UX Prototyping: my journey through the landscape in 2016

This is a story of my quest for a prototyping tool that can go further than Balsamiq, update faster than MS Visio and can be adopted easier than Axure.

When mocking up an online experience, there are few tools available that enable me to visualise my ideas better than a piece of paper, a solid pen and my right hand. However, once inspiration strikes and my drawing has life breathed into it, I need a piece of kit that will help me roll out interfaces for a variety of use cases.

This is where the right software helps me scale up…and fast.

I invite your thoughts and suggestions and encourage you to declare where your current preference lies.

I’d been working on an interface for an online form due to be released by a well known travel provider. The goal was pretty simple. Enable a user to make a claim for a delay to their journey caused by my client’s train service. I knew what the business requirements were and my task was to recommend a user experience that was simple, with minimal room for user error but to obtain as much detail so as to enable them to pay out compensation quickly.

One bright Sunday morning, I woke up and some minor modifications came to mind (as they do) and I was eager to get my mock-ups updated to reflect my suggestions. Having addressed a number of use cases in my work so far, I was looking at a task which required me to update a rather large number of screens in MS Visio.

Frustratingly, being a Sunday and with my software being tied to my work machine, all I could do was make notes and wait patiently to get into the office to get them visualised.

I felt a pull at my heart strings for Balsamiq, which I could log into and get updated in a matter of minutes, until I remembered that the reason I didn't use Balsamiq in the first place was because I needed something a bit more powerful to keep my backgrounds consistent.

Honestly, I was also far more competent with MS Visio and knew that I’d tackle my use cases at the speed at which my brain was working.

My heart then started seeking Axure, which I’d used a few years ago and knew would actually have helped me release a prototype that would have allowed me to address my use cases, test my prototype and modify it far quicker than I was able to now.

I am fickle, I admit.

I ended up spending my Sunday evaluating a host of other prototyping solutions in my quest for a Balsamiq / Axure / MS Visio alternative. (I recognise that this sounds rather pitiful, however, I also spent a few hours at my local market, picked up a couple of new clothes, walked along the riverside and lost a badminton game to my partner so don’t feel too sorry for me.)

Back to my research…

I made a list of core needs perceived by me:

Ease of Onboarding: I recognise that with the landscape changing so rapidly, UX bods may not have the leisure of time to train, especially when they can achieve the objective in an existing tool e.g. MS Visio, Balsamiq, Invision (with the aid of my design team) and even a plain old Sketchpad.

Visual and functional familiarity: Basic stencils and the ability to emulate essential interactions on an online estate are key. I love the fact that Balsamiq includes a library of visually familiar icons and interfaces in addition to allowing me to link up mock-ups to emulate user journeys. It didn’t, however, beat Axure’s publishing option where I would have liked to test and rework based on user interactions

Which brings me to…

Publication and sharing: I'm being seduced by Axure and Protoshare’s ability to publish mock-ups as interactive prototypes while also using it as a visual specification document! Especially as this is what Tuesday holds in store for me once I get my prototype working!

And as always, the million dollar question (or around that mark) asked by any sensible procurement bod…

Is that cost effective? Typically measured by a combination of the factors listed above and hard to justify until put into practice. This is where trial periods come in useful.

I'm not claiming to be an expert on the topic and my verdict below is based on a very brief audit of the tools in a poll that I will invite you to participate in later on.

My verdict!

I’d use a range…

…and I would do so purely based on the type of digital project my agency was in the midst of.

Brochureware websites: Balsamiq and Invisionapp

Heavier digital platform development: Axure or Protoshare

Frankly, for a lot of the work we do, all a UI designer needs is a good brief and a quick brainstorming session to establish an ideal User Experience.

Once in awhile, we come across the need to consider a more complicated user experience and this is where it can actually be more expensive in the long run if we haven’t taken the initiative to get on board with a more powerful tool.

This is where I invite your thoughts…

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My invitation

To those who work with more complex user experiences e.g. journey planners, online purchasing, social networks!

Q. What’s your prototyping software of choice?

Comment on this story and share your thoughts on the “Why”?

…and for those who are interested in how my Sunday ended, it continued into Bank Holiday Monday and I am re-doing my form in Balsamiq — currently stuck at trying to set a standard background. I already know I can do this in Axure but that pricing/adoption obstacle I mentioned earlier? Makes this weekend that much longer…