This week in ux-clinic: The horror of the small screen
This week in the ux-clinic discussion forum – the horror of the small screen:
“WooHoo! We just shipped a massive redesign of our online banking website. 6 months of work finally launched and we’ve been partying like mad. The bad news is that the launch was so successful, our CEO has committed us to making a mobile version of the site: cell phones, PDA, you name it, we need to design a version of the site that works on these tiny formats.
Mind you, this was never a requirement – we fought over this months ago and all agreed we wouldn’t do this. But ha ha – now we are.
Has anyone been in this situation and can give advice on how to plan/manage/shape/design so that it doesn’t suck? Our organization has never tried to do this before and I fear they’ll expect an experience as good as the full site, which is impossible.”
– Signed, The horror of the small screen
Been there, seen that.
All I can say at this point of time is to never hype up something. It makes it difficult to sell.
At my previous place, I managed to keep the expectations low by producing a prototype of what is achievable and what is not. If it can’t be demonstrated, it probably can’t be implemented.
Eventually a successful implementation for mobile users would depend on
1) the market need, and
2) the availability and capability of resources required to achieve the goal.