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5 Tips For a Better Android User Experience

With 97 percent of consumers indicating their purchasing decisions are influenced by an online experience, it’s evident that user experience (UX) is now inextricably linked to the overall customer experience. Just as living the brand message extends beyond the marketing department, so too, has UX extended beyond the domain of the web design and development.…

With 97 percent of consumers indicating their purchasing decisions are influenced by an online experience, it’s evident that user experience (UX) is now inextricably linked to the overall customer experience. Just as living the brand message extends beyond the marketing department, so too, has UX extended beyond the domain of the web design and development.  Moreover, a good mobile user experience is no longer a nice-to-have; it’s an expectation, as illustrated by the 89 percent of consumers who said they would switch to a competitor if a mobile experience was poor. To transform your customers into brand advocates, a positive user experience must be part of every interaction a consumer has with your brand.  Engaging a professional UI UX design agency to assist with this effort is a wise move.

Of course, sometimes the source of a poor user experience, begins with the device itself and how it is configured or maintained.  Any new computer, tablet, or smartphone feels blazingly fast right out of the box, but things eventually start slowing down over time. Sometimes it is beyond our control and could have something to do with the hardware where some of the hardware components stop functioning optimally due to stress along with wear and tear. Buying a new mobile device might be the easiest “fix” so to speak, but if you aren’t looking forward to spending all that extra money, there are some things you can actually do that may potentially help in bringing back some of that speed.

So, if you’re an Android user, here are 5 tips to optimize your mobile experience:

  1. Declutter the Home Screen – Unlike Apple where all apps are placed front and center, in Android you can choose what apps you would like to see on the home screen while hiding the rest in your app drawer. If you are the kind of person that loved placing everything on the home screen, it is perhaps time to get rid of apps that no longer spark joy. If you remove apps from your home screen, it means that your phone won’t have to display as many things at the same time and that may have a positive impact when it comes to both RAM usage and loading speed, which can make the phone start feeling faster again.
  2. Switch to a New Launcher – The other amazing Android feature is being able to change the launcher on your phone. Today, the Google Play Store is full of many different launchers and if your phone is lagging slightly or feels somewhat sluggish, you can try switching to a different launcher to see whether things speed up. The reason for this is that some launchers are packed with information of all kinds. While that might be useful for some people, if you have a lower-end device that is either not as powerful or does not have as much RAM, this may end up translating to a detrimental experience. If you do not need all that information, you can even switch back to the default phone launcher or try finding a different launcher that is not as resource intensive. Whether you want to play Call of Duty on Android or just simply gamble online in India via a simple app – this will help.
  3. Use Lite Apps – The fact that there are numerous low-end Android devices means that there are developers that are actively making efforts to create “lite” versions of their apps. Lite apps have been designed to be significantly less resource intensive for the phones with lower-end hardware. While those apps may sacrifice some features in the process, you may consider giving it a look to find out whether those are compromises that you are comfortable with. Fortunately, there are already several lite apps already in existence for some of the most popular apps such as Instagram Lite, Messenger Lite, YouTube Go, Gmail Go, Skype Lite, Facebook Lite, Twitter Lite, and so on. You may also consider using third-party versions of apps since they are sometimes actually better optimized than the official version.
  4. Don’t Auto-Sync Your Apps – You might be surprised by the number of apps that automatically sync in the background. That’s actually not too bad since it means that any time you launch the app, it will have the most current information ready for you. That said, with all these background processes running, it may also lead to your phone consuming more resources than you would probably prefer. Disabling the auto-syncing feature can also help with memory management, which means that rather than having all your apps sync automatically in the background, you should only pick and choose the apps most important to you that you would like to always be updated and disabling the rest.
  5. Stop Using Antivirus Software – Not having antivirus software on your Android device might sound scary, but unless you have a high-end device with a lot of RAM and is capable of multitasking effortlessly, sometimes antivirus apps end up actually doing more harm than good. Preventing your phone from being infected by malware is also relatively easy. Ensuring that you only get apps from legitimate sources such as Google Play is one of the ways you can protect yourself since Google Play has its own built-in projections. Not opening suspicious looking emails, not clicking on shady links, and not downloading weird attachments from people that you don’t know can go a long way towards ensuring that your phone isn’t infected.

A transformational user experience must be fully aligned with a brand’s story and strategy.[tweet] 

Marketers who are innovating and transforming the customer experience understand that UX goes far beyond digital design. It’s a sales enablement tool, an opportunity to create customer experiences that engage and delight, and a vital subset of the overall customer journey. In order to create an effective and revenue-generating UX strategy, you must distill your brand story down to six seconds.

If you’re looking for more tips on formulating your UX, transforming your mobile marketing, or creating winning digital strategies, subscribe to the TopRight blog! Or connect with me on Twitter and on LinkedIn.  You can learn more about how to bring simplicity, clarity, and alignment to your brand’s story, strategy, and systems in our best selling book: Marketing, Interrupted.

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