Partnership will help advertisers target consumers more effectively through precise location-based services.
Partnership will make it easier for advertisers to access Tamoco’s location data through platforms such as The Trade Desk, Adobe or Facebook.
Tamoco, the world’s largest proximity network, has today announced a new partnership with Audiens, the worlds easiest to use customer data platform (CDP). The partnership allows advertisers to gain more precise insight into their audience members through their existing ad-serving solutions.
This partnership makes Tamoco’s location segments instantly available in leading platforms such as DoubleClick, AppNexus and Adform. It also makes it easier for advertisers to access Tamoco’s location data through platforms such as The Trade Desk, Adobe and Facebook.
Tamoco have 1 billion proximity sensors worldwide, collecting data on over 100 million devices, with more than 4 million MAUs in the UK. The product enables businesses to build better products, understand audiences and make better business decisions by using powerful mobile device data. Testament to the success of the product, Tamoco has previously worked on projects with industry giants including Uber, Heineken and The Coca-Cola Company.
“What this partnership represents is an opportunity for brands to understand their target audience’s habits and movements with greater accuracy than ever before.” Founder and Executive Chairman of Tamoco Sam Amrani said. “We’re thrilled to be working with Audiens and we’re really passionate about the difference that this partnership will bring to the industry and to our clients.”
As a result of the partnership, advertisers can now reduce campaign wastage and target consumers effectively by using more precise location-based audiences.
“The move will allow savvy brands and agencies to more accurately fine-tune their campaigns based on how consumers behave in the offline world,” Amrani said. “This creates more specific and customizable segments which can be used to further personalize advertising.”
The Audiens CDP unifies complex data across websites, apps, in stores, CMSs, CRMs and other data sources. It builds meaningful audience segments and conveys easily-understandable insights, specific to the marketing needs of a business and brand.
“Our clients demand the very best in location data and the partnership with Tamoco ensures we can deliver accurate, relevant and scalable location segments,” said Marko Maras, CEO, Audiens. “It adds another premium partner to our data marketplace, enabling our customer data platform to reach new global markets”.
About Tamoco:
Tamoco is making powerful location data accessible for all. Its global network provides businesses, organizations, brands, developers access to the leading source of precise, real-time location data. Tamoco is enabling businesses to build better products, understand audiences and make better business decisions by using powerful mobile device data.
About Audiens:
Audiens is a Customer Data Platform (CDP) that creates a persistent and unified customer database to improve the performance of advertising campaigns. Customers’ data can be onboarded from multiple sources (website, mobile app, CRM), normalized, and combined to create advanced audience segmentation. This structured data is then pushed to the most popular digital customer acquisition channels and marketing networks. Audiens makes it very easy for marketers to activate customer segments privately, or share them with other advertisers for data monetization.
Advertisers use audience segmentation so that they can eliminate any unnecessary spend from their marketing efforts, become more efficient and effective and boost key KPIs.
Using data, advertisers can create much smarter audience segments. They can prioritise the right consumer, with the right ad using the right message.
That’s why we’ve made sure that our precise, first-party data sets are available for marketers and advertisers to use directly in their DMP. Advertisers should be able to do this directly in their media buying solution.
About our data
At Tamoco we think that data accuracy is the most important thing for advertisers using data in their targeting, segmentation or attribution. That’s why we built a network that is leading the way in the drive towards more accurate data.
Proprietary location data focused on precision and accuracy
Tamoco’s data is industry leading. We use our proprietary SDK for data collection along with our extensive network of sensors to understand consumer location with higher levels of precision and accuracy.
Detailed visit behaviour
Tamoco’s data methodology is designed to reduce the number of incorrect data points. We understand visits with granular accuracy. False visits are filtered out, and our data methodology is transparent. This methodology means that advertisers can be confident that Tamoco visits data is more accurate than other visits-based targeting solution.
Benefits of using location directly in your DMP audience segmentation
To drive incremental gains to ROI location can signify which of these users are relevant to your campaigns. Location data is real-time and behavioural based. These attributes mean that you can exclude irrelevant audiences, and save valuable marketing dollars in the process.
Advertisers can then tailor their campaigns to users that have physically exhibited certain behaviours, such as visited a specific store or frequented a series of physical locations.
This targeting helps to build relevant messaging and ensures that your segments are squeaky clean in terms of precise targeting. No more wasted budget on consumers that aren’t relevant to your brand campaigns.
Location is a good indicator of intent
Add intent to the segmentation process. Retargeting campaigns are more effective if you can reach consumers when they are in the right frame of mind. Retargeting works well in the online world, but this is often limited to your current inventory.
Consumers show purchase intent in the offline world as well. Visiting your store is a good example. However, by mapping the offline world, advertisers can use location to identify consumer intent in different ways.
Retargeting to consumers who have visited (or are currently visiting) a competitor or a store in a similar category is a powerful way to reach the right audiences.
Using location data to fuel analytics
Using location signals directly in your data management platform enables smarter cross-selling. If you have built up a database of descriptive and behavioural audiences, adding location can provide a better way to upsell new products or promote return purchases.
Using your analytics solution, location data can directly increase how you understand consumer trends, patterns and intent. Location data is a tool for building up a more detailed view of your customers.
These insights can be used to inform future segmentation and predict which audiences are more likely to convert at a specific stage in the buyer journey.
Using location to build lookalike audiences
Reaching new customers that are currently outside of your customer data set can be challenging. It’s something hard to know if the process of building lookalike audiences is reliable.
Using location data, it’s possible to build real-world behavioural based audience segments. For example, by taking an audience that converts highly, we can understand similar consumers based on how they move and behave in the real world.
This generates lookalike segments that are based on current real-world behaviour rather than vague similar interest data. Ultimately it will build segments that are more likely to convert.
Example segments and audience segmentation strategies
Some of our location-based segments are available already. Here we will look at some familiar audiences segmentation use cases using this data.
Women’s clothing stores
Brands looking at segmenting their audiences based on consumer interests can use location to refine their audiences. Let’s look at how this would work with an audience based segment.
You already have a pre-built audience that is relevant to your women’s clothing brand.
Using location-based filters directly in your DMP you can further filter this audience to reach the most relevant users.
You can filter based on the number of visits to women’s clothing stores. You can set the time period for these visits.
This will segment your audience based on those that have physically visited a clothing store in your defined time period.
Drinking places (alcoholic)
Using location, you can build retargeting audiences in your DMP to maximise your ad budgets.
If you are looking to retarget consumers based on their behaviour, then location can help to define the right audience.
Set your audience to include those that have visited an alcoholic drinking place.
You can filter these visits based on past visits, or on specific dates or days of the week.
This can help you to build incredibly specific audiences – such as Friday night venue attendees.
Speciality food stores
As previously mentioned, location data can be helpful to build new lookalike audiences based on consumer behaviour. This method can help you to create unique lookalikes based on actual measured real-world behaviour.
We can build an audience based on visits to speciality food stores. Here we have our seed audiences that consists of consumers that we know have visited a health store at some point in our defined time period.
We can do one of two things here:
Move the identifiers into our current lookalike modelling solution. This will create a new audience based on a unique seed audience.
Use a location-based lookalike solution. This will use the audience to match with devices that have exhibited similar real-world behaviour.
All of the above segments are readily available in leading DMPs and other media buying solutions.
How to activate Tamoco’s precise location data
Our data is currently available through DoubleClick, AppNexus, AdForm. Here you can begin segmentation immediately using Tamoco’s location data.
We can activate these segments instantly in The Trade Desk, Adobe Marketing Cloud, Facebook Advertising, Sizmek, Beeswax, Widespace and BrightRoll. Please contact us to enable this.
Want something more custom?
We can build custom segments on demand with our team of data scientists. These can be fed into the above solutions. Here are some examples of what our team can provide for your campaigns.
Brand affinity – we can create segments that are based upon brand affinity to your brand, a competitor or another relevant brand.
Detailed visits – Our team can help segment audiences based on verified visits to any physical POI, venue or location.
All of our data solutions can be fed into your current data or targeting platform. Our team of data scientists are ready to support your integration and take your marketing to the next level.
The optimization of modern workflows depends heavily on technology. But a sluggish and unresponsive computer might prevent you from being productive, costing you precious time and possibilities. You may have realized that your MacBook isn’t operating as effectively as it once did if you’re a business professional. It can be annoying, but the good news is that your MacBook can be speed up and made more efficient for work-related tasks. This post will go over some quick fixes and productivity hacks to make the most of your workday and the performance of your computer.
Why is My Mac So Slow?
Let’s first explore the causes of the problems before moving on to the solutions. Your MacBook may be slow for numerous reasons, such as:
Not enough memory or storage space
Outdated hardware or software
Malware or viruses
Excessive number of applications active in the background
Fragmented disk
How to Speed Up Mac
Fortunately, there are a variety of techniques for optimizing Mac for business use. Here are some ideas to boost the efficiency of your MacBook:
Regularly update your software. Updates frequently contain bug fixes, security patches, and optimizations. Visit the App Store and select Updates to keep your Mac up to date.
Uninstall unnecessary applications. Having too much software installed can cause the system to lag. You can delete apps by going to the Applications folder, choosing the one you want to get rid of, and dragging it to the Trash.
Clean your hard drive. You can either use the Disk Utility tool that came with your Mac or a different program like CleanMyMac to free up space on your hard disk. As a result, your laptop will run faster and be better suited for office duties.
Mac optimization. Use software that has been optimized for Macs. This can help improve the efficiency of your Mac. Use Safari rather than Chrome, for instance, to browse the web, as it is Mac-friendly and requires less RAM.
Resetting PRAM, NVRAM, and SMC
In addition to the suggestions mentioned above, you can speed up Mac by resetting PRAM, NVRAM, and SMC. Little quantities of memory called PRAM (Parameter RAM) and NVRAM (Non-Volatile RAM) are used to store configurations, including starting disk, speaker level, and screen resolution. PRAM and NVRAM resets can be used to fix problems with these settings.
Your MacBook’s SMC (System Management Controller) is in charge of controlling hardware features, such as temperature and battery management. Problems with these functionalities may be resolved by resetting the SMC.
To reset PRAM and NVRAM
Shut down your MacBook
Turn it on from the power button
Instantly hold the following keys: Command, Option, P, and R
Don’t stop holding until you hear the startup sound twice
Release the keys and let your MacBook boot up
To reset SMC
Shut down your MacBook
Hold the Shift, Control, and Option keys on the left side of the keyboard, then press and hold the power button at the same time
Release all keys
Turn on your MacBook
You can learn more information on how to improve and speed up your MacBook in https://setapp.com/how-to/reset-pram-nvram-and-smc-on-mac article. This article provides detailed instructions on how to reset PRAM, NVRAM, and SMC on your MacBook, as well as additional information on when and why you might need to reset them.
Which MacBook is Best for Business and Fast Processes?
The MacBook Pro is an excellent option if you’re looking for a laptop that’s suitable for business and quick procedures. The MacBook Pro is equipped with a potent processor, a sharp display, and a long battery life to handle even the most demanding business applications.
The MacBook Air is another excellent choice thanks to its thin profile, lengthy battery life, and quick performance. It’s ideal for professionals who need a portable laptop that can keep up with their fast-paced work environment and are often on the run.
Conclusion
If your MacBook is slow, you won’t be able to simplify your procedures, and your productivity will suffer significantly. You may optimize Mac efficiency and quicken your workflow by using the advice provided in this article. Resetting your MacBook’s PRAM, NVRAM, and SMC can also assist in resolving difficulties with its settings and hardware. The MacBook Pro and MacBook Air are great options for business workers searching for quick and dependable laptops if you’re in the market for a new laptop. Using these tools and methods, you may configure your computer to operate at its peak efficiency in professional settings.
Jobs are needed by everyone who is a part of the economy, and business can be made anywhere, which is why the world of recruitment is slowly becoming so advanced as technology evolves.
Artificial intelligence is gaining popularity across the board through AI-powered job search sites like Lensa. The reason it has gained so much attention is due to all the benefits it provides to the recruitment process by making recruiter teams’ jobs easier. AI uses tons of data to function using algorithms, which also gives importance to recruitment data that is also being utilized.
How does AI show up in recruitment?
Recruiting teams now use artificial intelligence software to complete various different tasks that would otherwise take hours, if not days, to complete. The aim of AI is to streamline and automate these tasks to achieve higher efficiency rates and more accurate success rates, which we will expand on later in this article.
Recruitment data essentially means data-driven recruiting. This method is a base for AI to work off of since it is the information AI uses to come to conclusions through its powerful algorithms. AI takes a lot of computing power, which includes vast amounts of data, to function. Its payoff is the services it provides recruiting teams.
The addition of AI improves recruitment practices in the short and long term and cultivates a stronger team for companies through more accurate matching. It also betters candidate experience by being a faster and more versatile method for getting hired.
Methods for AI and recruitment
Automation
The first benefit recruitment teams could experience from artificial intelligence is the automation of certain mundane tasks that held efficiency back. The main task that was automated was reviewing resumes in bulk. This task is repetitive and doesn’t necessitate human interference, which is why AI is now being used to review resumes using keywords and other settings.
Communication and scheduling were also automated by the creation of chatbots and automated messages. There is no need for recruiters to spend time networking with candidates anymore since the messages are sent by themselves. Chatbots are an advanced version of automated messages that can help answer questions, change settings, or any other programmed task.
Automation has reduced the workload for workers, bettered the experience candidates go through, and improved the quality of hires while keeping them engaged.
Document review and organization
Artificial intelligence is also able to review resumes that hit certain key targets such as experience levels, the right skills, keywords, and so on. The AI then passes these on for further human review. This method alleviates a large amount of the work recruiters would have to do. AI can also organize documents by grouping them as it was programmed to do.
With reviewing documents comes background and reference-checking candidates, which AI can do automatically. This reduces risks for companies if they are looking into hiring specific candidates. From footprints left on the internet to checking past company records, AI can confirm the information on resumes more efficiently.
These tasks done by AI have one large benefit: they reduce any subconscious bias. In recruitment, it is only human to come across levels of human bias found in many individuals, even if they aren’t aware of it. Lack of bias means qualified candidates have better chances of getting hired to positions they deserve, thus increasing the company’s success as well.
Data identification
As mentioned earlier, data is to AI as flowers are to bees. By receiving feedback and monitoring activity, AI can determine patterns and group different sets of information together to create data sets that can be used to deduce statistics. This statistical feedback can shape the way a team works for the better if used correctly.
Artificial intelligence can also identify skill gaps in candidates and existing employees and help recruiters identify problems to reroute efforts into making solutions. Give a person the right task, and you’ll find the right outcome.
Conclusion
At this time, we’ve been seeing more benefits than setbacks in using artificial intelligence for the recruitment process. Technology is here to make our lives more convenient, and AI does exactly so by doing the unlikeable tasks yet boosting the difficult ones found in recruitment.
We wait four years for a world cup to come around. The final is the most watched event in the world. That’s a whole lot of consumer interest – it’s one that businesses need to get right in order to maximise the effect of this once-every-four-year event.
The World Cup consists of 32 nations. IN the UK every game is broadcast on terrestrial TV. Globally around 3.4 billion people watch some part of the tournament. It’s a huge event for a number of industries, but none more than perhaps the beverage industry.
That’s why it’s important to understand consumer behaviour during these monumental global events. Understand how customers move and behave can help business perform well across a number of different functions, from advertising and marketing to insights and planning.
To identify alcohol and consumer trends during the World Cup we analysed visits to over 5000 venues across London during the 3-week tournament.
Our accurate first party data-set combined with our network of precise location sensors provides detailed insights into how consumers behaved during the World Cup. Our visit methodology provides a powerful way to reveal trends and behavioural information around consumers.
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Dubai is a thriving metropolis in the desert, an international resort, and a developed technological and economic center of the UAE. For those who can afford a relaxed lifestyle, Dubai offers genuine estate and all the conditions for living and recreation. You can buy three-bedroom apartments in Dubai in luxury new developments ready to move in. They have an excellent renovation and are fully furnished.
Due to its premium status, this type of housing belongs to a separate category of real estate in Dubai, the cost category of which is an order of magnitude higher than the average object on the market.
However, despite their high cost, luxury apartments in Dubai are in demand among Arabs and visitors. This is due to their profitability and quick payback in the process of commercial operation. Subject to a competent selection of real estate, an expensive flat in Dubai will become a reliable tool for living in a new country.
What are the pros of three-bedroom apartments in Dubai
Such flats are not bought as often as one-bedroom flats and studios, but this type of housing also attracts investors. Foreigners acquire such objects for seasonal holidays with their families, permanent residence, and short-term lease to large groups of tourists. Income from renting housing reaches 5-6 percent per year.
Other benefits include:
Big square. As a rule, three-bedroom apartments in the UAE and several bedrooms and spacious living rooms have two or three bathrooms.
Thoughtful layouts. Ample spaces allow you to accommodate a large family comfortably.
Developed infrastructure. In Dubai’s new buildings, citizens have hidden parking, pools, and leafy zones for walking and outdoor activities.
How much does a three-bedroom apartment cost? Prices depend on the size of housing in square meters, area, comfort level, stage of construction, and other factors. The average cost is USD 450,000.
Benefits of purchasing an flat in Dubai
In addition to a good opportunity to receive passive income from renting out housing, the owner of Dubai real estate can count on the following:
Acquiring a resident visa. An investment in a three-bedroom apartment will be enough to obtain a golden visa for the customer and his family members. It will allow you to stay in the UAE for an unlimited amount of time and have almost all the same rights as citizens of the country.
The loyalty of the tax legislation. Ownership and use of housing for income are not subject to taxes in Dubai.
Safety. The UAE is one of the most unassailable countries in the world.
Government agencies control the procedure for getting a home in the UAE, so the acquisition is quick and secure.
Purchase of a three-bedroom apartment in Dubai Marina
Buying a three-bedroom apartment can be the right option, but it depends on your financial capabilities, future, and property ownership goals.
Dubai Marina is an upscale area with many dining, shopping, and amusement opportunities, excellent infrastructure, and transport links. However, real estate prices in the area can be very high.
Before you buy property in Dubai, you must thoroughly analyze your finances and evaluate your ability to pay for an apartment. In addition to the cost of the apartment, it is necessary to consider such expenses as taxes, commissions, paperwork, and maintenance of the apartment.
It is also important to pay attention to the layout and condition of the apartment, its location in the building, and the availability of amenities such as a pool, gym, parking, etc.
Buying a home in Dubai
If you are looking for three-bedroom apartments in the UAE and do not want to look for the best options, then Emirates.Estate will help you with this. The selected objects will differ in price per sq. m., space from the sea, quality of finishing, layout, and infrastructure of the area. All these factors determine the final price. Depending on your personal preferences and financial capabilities, you will determine the most acceptable option for a three-bedroom apartment in Dubai. Specialists will organize its viewing and handle all the paperwork necessary to buy it.
A key component of good mobile UI is consistency. Designing an intuitive experience is fundamental to creating an engaging app.
Familiarity
Keep an app consistent requires the right balance of familiar screens and using known experiences to reduce the learning curve required to use your app.
For example, a newsfeed is a screen that can be extremely complex. However, many users are familiar with a newsfeed. They are used to using this kind of screen on desktop and mobile. This means that users are probably primed to use a newsfeed at a reasonably high capacity, even without being exposed to it before.
As an app designer, it’s important to embrace these familiar screens and create a design which is familiar to your users. Leveraging services like instinctools for web application development ensures intuitive user experiences through consistent and familiar design elements.
You can view more examples of this concept in action by heading to the screens section of this article.
Intuitive design
Similar to familiarity is intuitive design. Where familiarity focuses on using established design trends to drive app engagement, intuitively is slightly different.
When a user interacts with your mobile app, they should not have to think about the process.
The user experience should be intuitive – it should allow them to achieve their desired goal without dedicating too much time to the process.
To achieve this, designers must get into the right mindset and understand how users will interact with their app. This involves defining the user’s flow and focusing on minimising the amount of time it will take for users to understand and complete the steps between these.
Getting the intuitive design right is a crucial part of the mobile UI design process. Without it abandonment rates will be higher, engagement stifled, and churn rate will increase.
Minimalism and simplicity
Functional minimalism
Designing a mobile experience means understanding the concept of minimalism and applying it to your app’s experience. Simplicity is critical on mobile devices. There’s a small margin for error, so it’s best not to overwhelm your users.
Decluttering is a great example or minimalism in action. As a rule of thumb, if the information is not needed, then don’t include it. This rule doesn’t just apply to content, but menus and other functional sections of your app.
Overloading the user with too much at once is another no-no. An excellent solution to this is collapsible elements or progressive disclosure. That might sound complicated, but it’s a simple concept which allows the user to control the amount of information on the screen.
Towards a simple navigation
Minimalism should apply to user navigation as well as content and elements. You are helping your users to navigate your app in a simple and time efficient manner.
You will lose users if your app’s navigation is too complicated, takes too long or isn’t consistent with other elements.
Using standard components in navigation – this means on Android using the navigation drawer or utilising the tab bar for iOS.
Keep it consistent – don’t mix different patterns and keep a single navigation pattern across your app.
Allow the user to understand where they are. Achieving this means having the current place in the navigation visible at all times.
Minimising user input
Typing on a mobile screen is never going to be as comfortable as using a larger keyboard. Many issues with user input occur when the user is using a form. These are common in mobile apps and often can’t be avoided.
A common mistake is to take a form that was designed to appear on a desktop or laptop and repurpose it for mobile. This quick solution is not good practice – and in the mobile-first world we find ourselves, it’s vital to think mobile-first when designing these.
Some fundamental principles to stick to when user input is required:
Less is more – fields that are not 100% necessary can be removed. They are blockers and should be left out.
Autocomplete is a designers best friend when it comes to user input.
Dynamic validation is critical for mobile. There’s nothing more frustrating than waiting for a page to refresh before being told a field was incorrect. Perhaps a user will not bother going through the process a second time.
Control (put the user in control)
To create a great mobile UX the user must feel in control of their app experience. To achieve this, the app should deliver an element of control to the user, through consistent design and predictability.
Keeping elements consistent and predictive
If a user predicts how to use an app and this turns out to be true, then this gives the feeling that the user is in control. Creating this experience is a fundamental part of mobile UI and UX design service.
On mobile, users are not afforded the luxury of hovering over elements to see the kind of interactivity each element offers. That means it’s our job to create components that are consistent and help the user to understand what they want to do quickly.
The way that an element looks should inform the user what will happen when they use, tap, swipe or interact with it. Don’t cross over designs with interaction. Not doing this will lead to confusion and will quickly annoy your users.
We all make mistakes – addressing errors
It would be futile to suggest that apps should avoid errors. Eliminating all errors is impossible. Errors exist and mitigating these are a crucial part of mobile design.
Sometimes errors occur because of a failure in the app itself. Other times it may be the user. Whatever happened the experience is ruined if these aren’t handled in the right way.
The best thing to do is to explicitly state what went wrong and indicate what the user could do to stop the error from occurring again.
Back to where exactly?
A common mistake as apps grow and the number of screens and flows increase involves the back button. A poorly designed back button can severely hamper the flow of an app.
Poorly designed experience involves taking the user back to a home screen. Try and ensure that this process takes users back incrementally.
This rule ensures that users can navigate backwards to check inputted information or verify other content without having to navigate the entirety of the flow again.
Text, images, video and other technical mobile design tips
Text design
Text is the primary way that you will communicate information to your users. Therefore, it’s crucial that you get it right. The typography in your app should be easy to read and legible.
The following guidelines are a great start when considering a typeface to use in your mobile app:
Font family – remember when we talked about familiarity? This concept also applies when choosing your font family. Google uses Roboto and iOS uses San Fransisco. You’d do well to continue this into your app. However, while these fonts are functional, you should also consider incorporating some aesthetically pleasing and stylish fonts that can give your app a modern and unique flair.
Font size – I would recommend 16px. This size may change slightly depending on your typeface.
Contrast – It’s important that the contrast between your app’s typeface and the page contrast enough to make your content readable. Some like the idea of a lighter font on a grey background, but these are hard to read. Also, as many devices are used outdoors, screen glare may make low contrast content difficult or impossible to read.
In individual instances, the following will help you to keep your text legible:
Limit line length – this provides your user with the luxury of not having to pinch zoom while reading.
Capitalisation – is most cases it is better to avoid this.
Line spacing – getting this right creates a better reading experience. Too little and it appears squished, too big, and it feels expansive.
Side note – Be a jargon buster
Jargon busting is more of a design choice, but I guess it’s relevant here. Don’t create smart terms for regular expressions. Your users will get confused. Stick to home, buy or profile instead of new words that your users will have to learn to use your app.
Images
Mobile screens are now some of the most advanced and offer high quality, high-resolution displays.
To do these screens justice images must retain the aspect ratio. Stretched images are a real turn off.
The best solution is to have an adaptive solution. This process will detect the display size and adjust the resolution of the images in your app accordingly.
With new devices taking new shapes and the potential for foldable devices and other weird and wonderful innovations it will be more important to have an adaptive solution.
The iPhone X is probably the best example of this. The device utilises a different resolution to most other devices and part of this is hidden behind a bezel, making it technically dead space.
Video
Video is fast becoming one the of the most important mediums, especially on mobile. It’s pivotal that you get this right in your app.
Research shows that many users like to watch videos in portrait mode. This preference means that you will have to think about how your videos appear both in landscape and portrait mode.
Facebook live and youtube are probably the best examples of this.
This concept helps designers to think about how devices are used practically. Thinking about this allows us to understand how the device is held and how this affects our design.
Many users hold their device in one hand. Sometimes this is in the left, sometimes the right. This choice means that only some of the screen is easy to reach with the thumb when the device is held in one hand.
This area is called the thumb zone. It changes between devices, based on the screen size.
Based on the image below try and stick to the following guidelines.
The green area is where navigation and other frequently used actions should be.
The reg area is where options that could cause damage to the user experience if incorrectly pressed should be.
Responsiveness and speed
With every advance in technology, we get more impatient. Loading time is therefore significant for user experience.
The longer your app takes to load a page the more likely you are to lose users. Now sometimes this is unavoidable. Luckily some tricks will allow you to create the illusion that your app is loading quickly.
Keep the following tips in mind if you can’ decrease the load time any more:
Clearly demonstrate when something is loading – blank screens will make the user think that the app is broken. The least that you can do is include a spinning animation or something similar. If anything routinely takes longer than 5 seconds to load, then opt for a progress bar instead.
Prioritise the visible area of the device – focus on loading the initial content that appears in the view when entering a page. The rest can load on scroll or in the background. This trick creates the illusion that the entire page has loaded quickly.
Other methods exist to help build the illusion of quick loading – an example is to provide an animation that also acts as a distraction.
Skeleton screens are understood by users to load quicker than a blank screen. Implementing them into your app design will help to improve the user experience.
Personalisation
There are countless ways to personalise your app experience and boost app engagement. It’s a fantastic way to connect with your users.
Push
Aim to keep your communication via push notifications personal. To create a great UX and great UX copy there are a few different methods you can employ to ensure your app push notification strategy stays personal.
Location
Using location wisely is another way to provide a valuable user experience to users. Contextual experiences can be added by understanding the device location. Adding location support to your app can fuel personalisation of everything from push notifications to in-app content. All of this contributes to improving the app experience.
Accessibility
Designing for everybody
Considered design should allow users of all kinds to use your app. Consider how trouble hearing, seeing and other disabilities can affect the usability for your mobile app.
The following are things that you should consider when designing your app:
Colour blindness – around 5% of the world’s population are colour blind to some extent. The most common form is the inability to distinguish between red and green. Unfortunately, these are the most common colours to use for error and success messages. Adding a separate icon that indicates this will avoid the issue.
Screen and app examples
In this section, we will look at specific screens. Drawing on everything we have learned in the above sections we’ll focus on examples where designers have done a great job on these particular screens.
Splash screen
Remember what your mother told you about first impressions? Well, unfortunately, she was right. At least in terms of mobile UX.
Creating a positive impression on the first use of your app is incredibly important. Churn rate is highest in the initial days after downloading, suggesting that first impressions are crucial in boosting retention.
Enter the splash screen – the first screen that a user will see when opening an app. They are minimalistic and usually consist of a name or brand logo. These can help with loading times of the home screen.
Try and keep these screens to less than 5 seconds. A nice idea is to keep everything centred so that it looks great on all screens.
Onboarding
Onboarding is a significant screen (or set of screens) for your users. When a first-time user opens an app, they will usually be presented with an on-boarding journey. This screen will educate the user on how to use the app and get the most from the features.
The aim here is to demonstrate that the app is useful for the user. It’s crucial that your onboarding process is simple, effective and not too long or short. Here are some tips:
Custom illustrations are a good idea. They help to explain specific features and help users to remember them.
Many apps use a mascot to guide the user through the on-boarding process. Remember the duo-lingo owl before it begins sending you annoying notifications?
The copy is everything. Clear, concise copy is the most important thing to get right in an onboarding process. It should be helpful, short and easily readable.
Log in and profile
To create highly personalised apps requires that users make an account. Most user’s response to seeing a sign-up screen isn’t positive, so it’s important to get it right.
Keep the number of fields short
Offer simple, one-click logins (such as Google and Facebook login)
Remember that on log-in pages to include an option to sign up
At the heart of the highly personalised app is the profile screen. This screen allows the user to interact with your app in a customised way. The profile must be clear. It must profile personalised information related to the app. However, it’s important not to include too much information.
Working on the navigation system here is important. Make sure that the profile page is part of any tabbed menus. Researching your users and most common functions can help you to understand the best information to prioritise in a profile view.
Home screens (menus)
The home screen is potentially one of the most important screens in your app. It’s the go-to screen for your users to navigate. It’s where they will go to instantly perform critical tasks and interact with the essential parts of the application.
Because of this, the home screen will look entirely different between apps. Some key elements remain the same, however.
Many home screens contain a search bar or a search function to immediately let users get the right content or the right page. This search function should be placed clearly and centrally.
The home screen must contain clear navigational elements which allow the user to get the most important pages within your app quickly. These should be simple and easy to understand. Users don’t want to spend time figuring out what each term means.
Many home screens surface these selections in the content itself. Sometimes this is in the form of cards. If doing this, it’s important only to include the most important options. Too many can confuse the user.
Permissions
Permissions are important for many apps. However, designers must strike the right balance between asking for permissions and negatively affecting the user experience.
We’ve all opened a new app and have been bombarded with permission requests. This a quick way to increase user churn and hamper UX.
There are some toolkits to help with this that allow multiple preferences to be collected. They also will enable the developer to pre-determine situations where it is acceptable to ask for user permissions.
Ecommerce
An e-commerce app’s primary function is to entice users to buy and a product and close the purchase. There are a few screens that are unique to this kind of app, and there are some critical UI tips to consider when designing them.
Catalogue screen
The catalogue is the home of the e-commerce app. It can look slightly different from app to app.
Generally, in these screens products are arranged in columns (sometimes single columns), and the user will scroll through them. It’s the designer’s task to create a view that prioritises certain items and provide a quick and simple way for users to navigate multiple products.
More advanced catalogue pages display items horizontally with the user input being a swipe gesture left or right. This design works best when there are fewer items as the user can only navigate through one at a time. Adding separate navigation can help in this instance.
Some critical rules for this kind of screen are:
Photos and illustrations should be high quality
CTA (call to actions) should be present and easy to identify
The catalogue screen should have the CTA as well as inside the product page. This way users can add items to basket directly from the catalogue screen.
Product screen
This screen will educate users in more detail on the product. A product screen is important because it allows users to dig into the product, answer any questions they may have, and provide more information on the product to close the sale.
Key elements include:
High-quality feature image
The detailed description that’s easy to read
Product specifications
Reviews
Checkout screen
Mobile is quickly becoming the primary way that users make purchases. Mobile UX should make the process as simple and pain-free as possible. The checkout is the final stage in this process and should feel comfortable for the user.
Include visual elements that indicate that important personal information is secure.
Supporting quick checkout options can be an excellent way of keeping the experience pain-free
Newsfeed
The newsfeed is a crucial element to many social apps. However, many other categories of apps now use a newsfeed to convey changing content to users. You can prioritise a specific kind of content (such as new posts) to the top.
Some guidelines for these:
try to keep 1-2 items on the screen to avoid over-cluttering
A new trend in newsfeeds is to have two columns, but this can be very easy to get wrong.
Swiping horizontally to reveal different local feeds is a better way to include extra information. Think of how Instagram hashtags and previously Snapchat’s UI worked (before they changed it).
Testing and feedback
Designing great mobile UI and understanding UX involves testing and routinely updating your design based on user feedback and user behaviour.
Everything that we have discussed will help you to design a better mobile app experience. They won’t replace the need for robust testing and user feedback.
Testing your UX with real users in real-world situations is a must if you want to create a UI that keeps users engaged.
Feedback loops
User feedback is incredibly important for UX design. To get it in reliable quantities you must design the feedback product into your app.
There are countless ways to do this; the most important thing is that it works. It can be anything from a form to background analytics that records how users are interacting with your app.
Tools
A poor craftsman always blames their tools. However, with app design and development, it’s important to have the right set of tools to develop, implement and test your app’s UX. Although, you might think of hiring a UX agency that will give you all-around UX design services.
The finance industry is a highly competitive space. It faces a new generation of disrupting banks and regulations. It’s an industry that needs to utilise big data to drive personalisation, boost customer loyalty, security and fuel everyday investment decisions.
The financial services industry has always been at the forefront of technical innovation. The availability of new datasets has provided a powerful way to understand behaviour and offers new directions for the financial industry to be predictive.
Big data application in financial services goes beyond predicting share prices. New data types are revolutionising the space.
We’re going to break down some examples of how big data is being used in financial services.
Personalisation
Personalisation has long been a priority when dealing with consumers. This is true both inside the finance industry and across other verticals with a strong consumer presence.
Disruptor banks have begun to establish themselves in the finance sector. One thing that these banks have done well is personalisation.
By understanding users spending habits and behaviour, they can offer more personal spending products and recommendations.
For example, in the world of digital banking, if a bank had the right data sets around its customers, it could provide services that truly bring value to the end customer. If a bank understands what their customers spend, where they go and where they work they can, for example, suggest that a travel card could save them a lot of money each month.
It’s in these areas that financial services can learn from disruptor banks. With the right dataset, the banking experience can be personalised for customers. This will allow financial services to boost customer loyalty and drive cross-selling of their products much more effectively.
Security
There are few industries where security and fraud are more of a threat than in the financial services.
As technology has advanced those in the space must be smarter and better adapted to the fast-changing tactics of those looking for weak points in sometimes outdated systems.
Adding location intelligence to the equation adds an extra layer of security for customers and allows financial institutions to instantly provide checks based on where a customer uses its products.
Location offers a new way for security teams to identify fraud. Location data can help to educate security systems on customer behaviour and can form a strong base from which to detect irregularities in financial behaviour.
Financial services continually process an incredible number of transactions. A location overlay which includes operational rules can help to determine when to flag records as fraudulent.
These processes enable financial services to provide better safeguards to their consumers and clients.
Investment
The rise of big data carries enormous potential for investors. Many have implemented predictive systems that are designed to understand data sets, digest vast amounts of data and then inform investment decisions.
These data sets have proved successful, but accurate location data is rarely used to optimal effect in this area. Location intelligence provides a more detailed understanding of trends and ingesting these precise datasets can help investors to stay ahead of the competition.
Understanding how populations move and behave en mass is readily available in the online world. Location offers something slightly different. It helps to understand how consumers move in the offline world.
Using location allows minimal lag between an aggregated understanding of consumer trends and investors being able to forecast the performance of portfolios and financial markets.
This allows investors to act quickly and decisively. Location is a fantastic indicator of market, brand or individual behaviour. With the progress made in accuracy by some in the space, this will prove to be one of the next steps in predictive analytics for the financial sector.
Insurance
For insurance location underlies everything. Many insurers can immediately benefit from quality location data to better model risk and dramatically improve their underwriting and pricing.
In insurance, nearly every data point has a relation to location.
Crime data – understanding crime risk in specific locations including historical data and predictive solutions can provide significant advantages to insurers.
Catastrophe – using data analytics insurers can mitigate the risks involved with catastrophes based on a customer’s location.
Behavioural data – using new kinds of behavioural data, such as location, can allow insurers to understand consumer behaviour better. This helps to predict risk and assist with pricing.
These datasets are now available in large quantities. Precise location allows for more accurate insights and the ability to generate this data, as well as store and process it, has changed the game for the insurance industry.
New revenue
For financial businesses, consumer data also holds the key to new revenue. It allows companies to maximise revenue from existing channels.
For example, using precision data marketing financial companies can identify products and services that are a much closer match for specific customers. This provides more value for both customers and branded partners.
Understanding customers behaviour allows companies to understand which type of person is more valuable for their business.
Using this data, it’s possible to build lookalikes and use this to drive more targeted marketing activity to customers that represent a greater potential for higher revenue.
Finding the right balance between design and functionality when creating your mobile app can be a challenge.
The last thing you want is a dull and boring design; you want an app with stunning aesthetics that dazzles users and makes you stand out from your competition.
On the other hand, you don’t want your app design to come at the expense of the user experience.
In this article, we’ll discuss how design and functionality go hand in hand and which one you should invest in when building a mobile app.
Functional mobile app design – enhancing the experience
Ideally, design and functionality should work together. You should design your app in such a way as to enhance the user experience.
For example, you should design the menu in such a way as to make it easy for your users to navigate the app and access the most important features, without distracting them with too many options.
Minimalism and functional design
When creating an app design with functionality in mind, you have to find the right balance between minimalism and enough features.
Some people will try to spice up with their app with all kinds of shiny features. Too much choice can be a source of distraction for visitors and prevent them from finding the essential information.
On the other hand, some will aim for a minimalist design, opting for a sleek design with plenty of white space. However, getting too caught up with creating a minimalist design can sometimes cause you to leave out relevant information.
Let’s look at some popular sites to make this point. Google’s homepage is an excellent example of how minimalism can work. The site was designed for a single purpose – inputting a query into the search engine – and that’s precisely what their homepage is designed to do.
But if we look at something like Amazon, it is far from a minimalist website. But, all of their features all work together towards a single goal.
Think about Amazon’s features. You can read reviews, find recommended and related products, look at product information and details, add products to your wish lists or shopping carts, and much more.
However, these features are all designed with one goal in mind – nurturing you towards to purchasing a product.
Functionality over design
There may be times when you only have the resources to invest in either the app’s functionality or its design. At that point, you’ll have to decide what is more important for your users.
Think about it this way: A poorly designed app may not entice new users the same way an app with a stylish design would. On the other hand, an app that is stylish but is difficult to use and figure out will probably have a low retention rate.
When comparing the two, functionality should generally be your main priority. If your app isn’t good at fulfilling any purpose, it won’t matter if it is aesthetically pleasing.
Taking inspiration from the web
Many successful websites don’t have much when it comes to design, but they are successful because they are so great at fulfilling their purpose and function. They know how to optimise their site, introduce a PWA or go for a mobile app.
Take Google, for example. Their main website is still mostly a search box in the middle of an almost-empty page.
Craigslist is one of the most popular free advertising sites (it’s number one in the Shopping > Classified category according to SimilarWeb), and its design hasn’t changed much for a long time. It’s outdated and it is as a bit of an eye-sore, but it serves its purpose.
Reddit is another example. Both their website and their mobile app feature a simplistic design, without many bells and whistles. However, Reddit is one of the most popular social media sites – according to Alexa, it’s the fifth most popular site in the United States across all categories.
Reddit doesn’t need to be aesthetic. It’s designed for reading, and their simple design is best for that purpose.
Reddit’s recent redesign cleans up the site, gives it a modern look and makes it more aesthetically pleasing without interfering with its simplicity, functionality and ease of use.
The same main essential functions are still in place – threads from SubReddits you are subscribed to appear on the left side of the page, the button for creating a new post is on the right side, your profile and inbox are in the upper-right corner, and homepage search filters are in the upper-right area.
Even the old site, which looks quite outdated, is still preferred by many users and can be accessed at old.reddit.com.
This shows you that you can update your design without changing the way users navigate and use the site.
Of course, if you are focusing on functionality over design, your app has to be useful and fulfil a real need.
That way, even though users may not be dazzled at first glance, they will still stay around once they see the benefits of using your simple app.
Design over functionality
If you focus on design and neglect functionality, it will be a lot harder to bring in functionality in later on.
Good design won’t help you if the user experience is terrible. Users may be impressed initially, but they’ll get frustrated and delete the app if there are too many distractions or it is hard to figure out how to get things done.
While the design can always be updated, it will be hard to fit functionality into an app design that wasn’t built for it. At that point, you’ll have to make fundamental changes, which may end up ruining the work that you have already done. Make sure you check multiple UX designer portfolios before you focus on design.
The case for design
For app developers design is still essential. Google, Craigslist, and Reddit were all unique innovations when they came out.
They didn’t have to set themselves aside from the rest because their function already distinguished themselves.
However, you need to stand out from your competitors and build up a brand image, and a great way to do that is through your design.
If the function were the only thing that mattered, all e-commerce websites would look exactly the same, and all blogs would look like one another. There would be nothing to differentiate from one to the next.
That’s not to say that design should be your top priority. As mentioned above, functionality should generally be given priority.
However, if you do have the resources available, it’s worth setting aside at least some of your budget and effort into creating a unique design. It doesn’t have to be fancy; it just has to be something that reflects your brand image. You can also try gamification in business as a strategy to improve your design.
What to consider when redesigning your app
As mentioned, if you have limited resources, it’s best to focus on functionality first.
Some organisations will redesign their app in an attempt to bring back users when download and usage rates are going down.
At that point, you have to take into consideration the effects of creating an entirely new experience. This could make it difficult for existing users. These users may be used to the old design and might not welcome new changes.
Let’s go back to Reddit as an example. The new design is more aesthetically pleasing, but it doesn’t affect the primary functions of the app.
The app displays topics on the left-hand side. Clicking on a title will take you to the threat, where you can browse through comments and leave your own.
To create a new post, click on the button on the right side. You can find your inbox in the top-right corner.
You can still upvote or downvote threads on the left side of the home page. And so on.
Not only that, but Reddit gave users who prefer the old version the ability to continue using it. This way, everyone is happy. New users see an aesthetically pleasing design and old users can stick to what works for them.
What to avoid
Snapchat, on the other hand, changed the functionality of their app with their latest redesign.
The redesign moved stories together with messages. The order of the stories also got changed, making it harder for many users to find stories of the people who interested them most.
There was also the introduction of the Discover feature, where users could discover news updates about pop culture and stories from celebrities.
This led to many users complaining about how they prefer the old version. According to TechCrunch, 83 per cent of user reviews bashed the new design.
Unfortunately, there was no option for sticking with the old version; the redesign update affected all users.
According to the Verge, the redesign cost Snapchat millions of users in just a single quarter.
Conclusions and key takeaways
So, what can you take away from this article? Here are some points to consider:
● If you can only afford to focus on one, focus on functionality first.
● Where possible, create a simplistic design at the beginning that sets you apart from your competitors without allocating the majority of your resources to it.
● The design can always be updated once your app is functional.
● When upgrading your app, be wary of entirely redesigning its look. Instead, try to retain its core features, functions, and navigational settings.
Function and design go hand in hand. The need for one doesn’t negate the need for the other. It’s all about setting priorities and allocating your resources accordingly.
In 2019 the number of connected devices will continue to grow to its highest ever. With more devices and increased sensors, the amount of data generated will explode.
It will be more accessible than ever before to use data to inform everything from business intelligence to advertising. Location-based data will be more accurate than ever before. These factors will mean it be used more commonly in areas where big data can have a profound effect.
Across a wide range of industries location data and location intelligence is helping to maintain a competitive edge. It is being used to deliver insights that have previously been inaccessible.
Location intelligence is the practice of using location data to achieve business outcomes. The process uses mobile devices and sensors to visualise and enrich understanding of how devices move in the real world.
The growing amount of precise data available will provide some challenges for those in the industry.
Privacy concerns will remain front and centre as they have done for most of 2018. Data quality is still an issue that many providers need to address. Businesses will need to find an effective and seamless method of consuming and getting the most value from location data.
Here’s what we think will be the biggest challenges facing the location data and location intelligence industry.
Challenges in location data
With this in mind, what are the biggest challenges that location faces in 2019?
Consent and privacy concerns
2018 saw the introduction of GDPR in Europe. In the US the upcoming CCPA act data privacy will still be front and centre in the data community. We are quickly moving towards a world where each individual will have control over their data.
Businesses using location data will need to take a similar approach. It’s pivotal to allow the individual to take control of their data. Companies must inform users of how their data is used. They must provide clear opt-in and opt-out solutions so that transparency can be placed at the centre of the big data revolution.
Businesses that utilise location data will need to be clear on how they collect and use consumer data. Location data providers need to have a clear opt-in process that allows consumers to understand how their data is used.
Data providers should provide solutions at the point of collection which allow them to manage consent preferences all the way through to the point of data use.
Data quality and standardisation
Many businesses look at a lack of accuracy in the location data that fuels location intelligence as a big challenge for the industry.
With the growth of geodata, many new providers have offered sub-par datasets with limited accuracy. These providers often have little transparency in how their data is collected and how accurate it is. For the proper application of location data, businesses need to be able to verify the data collection methodology.
The most accurate providers will be able to verify their first-party data sets. They can provide a detailed explanation around data collection. Accuracy in location data can be useless when it is just a metre out.
To avoid these poor data sets, location intelligence solutions should actively verify and remove inaccuracies in the data. The space requires a clear and transparent process for data users to see the entirety of the process, from collection to use.
For example, Tamoco is providing an extra data set which provides a clear and transparent rating for every data point collected. Our visits dataset demonstrated the accuracy of each datapoint. It can be used by business to filter out inaccuracies. It also provides transparency, allowing the end data user to understand data collection and data methodology.
Being ready to consume the data
More industries are looking to benefit from location intelligence. It will be more critical than ever for these businesses to be ready to consume the dataset.
For some, the use of location data to understand movement patterns will be a new data source. Providing a dataset that is ready for instant consumption will be a crucial challenge for many location intelligence providers.
Another challenge will be creating a solution that allows business to combine and manipulate location data alongside current datasets. This will maximise the effect that location intelligence can have on business functions.
There will be a move towards integrated solutions that will work as a service for location intelligence. With standardisation, it will become easier for companies to ingest large amounts of location data.
Effectively cleaning and normalising the data.
Many businesses that are interested in location data have concerns when processing data. Location data can be a challenge to clean and normalise for a business’ analytics or other functions.
These challenges usually involve transforming the data into a workable format. Verifying the data is up to date, and accurate is another issue for companies using location data.
A related but slightly different challenge is being able to understand when the data is appropriate for specific analytics.
At Tamoco we are working closely with our partners to create a data source that is thoroughly verified and cleaned. Our sensor driven approach makes us industry leading concerning accuracy and provides a more precise base to clean our data for customer use.
In 2019 location data providers will need to work closely with their customers to understand the data cleansing process. They must provide standardised documentation and solutions that help partners to get the most from the data.
The potential for location data remains enormous. In 2019 challenges in data collection and processing will need to be addressed. Fine-tuning a robust process that addresses security concerns will be the highest priority. Developing and managing the standardisation of location data will be another.
Some select assets of tamoco have been acquired by pass_by, a leader in the geospatial world, in a commitment to redefining standards through AI-driven intelligence and ground truth verification.
