Here is a list of a few core principles that defines the behavior model of any digital product. A few of them might sound hygiene, but unless they are established in the beginning itself, they tend to loosen their impact as we are in the process of making it.
- Minimalist: It is marked by clarity, purpose, and intentionality. At its core, being a minimalist means intentionally promoting the things we most value and removing everything that distracts us from it.
- Clutter free: The first (and most important) step is to remove the excessive possessions that are stealing our lives, time, and energy. In the process of removing the excess, it can be helpful to find a working definition of clutter to aid you in this step.
- Mobile/ Desktop first approach: This ensures that you deliver the right experience to the right screen. With such limited space available on a mobile phone screen designing needs prioritization of the elements than website that are most important to create a strong base to work from.
- Element first approach: This is a form of atomic design applied with a responsive mindset that enables the individual preparation of the interface parts so they behave responsively.
- Zero based design: Zero-based thinking is fundamentally based on imagining yourself back at the point before particular decisions were made, and if you can still change direction, make those decisions today with the knowledge that you have now about their outcome.
- Progressive Disclosure: It is an interaction design pattern that sequences information and actions across several screens. The purpose is to lower the chances that users will feel overwhelmed by what they encounter and eliminating information overload.
- Pre-emptive: They are elements that are designed as a measure against anticipated behavior of users.
- Pro-active: Introducing elements that are designed to predict user behavior and take liberty of performing tasks on their behalf.
- Personalized: Personalization is not limited to profile pictures with welcome messages. The users feel a kind of relationship when they start seeing relevant content, personalized recommendations, related information. When they start seeing value in what they are seeing, they would be inclined to tell you more about themselves.
- Customizable: Another way to provide personalization is to keep it customizable. This is user oriented. The user designs his space to make it more meaningful. This adds up to additional development effort but is worth it, specially when you are developing a tool.
- Scalable: This is a very important aspect of product development. It specially irritates at the time when your app is a bit old but can sustain with minor modifications. Business has discovered new things and the team who made them are not around. Making it a bit scalable in terms of adding data and minor features in the existing architecture would ease it out.
- Conversational: This is more towards the tone of voice that we use. Now, one could conveniently classify this as a part of content strategy, but this is critical as it contributes gracefully to enhance the experience of the user.
Can you think of more of these? Please drop them in comments!
