Not the designer’s dilemma more the designer’s challenge

Joseph Coughlin, of MIT AgeLab has an interesting posting on his blog about the challenge facing designers when dealing when older people.

He uses the good example of the mobile phone and argues that you can either create a product that is specifically designed for older people. He uses the LG’s Migo VX1000 as an example of this type of product – paradoxically as can be seen it is designed for children rather than older people.I guess that gives substance to the argument that old age is like childhood?

Alternatively, he argues, you can provide the ability to personalise the ‘normal’ phone (i.e. features to enlarge display font size, functionality). He mentions Vodafone, in collaboration with Toshiba, in this context.

I think that Jo has missed out on a third option. It will not come as a surprise to anybody who reads my blog that this option is connected with apps.

His arguments are based on using the existing technology platform. You either use it to create a bespoke simple version or provide it with the functionality to enable it appear less complex than it really is.

The third way is that you abandon the old technology platform and create a new one. This is what has happened with the smartphone and the use of apps. The technology platform is larger in size and the functionality is a step-change easier to use than the old menu driven phones.

Jo raises an important point that he calls the designer’s dilemma.

The older consumer serves as the designer’s acid test of success or failure in resolving the trade-offs of function, form, fun and usability. The explosion of technological capability makes it difficult to resist more function even if the form it takes makes it unusable. If all functions are designed to fit, they must also be designed for ease of use. Greatly reduced function may result in a more usable device, but at the possible risk of not meeting the aspirations of the older consumer and alienating younger buyers. A product obviously designed for the old becomes an ‘old man’s product.’

That’s as far as it goes. What you should add is that the designer’s challenge is to create products where the building block of functionality is easy to use and can be combined with an unlimited number of other building blocks, at the discretion of the user, to create a personalised device (i.e. The foundation of the product is personalisation) . Welcome to the Apple iPhone app. Dick Stroud

20plus30 goes Android

Thanks again to the guys at Motherapp for their great app creation service..

For all of you mobile phone users, with Google’s Android operating system (I think software stack is the more accurate term), you can now download a version that will work on your phone – the iPhone version has been available for the past 3 months. Dick Stroud

Words of guidance about the design of mobile apps

Some more words of wisdom from Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox, this time about the design of mobile apps. As with most of Nielsen’s comments they are most definitely worth the read. Here is what he has to say.

Most mobile applications are used only intermittently, so they must be especially easy during initial use. In particular, upfront registration shouldn't be required before users experience an app's benefits.

His "master guideline" remains the same as in 1986: don't port a UI from an old interface paradigm to a new one. In the past, this meant not slapping a GUI on top of something that was inherently a clunky mainframe flow. Now, it means not adding touch-screen access to a desktop-oriented direct manipulation design — users can't touch as precisely as they can click, so the number of manipulable graphical objects should be much smaller (so that each one can be much bigger). This is particularly valid for older users.

Nielsen’s main conclusion from watching iPhone app users is that they suffered much less misery than users in our mobile website tests. In fact, testing people using iPhone apps produced happier outcomes than testing people attempting to use websites on the same phone.

On mobile devices, applications are easier to use than websites. Browser-based sites would be easier to use if designers started following more mobile usability guidelines.

Why are apps better than sites for mobile? Because the more impoverished the device, the more the design must be optimized for the platform's exact abilities, instead of bowing to a cross-platform common denominator. Wise words. Dick Stroud

Do you have an iPhone and want to follow my Blog/YouTube/Twitter postings

Thanks to some great work by the guys at MotherApp I am the proud possessor of my own iPhone app. If you want to view it you MUST have iTunes installed and to use it you need an iPhone or iPod touch.

An exercise in vanity – probably. But I think it shows how simple it is for companies to add value to what they do and make it accessible via a mobile app. Cripes, if I can do it surely any company wanting to engage the 50-plus can do the same.

Final plug for the excellent work done by MotherApp.

I promise this is the last mobile app posting for a few days. Honestly. Dick Stroud

Technology use is becoming age-neutral

Motorola has just discovered the concept of age neutral behaviour. Better late than never.

The research study (Media Engagement Barometer) found that high percentages of Americans - across multiple generations - are using media and mobile technology. Age no longer dictates new media use. And surprisingly, influencers who drive usage are now found in every group. Well that is not totally true but Motorola has definitely confirmed something that a few of us have been banging on about.

What we are seeing is the highly engage technology group of older people is growing in size. It is expanding from the leading edge users to masses. Let’s be honest, using Facebook, Twitter, my beloved iPhone and all of the other goodies isn’t exactly difficult.

We have constructed this idea that only Yoof have the mental horsepower/agility to understand this stuff – plainly nonsense. For the tech aware members of an older generation that brought up trying to work out the mysteries of MSDOS it is all easy-peasy. Dick Stroud

Watch out iPhone HTC is about

I like this new advertising campaign promoting yet another smartphone.

HTC (a Taiwanese manufacturer) has ads running across 20 countries as it makes its first foray into advertising with the tagline: "You don’t need to get a phone. You need a phone that gets you.”

From the imagery of the ads they appear to be primarily aimed at the young, however, I reckon they will have a resonance with the tech-savvy and tech-interested parts of the older market.

The ad and a presentation about the phone are shown above. It is also worth reading the take on the campaign in Brand Channel. It hadn’t struck me, but apparently there has been some confusion, in the mind of the consumer, between the word “You” and a similar ad campaign for Yahoo. HTC has begun to replace the “O” in “You” with a smartphone.

The reason I reckon it will ring bells the 50-plus is that the product’s pitch is that it complements consumers “just they way they are” (echoes of Bridget Jones), rather than offer a product that will make them a better person: more responsive, better organized, less cluttered etc etc.

A gutsy campaign. Dick Stroud.

A comprehensive report about the UK communications market

The 2009 Ofcom Communications Market Report is published, all 332 pages of it.

Want to know anything about the TV, Radio and telecommunications markets in the UK then look no further. And it’s is free. Well it is not free, the UK taxpayer pays Ofcom a fortune for producing the thing but it gives the impression of being free.

The report contains lots about how the use of communications services varies by gender, socio-economic group and age. It is a goldmine of factlets, like the one above.

Beware of these stark ‘averages’ since they might lead you to the wrong conclusion. Only 18% of the 75+ have home broadband, but this small number will be the most affluent and Web literate. 83% of the 35-54 year olds have broadband at home but that will include the fall spectrum of consumer wealth.

As much as begrudge the cost of Ofcom I have to say they do product extremely competent reports. Dick Stroud

Addicted to screens

This is a heavyweight study (Video Consumer Mapping study) conducted on behalf of the Nielsen-funded Council for Research Excellence by Ball State University's Center for Media Design (CMD) and Sequent Partners.

The main conclusions:

• The 45-54 year olds consume the most video media (this includes TV, computer, mobile and any other form of screen input)
• Live television remains the big consumer of time across all ages.
• The quantity of time spent gazing at a screen is remarkably consistent across the age spectrum (see the chart) with the notable exception of the 45-54 year olds who gaze at even more TV than their parents.

This is a summary of the main report.

These headline conclusions belie the quantity and quality of the analysis contained in this study.

It is a remarkable insight into the screen viewing habits of Americans and hence a great guide to channel and advertising consumption. Dick Stroud

European mobile web users

These numbers are from comScore showing the differences in the types of Web sites searched by the age of the person - note this is for mobile web use. I am so glad to see that I am not the only person who is paranoid about the weather! What a differences in the use of social networking sites (16.5% compared to 2.5%).

The data is for mobile Web users in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom. Dick Stroud

Consumers' use screen media

Matt Thornhill’s excellent newsletter about Boomers referenced the Video Consumer Mapping Study conducted on behalf of the Nielsen-funded Council for Research Excellence (CRE) by Ball State University's Center for Media Design. This is no quick PR generating study but a $3.5 million year research project.

This page has links to the main documents resulting from the study. This is an Adobe copy of the research presentation (it is a BIG document 17 Mb).

It does the research project a disservice to try and distil the findings into a few single sentence headlines. Having said that it is the nature of blogging that you have to just that. I really do recommend that you download the report and study the results. I suspect it will dismiss some of the myths that have grown up about media consumption habits.

The research is US only but I am sure it applies to most of Europe.

• You might think that "free TV" via the Web consumes a substantial part of video watching – not true. It represents an average time of just two minutes a day.
• TV in the home still commands the greatest amount of viewing of the 18-24 age group.
• Even in major metropolitan areas, where commute times can be long and drive-time radio remains popular, computer use has replaced radio as the No. 2 media activity. Radio is now No. 3 and print media fourth.
• On average, TV users were exposed to 72 minutes per day of TV ads and promos dispelling the belief that today's consumers are channel-hopping or otherwise avoiding most of the advertising in the programming they view.

I found the above slide one of the most interesting. It shows the different types of video streams watched by age group and the amount of time spent on each. As the slide states, the 18-24 year group watch 10 different screen sources for longer than 10 mins/day compared with the 65+.

My bet is that these results vary considerably by socio economic class. I would think that your wealthy, better educated 55+, would have a much higher screen use of playback via DVR, mobile talk, mobile text and games console.

This is a really brilliant bit of research. Dick Stroud

Technology and yoof

Accenture has published a report that provides innumerable variations on its title: “New-generation workers” want technology their way.

I had to laugh at the way Generation Y was split no less than three groups:

14-17 (“younger Millennials”)
18-22 (“mid-Millennials”)
23-27 (“older Millennials”)

Accenture, don’t you think that is a bit of overkill?

The one conclusion that interested me is shown in the chart. If it is true, the preference for mobile is a significant difference between the generations. Dick Stroud

Accenture Consumer Broadcast Study – make sure you download

The report gives the key findings from the Accenture Broadcast Consumer Survey 2008 and contains lots of nice graphs showing how people of different ages and nationalities respond to the changes taking place in the TV broadcasting (whatever that is).

The above chart gives a hint to the report’s conclusions. This is an extract.

The message is clear: watch the youth — they are the leading indicator, and the wave is coming. Our research reveals many correlations between consumers’ age and their attitudes and behaviour about new viewing options. These findings suggest that changes in behaviour will accelerate as these young consumers gain greater spending- power over time. For instance, compared to older consumers — and especially those over 55 — the under- 25 set is:

• Less likely to say they are satisfied with current television options;

• More likely to watch content on alternative devices;

• More likely to be familiar with on-demand TV, and to prefer watching content on demand; and • More willing to ‘pay’ to download content, whether by paying money or agreeing to watch advertisements.

If you believe the findings of this report then the future looks to be one where the 50-plus are glued to the TV in the corner of the room (maybe with pipe and slippers) whilst their children and grandkids are paying for the latest edition of their favourite programme, viewing it on their mobile phone whilst catching a bus.

Maybe, maybe not. Dick Stroud

Rip van Winkle awakes!!

Deloitte Touche published an annual report giving its predictions about Technology, Media and Telecommunications. This year one of its predictions is titled: “Gray is good”. How do they come up with these names?

The report doesn’t say anything that readers of this blog will not already know, but it is interesting to see that a large consultancy has finally woken up to the potential of adapting and selling technology to older people.

This article from Canada is also worth reading about the persistent youth-centric nature of the mobile phone industry. Dick Stroud

The Boomers TXT 2

I thought this title (used by emarketer) was a bit more original that the one used by the company that did the research (InsightExpress):” Does ur Granny text”?

So what do we have here? 18-24 text a lot (Yep, no doubt about that), everybody else texts less, but after the age of 25 not a great deal separates the other ages. Very few people use video on a regular basis. End of Story. Dick Stroud

Users are fed up with receiving marketing spam from mobile service providers finds new survey

Why does this headline not come as a shock?

If you want some proof of the obvious have a look at these details.

Another statement of the obvious: “The survey highlights how mobile operators are failing to capture the imagination of the baby boomer generation, with 75% of 45-54 year olds and 78% of 55-64 year olds viewing the marketing offers they receive as irrelevant to them”.

Surprisingly (not to me), even teenagers and young adult are less than enamoured with the ability of the operators to promote services which might interest them: 57% of them feel that the services they are offered today are irrelevant.

For more proof of the obvious read the article. Dick Stroud

Firms snub 'mobile for elderly

According to the BBC, UK stores are refusing to stock a mobile handset aimed at the elderly because it "fails to fit their customer target", says the phone's distributor.

Charities for the elderly have accused the mobile industry of ageism.

"We are in discussion with a number of retailers, but particularly when it comes to the mobile networks, they find it hard to see where this kind of device fits within their brand," said the MD of the UK distributor.

"Currently they're very much driven by the youth market or the business sector because that's where they make their revenue. It's difficult to see where a product like this would fit within their portfolio," he added.

O2 (a large mobile network provider) denies any accusation that it is discriminating against older people.

"That is absurd. We already offer a handset (Jet handset) that is ideally suited to older people. We don't directly market it at them because that would be a bit patronising," said an O2 spokeswoman.

As a good consultant I sit somewhere in the middle on this issue. The phone is supposedly targeted at the 50-plus. From the look of the thing (not the most atheistic device I have ever seen) it is really designed for the 70-plus. Also, it is expensive.

O2’s claim that the Jet handset is – “ideally suited to older people” – is plain daft. All of the reviews I have read about the phone stress it is for the ‘businessman’. O2 needs to employ some new copy writers if it thinking this list of ‘top features’ are going to set the hearts of older people racing:

- Exceptionally long battery life
- Quick keys for features such as Bluetooth
- 65k colour screen
- Bluetooth & Quadband
- Includes docking station, in-car charger & protective skin

Bottom line is this. The phone is probably ideal to the technologically averse 70-plus. Is this a worthwhile market sector – probably? If O2 has got any sense it will be the good citizen and either stock the thing or refer enquiries to another supplier and stop suggesting that the Jet phone is an alternative. It could even think creatively about cross subsidizing the phone by offering a deal to get the older person’s children onto the O2 network. Dick Stroud

Goodbye to triple typing?

Sometimes clunky old technologies hang around much longer than the problems they originally solved. The 12-button alphanumeric telephone keypad is a prime example.

Nobody with more than two brain cells would come up with the design as a way of entering text messages. The fact that zillions of messages are created each day is a testimony to either human ingenuity or stupidity – I am not sure which one it is.

"If it were a new invention, people would think that it was a very poor idea," says David Levy, an inventor and former ergonomic designer at Apple. Levy thinks that people are so fed up with triple typing that they're finally ready for a new keypad design, one that places each letter in alphabetical order, without adding a space-consuming QWERTY keyboard.

Levy's idea is for a new keyboard is called Fastap, which has raised letter keys in the corners between the numeric keys.

I have to say it doesn’t look that much easier to use than what we have.

So far, two mobile operators--Alltel in the United States, and Telus in Canada--have introduced Fastap phones, both made in South Korea by electronics giant LG.

At least somebody is thinking about trying to improve the dead-end technology that we currently are forced to use. Dick Stroud

Podcast about the 50-plus and mobile data

A while back I gave a session at an event organized by Women in Mobile Data.

A podcast of my dulcet tones is now available for download from Helen Keegan’s blog (The diary and musings of a mobile marketer). Dick Stroud

Nothing like a simple phone

The other evening I spoke at an event organised by a group called Women in Mobile Data.

As you can imagine the focus of my talk was about the role of mobile data applications and the 50-plus. You can download the presentation from my web site.

During the session I said that the mobile phone must be the single device that combines all of the physiological problems that people suffer as they age (eyesight, dexterity, cognitive and understanding of the latest technical jargon).

I was amused to open the Spectator magazine – audience predominately 50-plus - to see this ad for a Samsung phone/PDA. Now that really does look complicated. Dick Stroud