User Friendly App | How can we design them

It is a no brainer that the market for mobile applications in growing 10 folds and just keeps on expanding. According to a recent survey in the 3rd quarter of the year 2020, mobile users spent an estimate of $28 billion while in just the previous year, they spent a gross estimate of $21 billion which represents how rapidly the industry is growing.

This creates massive opportunities for people that have a passion for a mobile app design to contribute and reap benefits from this market and to succeed in winning the hearts and minds of users, an app with a user-friendly interface is the topmost priority which has a visual appeal to the user and engages the user as well as interacting with the user.

Here we discuss how a developer can design a user-friendly app for the market.

Market Survey is a must

There are a total of around 2.72 million applications available at Google Play and similar around 1.82 million apps available on the app store but only a seldom 1% of the application ever becomes a huge success. Thus, if a developer wants his/her application to grow and progress then he/she must know the market trends and must conduct a thorough market research survey.

The core steps of market research include:

• In order to meet the needs of the users an investigation of the target audience is paramount for a developer where they determine if their design of the app will be of interest to the user. A developer should define all elements like age, location, gender, occupation etc. and detect the purchasing behaviors of the customer.
• Another qualitative step in figuring out what makes it attracting for the target audience to use an application and solve their issue is to interview potential users. Let’s imagine that a developer plans to build an app for self-driving cars, he/she needs to learn what factors can encourage the target audience to use it.
• Doing a competitor’s analysis is one of the most important steps in market research. During this procedure, a developer scouts out what strategies his/her app competitors implement to engage, attract, and retain their users. As a result, a developer can verify his/her app's distinctive value proposal to stand out from their market competitors.

Develop an App Wireframe

Once a developer has completed the market research phase, the next step is to sketch a wireframe for the app. A wireframe is an easy layout of the app’s functionality that determines the interaction of the user with the product. Before starting this procedure, a developer needs to brainstorm ideas with key stakeholders in their respective organizations which can be the product managers, UI/UX designers and many others.

Testing the UI/UX portion of the app

User Experience (UX) Design

The main goal of this stage is to develop a user-friendly app. This piece of design focuses mainly on user experience and how to make it better. Some studies show that good user experience can increase conversion rates by nearly 400 percent.The main goal of this stage is to develop a user-friendly app. This piece of design focuses mainly on user experience and how to make it better. Some studies show that good user experience can increase conversion rates by nearly 400 percent.

User Interface (UI) Design

It is the method of making a good-looking app based on the way it handles and interacts with users. Interaction Design Foundation separates user interfaces into graphical (GUI), voice-controlled (VUI), and gesture-based formats.

Testing the App Design

A step in the app development process that should never be omitted is the testing phase. By testing the user-friendliness of the app, a developer can figure out if the visual design of the app will be appealing to the target audience or note. Also, some of the steps highlighted below can help spot usability issues and how to address them:

1. First-click tests are methods that aim to calculate app usability and find out whether a particular task is easy to complete.
2. Preference tests help to define what design is better for a user between two options.
3. User surveys intend to collect data from your users about your app design