In website design, user experience encompasses the usability, effectiveness, and value that a site can provide its visitors. Wireframes are developed at the initial stages of the design process to validate that the user experience is intuitive and efficient when navigating the site. At this point, content is flexible and devoid of details such as color, imagery, and typography. The focus of these wireframes is to take what we learned from our discovery and strategy phases and structure the conversations and research into a visual form. Prototyping provides an interactive and engaging way for everyone involved to navigate through these wireframes and provide feedback in a contextual environment.
The rapid adoption of smartphones, tablets, and computers to interact with one’s business 24/7 has transformed the web into a responsive and dynamic platform for collaboration. To design for these complex interactions and experiences, static wireframes can sometimes fall short when attempting to demonstrating specific workflows for developers and clients to understand and conceptualize.
A working prototype brings the design to life and reveals aspects of usability for clients and designers to evaluate and improve upon while the website is still in a flexible stage. As a team, we determine the type of prototype we should build by identifying the user and focus the interaction to specific use cases. This process saves us time and involves our clients in the process from an early project stage.
With tools such as Invision, we can take our wireframes and designs, and create a functioning prototype as a better way to share work with our clients. Experiencing these interactions firsthand allows our clients to effectively communicate and comment directly on designs without navigating through long, confusing email chains. This level of transparency facilitates discussion and keeps the project moving forward.
In the past, wireframes would often be accompanied by extensive documentation to describe interactions and navigation throughout the content. Invision streamlines this process by giving our clients a way to interact with our designs in a clear and concise way without detailed annotations. With this collaborative platform, clients can provide feedback directly on our designs and we can respond to necessary changes in real time and in one place.
At Dwaiter our solutions are the direct result of a collaborative process with clients, users and our team. We are always looking to enhance our process, and prototyping offers a way to bridge the gap between design and development. With your input, we can deliver results that are beautiful and functional.