A new application from Dubai is looking to give consumers a way to feel good about their purchases. The application which is developed by the Dubai based Innoventa, a leading provider of integrated solutions in management and marketing focusing mainly on the internet and mobile spaces, was recently launched and is a great and simple idea for people to shop, get rewards and help a cause.

CareZone has a neat design and is easy to use. It is basically a location-based mobile app that suggests and rewards users for checking in at specific retailers that have already partnered up with Carezone. The rewards are given as coins or “CareCoins” (which go to charity) and “MyCoins” (which you can redeem at any of the partner retailers.) Users would also be eligilble to receive more coins if they make a purchase from that retailer.

The platform uses a location-based mobile app that identifies an extensive selection of retail partners participating in CareZone. Users can see messages from brands that have made a conscious decision to be socially responsible. CareZone will also come with a social media component that allows users to share their good deeds with followers, friends and family on Facebook and Twitter, thus encouraging them to support a cause through CareZone as well.

Carezone benefits both companies and consumers while facilitating support for various charitable causes. This new mobile app aims to bridge the gap between brands and consumers in a socially responsible manner.

Which is where the beauty of CareZone lies, half of all the coins collected will be donated to a charity you support in a couple of simple taps from the app and CareZone has already teamed up with a number of leading charities, including Dubai Autism Centre, K9 Friends and the United Nations World Food Programme, among many others. Also, if any users would like to support any other charities all they have to do is contact the CareZone team and they will get in touch with that charity and add it on board.

Ritesh Tilani Innoventa CEO, explained, “Mobile search and location-based software has changed the way millions of consumers decide where they are going to eat, drink, shop and entertain themselves and their families. CareZone not only places brands top-of-mind and prominently on search results, but also gives its users a direct incentive for simply visiting an outlet. Users get further rewards and benefits for their causes if they make any purchases with a partner outlet.”

CareZone is currnetly available for the iPhone and in the UAE only, however plans to expand and move onto other mobile platforms are in the pipeline. You can download the application here.

A report released earlier this month by AppsArabia and Real Opinions gives some great insight about the MENA regions smartphone usage. The research which was sponsored by RIM, which mainly aims to increase and support the developers in the region.

The research which was conducted online in both English (23%) and Arabic (77%) with almost 3,000 respondents and contains a vast amount of information regarding the region which should interest all developers and mobile entrepreneurs. Below is a summary of the report’s most important findings:

1. 49% of smartphone users expect to upgrade in the next six months, 70% in the next 12 months
2. 82% who don’t have a smartphone want one and 54% expect to get their first one in the next 12 months
3. 95% of smartphone users have apps installed
4. Smartphone users have an average of 29 apps installed, while 40% have 10 or less
5. 51% of smartphone users use apps all day long
6. 73% like downloading apps that make their life easier and 57% are interested in game apps
7. 82% of smartphone users with apps download at least once a week
8. On average, smartphone users download 6 apps each month
9. In the coming 12 months, 53% of all smartphone users claim they will be buying apps (30% said they wouldn’t and 17% were not sure)
10. In the coming 12 months,, 24% of all smartphone users claim they will spend more than USD 50 on apps
11. 58% would trade their usage data and receive targeted advertising in return for free app
12. 52% recommend apps to friends while 26% give a simple rating score for those they don’t know to see
13. 33% find out about new apps from their friends while most are discovered doing a search on their smartphone (38%)
14. Just 14% would evaluate an app based upon general media coverage
15. 62% of all smartphone users surveyed in the Middle East prefer apps to be in English while 39% of users who understand Arabic prefer apps to be in English.

Below is a deeper look into the report:

Demographics:

Country of origin for respondents (Top 5):

1. Egypt 14%
2. Saudi Arabia 9%
3. Morocco 9%
4. India 8%
5. Lebanon 6%

Age:

1. 21 or younger 16%
2. 22 – 35 56%
3. 36 or older 25%

Gender:

1. 73% male
2. 27% female

Smartphone Brand

For now Nokia seems to be the clear leader, however strong gains in the region have been made by Apple, Blackberry and other devices with Android operating systems.

Number of smartphones per user

 Which Brand is used mostly for Apps?

I haven’t used a Nokia phone for a while now even though I used to consider them the best. I find this chart somewhat surprising because I never expected that apps on Nokia’s were popular. I guess this could be due to the number of people with Nokia smartphones in the region. I wonder how many of these apps are paid apps?

Application categories of interest

Video, Books and religious applications seem to have more popularity in interest in North Africa than the remaining part of the MENA. And photography and communication applications have a clear overall lead throughout the region.

Application categories in terms of use

Users in the MENA are generally using communication and social networking apps the most, I added these two charts to point out that even though users might be interested more in photography apps than social networking however that doesn’t necessarily mean that they will use them more. Just goes to show the power of social apps and how people always prefer to be connected with their circles.

Why do users download apps?

Its all about convenience, mobile phones in general are very personal devices and users with smartphones are all always connected and on the go therefore it would make sense to check their phone first for anything that will simplify their lives. I know I check my email on my iPhone to avoid starting up my laptop, its just quicker and easier therefore if there are other applications that can help me do things faster and easier I would definitely consider paying money for that app.

Free apps vs. Paid apps

Free apps are clearly preferred over paid apps, however users in the MENA region will pay mostly for Banking/Finance, Travel and communication apps. If an app can help users save money or manage their money better I think that it would be money well spent. As for travel apps this is a category that can be lucrative for developers, as long as they provide  informative content for users. I recently met a startup in Jordan that are looking to develop paid traveling apps for the region we will write more about them in another article however there is a demand for these type of applications.

Number of Apps

From the chart above you can clearly see iPhone users have the most apps, so if you’re a developer or an entrepreneur with an idea it would be wise to start with the iPhone and then go onto other platforms.

Why do users delete apps?

A very interesting fact mentioned in the report is that half of all apps downloaded are deleted while one in five are bought. This should be a red flag for developers, their apps should be useful for their users and they should always update their apps with new features in order to keep their users coming back and avoid getting stagnant.

Terms & Conditions

44% of users claim that they don’t read the terms and conditions, that should come as no surprise! However I added this chart from the report because I wanted to point out something very important, users will rarely read content or long passages even if they need help to figure out how to use the app. I’m saying this from personal experience, if you’re counting on users to read more than a couple of lines in order to use an application than start over and make the design friendlier. An app should never have a “how-to use this app” section it should be easy and intuitive to use. We’ve learned this the hard way when asking for feedback from our users, they all had comments about a specific feature even though it was described in the help section. Again it’s all about user experience.

How and when users access apps

Users mostly prefer to use apps when they have free access to Wifi connections and when they have spare time, so developers should keep in that in mind and develop their apps that don’t require the use of the users data packages.

App spend

25% of the users will pay up to USD 5 on applications, so make sure to stay within that range. There is a demand for it!

App discoverabilty

When marketing your app its very important to get it submitted on review blogs and websites to get the word out and more importantly check the review and the feedback to know what you can change and what users would like to have in the app, after all you are developing app for users and not yourself.

Language

Localization is important however given the chart above English still has priority, developing apps in Arabic should be thought of however I would recommend launching in English, unless it is specific for the Arabic market.

Tablet numbers

Users in the MENA are interested in tablets, and it seems that this interest is going to increase in the future.

Tablet Brands

Important Tablet features

Users that are looking into purchasing tablets are most likely to consider internet connection, battery life and the apps available for download. Therefore apps should really cut down on the use of GPS and location services unless they are needed, because the GPS consumes a lot of power and therefore cutting down on the battery life.

App intergration

Users would prefer an expensive app that can automatically identify the device and be fully optimized for that device.

Digital Marketing

Good news for advertisers and developers, users actually prefer targeted, customized and location based ads the most.

If you’re a developer and have any comments from past experiences or would like to know more information, please let us know.

Last month I was following the coverage of Democamp Amman on Twitter and read about some really good ideas, I thought I would get in touch with some of the people that were presenting their demo’s. I got in touch with AlHudhod and got a response from Mohammed Al-Bishtawi one of the Co-Founders and he was very happy to answer a few questions to give us a little bit more insight on what he and demoed.

Background:

Q1) What is AlHodhud?

Alhodhud is a Lead company  aims to create and develop the content targeted for the Arab and Muslim children in creative and attractive modern way starting from age of preschool age -early childhood-, we provide the content to be customized in the most suitable way to enrich the childhood. Our content was implemented in many fields Smartphones, interactive boards for schools, PC’s, web applications social communities, and any other available technologies we are concerned to develop its content according to our vision.

Q2) When was Alhodhud Launched?

Alhodhud was launched on Dec 2010.

Q3) You recently demoed your iOS application “Hurofy al Mariha” in democampamman, can you please let us know more about it? And what was the thought behind it or what do you plan to achieve with it???

1. Alhodhud’s first project was “Hurofy al Mariha” launched to AppStore on 26/2/2011, this application occupies the first step of huge educational project aimed to learn the Arabic language alphabet in creative and attractive modern way targeted for early childhood.
2. the concept of this application is 28 characters and 28 wonderful animal in the framework of friendship between them, each character has a certain Arabic name related to a letter of alphabets, each character is combined with an animal where both of them (character and animal) starts with the same letter. In the App child will discover letters, related characters, animals and combination between them,  and being able to perform a sentence from two words . This Application set up the feeling of joy and happiness to the child, he will play the alphabet game, and color his preferred characters and animals.
3. we aimed to develop the child’s knowledge In a unique unprecedented way, so that the child can spend time in a useful and enjoyable way gaining the wanted benifits.
4. the most important part of our plan is to make Arabic language, culture, and content available worldwide to all Arab’s and people who are interested on the Arabic language. And we achieved a part of this since more than 20% from our users are from USA.
5. we have entered a partnership with “Baramjeyat company -for software solutions”  to handle all the technical and development issues.

Q4) Who are the main players at AlHudHod?

Main Players are:

1. E.Mohammed Al-Bishtawi (Co-Founder, business and marketing manager)
2. E.Shaima Al-Bishtawi (Co-Founder, content development manager)
3. Laura Scaron (Illustrator and Art director)

About the App:

Q1) How many downloads do you have so far?

we have more than 70K downloads of the free version which was launched on 26/3/2011.

Q2) From the twitter feed about democamp amman I think it mentioned that there were 60K downloads in the first month, how did you manage to achieve such a sucess?

We got 60K within 45 days by 4 basic elements:

1. Quality of the product and unique concept.
2. Paid version was launched one month before free version.
3. All minor details where revised based on child’s user experience so children’s feedback was excellent. Which means a great word of mouth.
4. Twitter campaign was accomplished on days of launch with an average reach of 15K.

Q3) What advice do you have for people who are launching a mobile application, what should they focus on?

1. Get a Unique concept and don’t repeat other Apps.
2. Get a Real benefit to user.
3. Simplify the Usage of application .
4. Concentrate on interfaces, and items design and artwork.

Q4) How do you think they should market it?

1. Reviews by specialists and Apps networks should be upon launch.
2. Social-Media coverage.
3. ADS on mobile (We still didn’t use that) or other Apps.

Q6) The application was developed by Barmajeyat, are you connected with them in anyway?

We are partners, We handled all content related issues and user experience, and they covered all technical side.

Future plans:

Q1) How do you plan on extending the application in the future

adding one more basic feature soon, developing and supporting the existing items such as animating the cartoons, and Adding more coloring illustrations and audio effects.

Q2) Do you have plans for any other apps?

1. Yes, We finalized our next application concept, logic, illustrations, and related content. It Will be soon on the appstore inshallah.
2. Our third application will be with a different style (surprise) within two months.

After huge success and expanding reach we gained we are now going to launch free/semi free apps to distribute Arabic content as much as we can and we will cover cost via Sponsors and supporters of Arabic content.

We’d like to thank Mohammed for his answers and all of the team involved for such a helpful initiative. You can also view the presentation they used in Democamp Amman below:

Last week we posted an article about some interesting information released by Effective Measure regarding mobile internet consumption in the MENA region. Apparently brands in the region have noticed this trend and have started reacting to this consumer need by producing either mobile apps or mobile websites to connect with users on the go.

The latest company to do so is Dubizzle, they have launched their mobile website dubai.dubizzle.com/m earlier today. The design and layout of the mobile site is neat and is very similar to the site but on a smaller screen. You can see some screenshots below:

This is the homepage with the main categories of the website available along with the main functions such as search and help.

The search follows the same logic as the full site, you can filter through categories, sub categories, enter keywords and enter a price range.

The sub-category menu…

The listing page has a scroll and displays the main information exactly the same way as the full site does.

The detail page displays the classified’s information and you can view the google map of the ad directly form your mobile.

You can reply to the ad directly from your mobile

The settings page allows you to change your location…

In their latest newsletter Effective measure released some information on mobile internet consumption in the MENA region, which shows strong growths all over the region mainly in the GCC and the levant where there was a 34% increase in mobile browsing in the Gulf from March to April 2011 with the Levant just trailing with around 33% growth as you can see from the image below:

Another set of important information released were the browsing patterns of mobile Internet users in the Gulf in April 2011:

1. Mobile Internet users stayed on a webpage at an average of 1.19 minutes, 3 seconds less than PC users
2. Each session on mobile Internet lasted for at an average of 7.36 minutes, 31 seconds less than a PC session

From the numbers in the chart its clear that mobile is picking up in the region and a mobile version of your site is slowly becoming a must, because users are using smartphones and connecting with your brand on the go. In fact 3.5 Million users from the gulf are consuming the web on mobile devices that’s almost 17.5% of the entire internet population in the Gulf.

A couple of days ago we got our hands on the new Blackberry Playbook here in the UAE. The device looks sleek without any buttons on surface everything is controlled via hand gestures. It does however have a small on/off button above the screen on the edge along with a increase/decrease volume and pause play button.

When I started to fiddle with it I was lost and very unimpressed I opened an application and couldn’t figure out how to go back to the home screen and didn’t realize that in order for the gestures to work you have to start the gesture from the outer black border on the surface. In my mind I was thinking this is no iPad!

But then my friend took over and demo-ed it and explained how things work, and that’s when my impression started to slowly change. Perhaps the most interesting thing was the multi-tasking, he played an HD movie clip and opened the Need For Speed game application and they were both running together smoothly and you can easily switch between them quite easily. Now I thought why would anyone need to run a game and a video at the same time but then I realized the potential one could have running other useful applications at the same time and how quickly and easily you can switch between them.

Another neat feature is the Bridging option, where you can tether you’re Blackberry phone and instantly sync all your messages, emails, contacts, calendars and so one through bluetooth. The upside for this is that you can view your messages and emails on a bigger screen and it has more of a webmail feel to it.

However as we were testing it, I felt the size was a bit awkward it’s too small to carry or to put on your lap if you’re sitting down on a couch and we ended up placing it flat on the surface most of the time.

I think overall once you’re introduced to the gestures and get a hang of it, it’s a pretty good tablet. Of course that wouldn’t matter unless there are more apps to add value to the people with a Playbook. Or a decent app store that is supposedly going to re-open very very soon.

You can view videos of how it works below, we edited the video (poorly I’d say) and we had to remove the sound because there was to much going on in the background since this video was taken in an office in Dubai Media City:

Day two of the event at twofour54 in Abu Dhabi, which held 3 different sessions running in parallel. The first session covered Blackberry development the other was covering development for Symbian and the last (the one we attended) was the iPhone iOS basics.

The key speaker was Amir Jahanlou from SAE Institute Dubai, he specializes in developing apps and 3D games. Amir started off with explaining the advantages of developing for mobile which include independence and exposure he mentioned that there are over 225 million users on iTunes of which around 12 million users are actively buying apps. Therefore there is an audience worth capturing.

Another important fact that was mentioned is that now developers have a wide range of resources to learn from unlike the early days of mobile development where everybody was a beginner, now there is a vast library of video tutorials on Youtube, great deal of books, forums and of course the Apple developer portal.

Developers considering to develop applications for iOS need the following tools:

1. Xcode
2. A MAC OS machine (Or a Mini Mac, which provides you with everything you need to start developing apps at a cheaper price)
3. Developer account from Apple

And that is pretty much it, Although it is important to test an app on an actual device before going live it is not needed because you can still develop and launch an app without a device, but that isn’t recommended. However to test the app on a device you require an Apple developer account.

There are alternatives to the Xcode, however Amir recommended everybody to start with it, because it is a neat and integrated tool that is very powerful, the other development tools are:

1. Flash CS5
2. Airplay SDK
3. Unity 3D
4. Dragonfire

The drawback with only using Xcode is that it will not be of any help if you want to develop on any other platforms. This is where the Airplay SDK comes in this SDK can be used to develop on cross platforms enabling you to develop an app on iOS and then deploy it on virtually any other platform. However there isn’t to many resources just yet for developers to utilize that is why Amir suggested to start with Xcode and start getting into Airplay for the future.

Amir then went about demonstrating how simple and powerful Xcode is by building a couple of simple apps for the iPhone, and then using the simulator to show the entire audience the result. This went on for a couple of hours since it was very interactive and members from the audience were participating in the development of the apps. Since Xcode doesn’t have any sample code you can download and view some sample code from the Apple developer portal.

Also a very important note that was mentioned in many blogs earlier last week is that there is no garbage collector which can be more time consuming for a developer.

According to Amir 20% of the Appstore’s 350,000 Apps consists of simple apps such as the ones he developed in front of us in the session. So quite literally anybody can develop an app given all the tools above are available.

After Lunch, the discussion became less technical and more focused on the iOS interface design, how to make money from and how to market an app.

The neat thing about the iOS interface design is that it is timeless. The design since the first generation has been the same and not been changed, unlike the other platforms. And developers have to keep that in mind the guys at Apple have put a lot of thought and effort to develop this interface so think twice before changing or using a different elements.

Some tips and advice about User interface:

1. One thing on each screen
2. Minimum screen elements
3. Easy to tap on buttons, leave good spacing between elements
4. limited preferences, don’t give the users to many options or customization options, just give them one really good option that the majority of the people will like it and now how to use it.
5. Limited drilling, by which you shouldn’t categorize your content to multiple levels where the user would have to keep drilling through pages and sections to get the information they’d like. Instead use the table design and a search box.
6. Consistent designs
7. Guided interface

Finally Amir discussed how to market and make money from apps and made it clear for all that as a developer it is good to aspire to reach the success of Angry birds, however you have to be realistic with your expectation and it was stated that Angry Birds developers had developed hundred of apps before they got to Angry Birds and most of them were complete flops.

It is also important to keep publishing apps, you may not make money from one however if you have a number of applications the total may add up as well as gaining a wealth of experience. Once an app is ready for launch you have to market it by every mean possible on social networks, getting the word out on blogs and review websites, forums and even advertising on the local paper if your app is relevant. Developers have to remember in order to be considered as a successful application and/or developer your app has to be downloaded at least 43,000 times.

After a quick round of introductions, David Ashford took the floor and discussed the support services that are offered by Apps Arabia and gave a quick presentation about the things that make an app any good. He also shared a couple of interesting facts about mobile apps:

• After launching their Android app the well known Angry Birds game generated $1m from advertising  alone.
• Apps Arabia have already launched one app on the iPhone, “Kalimat” which translates to words in Arabic. Plus 3 other apps in the pipeline which are Finjan, musicfn and a application targeted to kids which with the name wasn’t disclosed.
• Main point that was repeated through out the event was that all developers should think about their consumers and what their needs are.
• Five things to consider when you are choosing your platform: Market size, Distribution, local currency, operator billing and commercial.
  

  Choosing platform in the MENA region (picture taken with my phone!)

from the (unclear) image above it lists the platforms starting with Android at the top, iOS, Blackberry and Nokia. The check marks and the “x’s” indicate if they are available in the MENA region. Now for the Blackberry Appworld it was said that the market will be available in the UAE very soon and it will support local currencies.

• From a business or investment point of view, developing Android apps is not interesting for Apps Arabia since the Andriod Apps market is not fully open in the UAE, only the free apps are available in the region.
• The Final Fact that was one that was emphasised by the key speaker later on through the session which is: A great app is one that meets a demand and leverages the mobile uniqueness. Things users are attached to their mobiles, they check it on the go, location based applications, using the gyro-meter, and so on…

Next up was Oliver Weidlich, who gave a very insightful presentation on creating a great user experience and how all their work was based on a technique called User Centered Design or (UCD) I will talk more about this later on this post, however Oliver has a great deal of experience with developing mobile, tablet and even touch screen applications. They all follow the same process but each medium has different strengths and weaknesses and as a developer you should keep those in mind depending on what you are designing for.

A very important note that was also repeated that developers should not develop applications they want to use, they should develop apps that solve your users needs!

Oliver first started with explaining a few points about mobile that developers usually start with when they are developing an app but usually lose track of them when the are in the final stages:

• Mobiles are personal
• Mobiles are portable
• Mobiles are pocketable
• Mobiles are constrained
• Mobiles are contextual

They are always close to their users , Oliver mentioned a study that was done by placing a bluetooth device on the user that was tethered to the phone and it was found that people always keep their phones within a distance of a couple feet away from them. Surely they might flash their phones around but they will rarely ever share their phones with anyone.

Mobiles do have constraints such as:

• Small screen size
• Difficulty of input
• Reliant on mobile data
• Device size
• Battery life
• Processing power

How people use their mobiles is contextual meaning you can develop an app to take advantage of all of the following:

• Location, where the users are
• Time, useful for setting calendars and alerts
• Orientation
• Direction
• Movement
• Activity

To sum up the points above Oliver gave a very good example, lets say a user had meeting to attend, the app would know the user’s current location, and according to the time of this meeting the app suggests that the user should start moving because his direction is currently going to be moving in traffic because so more time should be given on the road.

Quick helpful facts:

• If nobody uses your application – then its useless
• Sometimes there’s to much going on in an app
• Mobile is first – Eric Schmidt 2010
• Blackberry Playbook to support Android
• People use iPad differently than mobile
• Ovi means “Door” in Finnish
• 10 Billion iOS Apps installed to date
• Smartphone sales increased by 96.8% from 2009 to 2010 globally

Oliver then went to discuss the advantage of having a mobile app over just using the mobile version of a website:

Mobile App Strengths:

1. Richer User Interface
2. More responsive
3. Less data download
4. Visibility through app stores
5. Leverages the mobile hardware

Mobile App Weaknesses:

1. Need to download
2. Might be big and require WiFi
3. Updates could take a long time to reach the consumer depending on the App store
4. More specialist skills required to develop
5. Different apps for different platforms

After that introduction on mobiles and apps, Oliver went it to discussing the key factors of great UX design and why it is needed. He states that apps are no longer just apps that are downloaded on users phones they are apps that enriching their lives and making their daily lives easier.

Key aspects to great UX design are:

1. Useful: Developers should always separate themselves from their target Audience. (The app should for their needs and not yours!). The more useful the app is the more engagement it will create, it will have to achieve goals either faster, easier or provide a better result than other existing apps. An example was given instapaper an app that provides a better, easier more convenient way to read your articles. If you read several articles and have multiple tabs open in your browser you can send them to your instapaper account where they are saved for you to view later and from their you can access through your mobile, table and you can also share the articles directly on social networks from your instapaper app.
2. Usable: Simply your apps as much as possible, make them easy to use and keep in mind of peoples mentalities. users have an expectation of how things work so try not to re-invent the wheels if things make sense for users to do it in one way try to take advantage of that factor. A good example to explain users mentalities is when people enter a restaurant, they expect to see a host/hostess to seat them their tables and then a waiter comes and asks if they would like to drink anything, after that the comes the menu and then they can order, a waiter wouldn’t get their order before they get the menu! Also always try to use labels and language that users will understand, don’t use labels that you and your friends use when everybody else know it as something else.
3. Desirable: Go a step further beyond the user’s expectations this will make the make more desirable since it will provide an extra reward feeling with the consumers. For example you can make the experience a playful one (where appropriate) an example was given from the Nokia Beta Labs where they are trying to make unlocking the phone a bit more playful by adding bubbles to the home screen and each bubble represents a function (messaging, browser, etc.. and when the phone unlocks it directly opens the function of the chosen bubble). Another example shown was from TAT where the design very playful in app designs and movements.
4. Value: People will download your app if they see value in it. It has to have an added feature to the normal service provided elsewhere. Oliver displayed the Square which is a device that attaches to the top of an iPhone and can make credit card payments easily using your iOS, this is useful for vendors who do not have access to credit cards readers or don’t want to pay regular banking charges for such a small percent of their customers who pay in credit card this way they are only charged by purchase. The app also goes an extra step by providing aid in managing inventory and seeing when different items are being purchased.
5. Findable: Make sure you market your app well and correctly, for example if it is a card game it should be under games > Card games. the categorization is very important to make it easier for users to find your app. Also utilize social networks and your website to advertise your app.
6. Accessibility: This should be accessible for everyone and not just for users with disabilities.
7. Credible: At the end of the day people have to trust you, your brand, your reputation and you distribution methods. This is key to having a good app.

After that Oliver went to explain the UCD method, which is what they use in their labs to produce a better UX. It is an approach to research and design by involving users throughout the process at every step and milestone. It helps in creating great UX by putting the focus on the user which is going to be the end user (of course the user should be from your target audience).

UCD is an adaptive process that changes according to feedback at different milestones, this helps in scoping projects in a better way reduces costs because changes are being done on the fly and not waiting till the end product is ready and therefore changing the entire code from scratch. If UCD is not followed apps end up being developed answering your needs and not your users, so make sure to get it right because unlike websites you can’t get away with a bad UX design for a mobile app.

UCD should and can be used by the majority of your team including:

• Designers
• Project managers
• Business Analysts
• Developers

A very important note to keep in mind is that users often can’t articulate or let you know exactly what is wrong for a number of reasons, mostly it is because they don’t have anything to compare it to and are not aware if it can be done better. A good way to solve this is to provide them with different options and see how they interact with each option and get feedback from them, you might end with a 3rd hybrid design of the 2 options. You have to know that feedback is sometimes very valuable and a lot of times not very useful at all, so you have to know how to balance and use what makes sense.

Moving on Oliver went through the UCD process steps, which:

1. Research: This is the step where you do your homework and identify customer and business needs and do some competitive analysis. You can’t say that your app is the best if you haven’t seen what your competition are doing. Also be sure to set goals on how to measure your UX is it by number of clicks, number of pages, is it fun to use, is it social? and so on…
2. Concept: This is the fun part where you can brainstorm ideas, identify platforms, create user journey mapping (this is like a storyboard for the user’s journey), and see if you can utilize or develop for other platforms to make the app more of a success.
3. Design & Refine: In this step you start getting designs reviewed by experts (remember these experts are not necessarily your target, even if they try to put themselves in your target’s place they will only give you feedback according to their experience which should be more cost effective at this stage than testing out with great number of people.) You can also carry out usability testing and Guerrilla testing which means place any person that fits your target audience profile and ask them for feedback (And don’t take it too personally).  A good tip that was given is that make your life easier and use templates and stencils this will help in standardizing designs in case a big team is working on an app. And this will also save a lot of time for you to think of the bigger more important issues.
4. Development: Here the same activities from the previous step still have to continue, feedback from experts and users. And always make sure to give plenty time for usability testing. Because if you do get feedback you will require some time to make adjustments.
5. Launch & Monitor: Launch the application and always keep monitoring the performance, see where there are drop off points. And go back to your list of goals you set during the research phase and revisit the goals you’ve placed to measure the UX performance.

When carrying out changes or adjustments to your app, don’t expect users to quickly adapt to those changes. They are most probably still used to the old one and might be resisting slowly to the new updates so be patient. Make sure to monitor how user behavior is changing over time.

So what are some of the tools that can help with creating good UCD and UX in general, you can use the following:

1. App Definition Statement: This is what the iTunes suggests, which basically lets you put in prespective to design the app for the device and make sure its tailored to the task at hand so that you can prototype it and iterate as needed.
2. Personas: These are made up characters that could be in your target audience. This will give you a better insight on how they might interact with the device, when, their behavior, needs and goals from the app. You can create fictional characters with names, gender, age, their interests, jobs, etc…
3. Scenarios: Use scenarios to see how different personas might interact with your app. You will find that some persona will not necessarily act alike in the same scenario.
4. Focus Groups: Groups of 4 – 6 people per group and make sure to segment your groups in which people from the same background are grouped together to get richer feedback. For example if you have an application that is geared towards business professionals, you might want to place the younger crowd together, then the experienced people together and then finally the ultra successful people together.
5. Customer Interviews: Conduct 1 0n 1 interviews with your target.
6. Contextual Inquiry: This is where you interview the user in their usual environment while using the app. It could be during the day or in the office and so on. This will lead to a better result of feedback since they are not pressured to feel that they are trying testing out something.
7. Prototype on Device: Make sure to use things in their place and how they will appear on the platform you are designing for. There is no point in printing out the designs and making them bigger so that users can view them. It has to be on the device to get proper feedback.

After that the discussion was moved along to the UX design for tablets, which usually follows the same process above, but you have to always keep in mind the different usage behavior as well as the different strengths and weaknesses of different platforms.

For example a story that was shared about how tablets can change people behavior, was when Oliver and his business partner went to meet a client. Oliver had an iPad lying flat on the surface of the table and his business partner had a laptop. At the end of the meeting their client realized that he spoke and interacted more with Oliver than his business partner because there was a screen in the way kind of interrupting the conversation.

Some tips and advice given for developing apps on tablets:

• Screen size
• Screen distance from users
• The way the tablet is held, where is the interaction area with the device?
• In what state is used, usually sitting down and relaxing unlike mobile
• Work with guidelines, people already put the time and thinking in them for you
• hand/finger position on device

Finally Oliver touched on designing for touch screens and how the same process can be applied to those as well, especially the tips form designing for tablets.

The final thought that was shared:

“There are more and more apps out there, that’s why you have to sweat the UX details”

Resources:

1. For wireframing tools check out: www.amirkhella.com and www.redfoundry.com they offer great resource for the iPhone and iPad.
2. To test your beta application you can check out www.testflight.com
3. To download gesture stencils and iOS resources visit: Lukew.com

1. Photosythn

A lot of coverage has been given lately to Photosynth a new photography app released by Microsoft on the iTunes Appstore. I’m not very big on photography so I didn’t really pay much attention at the time until I downloaded the application which you can do so from here (the best part its free!) and I must admit the app is a must have on your phone.

The beauty of the app is that it doesn’t require any additional programs or apps to produce high quality panorama shots. All you have to do is follow the instructions and that’s it. After taking the shots, the application “stitches” the images together and then you enjoy a 360 degree view of your shots. Here’s an image I took from Dubai Media City (DMC) earlier today just to give you an example:

Now that is a 360 degree shot and the building in the middle is the MBC building, even though these pics are impressive they’re much better to view on your phone because you can actually slide the picture with your finger to get a better feel for the image.

You can create an account online or login using your hotmail to upload all your shots plus share with your friends on social networks instead of only storing them on your phone. Microsoft is betting on this app to generate more users  utilizing their photo cloud storage abilities to store and share their images as well giving Hotmail a well-needed push.

2. uscape.it

uscape.it is another similar app that allows you to take panoramic shots and share with your friends. However this one work differently than photosynth. In order to use it, you take a 360 degree video shot of what you want to capture and then once done, you have to upload it to uscape.it’s servers for it to be processed after its done you get a message and the file will appear on your phone. Their demos on the app look very high quality and could be very useful (if you want to sell or rent your apartment you can just take a shot with this and upload the file).

However there is a setback to this app, I have tried it several times and processing times can take a while which is fine I guess but what is not alright is when you get a message saying “your image processing has failed” after waiting 15 – 20 mins. But overall I believe it is a decent app and does deserve a shot and maybe these kinks can be ironed out in the future updates.

Bloomberg TV today interviewed a very renown analyst on technology, Shaw Wu of Kaufman Bros., about the outlook for Research In Motion Ltd.’s BlackBerry PlayBook and Apple Inc.’s iPad 2. Here is the interview: