How to Think Like an App User

I have a great idea for an app… Nine times out of ten, those are the first words I hear when a new app concept is presented to me. This isn’t generally a bad thing, but I can think of hundreds of “great ideas” I wouldn’t necessarily use. As an app developer, the absolute most important question you need to ask yourself is: Would you use your app?

Take off your developer hat for a moment and think about your personal app usage habits. What makes you stop and even consider downloading an app? Is it its visual elements? Is it its usefulness? Its price point? How about the fact that it’s being talked about through your social networks? Maybe it’s the video trailer that did it for you? Did you compare similar apps? App developers, this is the kind of thinking you should be doing way before you write your first line of code. Get the answers right, and your customers will thank you for it.

To help turn off that pesky app developer part of your brain and think like a user, here are 5 key points you need to keep in mind.

Use it in a Hurry

People are short on time; it’s a well known fact. Most apps are used for the first time when there are a few a minutes or seconds to spare. After the initial first use, only 20% of users even open a free application again the day after it’s downloaded. As time goes on, that decline continues. This means you have 3 options. Make your app insanely useful, insanely fun, or insanely well designed. Your app has to scream “Open me again!” A recent report by Flurry shows that app usage spikes during prime-time, when people are relaxing at home in front of the TV.

Interface, Not In-Your-Face

Just because you can design, doesn’t mean you should. Nothing turns users away more than a poorly designed app, regardless if it’s a game, utility or productivity app. I understand that you may want to save on the overall development / design cost of your app, but someone much wiser than me once said “I don’t have enough money to buy cheap things…” Keep that in mind when you’re bringing your app together. I urge you to look at the quality a few of the most stunning apps available today.

Image via: IconMoon

Minor Bugs, Big Problems

We all love apps that crashes again and again, right? No? Well neither do your end users. You on the other hand, might have a little patience since you developed the app, but I assure you, no one else does. The only thing app users don’t like more than an app that crashes is an app that takes up useless space on their device. You may have done everything right, from the development, to the marketing and made your way on to user’s devices, but it’s definitely not their job to do quality testing on your app.

Watch Someone Use The App

The best thing you can do is get a testing group comprised of real, honest-to-goodness end users, and value their feedback. The ultimate test is letting someone who’s a complete novice user look at it, and give you their fresh perspective. A service that can’t be beat is UserTesting.com which lets you watch users actually engaging with your app and sharing their honest feedback.

Consistency Goes a Long Way

Everyone loves being surprised now and then, as I mentioned above, you only have a very short window of opportunity to blow away your end-users. That being said, consistency resonates professionalism. Stick to a standard formatting of fonts, links, colors, etc. This is usually lost when developers stubbornly want to design the app themselves. Even small changes through the app may confuse and frustrate your users.

After all is said and done, your app should always allow you for room to grow. If you did things right, you probably left out more features, bells and whistles than you originally intended to include in the first version of your app. If you did, I applaud you.

Turning it back over to you – What are some of your tips to make a quick switch from developer to end-user? Share them in the comments or reach out to use on Twitter and Facebook. We’d love to hear about them.