\ud83d\ude80 Table of contents<\/strong> <\/p> Brands like to talk about how their products can do more things than any competitor in the market. They say the products are the most \u201csophisticated\u201d and \u201cfeature-rich\u201d to the point where you might not need to buy anything else. But being loaded with numerous features and functionality often makes the product more complex than it needs to be. It either has too many buttons to clutter the aesthetic, or too few of them that you need to refer to the manual time and again. You want the product to make your life simpler, but complexity turns it into an inconvenience instead.<\/p> Simplicity has always been a valuable commodity, and even more so in an increasingly sophisticated everyday life flooded with technology. It\u2019s part of what makes a product an appealing proposition to customers. This applies not only to digital products like software or apps, but also to physical goods.<\/p> Take, for example, the original Apple iPhone released in 2007; it was a groundbreaking device that practically redefined what a smartphone could be, but with one glaring feature omission. The original iPhone didn\u2019t have a copy-paste function, when just about every other phone in the market back then, including BlackBerry, offered it.<\/p> RELATED: Designing for visual impact with your product design services company<\/a><\/strong><\/p> Long story short, the missing functionality wasn\u2019t at all a mistake or an oversight, but a deliberate omission to let the engineers focus on the core features. Apple didn\u2019t see \u201ccopy-paste\u201d as a priority, so the touchscreen interface was mainly geared toward seamless web browsing, email access, music playback, and navigation. Did users at large see the missing functionality as a drawback? Some users might scratch their heads, but Apple\u2019s decision to focus on creating an intuitive and simple user interface rather than delivering non-critical features proved to be a brilliant idea. It sold millions of devices and set the path for taking a significant market share. Moreover, the deliberate omission still today holds a valuable lesson to product managers, engineering design experts<\/a>, and designers that simplicity wins customers.<\/p> Users want a product that\u2019s easy to use. Even when the product is highly sophisticated from a technical standpoint, users can appreciate how simple it is to use all its features and functionality. It makes the product more accessible, and people actually enjoy using it. And at the end of the day, simplicity increases adoption, sales, and brand recognition. Simplicity matters even more in a tech product, where sophistication can make a device difficult to operate and understand. If a product is frustrating to use, people might avoid buying it altogether.<\/p> Within the context of product development, design simplicity primarily concerns the user interface. For instance, a car is a highly complex piece of engineering with an internal combustion engine connected to a series of computers to control power delivery, fuel efficiency, infotainment, air conditioning, climate control, and a vast array of safety sensors. But a good road car still maintains a user-friendly interface design with a convenient button layout in the interior, enough storage space for practicality, and well-organized instruments for convenient driving.<\/p> Sometimes, less is more. It\u2019s easy to fall into the temptation of packing as many features as possible into a product in the hope of gaining a competitive advantage. But just because your competitors offer a new function, it doesn\u2019t always mean you need to follow suit at once.<\/p> One of the best examples of the matter is a coffee machine. There are probably dozens of popular brands and models out there. Some of them are all-in-one models (often referred to as bean-to-cup), while others are of a single-purpose type. In simple words, bean-to-cup is a combination of a coffee machine and a coffee grinder. It also often has multiple features, settings, and certainly a lot more components inside. On the other hand, a single-purpose type doesn\u2019t do as many things; you even have to purchase the grinder separately. That said, a single-purpose machine tends to make better cups of coffee consistently than its jack-of-all-trades counterparts that may be done by other consumer product companies<\/a>.<\/p> The most likely reason for the case is that a single-purpose machine focuses primarily on the core feature: brewing coffee. It has a simple user interface, thanks to the lack of numerous buttons and switches, making it easier to use. And because the designers aren\u2019t busy adding non-critical features, they can focus on the reliability, serviceability, aesthetics, materials, and cost-efficiency.<\/p> As a design principle, simplicity is applicable to just about every product in the market. A simple interface makes the product easier to understand and more enjoyable to use. If you have to introduce an upgrade by adding new features, keep in mind that an upgrade may come at a cost of making the product unnecessarily more complex than it needs to be. You may need to go back to the drawing board, perhaps to plan for a redesign that can minimize the negative impact.<\/p> RELATED: How CAD turns your idea into a prototype for CAD design companies & freelance services<\/a><\/strong><\/p> According to Dieter Rams, a German industrial design expert<\/a> whose most notable works include the Braun SK4 Radiogram and the Vits\u0153 606 Shelving System, good design is honest. Rams further explains that an honest design doesn\u2019t make the product more powerful, valuable, or innovative than it really is. And it doesn\u2019t try to manipulate consumers with unrealistic promises.<\/p> With so many options available in the market, customers have become more resourceful and selective when purchasing a product. Armed with a better insight into product specifications, manufacturers, and price comparisons, people are actively searching for products they can trust; they look for brands that can offer real value, display a penchant for empathy, and place emphasis on honesty.<\/p> Designing a product with little care for honesty and empathy is a risky path to brand growth. Say the product makes it to market launch, surrounded by a marketing campaign to tell people how great it is. Soon enough, buyers will figure out the product doesn\u2019t do what it promises to do or that it is overpriced considering the false promises.<\/p> Just like simplicity, trust is a commodity. When a product fails to instill trust in the customers\u2019 minds, it\u2019s difficult for the brand to recover from the bad reputation without extra effort.<\/p> Brands need to be conscious about their own products. Avoid designing a product to make it appear as if it\u2019s \u201cmore\u201d than it actually is. For example, Sony makes a lot of audio equipment, but it doesn\u2019t say that every single one of them is the best in the market. Casio makes many different calculators, but the company never claims that any of them has all the functions everybody needs. Each model serves a specific purpose, designed with a specific category of users in mind.<\/p> You can see the same practice implemented by many other product development experts<\/a> like cars, shoes, kitchen equipment, watches, computers, home appliances, and more.<\/p> Even if a product is excellent in and of itself, the lack of an \u201chonesty\u201d factor may end up hurting sales and brand reputation. A fine example of the case is the Adobe Ink and Slide, which basically is a bundle of a stylus and a ruler that works with Apple\u2019s iPad, in addition to a pair of apps that let you take advantage of all their features. While the stylus is an overall fantastic device, bear in mind that you have to subscribe to the Creative Cloud platform to be able to use the stylus and ruler to their full potential. Adobe doesn\u2019t just sell you the devices; the company sells subscriptions.<\/p> Compare that with the \u201cPencil\u201d stylus from FiftyThree, designed to work with the Paper app on iPad. In terms of physical design, both the Ink and the Pencil are as sophisticated, sleek, and modern as each other. When it comes to ease-of-use, however, the latter feels more honest as it doesn\u2019t require you to log into any subscription-based cloud service.<\/p> Honest design isn\u2019t an easy feat to achieve, but it’s not impossible either. It requires you to empathize with the users, take the experience of a product as a whole into consideration, and carry out the design process almost entirely based on those insights. An honest product design expert<\/a> is a testament to your intention to show respect for the users. Whether or not the product turns out to be perfect in every way isn\u2019t the main issue here; the most important thing is to plant the seed of trust, which perhaps is the most valuable intangible anybody can discover in a product.<\/p>
Why simplicity matters<\/h2>
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<\/figure> Honesty is still a good policy<\/h2>
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