Desirability is what transforms a product or service from merely useful into something truly wanted: it is the spark that inspires people to adopt it, return to it, and enthusiastically recommend it.
It represents one of the three vital pillars of innovation popularized by IDEO: a project must be desirable (people want it), feasible (we can build it), and viable (the business model works). Too often, the first pillar is overlooked in favor of the other two, resulting in perfectly functional solutions that simply fail to capture anyone's heart.
Because utility alone is no longer enough. In Emotional Design (2004), Don Norman demonstrates that we evaluate experiences on three distinct levels: visceral (immediate attraction), behavioral (usability), and reflective (what it says about us). A service can perform flawlessly at a behavioral level yet remain completely uninspiring on the other two. Norman even takes it a step further: beautiful, desirable things are actually perceived as easier to use! Emotion isn't just a polished finish applied at the end; it actively shapes how functionality is perceived.
The balance is essential: too much utility without desire leads to services people tolerate; too much desire without utility results in gadgets they quickly abandon. True desirability is far more than added aesthetics—it is the perfect alignment of what people genuinely need with the experiences they actually long to live.
Our conviction is simple: a highly adopted service is one that is as deeply desired as it is useful. Desirability cannot be retrofitted at the end of a project with a quick layer of graphic design; it must be crafted from the very start, grounded in real-world behaviors and emotions rather than just a checklist of features. Delivering a desirable promise that operations can seamlessly fulfill—that is where true adoption is won.
Exploring related horizons: emotional design, utility and usability (the other pillars of the triad), acceptability, perceived value, and user experience.
References: Desirability / Feasibility / Viability framework (IDEO, T. Brown); D. Norman, Emotional Design (2004).
Rémi
Gréau
Director of Design
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