Month: August 2012

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly – Skeuomorphs

What is common among (most) cigarette filters, copper rivets on jeans, the UI of iCal in Mac and the 89-metre pylons at each end of the Sydney Harbour Bridge?

They have design elements that serve no practical purpose.

  • Cigarette filters are printed to look like cork — an allusion to an era of carefree smoking, when the biggest worry women smokers had was smeared lipstick.
  • Most rivets that you see on jeans are just decorative and functionally useless (some even covering the functional rivets underneath).
  • The UI of iCal as seen on Macs has references to functionally useless design elements like leather stitching, torn paper etc.
  • And believe it or not, the twin 89-metre pylons at each end of the Sydney Harbour Bridge  do not support anything; they are functionally useless. They are there only to frame the structure for aesthetic reasons.

These are examples of what are called as ’Skeuomorphs‘ (pronounced SKEW-a-morphs). In simple terms, Skeuomprph is an approach to design that uses design elements which serve no specific function but are purely ornamental/emotional/metaphorical in their roles.

This S-word apparently is one of the most debated trends currently in design. The interesting thing about Skeuomorphs is that, once you are aware of them, they start popping out from everywhere around like:

  • Physical Skeuomorphs: fake windows and vents that don’t open, the hubcaps on car wheels that have no functional relevance,
  • Digital Skeuomorphs: the Folder icons on your desktop, the iBooks & iCal UI in Macs,
  • ‘Experiential’ Skeuomorphs: digital page turning that mimics the physical experience, and
  • Aural Skeuomorphs: theshutter release sound in a digital compact camera, the recorded sound clip that gets played each time you Empty Trash on mac, etc

Apparently most things Apple are very infamous examples of the Skeuomorphic design philosophy. Designers who hate Skeuomorphs do so as they find them distracting, and gimmicky often limiting real innovation. Proponents of Skeuomorphs however argue that they create familiarity and build a human element in our interaction.

I tend to take both sides of the argument. While I definitely am not a big fan of designs that limit possibilities in new mediums on account of their outdated references, I tend to believe that when executed well, Skeumorphs can play a very meaningful role in fostering an effortless level of user (or viewer) interaction (or perception).

My 3 favorite Skeumorphic design examples:

1. The concept of a Shopping Cart in e-commerce sites: While this is obviously a reference from (a bygone?) era of brick and mortar shopping, it nevertheless makes us easy to understand and relate to what we are doing. Can you think of any other simple, logical and a more compelling way of designing this element ‘in tune with the times’? I can’t.

2. Nest Thermostat: Touted to be the most innovative thing that ever happened to thermostats, its design is based on a deceptively simple yet alluring concept of the analog knobs. Do they necessarily need to have the ‘knob’ interface? No. But do they serve any specific purpose? You bet! See the  video here:

And lastly – my most favorite example:

3. Skeuomorphs as a powerful metaphor in advertising: In 2009, Transitions – the first company to commercialize and manufacture plastic photochromic lenses –  had a 30s TV spot. See below.

Do I get it? May be yes/May be no.

Now in early 2012, they introduced what they called as ‘Adaptive Lens Technology’ through a 30s ad. See below.

Do I get it? Hell yes! The concept of a ‘control knob’ is a brilliant metaphor that drives the point home with merciless clarity, engages me and potentially persuades me in just 30s- all this because I… I just get it! I understand how exactly these lenses feel like. Thanks to the obvious Skeuomorph!

Can you think of any other brilliant/ bad examples of Skeuomorphs?

PS: I agree, they should have thought a simpler word for this 🙂

Experiments in Branding – Of Buskers and Bud

CDZA is a NYC based band that creates musical video experiments.

Short for “Collective Cadenza”, the group is composed of 3 key members – a ‘video guy’, an ‘audio guy’ and a ‘music guy’ who get together and weave concepts that intertwine musical genius with slapstick comedy. Result: kick ass viral marketing savvy! Every other Tuesday, the band uploads a unique musical – ‘An Opus’, that almost instantly goes super viral, gets shared phenomenally and gets talked about in blogs and pop media alike.

What keeps CDZA interesting is that no two videos have been of the same kind to date. Each performance has been a unique experiment in creativity and musical craftsmanship infused with a liberal dash of humor. (eg: NYC Phoneharmonic – A wondrous orchestral medley of the iconic ringtones belonging to cell phone companies, History of Lyrics that aren’t lyrics – that takes us through 46 years of musical history through 20 songs with no lyrics!, Zuckerberg – the Musical etc)

Their latest performance – The Human Jukebox, Opus No. 9 –  was an experiment that stood out to me for a very interesting reason: the idea of giving ‘power’ to the consumer and watch them bask in sheer delight. See their performance here:

While I salute the sheer musical genius of the artists, what appeals to me in this experiment is what it successfully brings to life –  an enterprise that enables customers to have a degree of influence over the outcome. Result: consumers themselves become the owners of the experience!

The story can only go oneway in such circumstance – consumer delight and advocacy – every marketer’s wet dream. Let’s see another example.

Every Beer brand loves to own the Happy Hour. But how do you do it? Especially when you are a new entrant in a market with the incumbent being present for over a 100 years? Recently, Budweiser saw itself in this position in Ecuador. So what did it do? It installed a Budclock: 

This ‘ambient execution’ brilliantly brought to life the idea of “Happy hours never end with a Bud”, while empowering its consumers to stretch the Happy Hours by over 6000 minutes and thereby touched more than 50,000 people (and counting) with a phenomenal increase in sales. (source)

What again stood out for me here was the sheer delight – that ‘aha’ moment – a consumer is gifted with, each time they realize that they are able to add another minute to the Happy Hour. Result: The consumer owns the Happy Hour (not the pub). Thanks to Bud!

In each of these examples, what stands out is the magic that unfolds when the consumer realizes that she has a degree of influence over the outcome. As a result, she almost begins to own the (branded) experience and once that happens the story can only have one ending – Consumer Delight and Brand Advocacy.  

Do you know of any other examples that brings this to life?

The IKEA Effect

Betty Crocker learnt it the hard way, but it was arguably one of the first to know it.

It’s a classic case study – a number of years ago Betty Crocker had noticed their consumers feeling a bit guilty to be using its Instant Cake Mixes. Since all they needed to do was add water before putting in the oven in order to make a cake, it gave them a feeling of not working enough to show their love and care for their family. So what did Betty Crocker do? It made the process of cake making a ‘bit more complicated’. Betty Crocker changed its recipe in such a way that it requires the consumer to add an egg as well! Result? The mixes began to get sold like hot cakes! The secret? It was found that the consumers liked the new cake mixes better, because the slightly ‘complicated’ process (of adding an egg) made them feel that they were actually contributing something to the meal.

The insight: Things seem better if you have to work for it. Apparently a name has been coined for this off late and it’s called The IKEA Effect –  essentially it refers to the disproportionate sense of pride and ownership that we feel for objects on which we have lavished our own labor, however intrinsically simple the work, like say assembling a piece of IKEA Furniture.

Dan Ariely from HBS is one of the co-authors of the paper titled by the same name. Following is a 5 mins video of him expounding a bit further on this theory:

Things indeed seem better if you have to work for it. Fantastic Delites – an Australian Snack Foods brand recently used this insight to device a vending machine. The following video shows the concept it greater detail. This was part of their integrated campaign called “How Far Will You Go For Fantastic Delites?”

The IKEA Effect is busy at work in the digital sphere too. Let’s take Pinterest, the online pinboard that lets you organize and share things you love. It’s essentially a social network that is built over the concept of ‘content curation’. The thing here is that the user need not necessarily create her own content like say blogs or portfolios in order to pin it on their boards. All you need to do is:

  • Create and name a Pinboard
  • And just continue your browsing..
  • Should you find any pic/video of interest, just ‘pin’ it on your board

The interesting thing to note here is the process of pinning is devised to hit the sweet spot of being simple enough for anyone to follow and ‘complicated’ enough to elicit your ‘IKEA Effect’. Result? The more you pin, the more your interest, effort and time are vested in the network, making it much more valuable to you (and thereby the advertisers!).

DIY.org exemplifies it even more directly. It is essentially a digital scrap book and social network for kids.

The premise? Simple. Every parent loves her kid’s creations and loves even more to flaunt these to their near and dear –  a sketch, a piece of origami, a painting, a piece of craft – virtually anything that the kids make with their own hands. Enter DIY.org- a fantastic concept that:

  • Gets kids on board a social network in a creative / constructive way
  • Gets parents to help their kids curate the content and share it in the social network

And that’s it! You just let the IKEA Effect lose in a parent-children equation. And the magic unfolds by itself. No wonder it is chronicled by the likes of FastCompany and PSFK and slated to be one of the most potent social networking sites to watch out for.

Any other interesting examples of The IKEA Effect in action?