Today there are more ways than ever for restaurants to interact with customers. The latest touch point, of course, is the Smartphone application. Web designer Shawn Borsky offers a useful way of thinking about customer interaction with this new technology. He states it plainly: user experience is nothing less than “the core of the brand…. Without good user experience your brand means nothing.” In short, when customers interact with an app, they interact with the brand.
Clearly then, good interface design must always be approached with goal of “supporting brand promise,” which Borsky defines as “the zeitgeist of the business culture. It drives the purpose, the ideas and the passion of the organization.” Furthermore, “everything about how a company does business constantly reinforces or creates impressions. The smallest details and most subtle points can have incredible effects on the overall experience.” Whether customers realize it or not, “every detail…contributes to the user’s associations and judgments about the company they are dealing with.”
If users are exquisitely sensitive to details and subtleties, so, too, must be the interface designer. Attention to detail is crucial because it serves to reinforce the brand’s promise (“We are quality because our app is quality”). Borsky writes that “when you spend time on the details…you communicate care and genuine passion.” That attention can elevate an average user experience to one that is “wonderful and fantastic.”
There are three principles critical to a great user experience (and therefore a great brand experience).
First, the design must be “purposeful.” In other words, it must have a high degree of utility, providing functionality for the widest group of users. Second, it must be aesthetically appealing. Careful, thoughtful brand details are important here because they add “personality into your design, imbuing it with value and pleasantry. In short, you build better user experience by making it both useful and enjoyable.” Finally, the design must be elegant and easy to use. As Borsky writes, “usability is comfort.” He cautions, however, that “simplification should equate to clarity, not lack of usefulness. We do enjoy the simple things, but we also seek out function and productivity.”
Borsky blogs about web design (to see the full post click here) and the challenges facing the designer. But the designer of a mobile app faces these and even more daunting challenges. First is screen size, which is about 1/30 the size of a desktop monitor. Second is the challenge of intermittent connectivity. And third is the fact that the user is likely to be interrupted while completing his task. Each of these constraints is unique to mobile, and will be the subject of future blogs.
