Must Design

Last week, Jeremy Osborn, Academic Director for Aquent Gymnasium, had the chance to attend the Artifact Conference. Here are his key takeaways.

Marty Note
This Artifact Conference looks interesting and worth checkout out (http://artifactconf.com/ ). I love this quote from the Responsive panel at the conference in Providence, RI:

"On the other hand, responsive design is forcing companies to prioritize site performance. The consensus is that slow-loading and bloated sites are just as much of a “design” flaw as confusing layout, clashing colors, and the rampant proliferation of typefaces on page. "

Most designers focus on how to accordion a website so it looks good on any device. The real challenge is deeper. How do we architect "less bloat"? How do we design information to be lean and responsive?

Couple of things I've noticed include:

* Building stories via visuals and rich snippets.
* Taking advantage of the swipe and spin options on mobile devices.
* Creating easier to understand backend functionality.
* Using a LEAN or MEAN filter forcing messaging to get to the point FAST.

The SEO and engagement benefits of the second half of responsive design - the information architecture half - are enormous. We know that as engagement goes up so do our site's heuristics and the "new Google" loves more time on site, lower bounce rates and other "engagement metrics".

The "Responsive Challenge" for designers is to realize more is involved than look and feel. The very core of our communication must be reviewed, reevaluated and changed to be leander and more responsive too or we design dissonance in. Confused customers do many things converting is never one of them.