How to Design for Branding

In defense of “making it up as you go along”

“I confess – I’m for it. And I’ll go even further – I think “making it up as you go along” is one of the greatest, and most important processes of any age.

No great explorer set out with a detailed set of explorer guidelines. They adjusted and discovered.

No great inventor set out with a detailed set of inventor guidelines. They experimented and adapted.

No great leader set out with a detailed set of leadership guidelines. Leaders point the way and rally followers when their faith fails.

“Making it up as you go along” means that you recognize a good foothold on your way up a mountain and know how to take advantage of it (in other words, you understand your craft). But you don’t need (literally) a step-by-step instruction book (because you understand your craft). In software development terms, the “step-by-step” equivalent is a requirements specification. Kind of like paint-by-numbers for would-be Rembrandts who don’t yet know that method is incapable of producing genuine art.” (Eric Reiss)

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How To Web 2010 Conference

Bucharest, 27th of July 2010. Today the How To Web 2010 conference – the most important entrepreneurship and web technology event in Eastern Europe – was launched at the Bucharest Hubb. The conference will take place on the 3rd and 4th of November 2010 at the Intercontinental Hotel in Bucharest.

The website of the How To Web 2010 Conference was also launched today and it will soon contain all the necessary information regarding the conference, schedule, speakers and registration.

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Endeca User Interface Design Pattern Library

The Endeca User Interface Design Pattern Library (UIDPL) describes principled ways to solve common user interface design problems related to search, faceted navigation, and discovery.

The library includes both specific UI design patterns as well as topics — groups of patterns related to significant aspects of search and discovery such as:

* Search
* Faceted Navigation
* Promotional Spotlighting
* Results Manipulation

The patterns are offered as proposed sets of design guidelines based on our research and design experience as well as lessons learned from the information search and discovery community. They are NOT the only solutions, strict recipes etched in stone, or a substitute for sound human-centered design practices.

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Focus pe SEO & SEM

Focus pe SEO & SEM este un eveniment dedicat optimizării şi marketingului pe motoarele de căutare

Cele 2 zile sunt organizate în workshopuri şi sesiuni interactive. Vei învăţa lucruri noi şi vei găsi soluţii alături de unii dintre cei mai cunoscuţi specialişti români în SEO şi SEM. Programul cuprinde sesiuni diversificate, de la stabilirea obiectivelor, organizarea unui website pentru SEO/SEM până la optimizarea conversiilor şi integrarea cu mixul de marketing.

IMTO Focus pe SEO & SEM îţi este adresat dacă eşti: marketer, brand manager, publicitar, antreprenor, specialist SEO, web developer, sau implicat direct în procesul de marketing şi publicitate.

Where business analysis and user experience intersect

The BA must understand the core business needs and express them in clear, concise language (most commonly as formal business requirements).  The UX professional must understand the business problem, as well as how customers see it, and then they can begin the real work of making complex products usable and aesthetically pleasing (even fun!), with interfaces that can be used globally and that are accessible by diverse audiences.

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Storyboards, Scenarios, Design Personas

Storyboards use little detail to communicate an idea. Developing a persona moving through a scenario helps the design team bridge the contexts of development and use. Patterns of behavior in the context of social settings gain a stake alongside functional requirements and demographic abstraction. And on a simpler level the storyboard is ideal for instructions and illustrating simple interaction.

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ROI and UX

Notes from The ROI of UX: Proving the Value of User Experience Design by Erin Young

What If Customer Experience Has No ROI? by Bruce Temkin

Curs de Arhitectura Informatiei

Dan Klyn preda arhitectura informatiei la University of Michigan School of Information. Clientii sai includ: Incorrect Music, Lumber Liquidators, Time-Life, ShopAtHomeTV, American Girl, TJ Maxx, Artistry Cosmetics, Rose Brand, British Virgin Islands Tourism Board, Costa Del Mar, Tobacco-Free Florida, SIGGRAPH, Ross School of Business, NOOMA and world-famous folk music venue The Ark.

Link to slides (English)

Maturing a Practice by J. Hobbs, T. Fenn, & A. Resmini

Acesta s-ar putea sa fie cel mai important articol pe care l-ati citit din 2004 pina in prezent pe tema disciplinei UXD. Din Jurnalul de Arhitectura Informatiei:

The authors of this paper position pratice-led research (PLR) as an effective agent in the transformation of the seemingly inherent and natural acts found in casual practice into the formal arrangement of accepted truths and regulated practices of a discipline for user experience design (UXD) and information architecture (IA) communities of practice. The paper does not intend to exhaustively define discourse analysis, discipline practice or pratice-led research per se, but rather to introduce practitioners and the fields of UX and IA at large to the basic concepts of PLR so as to begin establishing discussion and awareness.

Read the full article online »

Download Maturing a Practice in PDF format »