were monthly limits on the purchases of certain classic styles.

According to this piece in Business of Fashion, Chanel could be hoping that this scarcity will make it “an even more desirable brand,” said Ines Ennaji, a business development manager at Paris-based Luxurynsight, which provides industry data.

“By increasing desirability, they’ll have a reason to justify their price increases.”

Thus, desirability is the one quality that allows the UX designer to add that “little extra” to a product that sets it apart from the rest, especially in a market full of similar products in terms of utility and usability. Desirability is a crucial aspect of UX which gauges how coveted a product is. It can be ensured via outstanding features, exclusivity, and also a premium price tag, which is most likely the result of having exclusive features.

Attaining desirability in product experiences

As seen in the Diet Prada post above, Chanel seems to be aiming for desirability by increasing its prices to gain ground on the most iconic handbags of all: the Birkin and Kelly bags by Hermès.

But, the burning question is, can replicating a marketing strategy without updating the product experience bring about desirability? Going by the comments on the post, that seems unlikely to happen for Chanel. What brings desirability to Hermès products is their handcrafted quality and attention to detail — features that justify the waitlists, the exclusivity, and the price tags. Does that ring true of Chanel? Not at the moment!

Therefore, it is important for UX designers to understand desirability and what users truly want. Desirability is the fundamental differentiator in a product that impacts important business KPIs such as engagement and user adoption.

To understand desirability criteria, one must acknowledge that there is a prominent emotional component to it. User desires (wants and needs) tend to be more emotional in nature, and therefore, difficult to map. For example, usability focuses on logical outcomes such as does the product function as expected? Desirability, on the other hand, introduces questions such as this product functions as expected, but would you use it?

So, how can designers tap into this emotional component that drives desirability? The answer lies in user research techniques such as,

• Observational studies (‘Day in the life’ interviews)
• Ethnographic surveys
• Contextual inquiry
• Task analysis

Desirability studies typically include a minimum of 15–30 users (5–10 per segment), with the purpose of identifying behavioral patterns, pain points, undiscovered needs, workflows and task flows, along with goals, tasks, and sub-tasks. User data gathered from these exercises can be used in conjunction with personas and user journey maps to gain more insights.

So, do you think Chanel took the effort to conduct these detailed desirability studies before implementing their strategy? Who’s to say? However, the best UX practitioners are capable of differentiating between usability as the base level of the user experience and desirability to be the quality that leaves a lasting impression and ensures the implementation of both.