When designing mobile apps to be used by millions of mobile phone users, there are some considerations that need to address. While some are rather obvious, many mobile apps designer sometimes tend to forget the applicability to the design of their app. Here are some things to consider when designing your apps.
Think About The Users
Before you start doing anything, you should ask yourself these questions:
Who is your target?
Are they iPhone or Android users?
…each smartphone has their own features and operating systems, apps needs to be compatible with all devices out in the market.
Why are making this mobile application?
Will it be useful to your target?
Anytime a product is developed, including mobile apps, the consumer who will be using it must be taken into account. By knowing the answers to these questions will help you determine if developing the mobile application worth your while or it’s just a waste of time and effort. Most of the time, mobile app designers/ developers just think about the functions of the app and forgetting why or to whom he is doing it in the first place.
Design It On Paper
Once the purpose and functionality of the mobile application have been determined, the next step would be to sketch out a design.
Your design is a work in progress..
The design should not be considered final but rather a work in progress. It’s more than likely that there will be edits made along the way. Make sure your app has some unique features or capabilities in comparison to other apps on the market. Otherwise, it may not be successful if there’s already one on the market and yours is not even better than the one already out in the stores.
Be Exceptional
There could be many more similar apps out there already, so how do mobile users know the difference between your application and the others? Make your mobile apps different and exceptional by giving it an awesome looking aesthetics, outstanding features and remarkable usefulness that your target users will love.
Make it stand out among the others.
Keep It Simple
Less is best
Users do not respond favorably to apps with cluttered screens and hard to navigate. They want sleek, streamlined apps that are easy to use and fulfill the intended purpose. You may have to assess what is really important in the design of your application.
Test It, Test It, Test It…
Lastly, test it, I cannot stress it more. Product testing is the last and one of the most important part in designing your app, like any other products in the market, to make sure that it works and it works how you intended it to be. The last thing you don’t want is an angry customer cursing you and your app because it’s broken.
Conduct a product testing with a sample demographic group you are targeting. Their feedback will provide you a substantial amount of data to help you shape your app to be better before it is released.
Do you have designing mobile apps tips you want to share? Please share them in the comments below.