When mobile app users feel it pleasurable to use the apps using their mobile devices, wearables and other sources and call it as a positive experience, it becomes an outcome of the Mobile User Experience (UX) Design. In the context where mobiles are used, the mobile markets bring down some unique requirements on user experience design. The major focus of mobile UX design is strongly over the features of discoverability and efficiency to attract more number of app users.
At crucial moments the mobile users get engaged with their devices and that too for short period of time only. Hence, mobile app design should be capable of bringing their personalized experience, efficient and enjoyable possibilities to make them retained for long with ensuring the continuous usage of your app. Hence, the mobile UX design involves concentrating on delivering devices and services that can serve spontaneous needs of the users that keep of changing time to time. ‘Your design should speak of the words’, should be your actual motto.
Need for discoverability for potential users
Discoverability is another significant challenge for the mobile UX. It involves how easily your service can be found out by the potential users, whatever the size of the marketplace is. Simultaneously, the retention and engagement features also bring forward significant challenges, as users quite often find handful of free alternatives to meet their needs. The efforts from the mobile UX designers demand carefully shaping the mobile UX from discovery of the idea to operation and it absolutely involves co-operating various other devices and services.
The field of mobile app designing also involves encouraging efforts towards brand consistency maintenance and the content expectations of the users regarding their products for less competitive versions of ‘full-fledged’ designs they generally get on the internet.
Designing for the Mobile Environment
If you want to proceed with the mobile design for your app, then you would likely to consider how the device is used along with the specifics related to it. Here involves some general principles that can help the mobile app designers to get started but do not forget that they cannot replace the need for user research. They are just the guidelines and not the rules. You should input your mind towards following them.
When you are designing for your mobile app development, you have to consider many things, especially the standard UX considerations. Some mobile specific design consideration should also be undertaken. It is you who will decide whether you are going to integrate your mobile offerings with what you are offering currently? What will you choose – an adaptive design or a responsive design?
A lot of this will cover up for this context where the mobile device will be used. It would be awesome, if your users are accessing the mobile web from their desktops, but only few of them do so. They will be using mobile device only when they are visiting the supermarket, their daily commute to office or just going for a walk.
This means, you are strictly considering about reducing level of distractions along with making it easier for the user to focus on their task in hand too.
According to Josh Clark, the author of Tapworthy - Designing Great iPhone Apps, there are three categories to access mobile web:
- Local: When the user is interested in knowing what is going around them
- Bored: When the user fails to get something better to do and he is looking to get entertained or diverted otherwise.
- Microtasking: When the user is interacting with his mobile device for a short time period of doing frenzied activity.
Basic Mobile Web Design Considerations
You just have a smaller screen area for mobile devices in comparison to the laptops and personal computers. Normally, you will be designing here for multiple screen sizes. At the initial stage only, you would have to decide as to whether you want an adaptive design or a responsive design for your app. A responsive design is where the device handles the display changes and an adaptive design is where, the changes are handled by your servers.
Your focus should be on the mobile first approach where designing is done for the smallest mobile platforms along with increasing level of complexity from there.
Here includes a good process to be followed:
- Type of group devices based of similar screen sizes with trying to keep this to a manageable number of groups.
- Define design adaption rules and content rules to display things effectively on all groups of devices.
- Try to stick closely to the W3 web standards as possible with flexibly implementing layouts.
Always remember that the world of internet comprises a wide number of browser types available for the mobile web as well as for internet too. You should ensure that your app is supportive on all types of available browsers for include those who are not at all available these days like Nokia WebKit and BlackBerry.
Simple System of Navigation
Precise navigation is a must for the perfect mobile app design. Hence, you can try out:
- Navigation prioritizing depending upon how users are working well with functionality.
- Minimizing the involved level of navigation.
- Ensuring clear and concise level of labeling for navigation.
- Different features accessible with using a short-key.
- Offering a 30x30 pixel space for tap points of touch screen.
- Ensuring visually distinctive links and making it clear as well about when they have been activated.
- Making the design easily swap-able between the full site and mobile site.
Keeping Minimum Level of Content
Avoid overwhelming your users and respect the space of small screen when you are getting the opportunity of displaying your web or mobile site.
Make sure about the universal support for the content on all the devices. Think of making design in Flash and then avoid using it. For example, create short and to-the-point description for relevant bookmarks.
So, here I conclude what actually comes under perfect UX design and what considerations you take while moving on this way. So, stay tuned and design the best mobile user experience for your clients.
