Mobile app development is a vital part of many companies’ marketing plans. Customers respond to mobile apps in a way that they never do to print and video ads. A good app engages the customer, which causes them to feel attached to the app’s creators, and creates a sense of loyalty to the company that has provided it. That is, if the app design is done right.

Who can Use your App?

There are quite a few different operating systems for mobile devices. Just because you’ve developed an app doesn’t mean it’s going to work on every smart phone. When you’re beginning the process of mobile application development, it’s necessary to make sure that your developer is planning to develop for all or most of these different operating systems in order to reach the widest possible audience. In addition, making sure your app is user friendly for all, regardless of what kind of mobile device they’re using is an important factor.

What does your App do for the Client?

An app by itself is a great idea. However, there needs to be a discernible plus for the client. There are many possible advantages you could provide for your client, and they may be combined to great effect when done artfully. Apps can provide necessary information about your business, provide discounts or coupons, or they can be entertainment. Any of these functions also serve as advertisement. It’s vital to ensure that the benefit to the customer is apparent, and that it’s something they can’t get anywhere else.

How much will Your App Cost?

The best time to consider the cost of your app is during the mobile application development process. The fact is development costs money, and the more money you put into the development, the more you’ll need to charge for your app in order to make your money back. Having an elaborate app may seem like a good plan, but if the development costs drive the price up, you may want to reconsider. Free apps are plentiful. If you do decide to charge, you must make certain your app is providing something a free one cannot, or at the very least, is doing so better than its free counterpart.

Where will your App be Sold?

There are many different stores for apps online. When you begin mobile app development, considering where it will be distributed is important. Some stores have certain requirements, which prevent developers from getting their apps into the store. For instance, the Apple app store has certain specific things it requires in the coding of the application. If these issues aren’t prepared for when the app is in its infancy, it may require you to do costly and time-consuming alterations to the program.

Keeping all of these issues in mind before you even begin mobile app development will save you a lot of trouble further down the line. If your already-created app isn’t selling, these are all issues that can be remedied after the fact; however, doing so will likely cost more than taking them into account to begin with would have.

If you ask a both a designer and a developer to create the perfect site, you will probably come up with two very different websites. To create the best user experience, or UX, elements from both of these ideal sites needs to be integrated into the final site. To do this, your designer and developer need to talk to each other to ensure that all of these needs are being met.

Aesthetics and Utility

While the web designer works mostly on how the site looks and functions, the web developer focuses on the actual coding. To create the best user experience design, the site should flow smoothly. An over-elaborate design may require intricate coding that takes months to plan correctly. Flash intros and other frills can cause a site to lag for some users, creating a negative experience, and may not add much to the actual site. The developer helps to ground the designer in the realities of what the technology is capable of, while providing functional direction to help your site stay user-friendly.

Finding what you Need

For sites with a large database of items, whether these items are content or actual physical objects, it is vital to good user experience design that they can be easily accessed. When the designer and developer are in contact, they can brainstorm about the easiest and most visually appealing way to present these items. Good UX design dictates that this process should be self-explanatory while still fitting in with the overall look of your site.

Keeping up with Technology

Web designers and web developers often have very different subsets of knowledge when it comes to UX design. While the designer may be more aware of what trends there are in the look of a site, developers may know more about the latest trends in coding, which will include new widgets and ways of presenting information. Having these two professionals talk to each other helps both of them stay on top of what’s new and what will make the best site for your company.

Ironing out Flaws

You don’t just want your customers to visit your site; you want them to come back after the first time. If customers aren’t coming back, you know that there’s a problem. It’s possible to try to resolve these issues by talking to either your designer or your developer, but it’s likely that the most effective solution will come from both of these people working together. Your site may have deficiencies that one or the other is blind to. By having two or more opinions on your site’s problems, you will most likely come to a better understanding of what’s going wrong as well as how to fix it.

Teamwork is vital for any department, and creating a great UX design for your website is no different. By having a variety of opinions and knowledge bases evaluating the final product, you are creating a system of checks and balances, which ensure that the final product is both lovely and functional.

Good logo design begins with a passion for your business. When a business owner loves his logo, chances are that his community will as well. Even so, there are 5 essential things that every business’s logo needs to say about that company. Use this checklist when designing business logos to ensure that the first image customers see is a successful hit.

Class

Customers need to know that a business has class. No matter how amusing or edgy a logo may seem, it has to be respectful of all audiences. A company logo design plan needs to include a review by various demographics to ensure that it doesn’t offend any audiences or present any problems otherwise. Businesses should use their judgment when they create a new logo and avoid any crass symbols, taboo subjects or potentially objectionable themes, such as religion and politics, unless they relate directly to the company.

Credibility

Every business’s logo needs to establish credibility with its demographic. To do this, a good logo design should easily portray the company as an authority on its goods or services. One way to do this is to include the number of years that a business has been in service. Implementing any awards the company has won is another helpful strategy. Credible logos need to have similar follow-up, such as award listings and customer reviews, on other company branding such as websites, business cards and flyers.

Connection

As credible and classy as a logo design needs to be, it should not be so stately as to exclude the audience altogether. A company logo must be inviting enough to establish a connection with users. Creating an eye-catching symbol that customers can easily identify with a company is a good way to accomplish this goal. This symbol can then be used on all company branding, merchandise and even clothing to help advertise as well as connect with the community.

Personality

Just as a logo cannot be too stiff as to ostracize users, it also shouldn’t be stuffy or aloof. Logo designs need personality. They should easily display the company’s look and feel, whether it’s hip and modern or flowing and organic. Strategic use of colors, shapes and overall design can easily accomplish this. Inviting everyone on the team, from owners to interns, to look at the logo can help designers find out which elements really work for the brand and which ones need to be scrapped.

Timeliness

Nobody likes an ancient logo. Every company needs to ensure that its logo is created to withstand the test of time. Although complete new logo renovations are sometimes unavoidable for businesses that last for decades, creating a smooth, timely logo can help a company prevent this process from occurring for as long as possible. Companies can do this by using simple designs and avoiding catch of the day tactics, like obnoxious animated images or pop culture references.

These 5 goals associated with a logo design may seem like a tall order to fill. When you consider how much this logo has to convey to customers however, taking the time to ensure that a logo does all of these things seems much more reasonable. Time spend on logo development is time invested in the longevity of the business itself.

Brand building is an important part of any corporation. Creating a brand makes allows for a large audience to recognize a product or service. There are traditional ways of corporate branding, but in today’s day and age, corporations are taking chances. Read on to discover 5 of the craziest methods corporations are utilizing to build their brand.

Tattoos

Recently, a New York based real estate firm offered their employees a 15% pay raise if they tattooed the corporation’s logo on their body. There were no size or position requirements, and the manager even paid for the tattoo session. Branding your workers is certainly one crazy way to participate in corporate branding. Employees said that having the tattoo served as a constant reminder to work harder. Managers said that having their employees walk about with the company logo made brand building that much easier for the company.

Humanizing

Tweeting has become one of the easiest ways for corporations to reach their customer base. Tweeting can, however, be very detrimental to a corporation, and therefore must be carefully scrutinized before using tweets for brand building. Humanizing a brand’s tweets can be as simple as adding the tweeter’s name to tweets, or including employee photos on the company’s Twitter page. Keeping up with tweets that consumers send back to the company is another great way of humanizing the brand while also creating stronger branding.

Insta-Branding

Instagram is another social media tool many corporations are utilizing for brand building. Posting pictures of their product or service in use or in creative ways attracts those who access Instagram. Through hash tags and Instagram’s filters, a photo is instantly transformed to a trending corporate branding mechanism. Instagram is also a great way to interact with consumers and get them to participate in your corporate branding through photo contests. Knowing which hash tags are trending will allow a company to gain followers and ultimately lead to a successful branding campaign.

Shock

Many corporations tap into fear tactics through the use of violence and gore. In this way, the company is able to shock consumers and build their brand. For example, PETA’s “slaughtered humans” campaign featured human corpses wrapped in plastic, symbolizing what is done to animals. PETA capitalized on human emotion and sentiment, and gained a lot of attention through this campaign. Using sex appeal or erotic imaging is another way of corporate branding. While these tactics of brand building are often controversial, they tend to create buzz about a brand.

Comic Relief

Corporate branding is about being more personable as a company. Companies worldwide are utilizing social media to showcase their corporate world in a comedic light. Corporations like Old Spice, with their hilarious commercials and tweets, or Capital One, capitalizing on Alec Baldwin’s airplane faux pas, use comedy to their advantage. Comedy allows for people to interact easily, and is a call to action for consumers to join in the fun. Comedy also creates more of a personality for a brick and mortar corporation.

Corporate branding has become more about making a brand more relatable and accessible to consumers, whether new or old. There are many methods of branding that exist in the corporate world, but the crazy ones seem to reap the most benefits, for consumers and corporations alike.

What better way to communicate with your customer base than through social media? The Vine marketing application for iPhone technology is a video recording software that allows you to share and loop videos with all of your social media connections. Using video marketing is a modern way of marketing for companies and corporations worldwide.

What is it?

Vine is an application for Apple software capable of recording video that allows the user to film and post videos to the application. Soon, users will also be able to link and share these videos on Twitter and Facebook . Much like Twitter or Instagram, you start by creating an account. From there, users can follow consumers and peruse through trending posts, categories, and hashtags. In this way, you can create video marketing campaigns and implement them through this useful tool. The video limit is 6 seconds, causing users to think carefully and to upload meaningful content for Vine marketing.

Vine Marketing

Using Vine, corporations can reach out to their customers and business connections in an interactive way. Uploading and sharing a video that tells a short story or where the company is headed starts a conversation with consumers. They can then respond with video from their own account, and use the company’s trending hashtags to interact with others. Consumers can also stay in tune with the company by following their own profile and will always be up-to-date with the latest marketing campaigns and efforts. This app can also be used to share new products and services, tutorials, or share about company culture.

Dos and Don’ts

Before participating in this video centered Vine marketing app, corporations should be aware of a few simple dos and don’ts. When utilizing this kind of marketing, do make sure that the company takes the application for a test run within the company before reaching out to the masses. With that said, make sure the content that is posted to the app is relevant and has a beneficial purpose for the company. It should not be used for sharing a 6 second clip of something that could have been a photo uploaded to Instagram, or to share boring or irrelevant content with consumers.

Marketing Ideas

There are a lot of great ways companies can use vine can to share a variety of video content. For example, a company can upload a video that showcases a new product or service in use, or perhaps in production to create excitement. Corporations could also feature videos of tours of the business, to bring consumers into the corporate world. Companies might also want to inform consumers about upcoming events by uploading a short promotional video onto their account.

Vine marketing is the newest way to market through social media. Much like its sister sites (Twitter, Snapchat), users have a time limitation that causes them to make uploads matter. With endless options as far as content, marketing has never been so easy. Sign up today to start your video marketing for your business.

What is user experience? For computer software services, it is the key to success. When a human interacts with a computer in any fashion, an experience is created. The user forms opinions of their experience based on aspects like ease of use, efficiency, and value. User experience is ultimately about the user’s personal opinions and for this reason, makes the topic of user experience important for those in technological fields.

User Interface Design

User interface design, often confused with web design, is a combination of how a site looks, as well as how a site works. Web design, on the other hand, is similar to graphic design and based solely on visual aesthetic. User interface design allows the user to focus their attention on a certain task, creating a memorable experience through functionality and design. That being said, user interface design is the key driver to a positive web user experience.

Who Deals With User Experience?

Companies that provide a software or service, like Google or YouTube, have particular departments that are dedicated to user experience. This department’s goal is to make the user interface accessible to a broad audience. There are several ways to achieve a positive web user experience. For one, speed and latency are important. Technology users seek instant gratification, especially in today’s day and age, so having software or services that work quickly is vital.

Web User Experience Factors

As mentioned previously, ease of use is a key factor in creating a good experience. Websites can make using their services easier through shortcuts. For example, focusing fields on pages that require data entry make the user’s experience easier. Another way to create shortcuts is remembering information. User’s information is stored on sites that they frequent, so that each time they visit a particular site, they do not have to constantly reenter data.

Fully Functioning Site

Having a site that works is another important factor in creating a positive encounter. When pages constantly have to be reloaded or the system is timed out due to too much traffic, users become frustrated and search for other more efficient ways to complete the task at hand. The only thing worse than having a site with glitches is a call center or help desk that does not work, is no where to be found, or lacks any idea of how to resolve the issue the user is experiencing.

Be Yourself!

Most importantly, a company should maintain their personality when creating a memorable online experience. Know who your users are, and understand how they want the software to work. Also, leave a way to contact the company so that users can react to their experiences directly to the creator of that experience. This creates a sense of value; the customer feels valued by the company, and the company values the opinions of their customers and the opportunity to grow.

Overall, user experience is an important part of any type of technological software. It is essentially the customer service of the technology realm. Through user experiences, organizations have the opportunity to expand their audience, as well as retain their current user membership.

Corporations, small businesses, and start-ups alike have all tapped into some, if not all, of the social media outlets on the web. It only makes sense to do so, as a majority of our world connects through sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and even blogs. We are constantly connected to the Internet, and the corporate world certainly understands that. There are thousands of companies utilizing social media, but only a few of them are doing it right.

Walt Disney Company – Magic

Being who they are, the Walt Disney Company can stand on their own and do not need to rely on gaining “likes” or “followers” through corporate social media. Disney is more focused on generating engaging and meaningful content. By focusing on their rich history, classic characters and stories, and what the future holds, Disney accesses their fans emotions all through social media outreach. This creates excitement among consumers, and keeps them coming back.

Starbucks – Trendy

Starbucks is a company that utilizes corporate social media to create trends among their consumers. Through Twitter and Facebook, customers can reach out directly to Starbucks to have their needs met and questions answered. Starbucks have launched a number of their own social media outlets (Starbucks Volunteer to Volunteer, Ideas In Action), which were created to help connect customers and develop ideas and solutions.

Dove – Bonding

By basing their social media strategy on health and beauty, Dove has taken corporate social media to a whole new level. With over 12 million “likes” on Facebook alone, Dove has created a community of consumers via social networking. Their up-to-date articles on beauty and health appeal to a variety of women, as do their news about new products and coupons. Through consumer untidiness, Dove does corporate social media right.

Google – One With

Google does corporate social media marketing right because they are corporate social media. With the advent of Google+, Google took the best aspects of popular social media and created their own outlet. Google Analytics is placed on numerous social media sites in order to generate traffic reports for sites. By being tools for social media, Google has infiltrated the business model of social media, as well as being a part of it.

Zappos – Stars

Zappos, an online retailer selling shoes, clothing, and accessories, pride themselves on relationships. When utilizing corporate social media sites, Zappos provides the option for consumers to sign up for their mailing list, instead of doing so automatically whenever someone “likes” their page. They have also created their own social networking, in which customers interact and receive information on promotions and coupons.

In all, a few themes are present when it comes to the methods that lead corporations to the best results when utilizing social media. Playing to your company’s strengths is key, as well asking the consumer a friend instead of a business prospect. Being interactive with consumers, creating a sense of togetherness, and keeping up with trends allow corporations to effectively use social media outlets.

When people purchase website design, they generally come from two different mindsets. One type of mind frame consists of simply buying web design without any rhyme or reason to it. These people just want to say they have a website. The second group of people, however, has very specific goals in mind when they buy web design.

Showcase a Brand

Savvy business owners know that a good goal to have in mind during website development is showcasing a brand. Having a memorable brand makes companies stand out, and a website should reflect the business’s brand easily. When customers arrive at the homepage of a website, the website design should instantly help them identify and connect with that brand. Not only should company logos be present, but the look and feel overall need to encompass the brand itself. Purchasers should work with web designers in order to make sure this occurs.

Examples of sites we built with 100% branding in mind:

Facilitate Community with Audience

One of the best ways to obtain and retain an audience online is to make website visitors feel like a community, and good business people know that. When they purchase website design, they want to ensure that every person who clicks on their website feels at home and is inspired to return daily. To make this happen, website development might include comment tools, forums, rating systems and other interactive materials to help the audience feel as if they, too, are a part of the website overall and have a say in what happens there.

Blog-Centered Design

Communications between a company and consumers has shifted from catalogs and mailers to blogs. Keen business people are very much aware of this and want their website to be centered around their blog to facilitate constant communication between themselves and their target market. The website needs to reflect this by not only linking to the full blog, but showcasing part of the blog on the homepage as well—whether by an excerpt, RSS feed or other creative means. The blog should be very simple for users to find and follow, and contain simple tools for them to either bookmark it or add it to their own daily reader feeds.

Outstanding Support

Good business people know that in order to retain customers, they must provide outstanding support. Their response must be timely, and web design must facilitate prompt service. A good contact page with forms customers can easily fill out without having to copy and paste e-mail addresses works well, as do customer chat options that allow them to speak with an agent in real-time. During the designing process, businesses should strive to ensure that their contact information, including address and phone number, is present throughout the entire website and fits easily into the branding theme.

Keeping these strategies in mind when hiring a design team, as well as throughout the development process, is what separates the successful businesses’ websites and the websites that do nothing for a company but cost money. Checking off each of these components is essential in creating and maintaining a website that actually provides a company with the marketing and public connection needed to succeed in today’s world.

If you had told a person from ten years ago what the Internet is like today, they would probably have been quite surprised. As it is, trying to project what website development will be like much beyond next year is quite a task. With new groundbreaking technologies appearing all the time, what happens next is anyone’s guess.

Mobile Technology

It’s not a huge leap to assume that the mobile craze we’re seeing now is only going to become more prevalent as time goes on. In terms of website development, this will probably mean that more sites will make use of touch screen interfaces, and will be formatted for the smaller screens of tablets and smart phones. It is likely that in the next 10 years, mobile device access to sites will be more common than the use of a PC or laptop. Older style, large screen formats may be phased out entirely.

Privacy Concerns and Persistent Identities

Online users have a conflicting set of desires; they want to share very specific details about their lives, but they only want select people to see them. The future of website development will have to address these issues, or risk losing their user base. One idea that has been suggestion is the use of persistent online identities. No matter where you go online, every action you take will be tied to your real life identity. This will make it more difficult for hackers to falsify an online identity, and will mean that fraudsters will always leave a trail.

Sensory Immersion

As the Internet expands, its ability to engage people’s senses will expand as well. In the early days of short video clips and low quality audio files, no one would have imagined that most of our entertainment would take place online. Video chat is common and inexpensive. Watching entire films in high quality over the Internet is a normal part of life for many. There’s now a website that you can hum a tune into, and it will tell you the name of the song you’re trying to remember. The possibilities for sites utilizing all of the senses are exciting, though the technology may take years to develop.

The Web and The Physical World

With the advent of objects like the 3D printer, it now is possible for the Internet to come into real life in unexpected ways. Imagine ordering a product online, and having a machine that replicates it right in your own home. It may be that you’ll be able to make slight alterations to available products, to customize them to your liking. Once this technology becomes common,it’s likely social media platforms for it will become widespread. Imagine your friends sharing their sculptures and other artwork as simply as they share pictures now.

There are many other technologies on the vanguard of progress, currently, and it’s hard to say what will become popular enough to influence web design, and what will be a passing fad. Technologies like Google Glass seem strange to us, now, but who knows how it may develop and become a part of every day life.

Like many industries once relying on face to face transactions, the IT industry now has quickly turned towards the power of social media. More and more IT professionals are first conversing with vendors through popular social media platforms.

LinkedIn in conjunction with Forrester Consulting & Research put together this infographic detailing the numbers and just how much they have grown in a short period of time.