January 24, 2012
Posted by Scott Luther

Tablet and E-Book Reader Ownership Nearly Doubles Over Holidays
Alex Kenney

Between mid-December and early January, the share of adults in the U.S. who own a tablet and/or e-book reader surged from 18% to 29%, according to Pew Research. This was in part driven by Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Barnes and Noble’s Nook Tablet being introduced at considerably cheaper prices than other tablets just in time for the holiday gift-giving season, with some versions falling well below $100.

Map Apps: The Race to Fill in the Blanks
Nick Daigle

With the advent of bigger supermarkets and hub airports, there came a need to navigate them. Usually, experience or physical maps were necessary to maneuver the countless aisles, floors and terminals. Now, many of those same stores, airports and malls offer patrons a way to navigate without partaking in a daunting and sometimes painful perambulation. And in the end, instead of stumbling upon their final destination, consumers are helped to their flights, holiday gifts and grocery items by their brand.

What’s Next for Digital Coupons?
Stephanie Wierwille

Digital coupons and daily-deal couponing sites have seen unprecedented growth in the past few years because of the economic recession and increased consumer interest in mobile. While businesses are not always profitable in the long run with coupon maven Groupon, several new platforms are developing that build on current digital coupons to encourage social sharing and mobile usage, incorporating the ongoing social-local-mobile trend.

Accounting for Half of Spending, Businesses See Strong Results in Paid Search
Scott Luther

eMarketer reports that current results for paid search across Google, Bing and Yahoo! are generating increased clickthrough rates year over year in 2011. Bing and Yahoo! report higher cost per click in 2011, showing that more businesses are running campaigns through these search engines, while Google’s average cost per click was slightly down toward the end of the year. Also of note, in Q4 2011, 6% of paid search clicks were generated through smartphones, and tablets accounted for an additional 4% of clicks.

Cadbury Pioneers Product Launch Using Google+
Mimi Wilfong

Cadbury became the first brand to launch a product via Google+ when it released its Dairy Milk Bubbly candy bar last week. It was quickly followed by Facebook and Twitter mentions. The bar’s wrapper is Blipper-enabled, showing Cadbury’s willingness to experiment with new augmented-reality digital capabilities.

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January 20, 2012
Posted by James Hering

You don’t have to be in advertising to know technology moves quickly. Even last year’s “tech laggards” now have a smartphone and Facebook page. So what’s next? As we look forward into 2012, trends in technology continue to ripple through the ad industry. Whether it’s “swimming up the social stream,” talking to your smartphone or “Shazamming” the song in a commercial, companies scramble to stay relevant as digital pushes further into the center of the advertising world. We invite you to dive into our Top Ten Digital Trends Report for 2012 and catch a glimpse of what is just ahead.

Mobile Apps Versus Mobile Websites | John Tornow

If you’ve experienced an app attack at all in the past year, we understand, especially since most everything is going mobile these days. But what’s it going to be in 2012…the mobile app or the mobile web?

http://trends.clickhere.com/mobile-apps-vs-mobile-websites/

Taming the Social Stream | Scott Luther and Sarah Allen

Too much content, so little time – why many social platforms are creating features to help users filter the influx of information. So in an effort to help you filter your content feed, we’ve highlighted our top topics for 2012.

http://trends.clickhere.com/taming-the-social-stream/

Reuniting the SEM House | Derek Louden

Most of us are familiar with the saying “two is better than one.” But when it comes to search engine marketing, does it make sense to manage SEO and PPC campaigns separately anymore?

http://trends.clickhere.com/reuniting-the-sem-house/

Advertising in the Dust of the Digital Revolution | Amanda Plewes and Sarah Allen

Digital or traditional…what’s your final answer? Don’t choose just yet, because you may not have to. The lines have fully blurred and a new time has come.

http://trends.clickhere.com/advertising-in-digital-revolution/

Creativity + Technology: Walking Hand in Hand into the Sunset | Jayr Sotelo

Ever notice how the tech people still seem to be put in a quiet silo to play with their gadgets? Even though ad agencies have undergone all sorts of change over the past decade, there is more to be had. A new model is emerging where creative plus technology truly equals innovation.

http://trends.clickhere.com/creative-technology/

Watching TV, Tweeting and Chewing Gum | Alex Kenney

Multitask much? Well, so do consumers, now more than ever. So how do marketers connect with people doing six things at once? Read on to learn tips and tricks to create engaging cross-platform experiences for your brand.

http://trends.clickhere.com/tv-tweeting-and-chewing-gum/

Real Artificial Intelligence Has Arrived: Voice Recognition | Colin Hogan

The time has come…

You: “What’s the big deal with voice recognition technology?”

Siri: “Click the Read more link below to find out.”

http://trends.clickhere.com/real-ai/

The Next Big Step for Digital: The Internet of Things Gets Real | Brian Kress

Internet connectivity is almost always at our fingertips. Literally. And advertisers are finding even more ways to make products and devices interactive. Read more to get inspired on ways to really bring your product or service to life!

http://trends.clickhere.com/next-big-step-for-digital/

The Responsive Web: A Web Fit for the Future | Matt Carver

Look to your left and right. You’ll probably find a smartphone, tablet and laptop all in near proximity. For marketers, that used to mean a separate site for each device, but with the emergence of responsive web design, there is now a holistic solution we’d recommend investigating.

http://trends.clickhere.com/responsive-web/

Buying Audio and Video | Cheryl Huckabay

Digital changed the game, in more ways than we may have expected. Check out this article to learn why television and video and radio and audio aren’t necessarily synonymous terms anymore.

http://trends.clickhere.com/audio-and-video/

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January 17, 2012
Posted by Scott Luther

Shazam! Super Bowl Ads Go (More) Digital
Mimi Wilfong

If you plan on watching the Super Bowl this year, make sure you have your phone handy. One-third of this year’s ads will be Shazam-enabled, allowing users to capture part of the ad and be directed to a branded interaction.

Observations from CES 2012
Brian Kress

For those unable (or unwilling) to sift through the never-ending stream of new tablets and ultrabooks, Greg Satell has put together a nice collection of thoughts and observations from CES 2012. Among them: the growth of the Internet of Things and a reimagined Web ecosystem.

Google Incorporates Social Content into Personalized Search
Scott Luther

This week, Google began delivering social content within the primary search results for Google+ users, elevating the importance of items that a user has shared or been exposed to through their network. The update is aimed at serving users more personally relevant content; however, it is also instigating a debate among major industry rivals about the prioritization of internal results over the open Web.

Facebook Rolls Out Ads to News Feeds
Stephanie Wierwille

Last week, Facebook began the slow rollout of Featured Stories – sponsored ads within users’ news feeds. Continuing the trend of personalizing online ads and search results, a “Featured” story is a paid ad that includes content from a page or person to which a user has connected, where “Sponsored” stories are simply paid ads. Featured stories increase the reach of stories that would naturally occur in the news feed, and can be used to give a page’s content more visibility among its fans or to promote the page to friends of fans.

Apple Store, Amazon Offer Best Mobile Retail Experience
Alex Kenney

According to a new report from customer experience analytics firm ForeSee Results, the Apple Store and Amazon provide a significantly more satisfying mobile experience compared to other retailers. ForeSee explains their success in part because they have trimmed down the mobile experience, while still providing much of the same functionality found on their websites.

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January 11, 2012
Posted by Les Boswell

Let’s face it – at one point or another, we’ve all had a bad user experience. For some of us, the memories appear in the form of a blinking red “12:00” on our VCR. For others, it’s the lid of your piping hot coffee cup that seems to crumble, popping off just as you pull out of the drive-through. For many of us these days, a bad experience can be an irritating remote control layout, while for others it’s called airport signage. And while we all have come to grudgingly accept commercials before a $15 movie, we all still feel somewhat victimized.

More often than not, we ask ourselves, “How could the designers have gotten this so wrong! I could have done better myself!”

To a degree, you may be right. At the end of the day, one of the many challenges of experience design is a disjointed process where the product or service is touched by specialists who don’t talk to each other or who simply see their own specialty as being “priority number one.” They all may have even seen the creative brief or statement of work – but, based on their specialties, they all translated it differently. The engineer may see “elegant” as exquisitely crafted with the finest chips. The designer sees “elegant” as the most beautiful shape, color or texture ever to have graced the human eye, while the salesperson sees “elegant” as whatever the data shows as selling most effectively this quarter.

So, how do good experiences get designed? A great house requires an equally great architect, and in that same vein, the user experience architect role serves to create good experiences. As a user experience architect, the fundamentals of good experiences are embedded in the study of human behavior. Here are some basic tenets that can be universally applied to any user experience:

  • Clearly define the end result of your product or service, the budget and the timeline at all phases. If you have more than one step in the process, it will be all too easy to lose sight of what’s being done, why it’s being done and how it will be delivered.
  • Define and categorize your users. Understand their priorities, the environment they’ll be in when they experience your product and service, and what’s ultimately important to them. User experience architects typically work with strategists to create “personas,” which are behavioral models for groups within your target market. These personas are referred to throughout the project as a sanity check to make sure that the user is always top of mind on project direction.
  • Understand your business goals and make sure everyone else understands them, too. Help the team understand roles and who drives at what point. You don’t want your engineer to design, and you don’t want your designer wielding a hot torch, but if both have ample opportunity to collaborate, the results can be wonderful.
  • Test your work early and often with actual users. Understand and study reactions to your product and service, and validate the work done. User experience architects understand how best to test and what to ask in moderated sessions.
  • Don’t leave each specialty to define and interpret the brand vision. Let your user experience architect work with the business analyst to clearly articulate the vision, through validated documentation that includes user-centric perspectives.

There is a method to creating a good user experience, regardless of whether it’s an e-commerce site or a multichannel marketing campaign. At the end of the day, your user experience architect can apply tried-and-true methods to advocate a positive experience for the user. Your customers will benefit from the constant advocacy of your user experience team, and you’ll find yet another key method for differentiating yourself from your competitors.  We may not be able to save you from 20 minutes of commercials before the movie, but we can help create the right kind of experience for your brand and for your organization.

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January 10, 2012
Posted by Scott Luther

World’s First Facebook Timeline Campaign
Stephanie Wierwille

While Facebook Timeline has yet to be released for brand pages, marketers are already leveraging the new design to connect with consumers. The Israel Anti-Drug Authority and McCann Digital created a Facebook page for a fictional drug addict, using Timeline to explore the two different paths a life can take: the decline as an addict versus success in staying clean.

Consumer Media Usage Across TV, Online, Mobile and Social
Sarah Allen

Nielsen recently took stock of consumer media usage across channels, and the results show that TV ownership is still most prevalent. Get the basics on how many people own other devices and use the Web in the article or download the full report.

IKEA Invites Facebook Group for a Sleepover
Scott Luther

After discovering a Facebook group called “I Wanna Have a Sleepover in Ikea” with nearly 100,000 fans, an IKEA store in Essex created a program where members could compete to be one of 100 people invited for a sleepover in the store. With product experts on hand, participants not only got a chance to roam the giant store after hours, they had a chance to test out the mattresses in action.

Do Social Media Postings Always Require a Brand Response?
Nick Daigle

Social media has birthed the age of customer-to-customer relationship management. When a question or complaint goes unanswered, other potential and current customers can make a decision from that lack of dialogue. And while customers say they are most likely to engage a brand for promotions, deals and discounts, they cited customer service as more important, according to the Conversocial study, ”The Consequences of Ignoring Your Customers.”

Wireless Bandwidth Dominated by Top Users
Mimi Wilfong

According to research firm Arieso, the top 10% of wireless users are consuming 90% of bandwidth. Nearly two-thirds (64%) of top offenders were utilizing 3G bandwidth to connect a laptop to the Web, followed by a third of users with smartphones, and just 3% were using tablets. Who’s responsible for the statistical gap? Europe, the United States and South Africa.

Word-of-Mouth, Consumer Reviews and Social Media Influence
Jill Krumsick

Ninety percent of people believe brand recommendations from friends. Products that have more than 50 reviews experience 65% higher returns than products with less than five reviews. Users are 71% more likely to purchase when referred by social media. Check out this infographic to see more staggering stats on the importance of word-of-mouth and inbound marketing.

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January 6, 2012
Posted by Scott Luther

In 2011, we saw major growth in tools for individual expression on the Web. No, this is not a post about the power of the so-called Mommy bloggers. This year, the democratization of media on the Internet focused on a new medium as content creators gravitated toward a more visual, more impactful medium than the typical blog format.

And it should not be surprising. The math has long been worked out:

One picture = 1,000 words

If we take this old adage about the worth of a picture as true, Instagram users definitely have a lot to say. With 15 million users having uploaded over 400 million photos in the year since the service’s launch, we’ve saved ourselves quite a bit of reading in 2011. It is also important to note that these users are solely posting from iOS devices through the Instagram network and on Twitter. We can expect these numbers are poised to grow even more rapidly with an expansion to Android devices and with Facebook instant-upload capabilities expected soon.

These snapshots are visual diaries that chronicle not only the events and sights that a user experiences, but emotions as well. The addition of filters after the picture has been taken allows the photographer the ability to infuse emotion and storytelling in a way that was previously only available to dedicated hobbyists. While many will lament the lack of craft that ready-made filters facilitate, the democratization of this ability will only serve to broaden the appreciation of the professional photographers who are elevating the medium.

But Instagram is only one example of a service that is taking advantage of this visual blogging trend; many others have attempted to catch the lightning in a bottle that makes Instagram so popular, both in mobile and on the Web. Within the mobile space, we have seen high-profile services like Foodspotting, Hipstamatic, Color and Path flood the social consciousness and make the act of picture-taking a social event once again.

Of these services, one that has shown particular merit in combining location-based sharing with this visual journaling is Path. The mobile social network is a companion app that registers location, music choices, musings, collaborators and photographs from the lives of its users. Limited to your 50 closest connections, this social service aims to create deeper connections and more honest sharing within networks.

Online, platforms like Tumblr and Pinterest have exploded in popularity because of their ease of use and ability to easily give others an inside look into our world. Compared to traditional blogs like WordPress or Blogger.com, Tumblr has gained significant ground over the past year in terms of unique visitors, visits and page views. Although trailing the more established blogging platforms in terms of total visitors, Tumblr users show more engagement with the content and view a significantly higher number of pages while on the site.  Finally, while WordPress.com and Blogger.com have remained stagnant or declined, Tumblr continues to climb.

Likewise, Pinterest has rapidly grown in popularity among certain online groups, generating 6 million unique visitors in November despite an invite-only restriction. For a more in-depth examination of Pinterest, check out these profiles by Sarah Voges and Darlene Lo.

Both the simplicity of sharing and the emphasis on the user’s creativity are essential to these services’ adoption. Pinterest features dead-simple usability to create visual bookmarks for projects, inspiration and the ability to share boards with others. Tumblr is similarly designed for simplicity in getting started, choosing readily from free or premium templates to design your blog, and again in practice. Users are able to share text, images, videos and music through a streamlined editor, or find and consume blogs created by others through personalized streams. However, with less emphasis on long-form text posts, the creativity of the blogger is free to shine, leading to as many different Tumblr streams as can be managed.

Many factors have contributed to the rising popularity of these visual blogging services; among them, simplicity and self-expression are very important. But at a higher level, the idea that social networks are aligning to connect people with similar interests or passions in new ways has enormous implications for how brands can engage through social media. Rather than traditional message boards, forums or “fan sites,” there is now a broader range of interests being followed across the Web. As we move into 2012, we can expect to see visual blogging continue to grow in popularity, both in mobile and the Web, and we can also expect to see services start to leverage the vast amount of content that is created through this trend to “humanize” the web experience in new ways.

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January 3, 2012
Posted by Scott Luther

Moms Driving Digital Shopping
Scott Luther

Recent studies have shown that one life event drives women to spend less time with traditional media and much more time online – becoming a mother. Time spent online is increasingly being utilized for savvy shopping, with mothers revealing they are spending more time searching for deals and coupons or comparing prices online with a small child in the home.

Nielsen’s Tops of 2011: Digital
Sarah Allen

As 2011 comes to a close, Nielsen reviewed the top online destinations, social media sites and smartphone devices. Google was the most-visited U.S. web brand, while Facebook held its lead among social networks and blogs. Smartphones were popular in 2011, making up the majority of new phone purchases with Apple as the top smartphone manufacturer and Android as the leading OS.

Company Sues Former Employee for Twitter Followers
Mimi Wilfong

How much is a Twitter follower worth? A court may have to answer that in a case determining ownership of a follower list after an employee left his job and continued to tweet on behalf of the company.

The “Trouble with Android”
Brian Kress

Stephanie Rieger contributes to an ongoing discussion on the challenges in designing for mobile platforms that currently lack standards. For instance, Android has some 500 different screen sizes. She makes a compelling appeal for simplicity in web design, and a recommendation for designers to focus on “lightweight” sites.

Ten Digital Trends Set to Go Mass Market in 2012
Stephanie Wierwille

With the beginning of 2012, digital experts are making predictions about trends for the coming year. Digital Agency Profero’s co-founder and CEO has identified several up-and-coming trends, such as more efficient transactions, personalized news feeds, filtering social circles, an increase in renting, location-based discovery, more control over data and the integration of digital into the physical world.

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December 29, 2011
Posted by Mimi Wilfong

Facebook Timeline. It’s probably the biggest thing to hit social media since the Kardashians (or “last week’s Facebook update”). With all the hype about how great (or horrible) the new Timeline feature was, I was skeptical. Facebook changes things all the time, and I never seem to notice much difference after a few days of use. I didn’t understand how using Facebook as a scrapbook was going to radically change my life. Nonetheless, I finally decided that – given the fact that I’m a “digital strategist” and am supposed to be on the cutting edge of all things cool, new and digital – I should activate my Facebook Timeline. So I did.

And it’s awesome. I may have a different perspective than most, but here’s why I love the new Facebook Timeline.

I joined Facebook when I was a freshman in college. “Back in the day” when you had to have an “.edu” email address to sign up, and before every tween and their grandmother had Facebook accounts. This is a key element of Facebook Timeline. I spent many years uploading pictures, writing “notes,” posting on others’ walls and sharing information. When I activated Timeline, I went back through all that I had done during my college years. I saw where I’d been, who I had spent a lot of time with, what I had said about classes or current events.

Granted, I can see the drawback to this. You probably won’t like Facebook Timeline if you’ve spent a considerable amount of time being a goofball. By that, I mean if you were tagged in a bunch of drunken frat-party pictures and you’re less than proud of them now, you’re probably not going to love the new Timeline. But have no fear! Facebook has thought about that! They let you turn on Timeline for only you to view for a week so that you can go through and delete all of the junk you’re not proud of.

The Timeline might not be so great for you if you’ve gotten married and your spouse was not a part of your life that Facebook timelines. I’m just saying: All of those pictures of you and your ex-girlfriend and the “I love you, sweetlips!” posts on your wall are going to show up. And your new wife is going to see them. She might not be amused. Again, this is an excellent opportunity to use the trial Timeline and remove every post you feel could later incriminate you with your loved ones.

But you know who else will love the Facebook Timeline? Grandparents. Why? Because not only can they see what their children are doing, but they can look at the lives of their grandchildren without having to pester their kids to send them pictures. Look at it this way: They’re already keeping up with birthdays using Facebook – why not use it to remember what kind of birthday cake you made last year or who you invited to the birthday party?

Given the fact that Facebook lets you remove whatever you don’t want on your Timeline, you can, in a way, recreate yourself. Or at the very least, delete the less attractive elements. Here’s an example. Childbirth. It’s an important time in a mother’s life. Some people feel the need to take pictures of the new, exhausted mother, then post them on Facebook.

The new mother, no doubt, will not be happy with these pictures, especially in two years. Pictures of baby = OK. Pictures of Mom, cheeks void of color in a hospital gown = not OK. The mother may opt to take down those photos.

But how awesome would it be for brands like, say, Pampers, if they could target this mother and track the baby’s growth and promote products that fit that life stage? Not only right when the baby is born, but in a few years when they need pull-ups instead of diapers? Or maybe Weight Watchers has a potential customer as Mom tries to get back into pre-baby form.

Because Facebook Timeline can let people know when important events (like childbirth) happen, they also allow brands to use a little deductive reasoning and think about what other important events are going on in the lives of users. Sixteen years after that childbirth picture? Hello, car insurance companies…

One more thing I love about Timeline. The huge picture, what Facebook calls the “Cover Photo.” That’s right, you can highlight a much larger picture on your profile while still having your little passport-style “this is what I really look like” picture (that is commonly used for the token keg stand picture among my friends). This opens up a lot of doors for creativity.

Check out http://mashable.com/2011/12/08/facebook-timeline-ideas/#375873-Pao-Abella for some great examples of how people are expressing themselves with the Cover Photo.

It will be interesting to see if Facebook allows brands to activate a new Timeline page. Many brands on Facebook will be reasonably new, as it’s a great promotional tool for young brands to get some word-of-mouth coverage. It’d be really cool for brands with a lot of rich history. For example, I’d like to see some timelines like this:

Coca-Cola

  • 1992: Clear colas: Failure.
  • 2008: Tested Diet Coke with Bacon…did not go into production.
  • 2011: Fans reject white Coke can, saying it “tastes different.”

Ford

  • 1908: Model T introduced.
  • 1914: Ford introduces a $5/day minimum wage, double the existing wage.
  • 2011: Ford Focus electric unveiled.

Facebook

  • 2004: Facebook launches.
  • 2006: Facebook opened to everyone ages 13 or older with a valid email address.
  • 2009: Facebook users freak out about privacy changes.
  • 2010: Facebook users freak out about change to live news feed.
  • 2011: Facebook users freak out about new Timeline feature.

To close, I’d encourage you to try Facebook Timeline. The longer you’ve been a user and the more you’ve posted, the more interesting your timeline will be. Who knows, maybe Facebook Timeline will serve as a gentle reminder for people to be responsible? Like my grandmother always said, “Don’t do anything if you don’t want it posted on Facebook.”

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December 22, 2011
Posted by Scott Luther

The Buzz Holiday Edition
Before we go on break, we wanted to share with our loyal readers a few of our favorite holiday digital goodies to lead you into the new year. Happy Holidays from your friends and loved ones at The Buzz. See you in 2012!

Google Brings White Christmas to Your Web Browser
Mimi Wilfong

If you haven’t seen it yet, when you type “let it snow” in any Google search bar, snowflakes start dropping and the screen frosts up. If you’re on your tablet, you can draw in the frost.

Send a Call from Santa
Jill Krumsick

Another festive treat from Google helps you send personalized messages to friends and family from Santa himself. Give it a try at: www.sendacallfromsanta.com

Times Square Ball App
Sarah Voges

If New Year’s is all about watching the ball drop for you, the official Times Square Ball app will keep you up to date on the Times Square celebration, allow you to submit photos to be displayed on December 31 and watch a live stream of the crystal ball. After you’ve rung in the New Year, the app will provide news about Times Square events and entertainment.

Heineken Connects Beer Lovers with BeerFriender
Scott Luther

Heineken is launching a home draft product called “BeerTender.” As it’s the holiday season, they thought it would be fun to connect beer lovers who think it’s better to give AND receive with an app that allows users to mutually buy a BeerTender for each other.

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December 21, 2011
Posted by Thanh Huynh

Do your customers find your brand’s digital presence easy to use and learn or difficult and confusing? Are your customers satisfied with how your products work? The answer to this question can be traced to the usability of your offerings. ISO defines usability as “The extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context of use.”

Usability is important to customers and often differentiates brands among their competitors. Look at Apple’s and Google’s success. Many of our clients ask their search to work like Google’s, and many of us can’t resist Apple’s products because of their commitment to simplicity, making them easy to use.

When customers use certain products or offerings, they have specific goals they need to accomplish or want access to information they believe those offerings provide. When customers experience your digital offerings, they don’t want to spend a lot of time figuring out how to use them. If they have a difficult time, they won’t be successful and will likely leave unhappy.

Get Your Design in Front of Customers

Usability testing is one of the most common techniques to assess usability and put your design to the test. During this process, observation is key – what customers say is often not what they do. You will find where the design hits the mark, as well as where users struggle that you may not have expected they would or find out there are aspects of the design they overlook.

Unlike focus groups where the collective wisdom of many is gathered, usability testing has customers participate in one-on-one sessions and asks them to complete common tasks as they normally would. Therefore, recruiting participants for usability testing based on relevant behaviors rather than marketing segments is key to ensure that you are seeing the right customers completing tasks they have performed before or would likely do on their own.

Based on what was learned from usability testing, you might need to make some simple tweaks like creating more intuitive link labels. Or perhaps you might find there were some showstoppers; for example, finding that most users were unable to complete the registration process. By seeing customers interact with your brand, your team is able to make more informed decisions on behalf of your customers.

Usability Is Not an Add-On

But usability should not simply be assessed with one usability test. It’s an approach that should be incorporated throughout the life cycle of the design process. When usability is a priority throughout the process, inefficiencies in design interactions can be caught early enough to make the necessary fixes when they are less costly and easier to make. Or once your product is in your customer’s hands, usability improvements can contribute to a reduction in customer support calls because customers can use your products without anyone’s assistance or they experience productivity improvements because they complete tasks more quickly.

As 2012 approaches, I’d like to propose that you make usability one of your New Year’s resolutions. Separate your brand from other competitors by making usability an integral part of your digital brand presence.

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