I’ve got a mate at work, lets call him Aharon. He’s an absolute champion at Graphic Design but being a designer, he tends not to notice things that I notice, purely because I don’t do design all day.  Before I get into things, let me attempt to define what pair designing is.

I think that pair designing is when you combine a designer with someone experienced in something like user experience, website design or product engineering.  It’s taking an imaginative, creative designer and coupling them with someone who can help get that to something practical.  Here’s how it looks with Aharon and I:

1. Aharon is briefed on the project and given a set of guidelines.  This might be something akin to wireframes or content (or nothing).
2. Aharon then comes up with a set of concepts he thinks would look good.
3. At this point I sit down with him and we start iterating through any ideas or issues we think of, which are sparked by his design.
4. Once we get down to a final design, we try and make some assumptions about user interaction and then test those theories with A/B testing when we can.
5. From there we’ll either do another round of iterations or stick with the best performing hypothesis.

I guess you could call it “lean designing” haha.  So what are the benefits?

I know I’ve just made a list, but permit me another:

1. Two heads are better than one — often we’ll find issues with design or functionality that the other has missed.
2. Two heads are better than one (dejavu right?) — even though we have similar tastes, we often end up with different ideas about what a user might do, resulting in more split tests (YAY!).
3. Design time is often cut down because there are two creative outflows.
4. It’s fun which means it increases job satisfaction.
5. Helps customers get a better design in the end.

So I’ve put out there what I think are the benefits, but I know you’re a skeptic and want to know what the cons are.  There are none! Just kidding.  In all seriousness I feel that the only cons are you’re taking up two resources instead of one and that if you pair the wrong people together it can be a disaster!

Now, I could tell you where it’s being used, but the only place I know of is my work.  So why not try it out yourself and make some comments?  I’d love to know how you go with your pair designing escapades.

TL;DR: THE AMOUNT OF PAIR DESIGN AWESOME IS TOO DAMN HIGH.

No matter what your opinions are on Mark Zuckerberg, it’s difficult to deny that Facebook is an incredible service. The website has found its way into the vocabulary of just about every person on the planet, by offering an easy way to connect with friends. Whether or not you enjoy the service, is usually down to the friends you have and what they share.

Facebook boasts over a billion users, which is simply incredible. There isn’t anything like it, and I doubt there will be for a long, long time. With such a tight hold on the media, popular culture and a large chunk of the Earth’s population, it leaves us wondering why the company has waited until now to deliver a website design worthy of it’s success.

Let me begin by saying, I’m not Facebook’s biggest fan. I’ve been using it since around 2008, and used it as part of my daily life, taking advantages of all of its features. Now, although I do always have it open in a tab, I usually just use it to communicate through the messenger service and to see what photos I have been tagged in recently. Timeline got me interested in sharing detailed content every day again for a brief period last year, but ultimately I got tired of using the very bland design of News Feed, and made Twitter and Google+ my priority.

Despite the significantly lower active user count on Google+ compared to Facebook, I find myself drawn to it for the reason that, for the most part, it’s beautiful. I’ve been using it since the invite-only stages, and since then the style has changed quite a bit. However, due to the amazing team Google have on board to design their services, it’s always been an incredible looking social network.

For those that missed it, yesterday Facebook revealed a new design for the news feed, which says ‘Goodbye to clutter’. Although there will inevitably be several groups begging for Facebook to change the design back, I’m sure most people with an eye for web design and usability will agree that Facebook have done a very good job with this design, especially when you compare it to the design that we have been forced to use for the past couple of years.

There many nice touches added to the latest design of Facebook. A personal favourite of mine, is the decision to have the description of a photo within the photo, instead of breaking it away. This means the photo can be a lot bigger on the news feed, without taking up a lot more space.

It’s noticeable from first glance that the revamp has been inspired by mobile. The desktop site now has an expandable sidebar on the left side, which contains the apps and messenger contacts.

After reading all the new features, you’ll soon start to notice what Facebook have tried to do. Finally listening to the complaints of users over the past few years, the company has tried to make use of the huge amounts of white space, which used to plague the design. Thankfully, this has been achieved.

googlE+ and facebook, who’s copying who?

This is starting to look familiar…

A couple of days ago, Google updated the design of of user profiles on Google+. The change meant that users could have an even bigger cover photo, which could then have the user’s information within it. When cover photos first arrived on Google+, there were a few who accused the service of copying Facebook, and the small redesign this week prompted the same accusations. For many people, Google+ were copying Facebook.

With today’s release of the new Facebook design, the accusations have returned, however this time pointed in the opposite direction. The slightly rounded edges of status boxes, larger viewing pane for photos in the news feed and an all-round cleaner look has suddenly made Facebook look a lot like Google+.

I wouldn’t go so far as to say the two are copying off each other, but they’re definitely taking ideas. To be honest, it would be silly not to. Of course Facebook are going to take notes from Google+, a social network which has sported an incredible design since day one. On the other side, Google+ would love to have a user base the one belonging to Facebook, so it’s only natural that they are going to take some ideas, even if it’s just to make new users feel comfortable.

Facebook are rolling out the new design over the next few weeks, and you can sign up for the waiting list to get it slightly before everybody else. Personally, I’m extremely excited to try it out. I really want an excuse to get back into using Facebook as part of my daily life, and I’m hoping this is it.

]]> http://theblocc.com/finally-a-design-worthy-of-a-billion-users/feed/ 0 http://theblocc.com/the-revolutionary-scrollbar/ http://theblocc.com/the-revolutionary-scrollbar/#comments Tue, 05 Mar 2013 17:11:26 +0000 Dan Holmes http://theblocc.com/?p=340 Original article on GHL website - The revolutionary scrollbar

One thing you’ll notice about digital design is that it seems to be more attractive and understandable when it follows along the principles of a physical object. Apple, being the pioneer of the “touch revolution”, created a suite of apps and products which took the feel of real-life objects and made them digital. What this - Read More -

Welcome to the first of hopefully many interviews with established designers from around the web. To begin, we had a talk with Jordan Beck, the creator of Press, a Google Reader app for Android which became extremely popular since it launched shortly before Christmas.

Please tell us a bit about yourself

I’m Jordan Beck, developer and co-founder of Twentyfive Squares. And I love to build things. That started at a young age when my father taught me about woodworking, which is still a passion of mine. I went from that to an interest in architecture, but that changed in high school when I took my first programming class. I’ve been hooked from then on.

Since then, I’ve lived in many places and had the opportunity to meet a ton of talented people. They have both inspired and challenged me. During my time in Chicago, I was able to see a blossoming tech scene where amazing things were being created everywhere. That’s also where I started working with my friend and co-founder, Jay Ohms. We both shared a love for technology and decided to see what we could build together. So we built our first app: Press.

Press is arguably one of the most beautiful apps on the market, was this an aim when you began development and did you take any inspiration from other apps?

We definitely wanted to make Press a great looking app from the beginning.  There are some great Google Reader apps out there, but nothing fit for us.  When building Press, we tried to focus on two main things: simplicity and reading experience.  This impacted most of what you see in Press and continues to direct future development.

And ironically, we did take some inspiration from Reeder for iOS.  Silvio Rizzi used an amazing amount of tact with Reeder.  It brings together functionality that does not impede experience.  We didn’t set out to build the Reeder app for Android, but we did take inspiration from how he combines simplicity with functionality to create a great experience.  Whenever we add a new feature to Press, we want to make sure that it remains consistent with our focus.

Press is currently an android exclusive. what advantages do you feel android has over the competition in terms of design?

Android as an ecosystem has grown and matured tremendously since the release of Android 4.0 or Ice Cream Sandwich. Google has pushed the Holo design guidelines and created a solid design platform to build on top of.  That, combined with extras like rich notifications and widgets, allow developers and designers to take their apps outside the traditional boundaries and become more intimately involved with people as they use their devices.

That was a major part of our decision to launch on Android.  Also, there is a huge opportunity right now for quality apps in Android.  I can’t put it better than Shifty Jelly did in their blog post:

“…there’s a gap in the market right now for small developers like us who are passionate about design to create something a cut above the rest.”

(Definitely read that post if you haven’t already.  It’s really good.)

Android has always been criticized for a lack of well designed third-party apps, but that is gradually changing through the help of people like yourself. Focusing completely on design, what would be your top 5 Android apps?

Hmmm, this is a tough one. There are some really well designed apps for Android. Here is five of my favorite (not in any particular order since I’m having trouble ranking them):

Timer – The guys at Opoloo have done an amazing job designing this app.
Google+ – It’s a system app, but it has some really nice design features.
Feedly – Even though it’s a Press competitor, they did a really good job with this app.
Falcon Pro – Well done and it keeps improving.
Pocket – Great reading experience because they pay attention to the details.

One note about all of these apps that is very important to me when talking about design for Android: they all handle different device sizes well, giving you more content for larger screens.

What’s your view on manufacturer-made Android skins. Are you a vanilla-Android guy, or do you like skins like Sense and TouchWiz?

I have always been a stock Android guy. I understand why Google allows it (to some extent), but I’ve never seen a manufacturer’s skin that holds a candle to stock Android. In my opinion, they end up adding things that are unnecessary and ruining the experience.

What does the future hold for Twenty Five Squares, are any future projects or updates to Press planned?

We have a lot planned. Press will be getting a big update in the next few weeks that will add several large new features and some really great changes. Beyond that, there are still a lot of things we want to accomplish with Press including a really nice dark theme, a redesigned phone workflow, and feed management. It’s just a matter of time and priority

We do have several other app ideas that we are hoping to do this year. We just need to get together with our designer, Chad Urbanick, and start the process. He takes our ideas and makes then really slick.

Finally, we’re planning on expanding into some web projects. Not sure exactly what that will look like yet, but we want to continue to keep ourselves well-rounded.

Disclaimer: If there is one thing I can’t stress enough, it’s that design is more than just making something look beautiful. It’s the form, the function and the subtle undertones of everything about the product or website you create. Beautiful design is something I’m entirely consumed by and thus, will most likely underpin the articles I write.

Introduction

As you may well know, the business world takes a fairly skeptical approach to new fads, especially when it comes to technology and it’s only now that companies are starting to take a look at what responsive design really is. In my opinion design is critical to any business, and if part of design means making your website responsive, it’s something you need to consider.  Now if you were Apple, you’d think that if it’s design, it’s great for your business but of course you’re not Apple and you need to be convinced. So here goes nothing!

Responsive websites are necessary

Part of any business plan is doing a market analysis to see what competitors you’re up against. You also take a look at what your target market is and what key things there are about your market that you need to know. Do that market analysis with the web in mind and your target audience suddenly becomes something of a beast in the closet. The sheer number of platforms and devices that exist is phenomenal and you can’t guarantee that you are providing the best experience to all your customers.

So what would the impact be of providing a bad user experience to a small subset of your users? (WARNING: MATHEMATICS IMMINENT) If you have approximately 60,000 hits per day with a conversion rate of 32% that equates to 19,200 hits that are converting. If 5% of your users used a platform you didn’t specifically target (e.g. iPad) that means that 960 hits would possibly not convert due to your lack of design. Now if your average cart amount is $30 then that’s a potential loss of over $10.5 million dollars a year. Now obviously that’s a very crude formula but keep in mind I haven’t even taken into account the word of mouth fallout and brand image degradation.

Enter responsive web design. Responsive web design attacks the issue by ‘responding’ to whatever device or platform that accesses it and placing the focus on providing a quality user experience for all your customers. A small but critical reason why having a responsive website is necessary for your business.

Responsive websites improve conversion rates

Already I’ve touched on the issue of leaving out customers by not using responsive web design to target all your users, but what are other benefits of having a responsive web site?

Glad you asked, because it turns out that it gives you a higher conversion rate. “Wait, didn’t you just say that before?” you ask but there’s a flip side to this coin. Responsive web design not only helps you target all the users who visit your site but it also helps give you a better ranking in google!

Maxatec’s conversion rate went up 12% by implementing a beautiful responsive web design.

In the web and e-commerce world you will know the importance of ranking highly for that coveted keyword that your primary users search for. You see google can tell when you are targeting all your users and can see them lingering lovingly over your pages. All that love juice makes google so happy that it ranks you up a spot or two. Seriously though, the SEO benefits of responsive web design are incredible. The guys at SEOmoz have done a great job in showing exactly how responsive web design impacted their organic traffic.

The key things to note are that responsive web design makes your content consistent from the mobile through to the desktop and that your website’s functionality is consistent no matter what device or platform you use. Customers love consistency because it gives them a sense of stability and therefore trust.

Responsive Websites are good design:

As I said at the beginning, if you’re Apple, you know that great design is something that will make your product last, and improve your brand image therefore increasing sales. This methodology can be seen in the life of Dieter Rams whose furniture designs are still in use today.

Dieter Rams has ten design principles which he feels make a great design. They are:

1. Is innovative
2. Makes the product useful
3. Improves aesthetics
4. Makes the product understandable
5. Is unobtrusive
6. Is honest
7. Is long lasting
8. Is thorough to the last detail
9. Is environmentally friendly
10. Promotes as little design as possible

To me, responsive websites are definitely innovative, promote as little design as possible and make the product useful and understandable. Really to me, responsive websites address almost all of these key things. Again I can’t stress how much this is key to your users having an excellent experience on your website. A frustrating website leaves a bad taste in the mouth of a user but a website that ‘just works’ is a beauty to behold with awe. You yourself know that the little things tend to be the ones that annoy you the most: “If only it just did x”. Think about your customers who look at your website on an unsupported platform and say that.

A responsive website is necessary, it makes good business sense and is the poetry of the web. I think it’s time you considered having responsive web design for yourself.

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