I am currently working flat out on a new business that my wife and I are putting together in the field of healthcare. With a bit of luck, we can take the covers of at the JP Morgan Healthcare conference in San Francisco next January. (Hopefully after that I can boost the SlideMagic product more, I have a few interesting ideas).
I am becoming better and better at designing web front ends, fusing what I am learning about HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, with what was already in my head when it comes to slide, spreadsheet, and data dashboard design.
I am surprised of the impact the look & feel of a prototype makes on early users. Investing in design can take a lot of time, and can be wasted when you are taking your product into an entirely new direction.
My approach is similar to presentation design. Focus on easy wins that make your product look professional and organised, and skip the “marketing design” for the moment.
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Minimal effort on the public facing web site
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No investment in “flashy” animations, videos, and other spectacular effects
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Instead get the little details right that make a big impact, and fixing them does not take a lot of time:
- Layouts of screens
- Lining things up
- Colour contrasts
- Font size and emphasis
- Rounding of numbers
- Etc., etc.
Having a prototype that looks good makes it also a lot more fun to work on.