Book picks similar to
Microcopy: The Complete Guide by Kinneret Yifrah
design
ux
writing
ux-writing
Product Design for the Web: Principles of Designing and Releasing Web Products
Randy J. Hunt - 2013
To create a successful web product that's as large as Etsy, Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest-or even as small as a tiny app-you need to know more than just HTML and CSS. You need to understand how to create meaningful online experiences so that users want to come back again and again.In other words, you have to stop thinking like a web designer or a visual designer or a UX designer or an interaction designer and start thinking like a product designer.In this breakthrough introduction to modern product design, Etsy Creative Director Randy Hunt explains the skills, processes, types of tools, and recommended workflows for creating world-class web products. After reading this book, you'll have a complete understanding of what product design really is and you'll be equipped with the best practices necessary for building your own successful online products.
The User's Journey: Storymapping Products That People Love
Donna Lichaw - 2016
The User’s Journey will show you how, when, and why to use narrative structure, technique, and principles to ideate, craft, and test a cohesive vision for an engaging outcome. See how a “story first” approach can transform your product, feature, landing page, flow, campaign, content, or product strategy.
Remote Research: Real Users, Real Time, Real Research
Nate Bolt - 2010
In Remote Research, Nate Bolt and Tony Tulathimutte teach you how to design and conduct remote research studies, top to bottom, with little more than a phone and a laptop. TESTIMONIALS "Nate and Tony have done it! They've described beautifully one of the user experience profession's best-kept secrets-conducting remote usability tests. This book is a must-have for anyone thinking about remote testing, since it tackles everything you need from soup to nuts. I can't wait to get a copy for my own bookshelf. Oh, it also will melt your face remotely." ?Jared Spool CEO and Founding Principal, User Interface Engineering "Remote Research is filled with sage advice, entertaining case studies, methods, and clear procedures that will benefit both new and experienced user researchers. Remote Research is an absorbing book that should be on the reading list of every user researcher. Kudos to Bolt and Tulathimutte for an engaging and informative guide to better remote research." ?Chauncey Wilson Senior Manager, AEC User Research, Autodesk, Inc. "The techniques in this book will make every designer's and user researcher's life much easier. Nate and Tony use the attitude and power of Web 2.0 technologies to create a new way of thinking about user experience research. They share their expertise clearly, concisely, and with a great sense of humor, giving practitioners step-by-step details to conduct remote research of virtually any complexity." ?Mike Kuniavsky author, Observing the User Experience "No longer must you only test your interfaces with people who come to your office or some expensive lab. So stop doing boring research! Stop having a boring life! Read this book!" ?Mark Trammell User Researcher, Twitter
Talking to Humans
Giff Constable - 2014
This book will teach you how to structure and run effective customer interviews, find candidates, and turn learnings into action.
Designing Interactions
Bill Moggridge - 2006
Designers of digital technology products no longer regard their job as designing a physical object--beautiful or utilitarian--but as designing our interactions with it. In Designing Interactions, award-winning designer Bill Moggridge introduces us to forty influential designers who have shaped our interaction with technology. Moggridge, designer of the first laptop computer (the GRiD Compass, 1981) and a founder of the design firm IDEO, tells us these stories from an industry insider's viewpoint, tracing the evolution of ideas from inspiration to outcome. The innovators he interviews--including Will Wright, creator of The Sims, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the founders of Google, and Doug Engelbart, Bill Atkinson, and others involved in the invention and development of the mouse and the desktop--have been instrumental in making a difference in the design of interactions. Their stories chart the history of entrepreneurial design development for technology.Moggridge and his interviewees discuss such questions as why a personal computer has a window in a desktop, what made Palm's handheld organizers so successful, what turns a game into a hobby, why Google is the search engine of choice, and why 30 million people in Japan choose the i-mode service for their cell phones. And Moggridge tells the story of his own design process and explains the focus on people and prototypes that has been successful at IDEO--how the needs and desires of people can inspire innovative designs and how prototyping methods are evolving for the design of digital technology.Designing Interactions is illustrated with more than 700 images, with color throughout. Accompanying the book is a DVD that contains segments from all the interviews intercut with examples of the interactions under discussion.Interviews with: Bill Atkinson - Durrell Bishop - Brendan Boyle - Dennis Boyle - Paul Bradley - Duane Bray - Sergey Brin - Stu Card - Gillian Crampton Smith - Chris Downs- Tony Dunne - John Ellenby - Doug Englebart - Jane Fulton Suri - Bill Gaver - Bing Gordon - Rob Haitani - Jeff Hawkins - Matt Hunter - Hiroshi Ishii - Bert Keely - David Kelley - Rikako Kojima - Brenda Laurel - David Liddle - Lavrans L?vlie - John Maeda - Paul Mercer - Tim Mott - Joy Mountford - Takeshi Natsuno - Larry Page - Mark Podlaseck - Fiona Raby - Cordell Ratzlaff - Ben Reason - Jun Rekimoto - Steve Rogers - Fran Samalionis - Larry Tesler - Bill Verplank - Terry Winograd - Will Wright
Show Your Work!: 10 Ways to Share Your Creativity and Get Discovered
Austin Kleon - 2014
Now, in an even more forward-thinking and necessary book, he shows how to take that critical next step on a creative journey—getting known. Show Your Work! is about why generosity trumps genius. It’s about getting findable, about using the network instead of wasting time “networking.” It’s not self-promotion, it’s self-discovery—let others into your process, then let them steal from you. Filled with illustrations, quotes, stories, and examples, Show Your Work! offers ten transformative rules for being open, generous, brave, productive. In chapters such as You Don’t Have to Be a Genius; Share Something Small Every Day; and Stick Around, Kleon creates a user’s manual for embracing the communal nature of creativity— what he calls the “ecology of talent.” From broader life lessons about work (you can’t find your voice if you don’t use it) to the etiquette of sharing—and the dangers of oversharing—to the practicalities of Internet life (build a good domain name; give credit when credit is due), it’s an inspiring manifesto for succeeding as any kind of artist or entrepreneur in the digital age.
Sketching User Experiences: Getting the Design Right and the Right Design
Bill Buxton - 2007
So while the focus is on design, the approach is holistic. Hence, the book speaks to designers, usability specialists, the HCI community, product managers, and business executives. There is an emphasis on balancing the back-end concern with usability and engineering excellence (getting the design right) with an up-front investment in sketching and ideation (getting the right design). Overall, the objective is to build the notion of informed design: molding emerging technology into a form that serves our society and reflects its values.Grounded in both practice and scientific research, Bill Buxton s engaging work aims to spark the imagination while encouraging the use of new techniques, breathing new life into user experience design. Covers sketching and early prototyping design methods suitable for dynamic product capabilities: cell phones that communicate with each other and other embedded systems, "smart" appliances, and things you only imagine in your dreamsThorough coverage of the design sketching method which helps easily build experience prototypes-without the effort of engineering prototypes which are difficult to abandonReaches out to a range of designers, including user interface designers, industrial designers, software engineers, usability engineers, product managers, and othersFull of case studies, examples, exercises, and projects, and access to video clips that demonstrate the principles and methods"
Service Design: From Insight to Implementation
Andy Polaine - 2013
They don't make us feel happier or richer. Why are they not designed as well as the products we love to use such as an Apple iPod or a BMW? The 'developed' world has moved beyond the industrial mindset of products and the majority of 'products' that we encounter are actually parts of a larger service network. These services comprise people, technology, places, time and objects that form the entire service experience. In most cases some of the touchpoints are designed, but in many situations the service as a complete ecology just "happens" and is not consciously designed at all, which is why they don't feel like iPods or BMWs. One of the goals of service design is to redress this imbalance and to design services that have the same appeal and experience as the products we love, whether it is buying insurance, going on holiday, filling in a tax return, or having a heart transplant. Another important aspect of service design is its potential for design innovation and intervention in the big issues facing us, such as transport, sustainability, government, finance, communications and healthcare. Given that we live in a service and information age, a practical, thoughtful book about how to design better services is urgently needed.
Competing Against Luck
Clayton M. Christensen - 2016
A generation ago, Christensen revolutionized business with his groundbreaking theory of disruptive innovation. Now, he goes further, offering powerful new insights.After years of research, Christensen has come to one critical conclusion: our long held maxim—that understanding the customer is the crux of innovation—is wrong. Customers don’t buy products or services; they "hire" them to do a job. Understanding customers does not drive innovation success, he argues. Understanding customer jobs does. The "Jobs to Be Done" approach can be seen in some of the world’s most respected companies and fast-growing startups, including Amazon, Intuit, Uber, Airbnb, and Chobani yogurt, to name just a few. But this book is not about celebrating these successes—it’s about predicting new ones.Christensen contends that by understanding what causes customers to "hire" a product or service, any business can improve its innovation track record, creating products that customers not only want to hire, but that they’ll pay premium prices to bring into their lives. Jobs theory offers new hope for growth to companies frustrated by their hit and miss efforts.This book carefully lays down Christensen’s provocative framework, providing a comprehensive explanation of the theory and why it is predictive, how to use it in the real world—and, most importantly, how not to squander the insights it provides.
The Humane Interface: New Directions for Designing Interactive Systems
Jef Raskin - 2000
The Humane Interface is a gourmet dish from a master chef. Five mice! --Jakob Nielsen, Nielsen Norman Group Author of Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity This unique guide to interactive system design reflects the experience and vision of Jef Raskin, the creator of the Apple Macintosh. Other books may show how to use todays widgets and interface ideas effectively. Raskin, however, demonstrates that many current interface paradigms are dead ends, and that to make computers significantly easier to use requires new approaches. He explains how to effect desperately needed changes, offering a wealth of innovative and specific interface ideas for software designers, developers, and product managers. The Apple Macintosh helped to introduce a previous revolution in computer interface design, drawing on the best available technology to establish many of the interface techniques and methods now universal in the computer industry. With this book, Raskin proves again both his farsightedness and his practicality. He also demonstrates how design ideas must be bui
User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product
Jeff Patton - 2012
With this practical book, you'll explore the often-misunderstood practice of user story mapping, and learn how it can help keep your team stay focused on users and their experience throughout the development process.You and your team will learn that user stories aren't a way to write better specifications, but a way to organize and have better conversations. This book will help you understand what kinds of conversations you should be having, when to have them, and what to keep track of when you do. Learn the key concepts used to create a great story map. Understand how user stories really work, and how to make good use of them in agile and lean projects. Examine the nuts and bolts of managing stories through the development cycle. Use strategies that help you continue to learn before and after the product's release to customers and usersUser Story Mapping is ideal for agile and lean software development team members, product managers and UX practitioners in commercial product companies, and business analysts and project managers in IT organizations—whether you're new to this approach or want to understand more about it.
Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content
Ann Handley - 2014
If you are on social media, you are in marketing. And that means that we are all relying on our words to carry our marketing messages. We are all writers.Yeah, but who cares about writing anymore? In a time-challenged world dominated by short and snappy, by click-bait headlines and Twitter streams and Instagram feeds and gifs and video and Snapchat and YOLO and LOL and #tbt. . . does the idea of focusing on writing seem pedantic and ordinary?Actually, writing matters more now, not less. Our online words are our currency; they tell our customers who we are.Our writing can make us look smart or it can make us look stupid. It can make us seem fun, or warm, or competent, or trustworthy. But it can also make us seem humdrum or discombobulated or flat-out boring.That means you've got to choose words well, and write with economy and the style and honest empathy for your customers. And it means you put a new value on an often-overlooked skill in content marketing: How to write, and how to tell a true story really, really well. That's true whether you're writing a listicle or the words on a Slideshare deck or the words you're reading right here, right now...And so being able to communicate well in writing isn't just nice; it's necessity. And it's also the oft-overlooked cornerstone of nearly all our content marketing.In Everybody Writes, top marketing veteran Ann Handley gives expert guidance and insight into the process and strategy of content creation, production and publishing, with actionable how-to advice designed to get results.These lessons and rules apply across all of your online assets — like web pages, home page, landing pages, blogs, email, marketing offers, and on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media. Ann deconstructs the strategy and delivers a practical approach to create ridiculously compelling and competent content. It's designed to be the go-to guide for anyone creating or publishing any kind of online content — whether you're a big brand or you're small and solo.Sections include:
How to write better. (Or, for "adult-onset writers": How to hate writing less.)
Easy grammar and usage rules tailored for business in a fun, memorable way. (Enough to keep you looking sharp, but not too much to overwhelm you.)
Giving your audience the gift of your true story, told well. Empathy and humanity and inspiration are key here, so the book covers that, too.
Best practices for creating credible, trustworthy content steeped in some time-honored rules of solid journalism. Because publishing content and talking directly to your customers is, at its heart, a privilege.
"Things Marketers Write": The fundamentals of 17 specific kinds of content that marketers are often tasked with crafting.
Content Tools: The sharpest tools you need to get the job done.
Traditional marketing techniques are no longer enough. Everybody Writes is a field guide for the smartest businesses who know that great content is the key to thriving in this digital world.
Communicating Design: Developing Web Site Documentation for Design and Planning
Dan M. Brown - 2006
Consultant Brown describes the ten basic deliverables as belonging to three basic types, thereby making it much easier to sort out who gets what and when. He wo
Solving Product Design Exercises: Questions & Answers
Artiom Dashinsky - 2018
Prepare for your next job interview."Redesign the NYC metrocard system. Design a dashboard for a general practitioner. Redesign an ATM".Learn how to solve and present exercises like these, that top startups use to interview designers for product design and UI/UX roles. Today top companies are looking for business-minded designers who are not just focused on visuals. With this book you can practice this kind of mindset, prepare for job interview, learn how to interview other designers and find concepts for projects for your portfolio. What will you learn from this book:- Prepare for the design interview — prepare for the design exercise and learn more about how tech companies hire product designers.- Improve your portfolio — use product challenges to showcase in your porfolio instead of unsolicited visual redesigns.- Step up your design career — practice your product design skills to become a better designer and prepare for your next career move.- Interview designers — learn how to interview designers to evaluate their skills in the most efficient and scalable way.What’s inside?- A 7-step framework for solving product design exercises- 30+ examples of exercises similar to exercises used by Google, Facebook, Amazon etc.- 5 full solutions for product design exercises- 5 short interviews with design leaders that worked at Apple, Google, Pinterest, IDEO etc.
Actionable Gamification: Beyond Points, Badges, and Leaderboards
Yu-kai Chou - 2015
Within the industry, studies on game mechanics and behavioral psychology have become proliferate. However, few people understand how to merge the two fields into experience designs that reliably increases business metrics and generates a return on investment. Gamification Pioneer Yu-kai Chou takes reader on a journey to learn his twelve years of obsessive research in creating the Octalysis Framework, and how to apply the framework to create engaging and successful experiences in their product, workplace, marketing, and personal lives. Effective gamification is a combination of game design, game dynamics, behavioral economics, motivational psychology, UX/UI (User Experience and User Interface), neurobiology, technology platforms, as well as ROI-driving business implementations. This book explores the interplay between these disciplines to capture the core principles that contribute to good gamification design. The goal for this book is to become a strategy guide to help readers master the games that truly make a difference in their lives. Readers who absorb the contents of this book will have literally obtained what many companies pay tens of thousands of dollars to acquire. The ultimate aim is to enable the widespread adoption of good gamification and human-focused design in all types of industries.