Nothing comes close to the negative impact on the morale and effectiveness of your designers than this one word you should ban from your office.
#ItsNotAboutYou
“Arrogance and fear still keep you from learning the simplest and most significant lesson of all,†Ancient One tells Dr. Strange. “It’s not about you.†Let me break this down into four key lessons that this particular arrogant and fearful fool had to learn the hard way.
How to Pick the Right Framework for your Chatbot or Virtual Assistant Project
There has never been a more exciting time to be a part of a team designing and building digital products! As an example, here are just a few of the projects that I was involved with last year: â— A Slack bot that serves up cloud application and network performance alerts and graphs, and provides proactive …
Lean UX is Simple
Lean UX Design Process in a nutshell: 1. Feel the pain 2. Brainstorm together 3. Prototype cheaply 4. Iterate quickly 5. Try it in real world 6. Repeat steps #2-5 until #1 is eliminated I got tired of how poorly the phone holder was working, so I made my own from leftover household materials in about 20 minutes, after 4 quick …
How to Name Your Chatbot: GUPPI, Samantha, Alexa, Siri, and HAL 9000
In his brilliant Bobiverse trilogy, Dennis E. Taylor writes about Bob, a Silicon Valley CEO, whose brain is scanned into a computer and becomes the AI in an interstellar spaceship. GUPPI (General Unit Primary Peripheral Interface) is virtual Bob’s virtual assistant. GUPPI has limited intelligence, on a par with Siri or Alexa of our own post-industrial age, …
Should I have a separate mobile website or one website that is responsive to all screen sizes?
This is a common question many of my clients and students ask me. The simple answer is that the baseline is a responsive website, especially if you are in the marketing and content distribution business. However, the truth is a bit more complicated, because: Today’s web landscape is sophisticated enough that no one strategy fits all scenarios. …
How to Draw an Effective Storyboard: UX Design Project, DesignOps Workshop, Web, Mobile, or Wearable Product Design
Video: 36-minute free segment of O’Reilly Video Course. Covers all of the essential parts of the storyboard: Things, People, Faces, Opening Slide, and Transitions. Expert hands-on guided exercises provide step-by-step instruction in basic drawing skills. The module also covers advanced topics like poses and camera angles for students who are ready to move to the …
Effective Sketching for UX Design: New O’Reilly Video Course
30 Minute video: Parts of a Storyboard is currently available to view FREE, for a limited time. I’m proud to present our new video course from O’Reilly Media: Effective Sketching for UX Design Written and presented by UX design expert Greg Nudelman (clients include Oracle, Cisco, and eBay) and Emmy-nominated graphic designer Will Krause (Sesame …
8 Mobile UX Trends You Can’t Afford to Ignore
Here are the top trends in the mobile UX industry. Without further ado, here’s our count-down to #1. #8 Mobile First: Responsive Web Design Responsive Web Design or RWD has been a dominant trend in web industry for several years now. We predict that this will continue to be the case. RWD will be the …
Visual Guide to Android L Material Design: 7 Insights Every Serious Designer Needs to Know
Material Design is a new Google design language that Google hopes to port to everything from mobile phones and tablets to websites and desktop apps. Here are 7 hard-won insights from 4 Material Design workshops I recently facilitated with my top clients in Argentina, Abu Dhabi and United States.
7 Mobile Trends for 2014 (and How to Profit From Them – with Case Studies!)
The importance of mobile to your company’s digital strategy cannot be overstated. But where to focus your energies? Here are 7 trends we see emerging in many of our clients’ businesses, from financial and banking services to ecommerce and social media.
C-Swipe: An Ergonomic Solution To Navigation Fragmentation On Android
There are 3,997 different Android devices. Your navigation should work with all of them. C-Swipe can help: It is an alternative navigation pattern for tablets and mobile devices that is novel, ergonomic and localized. This article provides a detailed walk-through of the design and code and provides a downloadable mini-app so that you can try out C-Swipe to see whether it’s right for your app.
Let Them Pee: Avoiding the Sign-Up/Sign-In Mobile Antipattern
Anything that slows down customers or gets in their way after they download your app is a bad thing. That includes sign-up/sign-in forms that show up even before potential customers can figure out if the app is actually worth using.
The Definitive Guide To The Android Carousel Design Pattern
We’ll use the analogy of a real-world amusement park carousel to explain what makes for an authentically mobile user experience, and we’ll give you the design, the complete source code and a downloadable mini-app, which you can use today to add an enjoyable and effective carousel to your own app on phones and tablets.
Three essentials of Android design DNA
For many years since its release, the Android OS has been behaving like a teenager in the grip of raging hormones. Growth has been nothing short of explosive and the changes have been sweeping and profound. With the release of Ice-Cream Sandwich OS, the UI standards and design elements have changed dramatically and the platform has really matured and even stabilized somewhat. Nevertheless, the OS has retained it’s rebellious hacker DNA with unique features that are authentically Android.
Mobile Welcome UX Antipattern: End User License Agreement (EULA)
Like the overzealous zombie cross-breed between a lawyer and a customs agent, End User License Agreements (EULAs) require multiple forms to be filled out in triplicate, while keeping the customers from enjoying the app they have so laboriously invested time and flash memory space to download.
Essential Design Patterns For Mobile Banking
Despite a great deal of mobile innovation, many creators of financial apps still copy their interface patterns from the desktop Web, even though these patterns are not as well suited to the mobile space. Small screens, custom controls, divided attention and fat fingers demand different thinking when designing for mobile: taking what works on the Web and converting it into authentically mobile flows using simple, effective design patterns.
Cross Channel UX Elements Framework
The Cross Channel UX Elements framework is a practical design tool you can use to create “Magic Moments†of flow and delight for your customers across the different channels in a more deliberate fashion, rather than arriving at great designs only through occasional happenstance.
Mobile Magic Moments: Transform the Trivial
When mobile or tablet design is executed well, the device feels like the extension of our bodies. Because interfaces respond even before we consciously give them a command. Often, the interface “dissolves in behavior†and we feel empowered, as though the device we hold in our hand is the equivalent of Iron Man’s suit of cybernetic armor, or Batman’s utility belt. I call this empowering experience a “Magic Momentâ€.
Don’t Put a QR Code on Your Business Card
… until you read this article. I had a QR code on my business card for years, and studied how to engage people after the initial QR Code scan, and how to drive tangible value. Here I will reveal everything I learned about using QR Codes for personal and social connection, including using special formats like MECARD, and the secrets of linking to Twitter, LinkedIn, blog posts and custom landing pages.
Why we don’t do mobile usability tests (and neither should you)
In my experience, mobile usability tests, as they are popularly conducted, are a waste of time and resources and in vast majority of cases fail to lead to creation a better mobile product. Instead, I conduct RITE (Rapid Iterative Testing and Evaluation) studies: the only methodology that I’ve actually experienced in the real life yielding more delightful, usable and successful mobile products in less time.
4 Ridiculously Simple Tips for Using QR Code to Connect 10 Times More Mobile Customers With your Social Media
Engaging with your customers through mobile social media is an excellent idea, and has the potential to add a lot of value and further enhance the relationship of your customers to your brand. Here are four simple tips that will help you make the most of the QR Code technology.
Ultimate Guide to Designing NFC Mobile Apps You Won’t be Ashamed Of
Mobile NFC (Near Field Communication) is finally here! Here is the ultimate guide to designing awesome mobile NFC apps your customers will rave about.
7 Ways to Whip Up Viral Value Through QR Codes: #6 Connect Through Social Networks (Part 1 of 2)
Installment #6 shows how to deliver QR code value by allowing your customers to connect to your company through social networks. As of the date of this writing, many companies have been implementing their social mobile engagement strategy by putting printed Facebook and Twitter “buttons†on everything from print advertising to packaging. We think QR codes offer a much better solution. This is Part 1 of the article: 6 Reasons Printed Buttons Must Die.
Mobile Websites, Tablet Apps and Hybrids: 7 Mobile Strategy Tips for 2012
Sites like YouTube and Facebook are already projecting mobile use to surpass desktop use as early as *this year*. What’s your mobile and tablet strategy? Allow me to humbly present the wisdom I got from the experience of walking the last 365 miles. Barefoot. In the snow. Uphill both ways.
7 Ways to Whip Up Viral Value Through QR Codes: #7 Offer More Info About Your Product
Your QR code is just the nail you need to engage the consumer. A chance to tell a story. A way to create the authentic, artesian, immersive product experience. An opportunity to give a service that extends the relationship with your brand well beyond the current moment of consumption.
3 Secrets for a Successful QR Code Campaign This Holiday Season
14 million Americans scanned a QR code in June 2011. Most of these folks had higher-end mobile devices and many had a household income of $100,000+. How do you reach these millions of Olympic Caliber Shoppers? Here are 3 key design strategies that help ensure the success of your QR code campaign.
Is Your UI Causing Zero Search Results Pages?
“Designing from Zero” – how to analyze UI challenges that are often the hidden cause of zero-results pages as a catalyst for creating powerful, original design solutions that create customer delight and business revenue.
Storyboarding iPad Transitions
In confined mobile computing interfaces, on tablet devices or in complex virtual environments, transitions are an authentic, minimalist way of enabling way-finding, displaying system state and exposing crucial functionality – in short, they are key in creating a superior user experience. Here is how to storyboard transitions quickly using Post-it notes.
Designing Brand Landing Pages for Mobile Devices
People love to search by brand names. On the small screens of mobile devices, well-designed landing pages can provide a much better experience than keyword search results. This makes brand landing pages today’s biggest sleeper opportunity for mobile and tablet ecommerce. But you have to learn to be completely ruthless with your features and content. Here’s how.
Design Patterns for Mobile Faceted Search: Part II
In Part I of Design Patterns for Mobile Faceted Search, I looked at Four Corners, Modal Overlay, Watermark, and Full-Page Refinement Options design patterns, which maximize the mobile screen real estate. This column covers strategies for making people aware of the filtering options and methods of improving transitions between the various states of a search user interface.
Design Patterns for Mobile Faceted Search: Part I
In my previous Search Matters column, Designing Mobile Search: Turning Limitations into Opportunity, I discussed how mobile search user experiences differ from those on the Web. In this and my next column, I’ll look specifically at the challenges and opportunities of mobile faceted search. This column covers design patterns for maximizing the real estate available for search results, while the next will cover strategies for making people aware of filtering options.
Designing Mobile Search: Turning Limitations into Opportunities
Thinking of porting your Web finding experience to iPhone, Android, or Windows Mobile? Just forget about the fact that these devices are basically full-featured computers with tiny screens. Designing a great mobile search experience requires thinking differently: In terms of turning limitations into opportunities.
More Like This: A Design Pattern
The idea behind the More Like This pattern is very simple: within each group of items representing a particular category from a catalog or accompanying each item in search results, provide a prominent link or button with a label that is some variation of More Like This ». Unfortunately, most sites do not make sufficient use of this pattern and some that do use it design and implement it incorrectly.
Best Practices for Designing Faceted Search Filters
Office Depot multiple-select attribute-based faceted search redesign misses some key points, making their new search user interface less usable and, therefore, less effective. This makes it an excellent case study for demonstrating best practices for designing filters for faceted search results.
Starting from Zero: Winning Strategies for No Search Results Pages
Search, more than any other activity on your Web site, is a living, evolving process of discovery, a conversation between a customer and your system. Unfortunately, misunderstandings in this conversation are all too common, and the effectiveness of the zero search results page is critical to keeping the customer engaged. Moreover, thinking creatively about the zero results case can turn a temporary snag in communication into an opportunity for deeper connection and a source of tremendous competitive advantage.