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Where to use standards and where to innovate in UI?

Hello all the designers and developers (or I would say all design thinkers), this piece of write up is not restrained to any one or two user group. As any professional, you need to think as a design thinker. This thought process is a universal approach to all professionals who want to design User-Centric Experiences for users around the globe.

Photo by Krisztian Tabori on Unsplash

Why is it relevant to all?

The Book ‘Change by Design’, by Tim Brown, redefines design thinking and shows how the techniques and strategies of design belong at every level of business. It has well explained that creativity and innovations are not from just geniuses. The reality is that most innovations come from a process of rigorous examination through which great ideas are identified and developed before being realised as new offerings and capabilities. For a synopsis about refer here.

1. Let’s understand the UX processes first

The 5 S’s of UX which breaks down and explains the larger picture of it

The 5 S planes in UX - Read here for more

2. Why UI/surface and why is it important?

Let’s face it, we all face it.

UI plays a major role to entice, engage and extend a user to a specific digital platform or websites. Let’s go through the 5 E’s of User Experience, for us to know why UI/Surface is as important as any of the other S’s.

The 5E’s of UX, in which UI plays major role for the user

The 5E’s of UX - Read here for more

From the above mentioned E’s, UI plays a major role to convince a user to get tasks done. If you want to prioritise the important E’s which UI contributes to, those are Entry, Engage and Extend.

Swiggy was one of the experience which I can remember when it launched, was with the dynamic tracking delivery guy on the map, which took my attention and definitely I visited back to the app.

So do this task, of remembering the last cool UI feature which you saw and ask question to yourself, ‘Do you want to go back to have that experience while performing a task online?’

Will explain that later with examples of where to use the standards and where to innovate.

3. Let’s broaden our view on the elements of UI

When you know broadly the elements which make a UI, you can decide where to use standards and where to innovate. For you to explain, let me narrow down to ‘Iconography’. But before that, see the broader picture.

Elements of UI - Read here for more

Why Iconography?

Icons are everywhere. They have been around for a long time, and it’s difficult to imagine a world without icons or symbols today.

Beck then, carvings were the medium to communicate, now it’s different

4. How Standards were created in UI?

The possible 3 reasons how standard icons are created are stated below

Either a Big Player push happens and it’s then picked up by other websites which becomes a trend. This eventually is used by a larger audience/user footprint, which becomes a standard, as larger audience gets connected to it easily.

Some famous icons which became standards

3 exmaples of iconic icons which became standards for UI industry

5. Now the final question comes. Where to use standards and where to innovate?

The previous flow till now is to drill down and justify as to why we should use standards in iconography. That is why the above 4 points were the justification for the end question.

The 3 questions to ask yourself before starting a UI

3 basic questions to ask at Pre-UI Design level

For example, a good movie has 3 to 4 unique and emotionally connecting moments which they highlight from the whole movie. This is because the director wants the audience to take back(extend) few memorable sequences back from the movie.

Let’s take Swiggy as example

Let’s assume, Swiggy took its App design tasks with this same methodology as mentioned above(3 questions).

Swiggy asking 3 questions

So the task flow will be order food quickly and tracking it till it arrives at home.

In this whole flow, the intent is to quick order and the USP is the dynamic tracking of the delivery boy. The USP area and the intent area are your areas of innovation, which will have maximum impact on the users.

And Hence, Swiggy innovated in UI level in these 2 areas.

POP feature UI screen

Quick orders, as users want the app to give suggestions of best food for that day.

POP feature benefits :

1. A sense of newness
2. Quick, not much to think
3. Saves time

Here the standard icons are used for explore, cart and account pages. The UI Designers focused not to innovate on these pages and focus on the intent and USP.

Tracking feature screen

Tracking feature benefits :

1. More transparency to the user
2. Dynamic/live update
3. Less customer care interventions

This feature was new and users remembered very prominently.

Therefore, good extend feature.

So, innovate on the correct intents, and use standards for the rest of the system.