Connecting the Pixels

"User Experience is about reducing friction for the user to use the product/service and providing contextual information quickly" - Mahuya

1. Avoid use of colors in your wire-frame

Colors can be very powerful yet distracting.  If you must use color, use it wisely.  Focus on the user interaction and overall experience that you want to take feedback on.  Ensure that your discussion is not getting trapped into visual design.

2. Consistency is must

Wire-frames are meant to facilitate your discussion not cause distraction. Therefore, consistency is must.  Ensure consistency in typography, spacing, alignment and icons that you use in the wire-frames.

3. Use Demo Content

Demo content will surely help you tell the story better and also help the users relate to the wire-frame faster – hence, they would be able to provide adequate contextual feedback.

4. Don’t get attached to your wire-frames

Don’t get too emotionally attached to your wires - with rapid ideation, we must be willing to entertain change and pivot often.

5. Don’t be in hurry!

Start wire-framing and validation process early on.  We recommend that you start at least one release ahead so that you have enough data points to decide the best user experience.

There are many in the market but our favourites are the following prototyping and design collaboration tools (they also offer free plans/trials):

• Axure
• Proto.io
• InVision
• Balsamiq Mockups
• Pencil (this is free forever!)

People often ask if we must have a huge travel budget to meet users for conducting usability research – well, not always!

Here are some platforms to find remote users and carry out your usability research:

• Ethnio
• TryMyUI
• UsabilityTools
• UsersThink
• UserTesting

Here’s our favourite UX Research note taking application:

• PearNote

We hope these simple wire-framing practices and easy to use tools help you to design an awesome experience for your product through rapid wire framing. 

We would love to hear from you - let us know how it goes!

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We are passionate about Product Management, User Experience and Experience Marketing

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 * This article has been written by the authors in their personal capacity. The opinions expressed in this article are the author's own and do not reflect or can be associated with their employers or organizations.