Responsible Design Part 13 of 14: Hidden Costs
What is this pattern?
Hidden costs are charges that surface when one reaches the last step of the checkout process only to realize that there are additional costs to the base price of a product or service that was visible upfront on a website....
Responsible Design Part 12 of 14: Misdirection
What is this pattern?
Misdirection is when the user is purposefully led toward one thing to distract them from another....
Responsible Design Part 11 of 14: Price Comparison Prevention
What is this pattern?
Price comparison prevention makes it difficult to compare the price of offers or products with other offers or products leading to an uninformed decision....
Responsible Design Part 10 of 14: Privacy Zuckering
What is this pattern?
Privacy Zuckering is a dark pattern that tricks users to disclose more personal information than the users had intended to....
Responsible Design Part 9 of 14: Roach Motel
What is this pattern?
Roach Motel, dark pattern makes it very easy for users to sign up but very difficult to opt out....
Responsible Design Part 8 of 14: Trick Question
What is this pattern?
Trick Questions are questions that when read quickly seem to ask one thing but when read carefully seem to ask something else altogether....
Responsible Design Part 7 of 14: Sneak into Basket
What is this pattern?
Sneak into Basket dark pattern sneakily adds offers or items into the basket which the user ends up paying extra for....
Responsible Design Part 6 of 14: Bait and Switch
What is this pattern?
Bait and switch is a dark pattern where the user sets out to do one thing but a completely different undesirable thing happens instead....
Responsible Design Part 5 of 14: Forced Continuity
What is this pattern?
Forced continuity is when your credit card continues to get billed and charged for a subscription service past the initial subscription duration. ...
Responsible Design Part 4 of 14: False Urgency
What is this pattern?
This dark pattern works on the idea of scarcity and how a user’s decision making is impacted under the pretext of scarce resources. False urgency works on the basis of loss aversion which is the notion that users prefer to avoid losses over acquiring gains....
Responsible Design Part 3 of 14: Confirm Shaming or Guilt Shaming
What is this pattern?
This dark pattern uses manipulative language and emotionally-charged design tactics to shame or guilt users from cancelling or unsubscribing a service. ...
Responsible Design Part 2 of 14: Friend Spam or Contact Harvesting
What is this pattern?
Friend spam or contact harvesting is when a company manipulates a user to give access to their private information, especially their contact list making it seem to the user that it would be beneficial for them but which the company later uses for its own benefit. It gets worse when the user finds out that their contact list has been spammed by the company in the user’s name. ...
Responsible Design Part 1 of 13: When design patterns go dark
We all know that when users visit a website or download an app, they do so with an intent in mind. The design community designs on the premise that every user has a certain goal in mind when they interact with a user interface, and the role of the designer is to devise a user experience that will steer them towards achieving that goal. This would be an example of a great user experience. ...
Designing for Data creation, moving beyond Data driven Design
Being data-driven has become a synonym for being new-age. The best thing about data and its analytics is that it can show us what people do on their own. But what it doesn’t tell us much about is the context, motivations, and intent behind the data to make it useful enough. We explore how design can inform the process of collecting and creating data that can help in finding insights about user behavior, and how product designers can leverage this phenomenal dynamic between data and design to create compelling experiences....
Healthcare – Marketing Innovation at the forefront
COVID-19 has largely sped up the digital transformation of healthcare and boosted innovation in how patients can receive and consume care. While challenges came unprecedented, this time continues to spell a phase of massive transformation and growth for the industry. ...
Experience entertainment 2.0
Big shifts and rejigs are in process across the entire entertainment value chain. While the closure of public entertainment options is largely increasing the bargaining power for streaming sites, it is also creating a longer-term shift in consumer behavior and sentiments. Opportunities abound in a time of crisis – how the industry aggregates user attention through high engagement experiences will determine what the future of entertainment will hold....
Digital for Finance - A Covid Advantage
The need for the digitization of the financial services sector has been apparent well before the pandemic with Fintech’s clearly indicating what is possible for competitive advantage. With COVID- 19 accelerating a digital path creation of customers, we look at how this transformation can spell out a more resilient and futuristic strategy for its various stakeholders. ...
Design for anyone to learn anything, anywhere, anytime
Covid-19 has changed the way we live. It is now prompting us to rethink how we learn. How learning can be enabled for individuals and how learning institutions need to redesign their models of engagement and delivery. This transition from physical to digital is accelerating inquiries into what learning needs to be imparted, how learning is universally accessed, delivered, and assessed which leads to true shifts in thinking and behaviors. ...
Go digital, or go dark – Learning for Enterprise
Many businesses are experiencing devastating financial consequences from the pandemic. Past recessions show that controlling costs by improving operational efficiency—a task for which digital solutions are perfectly suited—is more effective in sustaining businesses through financial turbulence than traditional cost-cutting measures alone. ...
What does the History & evolution of interaction design tell us about designing for digital? | Part 3
The future of user experience isn’t constrained to a screen. Ubiquitous computing would become the next frontier with the pervasive incorporation of computing into human habitats — cars, home appliances, furniture, clothing, and so forth. We explore the possibilities of interaction design for the future....
What does the History & evolution of interaction design tell us about designing for digital? | Part 2
Interactive digital products respond to human input and change their own content/behavior based on that input. The most fundamental principles of interaction design can be traced back to 4000 BC to the prehistoric Chinese philosophy of Feng Shui. Feng Shui is about spatially arranging objects in relation to the energy flow. Practically, being about arrangement of your surroundings in the most harmonious, optimal, and user-friendly way and covering everything from layout and colors to materials and framework. The end goal remains the same as about creating a user-friendly intuitive experience. We explore the history of interaction design across the decades....
What does the History & evolution of interaction design tell us about designing for digital? | Part 1
Too many digital products are hard to use. In a world with a pandemic, where most of our interactions and engagements with others are going to be digital, what does it take to make these digital interactions seamless, meaningful, and engaging? We get into a sneak-peak into the history of interaction design and how it stands to evolve and shape the future of our experiences....
Luxury with Digital: A way forward
What image comes to your mind when you think ‘Luxury’? If you are thinking about your last luxury good purchases or luxury vacation experience, you might associate luxury with timelessness, grandeur, aesthetics, personalization, exclusivity etc. Now, for a moment consider experiencing the same in your next digital purchase, as you maneuver through your next digital application. Does this even qualify to exist?...
Labyrinth through a history of Digital Iconography: From 1980s to 2010s | Part 4
Icons have always been found highly useful in limited digital environments and in diagrams, maps and other forms of visual communication. As a visual shorthand, it can label, inform, and aid navigation quickly and effectively in minimal space. At Think Design, we stepped back to discover how icons have been used from the earliest desktop days – in a pursuit to build on our current understanding, looking to appreciate and learn from the past, and look at the future informed by a lens of insights....
Labyrinth through a history of Digital Iconography: From 1980s to 2010s | Part 3
Icons have always been found highly useful in limited digital environments and in diagrams, maps and other forms of visual communication. As a visual shorthand, it can label, inform, and aid navigation quickly and effectively in minimal space. At Think Design, we stepped back to discover how icons have been used from the earliest desktop days – in a pursuit to build on our current understanding, looking to appreciate and learn from the past, and look at the future informed by a lens of insights....
Labyrinth through a history of Digital Iconography: From 1980s to 2010s | Part 2
Icons have always been found highly useful in limited digital environments and in diagrams, maps and other forms of visual communication. As a visual shorthand, it can label, inform, and aid navigation quickly and effectively in minimal space. At Think Design, we stepped back to discover how icons have been used from the earliest desktop days – in a pursuit to build on our current understanding, looking to appreciate and learn from the past, and look at the future informed by a lens of insights....
Labyrinth through a history of Digital Iconography: From 1980s to 2010s | Part 1
Icons have always been found highly useful in limited digital environments and in diagrams, maps and other forms of visual communication. As a visual shorthand, it can label, inform, and aid navigation quickly and effectively in minimal space. At Think Design, we stepped back to discover how icons have been used from the earliest desktop days – in a pursuit to build on our current understanding, looking to appreciate and learn from the past, and look at the future informed by a lens of insights....
Reinvent measurement strategy for the new normal
The reach of the pandemic is compelling business leaders to reinvent their offerings, services and products. Knowing how one is performing becomes crucial, as much as staying mindful of both the short term and long term impact of one’s decisions. Reconsidering your measurement strategy enables evaluation of what needs to be done – to remain sustainable and relevant when change is unprecedented....
Conducting stakeholder interviews: 12 Golden Rules
As a User Researcher at ekino, I have often started a UX design project with an immersion phase with our clients. This first step allows our teams to fully understand the objectives, the players, the stakes and the constraints underlying their mission. To do this, we take part in stakeholder interviews....
Yes, you can conduct them remotely: Approaches to Remote Design Research
A user-focused approach to design research has always aided the process of product development through creating objective results based on understanding how users think, interact and engage with a product or service....
Clustering Datasets: How to discover your order in the chaos?
Data has a lot of untapped potential. However, a dataset that is not classified or grouped does not create meaning for the users. The most important thing to make the data meaningful is to organize the information in a way that the user will easily access and understand. We explore the value of clustering data and how it can unfold patterns that hold a promising key to solving our most complex problems – from the prediction of dangerous earthquake zones to identifying frauds....
The importance of taking a proactive approach to Website Content Accessibility Guidelines
As companies continue to bring unique and innovative digital solutions to the market, it’s imperative they take the necessary steps to become WCAG 2.0 compliant. With 1 in 4 adults living with a disability in the US, companies have an opportunity to be proactive in their approach and execution of accessibility as opposed to reactive. The benefits in doing so include; cost savings, avoiding discrimination and lawsuits, targeting a wider audience, and improving SEO (Search Engine Optimization), to name a few. ...
How to create personas driven by data
We use personas to guide the designing of websites, marketing campaigns, mobile apps, and many other contemporary experiences. Once we launch, we gauge the success of our creations for these archetype user groups. And eventually, we create feedback loops that allow us to improve our creations using the perspective of real users. ...
COVID- 19: 5 Sites we recommend for the Data Designer
Data visualizations are required to make complex information easier to understand and effectuate intuitive actions as responses ....
Utilizing behavior data strategically to influence better CX
All interactions that a person has with a brand, makes for the experience a customer relates to the brand with. In times when a customers’ journey is encompassing several touchpoints and interactions, with an ever-increasing demand for personalization across, customer behavioral data is becoming an asset to form a basis for gaining clear customer knowledge. ...
Making the most of Behavioral Data
Understanding human behavior has been of crucial importance to developmental, organizational and social psychologists to share important insights while we live and work with humans in different social contexts. However behavioral analysis has recently forayed as an advancement into business analytics revealing pertinent business insights regarding consumers and users. ...
Making Remote Design teams happen
An important element of a designer’s life is to constantly think about innovative workarounds to challenges their customers face. Design thinking here is not just a methodology but an entire attitude of shifting our focus from reacting to constructive and collaborative responsiveness. ...
Empower your decisions through Data Storytelling
We are at the threshold of a culture where data-driven decision making and data-driven organizations will become a common phenomenon. But how reliable, expedient and impactful are these decisions? As we explore the promise of data storytelling, we also inquire how critical can this be in helping us make decisions, which are both meaningful and actionable. ...
How to carry out remote design workshops
Workshops remove participants from their everyday contexts and place them in a context that provokes reflection and innovation. But how to promote this evocation in the context where all participants have joined in virtually, separated by physical distances? ...
Design becomes learnable: Experience Design in the age of AI
It is often thought that once a good design is made it needs to be learned by the user. The digital age is posing an opportunity for the existence of a different kind of design – where the design learns about the user behavior and modifies itself....
How to create smarter CXO Dashboards?
The last decade saw an emergence of data-management functions and chief data officers (CDOs) finding ground – spelling out a clear urgency of managing and discovering through data, as a vital to any company’s success. Executive data dashboards inundated the market with a promise of providing business intelligence to the C-suite executives. Leaders no longer simply gathered a rearview-mirror look at company data but were also offered a window into the future. ...
Do’s and don’ts for Dashboard Design
Dashboards are a display of essential, actionable information. Dashboard users perform tasks and make decisions based on this information. A dashboard should display the data it contains appropriately in order to support the user in doing the right action at the right time. Oftentimes the space on a dashboard is limited and the data it displays is complex. So how to design a dashboard that allows users to quickly understand all the necessary information? In this article we will list a few best practices to keep in mind when designing dashboards. ...
CX Design Vs. UX Design
Over the past years concepts like Customer Experience Design (CX) and User Experience Design (UX) have become increasingly relevant. Oftentimes CX design and UX design are used as interchangeable concepts, which can be confusing and lead to misunderstandings. So what are we talking about when we are talking about UX and CX? Are the two concepts worlds apart or are UX and CX more like synonyms? Tomato tomato? Let’s clarify! ...
The Future with Voice Experiences
We are living in times where we are increasingly surrounded by voice assistants, voice ads, voice notifications, voice search and voice messaging to name a few. But we know that the time for voice has come when we see toddlers and teenagers picking up our phones and saying: ‘OK Google’ what is lego, really? ...
Power of interconnectivity and IoT
In the last two decades, the power of interconnectivity has spawned many innovations with it. In this article, we explore the concept of interconnectivity as a precursor to connect the world better in the near future. ...
Reasoning: The synapse between critical thinking and design thinking
Thinking critically and the approach of reasoning itself, can become a precursor to an innovative solution for the problem proposed at hand. Designers have long employed different methods of reasoning to create the most relevant and innovative solution for their customers. ...
The tricky equation between UX and Time
For centuries, humans have pondered upon the mysteries of time. Philosophers, scientists, artists have postulated theories, designed experiments and created art to explain the eternal conundrum of time. But beyond the various theories that lie before us, have we ever stepped out to understand how to leverage time and its various properties to influence our day to day life and experiences? ...
How to design a Media player?
As users are increasingly consuming entertainment on the go, it is of no doubt that designing a good media player ensures a good user experience. In this article, we explore the history of media players over time and our recommendations to design a good media player. ...
What’s wrong with broadcast UX?
Is there anything called broadcast UX (at all)? I had been meaning to talk about it for a while now; and I got an opportunity to capture comparable images last weekend (while all top 5 news channels were showing exactly the same content)....