10 Design Mistakes Mobile App Developers Make

Designer: uixNinja

For any app, an average user does not shell out more than 5-seconds of their critical time. Therefore, all an enterprise has from a user is 5-seconds, sometimes even less, to create an impression that brings them back to their app. Clearly, many fail. When it comes to design in web and mobile app development, it is not about the idea alone, for there are many apps that offer similar services. There is a tonnage of apps replicating Uber, Yelp, Airbnb, and so on, and yet, there are only a few that excel, while the rest are doomed to an existence of solitude and slow death.

Eventually, it all boils down to design. No longer restricted to UX/UI alone, the design for any web and mobile app property encompasses the first point of contact to the property to the final checkout point (in case the property involves sales). Therefore, if you are looking to develop an impeccable web or mobile app and wish to hit the billion-dollar valuation mark, you must address the design concerns in the development stage itself, for improvising later could mean little if once the potential users are repelled.

10 Design Mistakes you must avoid:

1. No Response, No Retention: ​​Gone are the days when users traversed their way through an app or a website. Inculcated in your design, should be a responsive aspect that helps the users to the services or products they are looking for via the shortest route and in a minimum amount of time. If you can’t help them with a response, the users will have no reason to stay.
2. No such Thing as a Free Lunch: ​​Free tools, website and app builders, and extensions can only get you to a certain threshold when it comes to design. To get ahead in the game, you must look beyond the free lunch and inculcate extensions, plugins, themes, and design tools that benefit your app.
3. Don’t Ignore the Convention: ​​In their pursuit of perfection, some enterprises tend to go overboard in the whole designing process, ignoring the fundamentals of design thinking. Experimenting with the web or app design is not a bad idea, but it should not constrain an average user, given they form the bulk of your market.
4. Dividing your UI: ​​Headers, footers, and sidebars, especially in web development are usually reserved for advertising. Care must be taken as the advertising prospects might interfere with the user experience. If you are not looking to advertise on your app, as many enterprises are these days, make judicious and innovative use of the space available. Make UI Great Again!
5. Ask, but don’t overdo: ​​Given the surge in apps and web entities built on the On-Demand Economic Structure, user input of personal data is necessary. While designing your forms, do not go for an elaborate layout. Ask what is needed and skip the rest. The lesser data you ask for, the greater comfort you will impart at the user end.
6. Don’t be Jon Snow with your Content: ​​The perfect idea, a brilliant design, and a thriving UX/UI, and yet the app failed? Often, enterprises don’t give content much thought for their web and app properties. It is important to note that content must be oriented to meet the app needs,
   market expectations, and business aspirations, or else, it is a recipe for disaster.
7. Don’t Beat Around the Bush: ​​If your web or mobile app helps users place an order for a meal, let them do it within the first three clicks. For any UX, the primary function must be to help the user with what they need. Forms, promotional offers, and other distractions should not hinder the core operations of your virtual property.
8. Keep up with the Times: ​​With location-based marketing becoming indispensable to the web and mobile apps, it is important for any enterprise to update their properties. Do not offer promotional offers for the NFL game that happened yesterday. There must be a mechanism for instant update and improvisation of design wherever and whenever necessary.
9. Broken Links, Broken Conversions: ​​A broken link or poorly optimised page on your virtual property is like a pothole on an F1 track. Not only it will cause immense damage to your credibility and reputation, but it will also lead to a fall in checkouts and conversions, driving users elsewhere for the same services.
10. Data is your Nuclear Bomb: ​​In this age of information, data is as powerful as your nuclear bomb, and it should be used to enhance the design of your website and app and hence, periodically, fetch customer feedback about the UX/UI, about the personalization of the property, and make appropriate changes. A little feedback every day keeps a poor design at bay!

Written by :
Aalekhya Puja
Project Delivery Manager