As the New Year quickly approaches I’d like to take a minute to look back at the accomplished year we’ve had. From the rise of new technologies and applications, to alternative experience design methods, each of these innovations have had a significant impact on the user experience industry.
I compiled a list of my favorite articles published over the course of the year, once from each month, including topics from Coca-Cola bottle selfies to IoT and AI’s. I hope you enjoy looking back at some of the most memorable articles as we dive into 2017.
Happy New Years!
December
Building positive user experiences (UX) in banking is about creating financial services that match users’ needs with banking capabilities that are easy and pleasant to use.
This article discusses the digital transformation the banking industry is going through, with the growing need for simple online user experience. It stresses out how organizations need to look outside of the traditional finance industry in order to truly succeed in 2017.
November
Are you a regular coke drinker? Do you always love taking selfies? Well, now you can drink your favorite beverage while taking a selfie at the same time! Coca-Cola just introduced their ‘selfie bottle,’ an exciting new product that both promotes the company, while enticing more customers to buy a coke so they can ‘snap while they sip.’
Giving users what they want, in this case another method to take a selfie, while incorporating the product is top notch user experience in my book.
October
Karen Clark Cole paints readers a picture of her experience with a banking site sorely lacking UX design, and just how drastically it affected her overall experience. In fact, the usability was so bad she couldn’t even figure out where to find her money. In her article, Cole stresses not only the importance of a good UX for the company’s benefit, but also for the customer’s happiness and satisfaction
September
John Brownlee lists 35 of the most technologically innovative apps released this year. I always find that it’s useful to learn about other companies’ successes in order to keep up with the latest news in the industry. Many of these apps excel in UX design, and have even made designers’ lives easier by simplifying important processes such as prototyping.
August
Read about this fascinating case study by People for Research that investigates how accessible online pages really to your users. Maria Santos discusses just how important this company determined user testing is for the success of a product, based on their own experiences in usability testing.
July
Codrin Aresene discusses the importance of user testing in software development. It not only saves time in the long run, but it is morally the right thing to do. Aresene lists six reason he’s come across as to why developers determine user testing isn’t useful. He makes sure to carefully and intelligently explain each myth away, stressing just how vital user testing really is.
June
A fantastic UX doesn’t just mean including a fabulous design. It is an all-encompassing field that demands the understanding of a person’s psyche and behavior in order to create a product that appeals to an audience.
A good designer understands human nature, and what their users want out of a product. This article lists some of the unconventional skills needed to be a great UX designer outside of simply knowing how to play with graphics.
May
Based on an interesting survey put together about what the average user experience designer’s process looks like and includes, this article outlines some of the insights gathered from the designers’ answers. The survey tackles some of the main steps in the design process, prototyping, and user testing. Each designer answered according to their own practices, providing interesting insight into each individuals’ practice.
April
In this enticing futuristic article, Nir Eyal discusses the user experience of the future. By pairing technologies with human assistants, the results will literally be out of this world.
Eyal states that from this innovative idea, new products will emerge which promise to enhance our lives. Certain products, which for example will guide a customer to find the cheapest ticket when booking online. Imagine what this means for user experience and our customers!
March
A product manager and a UX designer share many of the same responsibilities, and, when they work in synergy, their efforts can ensure that a viable and innovative product comes to the marketplace.
In this article, we examine the sweet spot where these two professions collide.
February
According to this article written by Scott A. Snyder, and Jason Hreha, a company’s success doesn’t just depend on the design or function of the product. Instead, it’s all about the data and user experience. The user prefers a comfortable and attractive experience, rather than something hard to use and confusing.
For example, Netflix didn’t charge late fees in the beginning, and Blockbuster did, and they eventually when out of business. This fascinating article outlines just how important the user experience is to a company’s success, and with some great examples and very interesting points!
January
Spencer Lanoue is ruthless about one thing in his career, which is stealing strategies and secrets from people much smarter than him. In this article, he writes about what being exposed toworld-classs UX designers from the biggest companies out there (Google, Ideo, CapitalOne, etc.) had taught him.
I especially liked how honest Lanoue’s writing is, because let’s face it – as UXers, we all find inspiration in other people’s work, but most of us are afraid to admit doing so.
