When it comes to product design, more methods and principles are needed to assist in implementation. This article introduces the 10 design principles proposed by Dieter Rams in detail, and I hope you will find it inspiring.
In "Mastering the Tao and Law of Product Design and Laying a Solid Foundation for Products", Uncle Feng introduced that user-centered product design needs to focus on the value proposition and core moving line, which is the "Tao" of product design. "Dao" is a program, which needs to be supported by "law", and more detailed principles and methods are needed to be implemented in product design.
When it comes to product design, Apple's products have always been talked about, and almost every product line of Apple maintains very high design standards, thanks to Jonathon Ive and Dieter Rams. Jonathon Ive is the founding figure of Apple's design style and a famous god in the design world. Diater Rams is another prominent figure in the design world, and he can be regarded as the pioneer of modern industrial design, and Jonathon Ive is a strong admirer of Dieter Rams.
A native of Germany, Dieter Rams joined the design department of Braun, a manufacturer of household appliances, in 1955 and continued to help Braun launch more innovative electronic products. In 1961, at the age of 29, Dieter Rams was promoted to chief designer at Braun and led Braun's design department for almost 30 years until his retirement in 1998.
Dieter Rams is a strong believer in the concept of "less but better", and has created many classic designs such as computers, radios, coffee machines, etc., which have become permanent collections in museums around the world. In the design method he pioneered, style is only the result of solving problems, and the essence of design is ease of operation, visual simplicity and exquisite details.
Dieter Rams's thoughts and insights have influenced the development process of modern industrial design and a group of designers around the world. To this day, many of the product form and interface designs such as Apple and Muji still have a lot of Dieter Rams in mind.
In this article, Uncle Feng will introduce in detail the ten design principles proposed by Dieter Rams.
1. Good design is practical
Good design must first be practical, and practical means that the product must be closely centered around the value proposition.
The product is intended for consumer use, and it should perform a specific function and solve a specific problem, including both functions that cover the core value proposition and functions that include the user's psychological and aesthetic aspects, so that consumers can feel relaxed and happy to use.
Therefore, good design must serve to improve the usability of the product, and everything that has nothing to do with usability does not need to be considered. In order to pursue the so-called high-tech and cool, some products have lost the original intention of providing value to customers. When the novelty of cool fades, users will eventually return to the soul torture of "what value can this product bring to me".
VR equipment, which was hailed as a next-generation computing platform by Goldman Sachs as early as a decade ago, after nearly a decade of development, is still not favored by the mass market, and only a small percentage of enthusiasts and early adopters buy it, or experience it in specific amusement places for tourists.
Because VR equipment has never solved the problem of practicality, the two most serious problems are weight and dizziness. Because the battery problem was not solved for a long time, the VR device had to solve the power and computing problems with a heavy headset. At the same time, the transmission rate of the VR screen is problematic, resulting in a delay in the picture, which causes serious dizziness problems.
Since these two core problems are not solved, there are very few users who buy VR equipment, so developers have no incentive to produce more fun and high-quality VR content, which further reduces consumers' desire to buy.
I still remember the first-generation Iphone press conference, when Jobs used two fingers to enlarge a picture, the shock to the audience was really cool. But more importantly, when we calmed down from the cool enthusiasm, we found that through the free operation of the touch screen with our fingers, we can complete a variety of smooth operations, such as clicking, dragging, swiping, zooming, long pressing, etc., and the application scenarios are suddenly enriched. The emergence of the iPhone has officially opened the era of mobile Internet, and applications such as games, e-commerce, office, and entertainment have sprung up.
Therefore, practicality is the first principle of design. Without practicality, no matter how cool and beautiful the product design is, it has no practical value. Even a good luxury brand needs to meet certain practical requirements before it can be favored by more consumers.
Second, good design makes the product easy to understand
Good design needs to make the product legible, and through simple and clear design, it not only allows consumers to understand the structure of the product, but also serves as a bridge between consumers and products. The best design is self-explanatory, that is, letting the product speak for itself, being able to explain itself. And the highest level is that when the user sees the product, he can know everything about it.
Uncle Feng remembers that there was a Tmall Double 11 event one year, which was to build a building PK after matching opponents in a team, and the winning team would be rewarded with red envelopes. This event is a very bad design case, with complex game rules, fancy page design, and lack of clear user guidance, which directly blocked many users from the door. After this Double 11 event, it was also complained by a large number of users.
And the same Double 11 event, Pinduoduo's activity rules are very simple, with an official subsidy of 10 billion. There are not so many noisy and complex activities, there are not so many incomprehensible game rules, it is very simple, users buy goods, and the platform will give a certain subsidy.
Don't design for the sake of design, good design must make the product easy for consumers to understand.
3. Good design is beautiful
Aesthetics is also an important part of products, everyone has the pursuit of beauty, and consumers can get additional emotional value when using beautiful products. At the same time, consumers are also willing to share products that look beautiful and convey their aesthetic abilities to the outside world. If a product is designed to be ugly, consumers won't even have the desire to learn about it, let alone buy, use it, and share it.
Microsoft Band is a smartwatch launched by Microsoft that was released in 2014, a full year before Apple's Apple Watch. But in 2016, Microsoft stopped selling Band. In terms of product core capabilities, Band actually does a better job than Apple Watch. The Band is equipped with a heart rate monitor that tracks physical condition and creates a personalized workout plan based on the user's exposure to UV radiation. The battery life is up to three days, which is also far better than the Apple Watch.
But why is the Band still abandoned by the market? The reason is that the exterior design is too ugly to compare with the sleek look of the Apple Watch. Especially for this kind of product worn on the user, who wants to show their aesthetic problems?
So, even the quality products of giant companies will fail because of ugly design.
As a contrast, the Apple Watch has a sleeker and more beautiful appearance, and it is available in a variety of color options. People are visual creatures, and I believe that most people will prefer Apple Watch at first sight compared to Band.
Fourth, good design is innovative
Innovation is what makes people shine, and as technology evolves, it makes new design concepts technically feasible. But innovation is not an end in itself, innovation is to better manifest new technical capabilities, so as to better provide value to users, never innovate for the sake of innovation.
When many people see the word "innovation", they can't help but think of particularly simple and grand things, as if they must overcome thousands of difficulties to achieve innovation. But in reality, innovation can also be very simple, as long as it can create value for target users in new ways, it can be called innovation.
UV sunscreen stickers are an example of how users can impress with very small innovations. In the past, when users participated in outdoor activities, they didn't know when the sunscreen would expire and needed to apply sunscreen again. With a simple sunscreen sticker, when the sunscreen can also effectively block UV rays, the sticker is transparent and colorless, and as the effect of the sunscreen slowly wears off, the sticker receives more and more UV intensity, and the sticker will change color. The higher the UV intensity, the darker the color. It is such a small innovative design, which has been welcomed by consumers as soon as it was launched, especially users in European and American countries who love outdoor sports.
Let's look at another example, curved screens. Curved screen used to be a major innovation in the field of smart phones, which was first released and promoted by Samsung mobile phones.
For a long time, the curved screen has only been regarded as a technological selling point, but what value can it bring to users, the curved screen has not answered this question. With a burst of heat in the early days of the market, the market quickly regained its sanity, and the sales of curved screen mobile phones also began to decline, and now the curved screen is basically invisible on new mobile phones.
5. Good design is honest
In this increasingly noisy and flashy world, sticking to the bottom line of honesty seems so precious.
In order to seize the market and gain growth, more and more merchants choose to exaggerate product capabilities and give consumers false descriptions or promises. This way of quenching thirst cannot be sustained for a long time, and this practice will never become an everlasting enterprise. Exaggerated slogans don't make a product look new and valuable, but can hurt the product and the business. So, don't try to steer consumers with promises they can't keep.
Meiji Milk is a dairy brand that has been the best-selling dairy brand in Japan for many years, and its core value proposition is quality, natural, freshly squeezed and original flavor. The box of Meiji milk is very distinctive, and there are no traces of any design to be seen. The core selling point of the product is honestly marked on the box, which is fresh, natural, 100% raw milk, and the ingredients are not adjusted. This design concept directly expresses the impression of "no sense of processing" to consumers, which is in line with the value proposition of the product. Because of the humanization and convenience of this design in use, countless milk packaging companies are now learning it.
Honestly convey product features and value, rather than deliberately highlighting luxury and luxury.
6. Good design is meticulous in detail
Every contact between the user and the product is an interaction with the enterprise. From seeing the product on the advertisement, viewing the product information, buying the product, receiving the product, unpacking it, and starting to use it, every link in the middle can leave a deep impression on consumers, so as to gain word-of-mouth and user loyalty.
Let's not let go of every detail, whether it is visible or invisible to the user. Only from the perspective of the user's behavioral journey can we provide a better user experience.
Uncle Feng remembers that many years ago, he once bought nuts, which seemed to be macadamia nuts or walnuts, and after receiving the goods, he unexpectedly found a tool used to open nuts in the packaging bag. Just such a small detail touched Uncle Feng a lot, which shows that this brand really cares about the feelings of consumers, and has taken into account the detail that nuts are difficult to open for consumers in advance. The cost of a tool is not high, but it has greatly gained the goodwill of users, which is the fulcrum of value.
Speaking of this case, Uncle Feng thought of some counterexamples. Uncle Feng sometimes buys toys for children, and some toys require batteries, such as remote-controlled cars and Transformers. Uncle Feng once had a very poor shopping experience, the merchant only sent toys, but did not provide batteries, Uncle Feng had to go to the supermarket downstairs to buy additional batteries before they could be used. This is a typical detail that is not in place, and the opportunity to make a good impression on users is missed, and Uncle Feng never buys toys in this store again.
7. Good design is durable
Durability encompasses two meanings, the first is the durability of the product's function, and the second is the durability of the product's aesthetics.
The durability of product function refers to the fact that the product needs to be able to be used stably for a long time, if a product is easily damaged, or the working life is too short, it is not a good product design. Poor quality products will naturally be abandoned by consumers.
Apple Airpods has indeed achieved a good reputation in terms of aesthetics and practicality of design, but in terms of durability, Apple Airpods have been criticized. A fully charged Airpod lasts only a few hours, and the entire product has a lifespan of about two years. Therefore, Airpods have shortcomings in terms of battery life and product life. However, from the perspective of the product, I can understand the original intention of the design behind it, and balance the convenience and battery life of the product.
AirPods have a total of three lithium-ion batteries, which are located in the left and right earbuds, as well as the matching charging case. Compared with other types of batteries, although lithium-ion batteries can store more power in less space, lithium batteries age faster, and each time they are charged, the lithium battery will age a little, and it will most likely be scrapped after a few years.
The design of hidden door handles for new energy vehicles is also a typical example. Looking at the current new energy vehicle market, the use of hidden door handles can almost be described as flooding, behind all this, is to reduce the drag coefficient of the vehicle. The data shows that when the vehicle is driving at 90km/h, the drag coefficient decreases by 0.01Cd, and the cruising range can be increased by more than 10km. It has been calculated that a single hidden door handle can reduce by 0.003Cd, and four doorknobs can reduce by 0.012Cd. The reduced drag coefficient may seem insignificant, but the increased cruising range is precious for new energy vehicles.
With the popularity of concealed door handles, the flaws in their design gradually surfaced. The hidden danger in the design of the hidden door handle is that after the vehicle has an accident, due to the impact and deformation and other factors, the door handle cannot be ejected in time or cannot be pulled out by pressing, which makes it difficult for outsiders to rescue the passengers in the car.
With the faster and faster pace of modern society, the pace of product upgrading is also getting faster and faster, for example, the current mobile phone can be used for two years is already a long time. So to a certain extent, the element of durability is slowly being weakened by society. However, with the decline of the economic environment, people's spending power has gradually weakened, and the quality of durability has once again been valued by consumers.
8. Good design is restrained
Restraint means that product design needs to have its own boundaries and not dominate the crowd.
The product is for people, and should be quietly integrated with the surrounding environment, moisturizing things silently, and only giving service when the user needs it. If we can convey emotions to users and meet their emotional needs while exercising restraint, we will definitely leave a deeper impression on users and make users become our loyal customers.
The WeChat splash page is a very affectionate design, a lonely person standing on the moon, looking at the earth, highlighting a kind of loneliness and insignificance, easy to resonate with users.
9. Good design is environmentally friendly
Good design is environmentally friendly, which is very deeply reflected in the design of products such as MUJI and IKEA.
This is a specially designed "naked" packaging by Muji, a transparent water packaging bottle made of low-polluting and environmentally friendly PET material, which supports recycling and reduces plastic waste. The design of the bottle is also a continuation of Muji's consistent minimalist style, with only one big "water" on it, which is very simple and eye-catching.
10. Good design is design with as little as possible
"Less is more" is a very important design concept, the more exquisite the product, the more the design focus on the essence of the product, return to simplicity. But often many products like to show all the features to the user in one go, regardless of the priority, importance and frequency of use.
Here's a very bad example of a microwave oven with a dense array of buttons on the right side, most of which won't be used. This is a typical stacking of functions, with no sense of design.
Let's take a look at the Xiaomi Mijia microwave oven, which is much simpler, and consumers know how to operate it after seeing the microwave oven. This is the power of "less is more", and the product itself is the best instruction manual.
summary
The above are the ten principles of product interactive experience design.
We also need to note that it is difficult for any one product to meet all the principles. There are even many examples of success that can be found in life that violate these principles, such as the cluttered store signs in Hong Kong that have even become a unique cultural symbol, such as the coconut tree brand coconut water that has maintained the same design style for many years. This is also the product of the development of society to different stages, different stages of the taste of the product is different, those long-lasting design, is the best design.
These ten design principles are more of a reference for some product design, and we do not need to fully comply with the script, and the ultimate goal is to better meet the needs of the target customer group.
Author: Uncle Feng, WeChat public account: Feng Shuyun
This article was originally published by @风叔 on Everyone is a product manager, and it is forbidden to reprint without the permission of the author.
The title image is from Unsplash and is licensed under CC0.
The views in this article only represent the author's own, everyone is a product manager, and the platform only provides information storage space services.