Microcontent Matters on Mobile: Create Good Directions

Thursday, September 12, 2013

Microcontent Matters on Mobile: Create Good Directions

Bad mobile experiences mar customers’ impressions of your brand. When designers and developers create apps and mobile experiences, they aren’t necessarily trained in the art of writing the cues for people. Brands end up with error messages that read like a computer wrote them. This mars the brand experience and annoys consumers.

Take this error message for example:

I feel like if I hit ok, a bomb will go off.

 

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And what about this one from Salesforce?  Seriously?

Writing Better Error Messages

Content strategists and writers can help mobile developers and designers create better experiences by working through textual and other content cues. Microcontent is an excellent opportunity to communicate voice and tone and therefore brand, making mobile experiences fresh and memorable.

Consider this error message from Facebook. While it’s easy to read, and I understand what I need to do, it doesn’t communicate to me in a way that feels fun and fresh, like Facebook should.

But check out this one, from the iPhone, where the user wants to download a PDF. Could this be said in any plainer English?

 

Communicating clearly helps the brand distinguish itself. Customers understand the error message and can try to find a workaround.

Look at this one from DStv.com. See how simply they explain the problem?

 

If we want to stay in business, we need to provide a user-excellent mobile experience. Learning to right great cues and microcontent is a part of delivering that fantastic brand experience.

Download our mobile glossary, so you always have the right mobile terms at your fingertips.

via Online it ALL Matters http://onlineitallmatters.blogspot.com/2013/09/microcontent-matters-on-mobile-create.html