New challenges in the healthcare industry accelerate the development of healthcare innovation. Striving to improve patient care, hospitals and clinics seek ways to digitize medical services and internal administrative processes. But while a lot of attention is focused on functionality, the role of a user experience design in healthcare software often remains undervalued.
In this article, we’ll outline key trends in medical technologies. We’ll also explain how quality UX design can help healthcare providers deliver better patient experience.
Telemedicine
With the help of telemedicine, physicians can consult, diagnose and treat patients remotely using telecommunication technology. A typical telemedicine appointment looks like a traditional visit to a doctor’s office. The only difference is that the patient and doctor communicate online. Video conferencing solutions and remote health monitoring apps are the most popular tools that medical organizations use for delivering clinical services from a distance. But the concept is constantly evolving so there is a lot of room for new ideas.
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Image credit: Alexander Plyuto
Potential telemedicine solution users aren’t a homogeneous group. In other words, UX design of this software must be created with different categories of patients in mind. In particular, to build an inclusive telemedicine application, UX designers should take into account such characteristics as users’ age, mental states, and tech skills.
Ideally, a telemedicine appointment should resemble a face-to-face visit as closely as possible. So when working with this healthcare technology, designers have to recapture the feeling of real-life experience for patients and doctors. This is obviously vital with this current COVID-19 pandemic.
Health wearables
Smartwatches and fitness trackers became mainstream soon after they appeared on the market. And their popularity continues to soar. For example, one study shows that the number of wearable devices is forecast to hit 1.1 billion by 2022. But the growth isn’t just in quantity. Technological developments allow app creators to expand and enhance the functionality of wearables, turning them into useful healthcare technology tools.
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Most regular smartwatches and fitness trackers can monitor basic metrics like the person’s heart rate, steps, and sleep patterns. Medical devices are much more advanced and can also detect different deviations in users’ health conditions. For instance, they can identify atrial fibrillation by tracking the person’s heart rhythms.
To build a successful UX design for a health wearable, designers should properly prioritize information. A device must be simple and intuitive so users don’t feel confused when they need to quickly find necessary data or functions.
Healthcare chatbots
In healthcare, the chatbot technology is still in the early stage of implementation. Yet, it has the potential to become the industry standard in the next few years. Today, hospitals and clinics use chatbots mostly for experience optimization. For example, there are chatbots that help patients book appointments, connect patients with doctors, or collect feedback after a consultation.
But it’s expected that digital assistants will eventually become the first line of primary care. In particular, they’ll be able to analyze health information provided by a user and offer responses with personalized instructions.
If powered by artificial intelligence, healthcare chatbots can help medical organizations deliver patient-centric services while reducing workload for doctors. It’s important to remember that people who seek medical advice need to feel cared for even if they talk to a machine. So the main task of UX designers is to make an interaction with a bot very similar to chatting with a real person.
Medical virtual reality
Virtual reality opens doors to a variety of new opportunities for the healthcare industry. First of all, this technology improves training methods for doctors. It also allows them to master professional skills without risking the health and life of real patients. Research shows that surgeons who used the VR platform for simulating operations enhanced their performance by 230 percent compared with doctors who used traditional training techniques.
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Another use case of virtual reality in healthcare is the reduction of pain and discomfort during unpleasant treatment procedures. For instance, VR healthcare technology comes in handy when a patient needs to sit for hours to undergo lengthy chemotherapy. VR can also help people with amputated limbs get accustomed to prosthetics.
Building a UX design for a VR-based healthcare solution is an extremely encompassing task. Designers working on such projects need to clearly outline the needs of a target audience and make accuracy their top priority.
Electronic health records
EHR solutions aren’t a new thing for medical organizations. Hospitals and clinics have been using this type of software for a long time. The purpose of EHR is to digitize medical charts and records while reducing the amount of paperwork needed. While this healthcare technology is widely adopted, its usability, in general, remains at a questionable level. As a result, nurses and physicians cannot fully rely on the system, as it may lead to errors and patient safety risks.
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Before creating a UX design for EHR software, designers need to study how medical staff will interact with a system. What is a user’s typical sequence of actions? Which fields are mandatory and which of them can be left blank? Is there something a user can forget to do after inserting information in a chart? Conducting extensive UX research will be very helpful during the early stages of development. But designers must also perform user testing and quality assurance at a later phase to ensure that a solution is user-friendly and effective.
UX and healthcare technology in a snapshot
Medical technologies aim to improve the efficiency of healthcare, enhance the patient experience, and make the doctors’ hard work a little bit easier. The UX design plays an important role in whether a particular health app meets these goals or not.
When deciding to develop a medical solution, healthcare providers must pay attention not only to its functionality but also to the user experience. At the same time, designers engaged in such projects must understand the specifics of the medical sector and be ready to deal with great responsibility that comes with tasks.
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Motion design and interactive web design has become extremely popular in the last twelve months. More and more websites use different types of animations, videos, and 3D objects to create a truly unique user experience. Browser performance has also increased and web technologies have evolved significantly. This, coupled with the much-anticipated arrival of 5G internet, allows website owners to keep up with the current trends with no harm to the load speed. In this blog post, we’ll explain how you can make your website stand out with the help of interactive and animated elements. We’ll also share some examples of digital products that already use such elements in quite impressive fashion.
Hover states
Hover states, also known as hover effects, are among the most common CSS animations on the web today. You’ve probably seen them, too. Remember the time when you placed your pointer over something and it changed or moved even though you didn’t click or drag anything? That’s a hover interaction animation you see in interactive web design. It’s used for many purposes. For instance, e-commerce stores often implement hover effects to show what an item looks like in different colors or from different angles.
Image source: econsultancy.com
There are other reasons why companies build digital products with this type of web design animation too. Sometimes, it can help users figure out what actions take them from A to B.
Image source: wpepitome.com
Alternatively, you can use hover states just to entertain your users and keep them engaged.
Image source: designshack.net
Parallax scrolling effect
The parallax effect, or parallax scrolling, is another interactive web design trend that can help you deliver an outstanding user experience. Simply put, it’s an effect that makes the background image or content and forefront content of web pages move at different speeds while scrolling. Combined with a full-screen interface effect, parallax scrolling creates a feeling of space and depth. Besides making a website more memorable, it helps to draw users’ attention to specific sections or content.
Image source: invisionapp.com
Loader screen
Internet speeds continue to increase, which is why website visitors can hardly tolerate bad loading times. But in some cases, delays are just unavoidable (like heavy traffic or a large amount of data that needs to be processed). Fortunately, interactive web design can help you with this task. When you use loading animations for experience optimization, you’ll be able to keep more people on a page. You’re also more likely to see users being more patient as content loads.
By Sulf: https://dribbble.com/shots/10173093-Loading-screen-animation
Animated and video backgrounds
Your interactive web design may also benefit from the dynamic layouts. Usually, when you animate elements, you create a much more immersive experience than traditional static backgrounds. Visually, it captivates users in a similar way to watching a movie or playing a video game. Additionally, dynamic backgrounds may help you instantly show what your business is about as well as convey its key messages. Basically, you can use animations or videos to add some motion to the website background.
Image source: optimizepress.com
Animated 3D elements
The use of three-dimensional, real-life objects in web design is a growing trend that is unlikely to change any time soon. Whether to add 3D web design elements to your UX design system or not is no longer a question. New technologies such as webGL allow website owners not only to include 3D objects in their web interface, but also effectively combine them with animations. The results can be breathtaking. View the video below to see the true power of animated 3D in interactive web design.
Image galleries
If you want to show several images on one screen, you may use an interactive image gallery. Selected photos will change automatically or after a user clicks on a button. At the same time, animating effects will make the user experience more pleasant. Another benefit of interactive image galleries is that they allow you to save space and avoid “cluttering” the page with photos. If you’re not sure whether you can incorporate this type of animation into your website, you can conduct a design audit first.
Different experiments with typography have become one of the most vivid UI/UX design trends in the last 2-3 years. Not only do designers play with fonts, text directions, and proportions but they also make the letters move. Since moving type provides almost endless possibilities for creativity, it can be harmoniously introduced into most styles. No matter whether you need to develop interactive web design for a FinTech company or digital agency, it’ll probably benefit from kinetic typography.
Image credit: Animography
Particle animations
A few years ago, the digital industry became obsessed with minimalism. So on the one side, website owners wanted to add motion to their products. But on the other side, they didn’t want to make landing pages overwhelmed with distracting moving elements. Particle animations appeared as designers’ solution to this request. Elegant yet impressive, they do make a difference, setting the website apart from the competition and greatly enriching the user experience.
Image source: dataveyes
This type of web animations is often used on homepages. Depending on your needs and goals, you may choose either interactive (i.e. movements triggered by users’ actions) or non-interactive (i.e. movements are not connected to users’ actions) particle animations for your website.
Animated navigation menu
Animated navigation is one of the simplest ways to create an interactive web design. It serves two purposes: 1) it helps designers liven up a page, and 2) assists visitors navigate a website. Additionally, it makes web solutions more “compact.” In some cases, users can access a menu without even scrolling. Although animated navigation isn’t something that necessarily amazes people, you can still be creative. For instance, you can use a slider instead of a hamburger icon that is considered a traditional navigational element.
Image source: dribbble Image credit: Tran Mau Tri Tam
Creative combinations
If you want to take a holistic approach rather than simply adding motion to a website, you can combine several types of animations. For instance, you can make every user’s action followed by some animated effect like a hover state or micro-movements of illustrations. This will make a website interface more intuitive and aesthetically pleasant.
Image source: tubikstudio.com
Animations can also help you tell your brand’s story or assist your messaging, especially when paired with other audio-visual effects/text. The Beyond Beauty project is a great example. When users enter the website, a song starts playing. Scrolling through the page makes the images and text move and change. If an image is clicked, users can listen to a story and read the transcript by the side.
Image credit: wazile.com
Keep your business relevant with interactive web design
No matter if your company is just a local business or an established enterprise, most customers will likely judge it by your digital presence. Creating a delightful user experience isn’t something you do once and forever. Website owners must always keep up with design trends to demonstrate to customers that their businesses are modern, reliable, and relevant. Implementing motion design and interactive web design is a perfect way to improve the usability of digital products, make them more memorable, and increase engagement.
Want to power up your website with interactive elements? Reach out!
A full-fledged launch of 5G will drive revolutionary changes in most modern industries, cities, and homes. Although the technology is still not active in many countries, a lot of tech experts believe that 2020 will be the year we will truly see 5G innovations for new business opportunities boom.
In particular, the mobile industry and large telecommunication carriers continue rolling out 5G networks all over the world and major phone manufacturers compete in releasing devices equipped with 5G capabilities. The pieces of the 5G evolution puzzle are coming together. It is high time to start preparing for the new 5G service reality.
In this article, we’ll explain why the advent of 5G is an important milestone for any company that strives to grow and remain competitive. We’ll also make some predictions about how the combination of 5G and the Internet of Things (IoT) will innovate the way we live and do business.
What is 5G how does it work?
Simply put, 5G is the new generation of mobile networks that will augment and eventually replace its predecessor 4G LTE. Unlike previous network generations, 5G technology is forecast to have a much bigger impact on the world around us.
Besides increasing the speed of the internet, it’ll enable ultra-low latencies and ubiquitous coverage. These changes will eliminate the last barriers to the wide IoT adoption, opening the door to large-scale automation and other almost futuristic transformations.
Image source: rfsafe.com
However, the main challenge is that 5G operates on three spectrum bands simultaneously. Each of them offers different data transmission speeds, has different coverage areas, and requires a separate infrastructure.
Image source: digitaltrends.com
Low-band spectrum
The low-band spectrum consists of low-frequency waves below 1GHz. It offers relatively slow data transmission speed, i.e. 100Mbps at its peak, that practically feels like a 4G network. But the coverage area is quite broad.
This means that a telecommunication carrier needs fewer towers to ensure the internet connection over a long distance. In addition, the low-band spectrum can penetrate walls and other obstructions.
Mid-band spectrum
The mid-band spectrum operates in the 1-10GHz frequency range. It provides decent speed (the peak is around 1Gbps) as well as low latency. However, the mid-band spectrum may fail to go through physical objects in some instances.
It also covers a lower amount of space compared to the low-band spectrum. So telecommunication carriers need to install a lot of stations, i.e. macrocells, to create the proper infrastructure for it.
High-band spectrum
The high-band spectrum or a millimeter wave operates above the 24 GHz band and can deliver the internet at super-high speeds, i.e. up to 10Gbps. But since these waves are very short range, their coverage area is extremely low. They also struggle with smaller physical obstacles, for example, the roof of the car. That’s why a great number of small cells are required to fully roll out the high-band spectrum.
The ultimate goal is to create an infrastructure in which a 5G smartphone will remain connected to a high-band spectrum all the time. But the implementation of this scenario requires millions, if not billions, of small cells installed literally everywhere. For this reason, telecommunication carriers strive to ensure adaptive beam switching. It means that the phone will be connected to a different beam if the previous beam can no longer track the user.
What 5G means for IoT?
Image source: dribbble.com
The 5G wireless networks will create perfect telecommunications conditions to make IoT devices function at their fullest potential and bring the most benefits. In particular, they will enable more real-time connections thanks to high 5G speeds and omnipresence.
Low latency is another reason why 5G is good for IoT. Machines will respond faster to requests. As a result, they will be able to “communicate” more effectively with each other and the number of delays will be close to zero.
But let’s take a look at what the benefits of 5g are and the specific changes the 5G rollout may cause at different levels.
Business automation
With 5G, IoT devices can be effectively monitored and controlled remotely with no compromises on their performance. Seamless connectivity along with the enhanced capacity of the networks will allow companies to automate a vast majority of operations that now require human intervention. This will streamline workflows, improve overall business productivity, and cut operational costs.
Image source: KPMG
Another considerable benefit of autonomous processes is that they eliminate the risk of human error. This will enable companies to largely avoid the most common accident type.
Industrial 5G-powered solutions
With the widespread deployment of IoT platforms and 5G devices, we may expect that drones andaugmented reality headsets will be among the most popular innovative solutions in manufacturing. In addition, real-time collection and analysis of big data will allow for predictive maintenance that will reduce machine downtime and repair costs.
Robotics of different types will also be used quite frequently, especially in factories. For instance, Audi already tests its 5G-powered robots in its production lab in Germany.
Smart cities
The combination of 5G, IoT, and artificial intelligence creates a solid foundation for building smart cities. Advanced 5G capabilities will allow local authorities to detect and respond instantly to different emergency situations, making cities much safer.
Increased internet speed will help to immediately process the data gathered from traffic sensors on the roads. This will lead to solving the transportation problem and most likely result in reduced roadway congestion.
Image source: bibliotecapleyades.net
Besides, 5G also brings us one step closer to autonomous vehicles. Fast internet connection throughout large areas will allow self-driving cars to travel long distances without any limitations. In addition, the possibility to assess information in real time will ensure adherence to traffic rules. This will lower the chances of accidents and make autonomous vehicles safer for passengers and pedestrians.
Although smart cities are extremely complex networks of connected devices and we’ll unlikely see them in 2020, many communities already work towards this goal. So the future may be just around the corner.
Personal devices
To take advantage of the 5G network service, users must have a 5G compatible smartphone. The news is bad for phone owners but great for device manufacturers. The latter ones see it as an opportunity to earn a fortune once 5G will get broader coverage. But even today, you can order a smartphone supporting 5G.
The key market players such as Samsung, Huawei, LG, and Motorola released their phones last year and more expected to follow in 2020.
On top of that, Lenovo showed the first 5G laptop for consumers at CES 2020. It supports 5G connection so you can access super-fast mobile internet from this device and download files at the speed of 4Gb/s. Chances are we’ll see other types of 5G compatible gadgets and IoT applications quite soon.
Smart homes
With 5G, more devices can be supported on one network and is likely to become a game-changer for smart homes. Today, keeping everything connected can be frustrating, as different pieces of the smart home infrastructure operate in different ways. For instance, a smart doorbell may use wi-fi while a toaster may connect only via Bluetooth. At the same time, 4G doesn’t have enough channels to ensure proper connection for a high number of devices at once.
By offering reliable coverage, low latency, and unprecedented network performance, 5G can solve this problem. As a result, it’ll be possible to create a truly interoperable system, not just have several smart devices placed in one home.
Internet of Everything (IoE)
Once 5G establishes itself, the Internet of Things will have every chance of becoming the Internet of Everything. This means that not only devices will be connected but also people, data, and processes. These connections will also become more intelligent, meaning that the right data will be transmitted to a person or machine at the right time automatically. So the IoE is more about creating a hyper-connected independent environment than just making several physical objects communicate.
Image source: researchgate.net
Since telecom carriers still need some time to fully roll out 5G, we don’t see the IoE coming in 2020. However, businesses should start preparing for this change anyway because such global transformations will likely require several years to happen. This leaves plenty of room for innovation as 5G IoT applications will be in great demand.
What are the benefits of 5G?
Once 5G becomes widespread, our connectivity will reach a new level that will have a significant impact on nearly every aspect of our lives. Combined with the IoT technology, 5G will create a perfect platform for building complex smart environments in offices, factories, cities, and even at our homes. Industrial robots, autonomous vehicles, and PCs capable of connecting to super-fast mobile internet already exist. Now, everything depends on telecom carriers and they demonstrate promising advancements in 5G’s speed and reliability.
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We expect 2020 to be a momentous year in the space of UX design. New technology and user experience trends during the last decade have made competition across most modern industries tougher than ever before. Naturally, this motivates businesses to put even a greater focus on the user experience.
Today, the challenge in sensing customers’ needs and wants is no longer enough to stand out and be successful. Companies that want to win a higher market share must also be a step ahead of the herd and anticipate future UX trends.
To give you a leg up, we’ve collected the latest trends of the digital world which, we believe, will shape user experience in 2020. Give them a look and make strategic decisions before your rivals do.
Even more personalized experience
Personalization has been an essential part of experience optimization for a while already. However, as technologies continue to evolve businesses become better able to precisely tailor their offers to different users.
Besides using cookies that store only basic information about a user, website and app owners may now take advantage of the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI) and related technologies (e.g. advanced data analytics, machine and deep learning). They open doors to a whole bunch of new UX-related opportunities and experiences.
A great example is Netflix. This well-known video-streaming service applies machine learning algorithms to provide every user with relevant content by personalizing recommendations, push notifications, and search results.
Starbucks goes even further. It combines AI with geolocation technology to deliver a truly futuristic experience. In particular, users of its famous location-aware app receive highly personalized promo messages at the time when they are in a specific place, i.e. near the Starbucks shop.
Image source: Build Fire
In 2020 there won’t even be a question whether to make your app user-centric or not. The key differentiator will be the extent to which you’re ready to personalize your product.
Voice user interfaces are getting to their peak
In today’s fast-paced world time is money, and its value is high. Voice User Interfaces (VUIs) and virtual assistants help users navigate through an app faster while the handsfree capabilities allow users to multitask. No wonder voice user interface interaction has been on the top of UX trends for the last several years. The question is; what will happen with Voice User Interfaces (VUI) in 2020?
Well, VUI will continue to strengthen its position as the second most popular type of app navigation after graphical user interface (GUI). Is there a chance it’ll leapfrog GUI on the list?
We don’t see that happening next year. But voice-assisted UI will definitely continue getting closer to the first position in the ranking. There is even a quite promising prediction made by ComScore in 2016 that nearly half of searches will be voice searches in 2020.
We still expect a significant shift in the quality of VUIs. As natural language processing (NLP) technology is evolving, voice interactions and voice assistants become more effective in finding accurate answers. Besides, our interaction with them will also become more natural. It’ll resemble more human-to-human communication rather than a conversation with a robot.
Image source: SnapTravel
On top of that, the array of tasks we can perform with a voice command will probably increase in 2020. For instance, Google Duplex, a new project by Google, has already enabled setting up appointments over the phone without any interaction with a person on the other end from a user’s side.
Image source: Google
Introduction of a Chief Experience Officer position
Creating a user experience that is both holistic and consistent is crucial for enhancing the usability of a product and making a brand memorable. Traditionally, UX professionals or a designer together with a marketing team has been responsible for ensuring this part of the development. But the situation is quite different now.
The list of platforms today’s organizations use to maintain their digital presence is not limited to a website and mobile app. Wearables and smart devices are growing in popularity, the number of social media channels is increasing and becoming more complex. In general, markets are becoming ever more dynamic. Ensuring a positive customer experience is now a much more complex activity than it used to be. This is why a new C-level executive position is necessary.
As of the end of 2019, not many businesses introduced the position of CXO. Introducing this position to your business will give you a significant competitive advantage for your company in the coming year. In particular, a chief experience officer will help you perform a comprehensive visual audit and build a holistic UX design system.
The rise of VR & AR in fashion and e-commerce
In 2020, Virtual Reality (VR) and Artificial Reality or Augmented Reality (AR) technologies will continue blurring the borders between the real and digital worlds. The success which such pioneers as Ikea, Toyota, LEGO, and Zara reached with their VR/AR-powered apps has inspired many other businesses to take a fresh look at the way they promote and sell products.
Image source: kidscreen.com
The development of applications containing virtual reality or augmented reality elements has also become more accessible in terms of costs and availability of specialists. All these factors lay the groundwork for a boom in VR/AR that can happen any year now. Of course, not all business areas will adopt these technologies equally fast. But such sectors as interior design, e-commerce, and fashion will likely become dependent on this type of interaction design in the near future.
For instance, at the beginning of this year, Gucci launched its AR-based app that allows users to try on sneakers by pointing a smartphone camera at their feet.
Image source: designboom.com
In May, Nike released its own mobile app that uses augmented reality technology to help customers accurately define their size.
Since online shopping is an active and ever-growing niche (e.g. about 60 percent of millennials prefer it over traditional shopping), we have all reason to believe that similar functionality will become industry standard quite soon.
3D design is taking over the app world
In our 2019 State of UX article, we were writing about Memoji which had been introduced with the release of iOS12. In the last twelve months, designers have started to use both static and dynamic 3D elements more frequently. The trend of 3D design has become vivid and noticeable.
Besides being eye-catching, a 3D presentation of interfaces helps to deliver a truly realistic user experience. A study shows that modern people are online for nearly 7 hours per day. This means that we spend an enormous amount of time in a virtual environment.
A 3D view makes our stay there more natural and comfortable. That’s why leveraging the power of 3D will be a great idea for all app creators and website owners in 2020.
Image credit: Chris Frank
In case you’re not sure if 3D elements will suit the overall visual identity of your brand, you can perform a site design audit before introducing any changes. Doing so will make it easier for you to get to grips with the big picture and make informed decisions.
Adaptability to the new foldable phones
The year of 2019 has been an important milestone for phone manufacturers all over the world. The long-awaited foldable displays finally became a reality. Practically all market leaders either expressed their interest in developing such a device or unveiled their prototypes capable of being folded in numerous different ways.
Realizing that stakes were high, Samsung tried to outrun its competitors. In April, the company pre-released its Galaxy Fold, the world’s first foldable smartphone.
Image source: Samsung
Although the device was exposed to a number of quality concerns and Samsung had to delay its release, we have all reason to expect that foldable displays will enter the global mass market in 2020. This will naturally bring a lot of changes to user experience, for example:
A grip will depend on whether a person is holding a folded and unfolded device. The main task of UX designers is to make it convenient for both cases.
A user will have to be able to switch between different forms of a device seamlessly. That’s why app creators must ensure the continuity of an application, meaning that a person should have an opportunity to continue using it when upgrading to a new device.
Unfolded devices will allow users to have multiple active apps on their screens. So to create a truly outstanding user experience, designers will need to keep this multitasking capability in mind.
Image source: Samsung
Versatile UX for device-neutral apps
Ever since the IoT technology came on the scene, the discussions about platform-agnostic applications have never left the tech community. Nowadays, our personal digital ecosystem is much richer than five, three, or even two years ago. We use mobile phones, PC, and laptops interchangeably on a daily basis but also wearables, smart home appliances (like Google home), and car dashboards (like the one Tesla offers).
For many years, responsiveness has been the main requirement of web solutions. However, responsive design is no longer optional, it’s the default. Today’s users will unlikely to tolerate an application that doesn’t adjust to screen size or platform.
Image source: giphy.com
But, on top of that, they expect to receive an integrated experience. This means that information must be consistent across all the systems. And the process should be continuous, allowing a user to pick it up at any point on any device.
That’s why we foresee that device integration and synchronization will get to the forefront next year. Logically, creating a versatile UX design will become a huge new challenge for designers in 2020.
User control over the content
The interactive experience is another ‘big thing’ that has a huge potential to become a major UX trend in 2020. To be precise, some forward-thinking marketers had been trying to promote products with the help of interactive videos before. But this type of content, where the user interacts directly with the content, only managed to generate massive interest after Bandersnatch, a Black Mirror’s interactive episode, was released on 28 December 2018.
Image source: meg.onemega.com
As it turned out, fashion brands and e-commerce stores became the first adopters of interactive videos. This is because such videos not only offer an immersive experience but they also are an efficient money-catching tool. By watching them, users can shop while still consuming the content. This allows them to act on their desire to buy a product when the desire is at its highest point.
Image source: cdn.trendhunterstatic.com
Besides making online shopping easier and faster, interactive videos are also more enjoyable and captivating than ordinary videos. If you want to create a stunning visual design with a great user experience that will allow you to win over the competition in the coming year, then giving users better control over the content is definitely the right thing to start with.
Expansion of interface animations
Adding motion to button, tabs, menus and other visual elements is not a brand new thing in UI/UX design. We’ve seen it this year and it’ll continue being popular in 2020. However, as animations seem to still be in the process of gaining momentum, we’ll probably see even more animated interfaces on our screens in the next twelve months. Just like 3D design, moving objects help UX designers grab users’ attention as well as make their experience more realistic and engaging.
Image source: tubikstudio.com
Yet, it’s important to remember that every animation you implement into the app interface should serve a purpose. In other words, you don’t have to animate everything on a page. If you do so, a user will be distracted by visual noise – which is no doubt not the outcome you’re aiming at.
Instead, you may create a feedback animation that will make app navigation easier. Specifically, it’ll show users that they’re on the right path after an action is taken.
Image credit: tubikstudio.com
Animated progress indicators are also a nice idea for most mobile apps. They help users understand that there aren’t any problems with the application, it just needs more time to perform a certain task.
Image source: Dribbble
If you have doubts about whether you need to add more animated elements to the interface or not, we recommend you to conduct a design audit first.
Typography will still matter a lot
When it comes to conveying messages, companies have a wide array of formats to choose from. But while videos and images are considered the most captivating, text content remains the main and the most effective method of communication in the online world. That’s why typography never loses its relevance and, of course, it will still be in the spotlight in 2020.
What major change may we expect in the year to come? As a rule, a user gets a meaningful and memorable experience only when the design is well-balanced and consistent. Since we’ll probably see more 3D elements and animations in the interfaces, typography will have to reflect these effects too.
Image source: andreirobu.com
Of course, this doesn’t mean that San-Serif fonts, which are now widely used in the digital space, will completely disappear during the next year. But UI/UX designers will become more creative with the way text is presented on a page. Chaotic typography with mixed sizes and patterns (e.g. filled and outlined letters), as well as experiments with text directions, will likely be quite common in 2020.
Image source: Dribbble (by Oleh Gvozdetskyi)
The obsession with dark themes
Dark Mode became the most noticeable visual change brought by iOS13 in September 2019. The feature provides the option of replacing the bright colors of an interface with black and dark grey, making it more pleasant for eyes in a poorly lit environment. During the month that followed this release, dark modes were also introduced by Instagram, Gmail, and Facebook (partially). So we can make confident predictions about the dark mode ‘fever’ that will likely expand in 2020.
Image source: techradar.com
Besides aesthetic value, dark themes also improve the readability of text and are perceived as less harsh if a person uses a device at night. Whether to enable it or not is a matter of personal preference. But if you implement such a mode for your app, your users will for sure appreciate it.
Custom illustrations will fill up the interfaces
In 2020, designers will have to cooperate with digital illustrators more frequently as bespoke interface illustrations are another emerging UI/UX trend. Stock photos that have been quite popular for many years now are no longer acceptable. Stock photos simply don’t offer the level of uniqueness most brands and users seek. At the same time, digital art is much more flexible in terms of styles, shapes, compositions, and characters.
But catchiness isn’t the only reason why illustrations are so powerful. The correct illustrations in combination with other elements on a web page can help you make the right emphasis and draw visitors’ attention to the CTAs. They also make an interface more emotionally appealing and help to create the right tone and mood.
Image source: Dribbble (by Tubik)
Speaking about mobile development, custom illustrations have always been less popular in this sector. However, such a situation is going to change as they’re getting more and more common – not only on the onboarding screens but also at other touchpoints (e.g. error notifications).
Image source: Dribble (by Icons8 team)
The final word
We want to give you a comprehensive review of the trends which will likely define the UX design space of 2020. We made our conclusions based on our professional experience and the latest information about technological advancements. Yet, the digital world is hyperdynamic and a lot may change in a blink of an eye.
Some innovative solutions may appear completely unexpectedly and change the rules of the game across several industries. But don’t worry. We’ll keep track of UX best practices of 2020 and let you know about all important trends.
Want to build your next product with us? Reach out!
Visual content, brand positioning and outstanding user experience (UX) are main things that help businesses stand out from the competition. Combined, they constitute your visual identity. This visual identity makes you different in the eyes of existing and potential customers. Both brand positioning and UX center around a company's interaction with its target audience. Brand messaging constitutes the foundation of any business-customer relationship. However, your visual identity and the form in which your company communicates with its buyers play a pivotal role – and ultimately determines the overall success of your customer engagement.
That’s why a properly designed visual identity can not only make a company’s digital presence beautiful. But it is also an effective tool for demonstrating a brand “personality” and improving the overall user experience (UX).
In this article, we will provide some visual design examples. We’ll explain how elements of graphic design and visual content constitute content marketing 101. Additionally, we’ll explain how it can strengthen your bond with customers.
We’ll also provide you with some useful tips for creating an outstanding brand image with the help of visuals and user interface (UI) design. But before we dive into the practical stuff, let’s briefly outline the basics.
What is a "visual identity"?
Visual identity and branding are often used interchangeably. But, they are not the same thing. Branding is a broad term and is about how a business wants to be perceived by consumers or clients.
For instance, a coffee shop that uses only recyclable coffee cups may identify itself as an eco-friendly place. They can demonstrate this through design as well as visual and text content. This position would be a distinctive feature differentiating it from many other cafes which also offer good coffee.
Image credit: justcreative.com
At the same time, a visual identity is a set of visible elements that would help the coffee shop convey its brand message. In general, it may include anything from interior design, graphic design principles and elements, to a logo. But if we narrow it down only to the digital presence, then visual identity would consist of the following two blocks:
elements of basic design (i.e. typography, colors, layouts, grids, etc.)
visual content (i.e. images, infographics, screenshots, videos used mainly for marketing purpose)
So, for example, a green color palette might be a great choice for a website or mobile app of the eco-friendly coffee shop. See the example below. At the same time, an infographic showing what happens with coffee cups after they’ve been used would be a nice supplement to its blog posts or marketing emails. They could also feature as pamphlets or posters.
Example of a website for the eco-friendly cafe Image credit: The Pear Tree Kitchen
The above case is oversimplified, but it perfectly explains the main idea. When website visitors know what you and your offers are about, their trust and engagement levels increase. This naturally leads to better experience optimization, business growth, and higher profits.
Why establishing effective visual communication is a must
As human beings, we perceive visual information easier and process it faster than plain text. That’s why internet users in most cases prefer images and infographics to other types of content. In fact, visual content statistics really underline this:
People are really good at remembering images. One study found that people remember 55 percent more information they heard three days ago – if there was a picture added to it.
Infographics can drive the increase in website traffic by 12 percent. On top of that, internet users spend more time on a web page if it contains informative visuals. See what type of visuals draws perform best in the image below.
Image credit: venngage.com
Interestingly, Twitter users retweet 150 percent more tweets that contain images as compared to tweets without photos, memes or infographics.
It’s three times easier for people to follow visual instructions than written guidelines. This is why you should focus on illustrations, icons, and color hierarchy which guide users to their goal when creating UX design for a digital product.
More than 63 percent of digital buyers believe that the quality product image is more important than a detailed product description or reviews.
Internet articles that contain images have 6.5 times higher engagement than text-only blog posts.
So how design works, creating engaging visuals and building a decent design system, is not only about drawing customer attention. It's also about communicating and conveying information in an efficient way.
It’s worth mentioning that there is no visual content vs text confrontation. Both types of content are important elements of any good content marketing strategy and brand positioning. That’s why they should complement rather than replace each other.
The role of design and visual content in branding
As we’ve outlined above, visual appearance is a crucial component of a company’s online presence. But how exactly does it benefit businesses’ self-presentation and the customer perception of a brand? Let’s discuss this in greater detail.
Setting the right tone
Website design and visual content marketing are the focal points and tools of visual communication. They determine the tone the brand use to “speak” to its target audience. Once visitors enter a web page, they form their first impression about the business behind it. If that impression meets visitors’ expectations they stay on the website. If not, they leave in the first few seconds without even reading the text.
For instance, if a bank’s website was designed like a digital platform for kids it would probably have a high bounce rate. So make sure that the visual appearance of your web design and brand corresponds with your brand identity and cannot be misinterpreted. But don't forget about the aesthetics — it plays a crucial role as well. That's why you should try to create a visually pleasant and relevant UI design without compromising on any of these aspects.
Building brand recognition
The long-term success of any commercial organization heavily depends on brand awareness and recognition. To build them, a company needs to develop a comprehensive brand strategy. This includes visual identity, among other elements such as a story, messaging, and personality. For most customers, the visual identity is the key differentiator since visuals are in general more memorable than text or audio.
Judge for yourself. When someone mentions Coca-Cola, what is the first thing that pops up in your mind? Chances are it’s the logo or brand colors. In most cases, it works in reverse equally well even if some element of graphic design is taken out of context.
For example, the combination of yellow and red is often associated with Mcdonald’s. Generally speaking, you should avoid any divergences between your offline and online core visual elements.
Image credit: McDonald’s
Delivering brand messages
There is a saying that a picture is worth a thousand words. And that’s exactly what visual identity is all about. Because while it may seem that we communicate mostly with words, studies show that nearly90 percent of the information that is processed by our brains is visual. That’s why visual content and identity should not only describe what the business stands for – but also demonstrate it visually.
The question becomes; how do we do this successfully? Since every brand is unique, there is no one-size-fits-all recipe. However, different colors evoke different emotions (see below). Similarly, typography, layouts, and icons may tell a lot about the company's style, while color hierarchy shows what exactly a business wants to emphasize, and so on.
Image credit: bigmouthdesign.co.uk
The same applies to the visuals used in marketing campaigns. For instance, even the high-level review of visual content on social media may give you a clear idea of what values a brand has and whether you want to buy from it.
The role of design and visual content in UX
An awful user experience can break even the most thoroughly built brand identity. That’s why when designers and marketers are working on a visual identity for a company, they should also think about the usability of a website or app.
The bottom line is that all elements and principles of basic design, as well as any pieces of visual content, must enhance the UX. In short, a decent visual identity and brand positioning should not come at the cost of user convenience. But let’s take a closer look at how visual identity impacts the UX.
Capturing attention and telling a story
According to Forbes, Google performs around 3.5 billion searches per day. Additionally, a study by the New York Times shows that modern people are on average exposed to 5,000 ads every day.
For businesses, this means that older marketing strategies likely struggle to grab customer attention. Or, in other words, they should use other means to help internet users notice them. Unique UI design, overall design, and high-quality visual content are the best tools to do that.
Besides, visual storytelling is often perceived by website visitors more easily and can, therefore, be considered more convenient. Look at the image below.
Image credit: Fitbit
Instead of describing a potential use case, site creators just showed a photo of a busy man who checks his work messages on the go. As a consequence, users can understand how the product may help them while they’re scrolling a web page. They don’t need to read long product characteristics to figure out if they need this item.
Guiding a customer through a site or app
People use websites and applications for a reason. For instance, they may search for information, want to buy a product, order a service, watch a movie, play a game, or text to friends. Ideally, the design of a software solution should be straightforward enough for users to reach their goals without putting too much effort into figuring out how to do this.
A great example is the Uber app. It’s built according to the basic principles of linear UX design which is a minimalistic approach aimed at creating goal-oriented experiences.
Simply put, this means that the app “guides” users to their goals through a number of steps and users clearly know what to do next at every phase of their journey. The UI design is also in line with this idea since it’s rather simple: black and white colors for buttons and notifications, straight lines, plain layout, and no distractions.
Image credit: Uber
How to create an awesome visual identity for your brand
Creating a visual identity that would properly present a brand and resonate with its customers is a complex process that doesn’t happen overnight. But here are a few recommendations that would help you do everything right.
Before you start working on something new, you need to review what you already have. A comprehensive visual audit will allow you to understand if the visual identity of your business complies with its brand positioning. When a design audit process covers the evaluation of all design assets, its results will help your marketing team create more engaging visual content for social media, blog, and future marketing campaigns.
Image credit: infographicworld.com
Develop a design system
Once a design inventory is ready, you may proceed to the next stage and develop a design system. In short, a design system is a set of guidelines and standards defining common rules for building different components of visual identity. For example, a design system will determine a color palette and brand fonts. Not only will it allow you to set a single vision of the outward expression of your brand, but it will also help designers avoid so-called design debt in the future.
Components of a design system Image credit: Ines Serizer
Consider basic design principles
When it comes to creating visuals for a brand, applying graphic design principles is always beneficial. They will help you develop a comprehensive visual language and make your brand “personality” look both consistent and attractive. Some things like visual weight, the level of white space, and visual texture might seem unessential to non-designers but they play a critical role in creating a holistic visual identity.
Avoid visual noise
Sometimes less is more. You should remember that every element of your design, as well as every visual, should serve a particular purpose, not just be mere decoration.
For example, there is no point in using five bright colors on a web page if three of them will just distract users and impair user experience. The same is with images. Instead of choosing a photo because it looks beautiful to you, pick a picture that tells a story or explains the benefits of your product.
Hire professionals!
Luckily, you don’t have to do everything yourself. Although there are some tools that can help you create simple template-based visuals, more complex tasks need to be performed by professionals. Otherwise, there is a risk your efforts won’t bring the expected results.
Looking for experienced designers who can help your brand stand out with an impressive visual identity? Reach out now!
How many companies have you worked in that have a clear understanding of their company’s vision & how they hope to achieve it? How many have a clear framework to actually define & prioritise what they work on? How many people in your team would be able to tell you exactly that they are doing, why, and how it ties into their team & company objectives?
The number of enterprises which adopted or plan to adopt marketing automation is constantly growing. A report by Social Media Today shows that nearly 75 percent of marketers use at least one tool for automating marketing activities. And according to Statista, the size of global marketing automation market is expected to hit 25.1 billion U.S. dollars by 2023. Hence, it’s no wonder that conversations about marketing automation are quite common among marketers, CEOs, and CTOs.
Yet, as we see from the practice, not all of those people really understand what it is and why a company needs it. Even fewer of them know how to automate marketing processes right. We bet you have also heard of so-called marketing automation failures when someone invested lots of money in automation software and received no positive results at the end of the day.
In this article, we will try to sort thing out so you can do everything correctly to make your business grow with the help of marketing automation.
What is marketing automation?
In general, marketing automation is the utilization of software aimed at automating the company’s marketing activities. However, such definition is oversimplified and it does not take into account some crucial aspects. So let’s look at the whole concept in greater detail.
The foremost thing you should understand about marketing automation is that it’s not limited just to purchasing the software that would do all the work for you. To receive the expected return on investment, you should use the right tools in the right way. Otherwise, such tools can do more harm than good to your business.
Example:
Let’s take a typical situation when a company decides to automate its email marketing process. With the help of automation software, a sales team can send out promotional emails to the whole customer list in a simple and fast way. But would it help them close more sales? Well, maybe, but only in a short-term perspective. At the same time, it’s much more likely that a lot of people would want to unsubscribe from the company’s emails not to receive irrelevant information in the future.
So the main purpose of marketing automation is to deliver the right messages to the right people at the right time rather than just automate marketing activities. Hence, marketing automation software should help you nurture leads and, as a result, turn them into customers rather than do the hard sell automatically.
Key functions of marketing automation software
When it comes to marketing automation, the first thing that comes into mind is email marketing. Sending out thousands of emails in one click can indeed free up a significant part of your team's working time. However, marketing automation software can do much more than that. The exact feature-set of such software will depend on the provider. But let’s take a look at the most basic features and functionality most of them offer.
SEO optimization
To get more leads, you need to get more traffic to your website in the first place. Marketing automation software usually offers a set of Search Engine Optimization tools. For instance, it can provide you with some recommendations for keywords and let you compare your keywords with the ones your competitors have.
Personalization tools
Personalization is probably one of the greatest benefits marketing automation brings. It creates the feeling that the company knows you by name and this helps brands build loyalty. For example, personalization tools will allow you to personalize email content and subject lines so your customers will get highly-targeted information tailored to their needs and product interests.
A/B testing
Marketing automation is not something you set and forget. It’s a continuous process that helps you get to know your customers better and learn from their behavior. That’s why we recommend you to opt for the software that allows for A/B testing of landing pages and emails.
Tracking customer behavior
Tracking behavior is essential in terms of providing customers with the most relevant content and spotting the hottest leads. This function will let you build strong relationships with customers and properly target your marketing efforts.
Segmentation
By dividing your customers into groups with some common characteristics you can talk to each of them individually but in an automated way. It’s worth mentioning that the segments are dynamic, meaning that a customer can migrate from one segment to another based on his or her behavior. Also, one person may belong to several segments.
Analytics
To get the most out of your marketing activities, you need to always measure and analyze. The analytics function will help you see what works and what doesn’t by allowing you to create reports, calculate your marketing ROI, monitor campaign performance, etc.
Benefits you get with marketing automation
Now, it’s high time to speak about return on investment you may expect after adopting marketing automation. Of course, everything will depend on a variety of factors, for instance, your business goals and inbound marketing strategy, software you’ll choose, and the way you’ll use different tools. But we hope the numbers and statistics below will allow you to see the full potential of marketing automation.
Higher revenue
This is the number one reason why companies need marketing automation software. Because let’s be honest: the ultimate goal of any business is making money. And if something can help you earn more, ignoring it is not a reasonable decision. The statistics show that companies which implemented marketing automation managed to increase their revenue by up to 77 percent.
Improved targeting
According to the survey, 70 percent of marketers believe that improved targeting of messages is the most essential benefit marketing automation brings. This is because it allows you to deliver personalized and relevant information to every customer. As a result, you build strong relationships with customers and don’t spend time and money on advertising to people who are not interested in your products.
Increase of conversion rate
If you have good website traffic but close only a few sales a month, investing in a marketing automation platform is the best business decision you can make today. Nearly 80 percent of companies that use marketing automation software said that their number of leads increased. On top of that, 53 percent of such businesses saw the higher conversion rate of leads into paying customers.
Stronger customer engagement
As we already mentioned, marketing automation lets marketers learn from customer behavior and track the performance of campaigns. This naturally results in more refined and targeted marketing strategies that allow brands to build loyalty and stronger relationships with the target audience. According to the survey by Liana Technologies, 45.9 percent of respondents believe that the opportunity to serve customers better is the critical advantage of marketing automation.
Enhanced productivity
Besides all those awesome things we mentioned above, marketing automation helps marketers work more efficiently. By using automation tools, your marketing and sales teams do not have to waste time on routine tasks and can focus on other priorities. A study shows that both business owners (33 percent) and marketers (74 percent) consider saving time a significant advantage of marketing automation.
Top providers of marketing automation software
If you decide to adopt marketing automation, you will quickly find out that the market is full of automation platforms. The good news that you have the opportunity to pick the software that fits you best and has necessary functions to cater to your specific business needs. But the bad news is that not all of the vendors are reliable and not all of the platforms offer the functionality you require to implement your inbound marketing strategy.
To stay on the safe side, we recommend you to choose among market leaders. The quality of their platforms is proven by the huge number of satisfied users. And they are always improving their products to keep the bar high.
Let’s take a brief look at some of the leading providers of marketing automation software you may want to consider.
1. Marketo
Image source: Jenna Molby
Marketo is a versatile marketing automation platform that offers rich functionality. Basically, you cannot go wrong with this software because it covers literally everything a modern marketer needs. Among other things, Marketo has a reputation for its analytics and email automation features. It lets users create large customer bases and manage complex marketing processes. So if you expect your business to grow and search for the solution that allows for scalability, Marketo is the best choice for you.
2. HubSpot
Image source: HubSpot Blog
Hubspot is also a popular platform commonly used by marketers. Like Marketo, it offers a wide range of functions that are necessary for running inbound marketing campaigns. The main advantage of HubSpot is its intuitive design. The platform is indeed user-friendly so you don’t need to have any coding background to take advantage of all the features. However, the drawback is that HubSpot may not be as good as Marketo for large enterprises since it’s more focused on small and medium-sized businesses.
3. Pardot
Image source: Salesforce
Pardot is another marketing automation platform that may help you increase conversion rate and drive sales. It’s a Salesforce solution so its reputation speaks for itself. On top of that, Pardot makes a great emphasis on lead generation by tracking anonymous users from landing pages. The main drawback of this software is its price — Pardot is one of the most expensive solutions on the market today.
Marketing automation success stories
The numbers we mentioned above sound quite impressive. But we also want to show you some real-life examples of marketing automation success. If you still have doubts, we hope these stories will help you make a wise decision.
Panasonic Europe
Panasonic is a global corporation that has millions of customers all over the world. In 2012, it merged its European subsidiaries into one company and the new challenge arose. The company wanted to improve the level of B2B services by integrating all customer databases into one unit. At that time, Panasonic Europe had about 72 websites with over 63,000 web pages in 22 languages. So, as you might have guessed, achieving that goal was not an easy task.
To implement its marketing automation strategy, Panasonic Europe chose Marketo platform. The results they received were profound. Marketing’s contribution to the total company’s revenue grew from 10 to 26 percent in just 18 months! On top of that, the marketing campaign output increased by 5 times.
Randstad
Randstad is a leading recruitment company, the second largest in the world. It was established more than 50 years ago but didn’t use any marketing automation software up until 2015. As a result, Randstad’s website contained lots of quality content, it showed excellent traffic but all the efforts made by the marketing team were fruitless. The company didn’t have effective tools to capture new leads and nurture them in order to convert in customers. After the adoption of marketing automation, Randstad managed to increase the number of leads by four time and conversion rate by 25 percent in just one year.
Schwab Advisor Services
Schwab Advisor Services is a network of investment advisors who provide wealth management services. Due to the specifics of this business sector, a personal approach to every customer is a crucial factor that defines the effectiveness of the company’s activity. Hence, the main goal of Schwab Advisor Services was to improve the level of personalization and better adjust its marketing activities to the customers’ needs and expectations.
With the help of Marketo, the company saw an increase of 500% in the engagement rate. It also reports a dramatic improvement of the team’s productivity.
The bottom line
The success of most modern businesses heavily depends on technologies, and marketing automation software is one of the most effective tools you can invest in. Like any other automation solution, it will help your marketing and sales teams work more productively. But not only that. With the help of marketing automation platform, you can also increase the revenue and conversion rate, generate more quality leads, close more sales, and build stronger relationships with customers. Hence, if your business is aimed at growth, there is no chance you can go without marketing automation.
Looking for a professional team to help you with marketing automation? Contact us!
Nowadays, more and more businesses opt for cloud-based IT infrastructure. Not only do enterprises choose to develop new applications in the cloud, but they also tend to move their existing software there.
With the emergence of smart home devices like Google Home, Amazon Alexa, and more, everybody is going nuts about connectivity. Wearables such as smartwatches and fitness bands are no longer something rare or unique – a lot of us have and use them on a daily basis. This is also the case with remote-controlled home appliances that are connected to the internet, industrial assets and transportation systems. It’s no wonder that the IoT market size is expected to grow to $457.29 billion by 2020.
The concept of connected devices, more commonly called the Internet of Things (IoT), is not brand new – it was introduced in the early 80s. However, tech experts and ordinary people alike are still excited to see where this is all going.
As professional designers and developers, we also keep track of the current IoT trends. In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the new IoT services and solutions which have the potential to become an integral part of our everyday lives in the near future.
Even more smart stores
It’s only been a year since Amazon opened its first no-checkout Amazon Go store to the public in Seattle. This automation solution has been made possible by the leaps in machine learning and IoT data processing. However, rumor has it that the company already plans its international expansion. As of today, the chain consists of nine smart stores located in the US but we can expect to have the first cashier-less store in the U.K in the nearest future. And, according to Bloomberg, Amazon will open about 3,000 other smart supermarkets by 2021.
Image source: giphy.com
The idea of doing shopping by just entering the store, grabbing the groceries and leaving without being checked out still sounds futuristic to a lot of people. Yet, Amazon is not the only company trying to take advantage of advanced shopping technology. Microsoft is already treading on its heels.
Recently, the company announced its partnership with Kroger, a large chain of US supermarkets. And many of the innovative solutions they created are based on IoT technology. Digital shelves, personalized ads and automatic alerts notifying store staff of low inventories are already redefining the way we think about supermarkets.
Reportedly, other retailers around the world will also have an opportunity to buy this solution. In other words, it’s just a matter of time before the smart store like Amazon Go will become an industry standard.
Smart fridges and the smart way of shopping for groceries
Smart grocery management is another category of IoT solutions which are going to take customer shopping experience to the next level. The main idea behind it is simple, yet genius. It is to make smart home products help us do grocery shopping in an easy and time-effective way.
The most famous smart device of this kind that already exists is Samsung Family Hub. Simply put, it’s a smart fridge that, among other things, can take photos of products stored in it. Users then can view such photos via their smartphones as they shop. On top of that, the fridge can mirror a TV, synchronize with calendars, share notes and messages. It can even help its owners control smart lighting, oven, front door video doorbells or security cameras etc. remotely.
Image source: Samsung.com
The smart home hub
Speaking about front door cameras, they’ll become smart too. At CES 2019, an IoT product called Door View Cam was announced by Ring company. The camera can be used as a regular glass peephole. But besides that, it can stream video to your smartphone and let you talk to anyone standing at your front door.
Image source: USA TODAY
As a side note, the smart home niche is expected to grow significantly in the near future (see the chart below). In short, the smart home niche can potentially become a gold mine for businesses that are ready to invest in IoT and new technologies. Among the many new products, you’ll find: the smart thermostat, smart speaker, smart plug, smart locks, and more.
Fairytales can come true with smart mirrors
Remember that episode from the fairytale about Snow White when she asks the magic mirror: ‘Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?’ ? Well, it no longer sounds like a fairytale because a ‘magic’ mirror can actually answer that question. A smart mirror by Capstone Connected Home was introduced at CES 2019 and it’s expected to be released later this year.
Image source: Capstone Connected Home
At first glance, this smart mirror looks like a regular mirror and can be used as such. But that is far from all it can do. Besides working as a mirror, this gadget also has Google Assistant built-in, so it can practically do all the things the latter does. For instance, you can check the emails while brushing your teeth, access social media, stream YouTube videos or even play games.
Another cool thing about Capstone Smart Mirror is that you’ll still be able to see yourself through the content shown on the mirror ‘screen’, so it’s not just a huge tablet. We believe that the idea behind this device is very promising and that smart mirrors will make our mornings more pleasant and productive very soon.
IoT provides the future of healthcare
Unlike the previous two types of IoT solutions which aim to make our lives easier, the Internet of Healthcare Things (or IoHT) also helps people feel better and be healthier. It even has the potential to save lives.
The list of ways you can implement this technology in practice is virtually endless. For instance, there are solutions that gather information about the patient’s health and send a notification to a doctor if something is wrong. Other apps help monitor user’s medication schedules, activities and sleep cycles. Some IoT devices can also automatically identify any glitches in medical hardware so they can be fixed in a timely manner.
E-Alert by Philips is a great example of the latter type of IoHT solution. This tool measures key parameters of magnetic resonance imaging and alerts if something in the system doesn’t work properly.
Image source: philips.com.au
Moreover, there are also IoT devices that help doctors train without the risk of doing any harm to bodies or patients. For instance, Osso VR is a training gadget for surgeons that combines IoT and VR technologies and allows doctors to perform realistic operations in a risk-free virtual reality space. The product was released a few years ago but is still actively discussed on different professional platforms, such as this year’s CES conference.
Image source: Osso VR
Although some smart medical devices already exist, we expect even more are in development already. And the IoT technology is versatile and flexible enough to satisfy the needs of any medical organization or hospital.
Pets will live better too
Human beings are not the only creatures who can benefit from the innovative solutions you can create with IoT. With the help of IoT technology, the life of our four-legged friends can be more pleasant and safer as well.
Different pet trackers that utilize GPS technology appeared a few years ago and have already won the hearts of animal owners. You can attach a small sensor to a pets’ collars or embed the sensor into them. This makes it possible to easily find the location of your cat or dog via a smartphone.
People often treat their cats, dogs, hamsters, parrots etc. as family members. That’s why they seek out pet care products that will make their pets happier. One of the most innovative solutions in this regard is a smart bed such as Petrics Smart Pet Bed introduced at CES 2018. Besides controlling the key health parameters (weight, sleep time etc.), it allows for the remote thermostatic control to maintain the temperature that is optimal for a specific breed.
Another popular IoT product that has the potential to become a must-have for any pet parent is a smart feeder. This type of device remotely controls food supply for cats and dogs (portion sizes, feeding schedule etc.). Some also have a camera, allowing the pet owner to check in on the pet remotely.
Image source: HomeCrux
It’s worth mentioning that quite a few smart feeders have already been created. Yet, the niche is ever-growing so there’s plenty of room for new pet-caring products with more advanced features.
Hyperconnected businesses and IoT manufacturing
One can hardly find a business that will not benefit from IoT-fueled solutions. No matter what your company produces and sells there are always processes that can be automated and done faster and more efficiently.
As of today, a lot of businesses, especially in the manufacturing industry, are successfully harnessing the power of IoT technology. For instance, at the Siemens plants in Germany, 75 percent of the production process is automated. The figure is quite significant, however, Siemens is planning on taking it further by creating a smart plant that is entirely automated.
And Siemens is not alone with its intentions. According to Juniper Research, the number of industrial IoT connections is going to grow to 46 billion in the next four years. This means that all businesses must consider investing in IoT solutions to stay competitive.
IoT is revolutionizing our personal and professional lives
Many IoT solutions may seem revolutionary or even unbelievable to us. However, we have to come to terms with the thought that most aspects of our lives will include IoT devices in the very near future. At the same time, the Internet of Things provides fantastic potential for innovation for businesses. So if you have a brilliant idea for an IoT-based product that will either allow people to handle their routine tasks more easily or help you optimize your business activity, it’s the perfect time to turn it into reality.
Looking for a development team for your next IoT project? Just contact us!
Keeping up with the current trends is important for any area, not to mention the UX design which directly influences the way your digital product is positioned and perceived by the users. In this article, we’ll take a brief look at what happened with 2018 UX trends and try to anticipate the emerging tendencies that have potential to become real big things in the coming year.
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We leverage industry standard UX best practices.
When your project has unique challenges, we custom tailor the team and our processes and workflows to fit your needs.
Stakeholder interviews
Lead stakeholder interviews to ensure that the business objectives are understood documented and aligned.
Prototype development Use prototyping tool to develop a clickable prototype for user testing.
Persona development
Use personas to define a list of typical user tasks/stories.
User testing
Validate current experience and create a process to user test new features prior to development.
Service map A map visualization of the architecture of features that comprise the entire (digital) product experience.
Wireframes/Visual design
UX wireframes based on initial research and stakeholder feedback.
Development
Let's imagine, build, tinker, and iterate until status quo is obsolete.
We're fully committed to iterative development and the concept of continuous improvement known as kaizen.
When it comes to software development, we follow the Scrum methodology. Our small team assembles at the beginning of each sprint cycle to plan and distribute the work they’ll undertake during that cycle in accordance with the priorities of the client. Each day the team meets to communicate progress and plan the day’s tasks. The progress of the team is visualized on the task board.
At the end of each sprint we will demo the working increment of software, taking the opportunity to gather feedback and discuss upcoming priorities.
We involve our clients heavily in the process. We believe that developing in a silo doesn’t work. Therefore, we expect that the client will assign one person to act as Product Owner, who will be available for planning sessions, manage the priority of the items in the product backlog, answer questions and provide feedback.
