Designing for Digital

Most companies consider strong product management to be the “glue” that holds together products as they are being conceived of and built, and most companies treat product management as either a marketing or an engineering activity. But modern startups like Airbnb and large corporations like JetBlue or Starbucks have proven that industry disruption is possible not by focusing on adding features or just improving sales, but instead by focusing on providing deep, meaningful engagement to the people that use their products or services. This engagement is achieved by designing products that seem as though they have a personality, or even a soul. These products feel less like manufactured artifacts and more like good friends.
Design doesn’t refer only to aesthetics or usability, although these are things consumers are most likely to notice or appreciate. Design is both a noun and a verb. It can mean the visual or tactical quality of a product, as well as the process by which products are conceived. Design is a more comprehensive way of thinking about people and human behavior than engineering or marketing. It is a product development process that uses empathy with a community of potential consumers in order to identify problems to solve. Design leverages a certain way of thinking in order to infer solutions to those problems that will have meaningful emotional appeal, and a strong market fit.
In this talk, you’ll learn how to apply that process yourself using these four steps:
- Identify product/market fit, by seeking signals from communities of users
- Identify behavioral insights, by conducting ethnographic research
- Sketch a product strategy, by synthesizing complex research data into simple insights
- Define the product details, using visual representations to simplify complex ideas

This is part of the Designing for Digital Conference.  Learn more at www.designingfordigital.com.

Last year, the New York Public Library established a new department- Department of Digital Experience. With a wide reaching range of services- from cultural programs, education programs, exhibitions, and traditional library services, the NYPL has begun to shape a digital strategy that will serve literacy students, educators, researchers, tourists, families and more. The new department supports existing programs and services, and will explore new opportunities for applications of digital technologies to improve and enhance customer service, program operations, user experience and access to information.

Frank Migliorelli, an experience designer who took the reigns as Director of Digital Experience last July, will talk about the challenges he’s uncovered as this new initiative helps to transform one of the world’s largest library systems. From redeveloping a new website, the approach to digitizing and activating a vast group of collections and archives, and bringing interactive, digital experiences to a traditional artifact-based exhibit program, he’ll share his ideas of creating user experiences that will not only transform NYPL’s on-line world, but also impact and enhance the digital/physical connection between our customers, the famous lion flagship building, the branches, and the NYPL community all over the world.

 

This is part of the Designing for Digital Conference.  Learn more at www.designingfordigital.com.