There is probably a full post in this somewhere but I have been drawn to a couple of pet projects recently and it got me thinking.

The app gold rush has led many to believe that publishing something that generates bathroom related noises is a license to print money.  If this was the case, it’s not any longer.

In-app purchasing is increasingly the preferred mechanism for monitising mobile apps. IAP remove barriers to purchase  as  the user is not confronted with any kind of payment wall, they don’t need to enter additional login details or credit card numbers, and the transactions all go via a provider that they already know and trust with their money.

You may have heard. Facebook acquired Instagram for some ridiculously large amount of money.  But why? Instagram have never generated a penny (or cent) of revenue. 

There is consistently talk of a bubble in app development. A .com boom style gold rush to cash in on the rise of the app. The question is when will this burst and where will we be when the dust settles? 

Whether or not there is a consumer tablet market at all, beyond the iPad, is still up for debate but in enterprise Microsoft is still a powerhouse. With the decline of RIM and the inability of Android to gain any serious traction I have long been an advocate of the rise of Windows in the mobile space. However, they do seem to be leaving it a little late.

The BBC reported this morning on some new stats highlighting the impact that the mobile web is having on young people.

Things are changing in the workplace. Tablets are now entering a ‘second wave’ of adoption. Anywhere that you might find a pad of paper or a clipboard you can see potential for a tablet. Potential applications are evident in every corner of the business but these are not apps that you will find in an app store or marketplace. Instead, enterprise accounts are being managed by internal IT departments who are being asked to acquire a new skill set very quickly. 

I’ve written recently on mobile discoverability. I’ve found that the stats quoted in the article are also in evidence here on Boagworld. In fact, even more so. 65% of mobile Boagworld users hit the site directly. However, only 18% of desktop users are direct hits. All of the rest come via search engines or referrals. That is quite a striking difference.

I’d love to know what the stats are for the sites that you run. This has, potentially, huge consequences for mobile design.

Traditional marketing consists of shouting to gain the attention of potential customers. He who shouts the loudest wins.

However, this approach requires big budgets and years of trial and error. Building websites with outstanding UX on the other hand offers the opportunity to attract potential customers with next to no expenditure on advertising.

In his presentation for UX Week, Adam Goldstein from Hipmunk explains how.

Podcast: Download (Duration: 5:07 — 2.8MB)

Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:02 — 1.7MB)

We all need to be reminded to do things. Whether it is the light on our dashboard telling us our car needs a service or a letter reminding us to pay our TV license. How then do you remind users to visit your website? How often should you remind them so as not to be irritating? Its time to put a policy in place.

Every now and again I read a post that makes me want to stand up and shout “Yes!” ‘Demystifying Design’ on A List Apart is one such article.

The post argues that it is time for us as designers to drop the smoke and mirrors act and open our profession to the world.

As designers, we must demystify the way we work. We must make our tools accessible, our jargon more mainstream, and our processes transparent to our teams.

But as the author goes on to argue, this doesn’t just apply to our teams.

We must work more closely and collaboratively with our teammates, colleagues, and clients.

This collaborative working model with clients is something I am obsessed about and is the subject of my upcoming book ‘Client Centric Web Design’. Collaboration brings many benefits.

Collaborative teams have trust. Trust stems from transparency between roles. As designers, we need to bring this transparency to our processes. Sharing the way we work and inviting others to participate is the first step. A colleague who may have originally thought that designers simply “made things pretty” starts to realize the rigor and experience that goes into each design decision.

If we want respect for our profession then we need to let people see just how complex and challenging it can be.

Of course inviting clients to participate in the design process is a scary prospect, but then that is why I am dedicating an entire book to the subject :)

Please inform me when Client Centric Web Design is available

User experience design isn’t just about building wireframes and Photoshop mock-ups. It extends to areas that you wouldn’t necessarily think are part of the discipline.

For example, your customer service department can have a huge impact on your website’s overall user experience. Similarly, the design of your user experience could have an awfully big effect on your customer service department.

Improving customer service through UX design

I couldn’t agree with this more. The web can be an incredible customer service tool that can significantly reduce the number of calls and complaints received.

However, as the quote above points out, it is a two way street. Customer service can make or break a website as can be seen from the story of Zappos.

Smashing magazine has kicked off an interesting discussion about semantics in HTML. It started with a post entitled ‘Our Pointless Pursuit of Semantic Value’. In a rather confrontation tone this post ripped apart many of the commonly held ‘arguments’ for creating semantic code.

Despite the tone it made some good points. On occasion I have expressed concern about the level of obsession some have with code being semantic. It is often used as a weapon to criticise others and the way they code, rather than for any legitimate reason.

However, in this case I find myself agreeing with Jeremy Keith’s (partial) rebuttal. Although an obsession with semantics is unhealthy we need to be careful not to swing too far in the opposite direction. Semantics does have value here and now. However, for me what is more important is the potential it has for the future.

As Jeremy says at the end of his post:

The specification is still being put together and our collective voice matters.

By having this discussion now and by working out how semantics operate in the real world, we will hopefully establish a standard for future applications. While now semantic code is only sparsely used it has the potential to improve accessibility, data retrieval and user experience. If we simply dismiss semantics as pointless then this potential will never be realised.

The interest in mobile is incredible at the moment. Many website owners are so confused and we are getting loads of questions on the subject.

I have therefore asked Rob Borley whether he would be willing to start mobile consultancy clinics to help people out and he has kindly agreed.

To celebrate the launch of this new service I thought it might be nice to give away some free sessions.

If you have questions about the mobile web and would like some free advice about your mobile strategy then visit our mobile consultancy clinic and signup*.

We will do free sessions for 6 of those who signup and offer paid sessions to the rest. However, you are under no obligation to do a paid session if you do not want to.

Visit the mobile consultancy clinic

*We promise not to use your email address for any other purpose, because we are nice like that.

I read a post on eConsultancy this morning which presents more evidence that we need to be taking tablet devices seriously. Conversion rates and average order vales are now higher (for this network at least) on a tablet than they are for the desktop! This is astonishing. 

So I came across an interesting tutorial today that allows you to sync web page elements with video.

Basically it triggers certain actions (like load content into the page) when certain points in the video are reached. Its hard to explain so check out the demo.

This is all possible using a JS include produced by Mozilla called Popcorn.

I can imagine all kinds of possibilities for this. Just some that spring to mind include:

• Add subtitles to video.
• Make a call to action appear when a video finishes.
• Provide a guided tour of a website with different screen elements being highlighted in time with the video.
• Show users content giving additional information to that covered in the video.

The list could easily go on. Check it out and let me know what applications you can think of in the comments below.

Podcast: Download (Duration: 2:59 — 1.7MB)

In a recent blog post Adobe wrote:

We will no longer continue to develop Flash Player in the browser to work with new mobile device configurations.

HTML5 is now universally supported on major mobile devices, in some cases exclusively. This makes HTML5 the best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms.

With mobile usage set to shortly surpass that of desktop, it is hard to see how website owners can continue to use Flash for any device.