The success of any tangible product in today’s market is primarily based on UI and UX, and these in turn are directly linked to the design of the product.
“Every company that worked on our platform asked for call tracking and call recording features, but no one was able to use those features until we made the UI more simple and intuitive”. – Rahul, co-founder TeleCRM.
As technology advances and becomes more commonplace in society, product design must also adapt to the needs of the user. To make the design of your product simple and intuitive, here are five ways you can approach the design process:
Keep it clean and uncluttered
Whenever a new product enters a market the ruling factor comes down to its simplistic working design that has to cater to large volumes! Too much clutter can be overwhelming and make it difficult to find what you’re looking for.
A prominent example of complex product design leading to its market failure is Google Glasses. Keep your design clean and uncluttered for a more streamlined and user-friendly experience.
Use familiar conventions
Don’t reinvent the wheel – use familiar conventions that users will already be familiar with.
A natural course of known conventions is the use of green and red colors for calling operations that have been effectively used since basic cell phones and are still used by it Androids, IOS, and video calling softwares.
The main reason behind this is familiarity and its link to the human psyche. This will make your product more intuitive and easy to use.
Make use of whitespace
Whitespace doesn’t just make your design look more aesthetically pleasing – it can also help to create a more intuitive design.
Grouping related elements together and spotlighting the required data/shape is the primary manner of attracting attention towards the wanted! That is, a red spot on a blank white page is how attention is an example of grabbing attention and
getting rid of the unwanted; the same is used for grouping and matching elements. Have a look at the default google search page.
Use clear and concise labels
Make sure your labels are clear and concise so that users know exactly what each element does, i.e words like BUY, SELL, ORDER, CONTACT, PLAY, and PAUSE are the easiest to understand and aren’t unnecessarily wordy.
This helps in having a smooth user flow while using a product. Ambiguous or confusing labels will only serve to frustrate users and make your product less intuitive.
Use visual cues.
Use visual cues and signifiers in your design to help guide users through the product’s interface. The classic example of having rated feedback as symbols ranging from a happy face to an angry/sad face signifies the aid visual cues provide.
Moreover, directions are often provided using arrows indicating right or left, ahead or U-turn.
The logic behind this is simple, the human brain learns from shapes and experiences rather than words and the retention of information is faster and more efficient with shapes than compared with words.
All these factors make using visual cues a must to have a simple and intuitive design integrated into your product.
Using these 5 ways can guide you to make design efforts in the right direction; there are many other forms and ways of having a better design for you to explore and understand.
The pointers mentioned are for you to understand the basics and have a touch-base idea for your future design projects and explorations.