A great user experience is little noticed, like UX for the very first cup of coffee in the morning. People don't like thinking about why one app is better than the next. In fact, most users recognize good UX about as well as bad UX.
User experience (UX) is the
interaction that a user has with your product. The design of your product can
make or break the user experience. This is why user experience is a very
important aspect of iOS app development. User experience mainly focuses
on the interaction that the user has with your product/service. There are fast
apps that know their place and let the user do what they need. Then, there are
the slow, smug apps that make the user tap twice, wait, think, and give up.
The broad range between the two lies in the hundreds of details that are meant to flow in a successful app design process. This methodology will help you understand the core fundamentals of what it takes to launch a successful app and everything that follows.
What It Means for an App to be Smooth
An app can’t be described as
“smooth” until it can be used without the user stopping to think what happens
next. An app is made up of several micro-interactions and workflows. Tapping
something should result in an instant response. A screen should load when opened.
One can always intuitively find the setting.
A smooth app's design can be as simple as gray, functional buttons. When compared to a nicely designed app but which lacks functionality and takes 1/2 second to respond to each tap, users will opt for the simply designed, faster app.
Good design needs to address the application's appearance and functionality independently. A great UI that resides in an app that is slow and glitchy loses users in the checkout process. These criteria are decided by a good iOS app development company.
Knowing Your
Audience Prevents Useless Design
Not performing user research is the leading cause of failed apps. Teams design apps according to their assumptions of what the user wants. This often results in apps that users do not engage with.
Designing a fitness app for beginner users and for professional marathon runners would require vastly different designs. In most cases, the shopping app for time-constrained parents is unlikely to benefit from an extensive filtering system.
This process can be done
affordably. All ten potential users need to be observed while they solve the
problem your app intends to solve. Additionally, observing the user’s
frustration while interacting with similar already existing apps is also
helpful. The time spent on designing the app in this way can prevent months of
complete redesign.
Design Within a Prevailing Framework
Users expect a certain level of familiarity across all apps. The iPhone users have an internal map that they use to navigate different apps. Swiping down to refresh a page, for instance, is home on most apps, a search icon is in the top right corner, and an arrow in the top left of the screen is the previous page.
What often happens is teams inventing their own navigation in an attempt to be original. Speed and convenience as a result are sacrificed, and users are often left frustrated.
There’s a reason Apple made Human
Interface Guidelines, and teams that follow them make apps that look more like
they’re part of Apple’s software and less like afterthoughts. Buttons that are
the right size for your thumb. Text that doesn’t require the annoying zoom to
read. Color that means something important and isn’t just pretty. They call it
a framework for a reason. It’s a ton easier to stay on track when you have
discipline even though most teams will ignore it when they get inspired about
their new idea.
The Time It
Takes To Load Sometimes Makes Or Breaks Apps
Judgement on apps happens fast, like in under 10 seconds most of the time, and especially when users are faced with an ugly, slow-loading page. Even though a slow load is the only hiccup your app has, people won't care that your app is fast if the first thing they interact with is a slow loading app.
Oversized images, massive requests for data, and old code that developers left behind will all slow down your app. All these issues can be fixed, but not after you get lots of bad app store ratings.
If your target is 2 seconds on a
bad connection to open the app, move through your app quickly with no pauses,
and feel like the app is responding to your input instantly, most people won't
be able to articulate why your app seems slow, but they will leave.
Testing on
Actual Phones is Better than Testing on Screens
We are all familiar with the use of simulators and all the conveniences that come with them. Fast, easy, no cords involved, easy resets. However, simulators come with their own pros and cons, especially for developers needing to address and speak for older phones which typically have less memory and less screen real estate like the iPhone SE.
Testing real-world devices shows the real-world problems simulators regularly ignore. Developed features on a given large screen may not fit well on a much smaller screen. Features may work flawlessly on safe, fast office WiFi, and choke real users when they attempt to use the feature over slow, spotty cellular connections on the subway. It’s in these real-world testing and deployments that drain on the device battery, how well a device can detect an actual touch, and a myriad of other touch-related features come to the forefront.
Some real-world user testing
brings in non-developers, and they invariably click on and combine things in
ways that no one planned for. Things that surprise non-developers and crash
things in unexpected ways often lead to real problems for real users.
Updating
Without Breaking What People Have Come to Rely on
Given the nature of software, changes will mean that software will have to behave differently. Not all updates are new features, some may be bug fixes. However, even bug fixes have the potential to break software that users may have formed habits around.
No one likes updating an app only to have their preferred settings reset. Well-tested updates, especially with major changes, are rolled out to a certain portion of the user base at a time instead of a sweeping update for all users at once.
Users often describe how an app
update broke something, and how fast a company responds to that update
determines if the app is kept or uninstalled. If there are no updates for
weeks, it leads to an app being uninstalled.
Why Some
Businesses Opt to Hire an Outside Team
Companies are inclined to hire an
iOS app development company because of the cost and effectiveness of doing so.
It is likely that the problems these companies have encountered will be
experienced by other companies as well. This iOS app development company has
probably built a successful process for research, design and QA. Therefore,
these outside teams have bypassed the cost and time of planning, research,
design, development, and testing. This benefits companies because developing
and designing an app is a considerable investment.
Why Hire an
iOS App Development Agency?
Many iOS app development companies also provide app services after an app has been published. Unfortunately, many companies lack the ability to support an app and have issues that can't be anticipated. An iOS app development agency alleviates these issues for a company and makes the app publishing process much easier. It is almost guaranteed that developing an app will require a much larger investment than hiring an app development agency.
Not all projects require outside
assistance, though. A small app would be relatively easy to develop and could
be managed internally or by a freelance developer based on the scope of the
app, the time constraints, and how much support the app would need after it is
published in the App Store.
Mistakes
That Quietly Wreck the Experience
There are certain mistakes that appear in apps that have user retention issues.
Many users find complex apps overwhelming. Design layout in relation to accessibility features is often disregarded in most app designs. Sometimes these accessibility problems, like small text or low-contrast text, aren’t addressed until folks review poorly. Additionally, skipped testing produces bugs that are discovered by frustrated users and leave reviews to express their complaints.
Lastly, chasing a trend vs.
actually solving the problem in front of you is a big issue. While a feature
may look nice and enhance a demo, if it is designed with no added utility, it
clutters the app. Each component of an app needs to be designed with a clear
purpose in order to assist the app in being more usable.
Final Take
There isn't really a single
answer to why the product works sometimes, or why the process is flawed at
other times. I suspect it has something to do with little details, navigation,
updates and tests working well together. Ease of use for completing a task
should be the goal when creating an application. It can help identify problem
areas in its process since it can show workflow flaws. The ideal user
experience includes a seamless application that promotes natural use.
Therefore, hiring good iOS app development services can help you in the long
run.