As you are probably already aware of as a web designer, the era that we live in now is dominated by mobile users, and UX and design have never been as important as they are today. If we take a look back at the years before us, we can conclude that a lot of change has happened, and every year it is essential to adapt your approach to the current trends in order to satisfy the needs of your customer base. We also need to focus on the psychology driven mobile UX trends that are happening.
The fact is that there is a lot of psychology behind every trend and approach. It is essential that you understand how the minds of your users tick in order to create the best experience for them, which will have them coming back for more. Let’s take a look at some of the mobile UX trends that are booming.
A Design That Saves Time
The world of the mobile web is fast, and the main goal for designers is to come up with sites and apps which offer valuable information to the user the quickest way they can. This means that the whole user experience needs to be intuitive, and take as little time possible for people to navigate the environment. Everyone wants a quick path, with not too many steps required to reach their goal, from the second that they open up your site/app to the moment when they decide to do something. This is what is necessary for you to have a design like this:
- Guidance. There are many ways that you can guide your user. You can give them clear directions, or point them the right way by giving them small rewards on every step they take.
- Clear navigation. Clear navigation is of an essence so that the user can intuitively find what they are looking for. A top-notch navigation pattern goes hand in hand with good information architecture.
- Features and information relevant to the context. For a proper experience, your design needs to be fully contextual, and provide the users only with the information and features that are most relevant to them.
- Anticipatory design. Basically, it’s a design that attempts to anticipate what your user requires, and provides them with the best possible experience while getting there.
- Linear design. The essence of linear design is that it has a structure that consists of a clear beginning, middle, and end. Along with that path, there is just one particular action that needs to be done during each step.
Emotional Experience
Emotional intelligence is going to take a large part of the mobile UX this year. Once consisting out of cutely animated effects that follow particular actions, now it’s becoming a greater part of the whole experience. The fact is that people usually tend to express their emotions during their communications. Even when it was all about command string interfaces, emoticons represented particular feelings.
Today, the whole idea of emoticons has evolved, and you can express a wide variety of different emotions. Various tools have improved this. For example, face recognition makes it very easy to show what you are feeling. iPhone, for example, has Animoji, which is an app that uses an animated emoji that responds to the user’s facial expressions. Furthermore, apps will focus on gestures that you use to interact with applications. For example, instead of implementing a standard-like button, the user will be able to draw a heart icon on the screen. Furthermore, apps will mimic human reactions as a response to what a user does.
Personalization
Ever since its birth, the idea of creating a highly-personalized experience for a particular user has only been evolving and becoming a trend that you mustn’t ignore. Every experienced web design company will tell you this and point out how much AI and machine learning has progressed over the years, as well as how powerful personalized data is. You can basically create systems that adapt the user experience to each particular user. You can imagine how much this matters to people interacting with your app/site. Businesses are only looking for new ways to get to know their customer base on a deeper level, and personalization is only going to keep blooming in the future.
Experiences Focused On Content For Psychology Driven Mobile UX Trends
When browsing the web, you will notice that a lot of websites and apps are focusing on minimalism and flat design. The reason for this is that such designs are content-based, and design is shaped according to it, or even to highlight it. Basically, the current design trend is that the user’s experience of the content isn’t hindered by anything. This is why designers create clear visual hierarchies so that the content is easily comprehended. Whitespace provides more room for the content and makes it a lot easier to focus on it. Finally, functional minimalism makes sure that there are no needless elements so that the experience is clear.
Of course, there is more to this than just the visuals. The focus is also on the content being highly relevant, engaging, and valuable. Content strategies are becoming ever so important, and the success of a business will exceptionally depend on the quality of the content.
Every year, it is necessary that you follow and adapt to the current trends when it comes to creating the perfect user experience. Some of the things that people most value today are time-saving designs, emotional experiences that they can relate to, personalized content tailored specifically for them, and experiences that focus on top-notch content that is presented to them in a clear fashion.
Our Guest Blogger
Media Gurus, an Australian business, and marketing resource. He is an aspiring street artist and does Audio/Video editing as a hobby.
