Improving the mobile user experience

The Mobile User Experience (MEX) event held in London earlier this month saw mobile experts from rival companies coming together in seminars and lectures to discuss improvements to handsets. It was a bit like being back at university.

Delegates suggested there was a lot to learn from other industries, such as the car and airline businesses. “Car makers have whole teams working on getting the right door-thud sound,” said Hampus Jakobssen, vice president business development at The Astonishing Tribe, one of the co-sponsors of the PMN publications event.

Another delegate pointed out that airlines were very good at surveying customers regularly.

By contrast, some mobile phone features suggest that insufficient time has been spent on creating a good user experience. Ken Blakeslee of Web Mobility Ventures, who was moderating one of the seminars, said: “I couldn’t get MMS (multimedia messaging) to work but now I have software from Shozu.com on my phone and it is easy to send a photo.”

Delegates at the event also looked at whether mobiles could use some of the information they already have built-in or available via the mobile network to respond more intelligently to a changing environment – such as day moving into night.