Zoho CRM User Experience & Interaction Design Blog

In our country, talking on mobile phone while driving is against Law. So I mostly avoid picking up calls during driving, or I pull over and pick up the call. Sometimes I wonder if I could wear a handsfree and answer the calls while I am driving.

I tried the supplied hands-free headphone with my Nokia 6233. Apart from the good quality, the hands-free headphone has two issues.

1. Wearability :- It does take some solid 30 seconds to wear it around your neck and put the two ear pieces on.

2. Mic Position :- The MIC is placed on the dongle that actually falls on the chest. This awkward position picks up other sounds rather than my voice.

I tried using the Bluetooth headsets, but they often created pain in the ear and a weird feeling that I looked  deaf. Also BT headsets has the same problem of picking up lot of wind noises when driving. So they too seemed useless.

All the highend headsets (wired and wireless) seemed to focus on quality but not on wearability. My “best” headset would feature a simple  connector with a Mic that hangs/sticks around my collar and a single ear piece. Fortunately I was able to find some, but they are often bundled with entry level headsets that feature a different connector. I am still searching for a good hands-free headset that fits my Nokia 6233.

In my opinion, a perfect hassle-free, radation free (bluetooth) hands-free headset is nothing but the ones that are bundled with the entry level headphones.  Check my sketch below.

- Rajesh Sundaram

Last month, I cleaned up a big mess of a Rat family. 6 kids and a couple. The couple escaped, but the kids lost luck. They were disposed. Lately for the past two weeks, the female mom started sneaking in and created two holes in the door yesterday night.

Unfortunately for her, Today morning, I spotted her hiding behind the window curtain. I didn’t waste a second. Quickly I closed the windows, door and pulled out an old telephone cable. Then the chase begun. She jumped, ran to the corners,tried to hide in darkest places. Then I got the idea. I grabbed the Mosquito repellent spray and sprayed on the rat when it was cornered. I guess it did some good. The rat lost it’s speed and I was able to whip the cable and slow her down. When she lost all energy and unable to walk, I took a polythene bag and captured her inside. Packed the bag firmly and walked out of the home. I then throw the bag into the street bin. Rat-Taa-taa!!!

I do not hate animals. But  rats, is a different story.The amount of damage they did to my computer cables, TV box, the cartons and the doors!! That is totally unforgivable.  No wonder.. people don’t like rats.

Recently I am receiving emails from phone service providers asking me to switch to eBills (aka Bills via Email). The main reason they say is “Save Trees, Save paper, Save Environment”. But I suspect the main reason is - to cut the cost on their front. Though the underlying idea is good. Why don’t they start with themselves? Why dont they cut short the usage of paper in their offices? Did you ever notice how much print materials like pamphlets, slips, banners, posters etc go waste, whenever they run a campaign ? If they can cut that cost, they can save millions.

Another problem I see when switching to EBills is - Address proof. Most of the BSNL bills are used as address proof and for reimbursment claims. Submitting a ebill (taken as a print out) is not accepted by the Income Tax dept. So I am not going to support the eBill, unless the I.T dept comes up with a policy to accept bills in the form or print-outs.

Instead of asking users to switch to eBills, let those corporates correct  their own policy for using paper.

- Rajesh Sundaram

At Zoho, I am using Truespace 3D to create some complex icons. The version I am using is - Truespace 3 which is almost 4-5 years old. But that is not the matter. v3 is  free to download and use. Recently, after acquired by Micorosoft, Truespace has announced that their latest Release 7 is completely free too. Though I have not installed it yet, I would give a shot in the near future.

When it comes to design icons, 3D software would save more time by helping to create perfect geometric objects with good  lighting and  angle. Below you can see one icon I created for a local presentation and another icon (retouched in photoshop) for “Customization” metaphor. I was able to do these two in 30 mins appx.

It requires a steep learning curve, but once mastered it is the CorelDraw of 3D. True to what it’s fans call.  I’d definitely recommend Truespace to anyone who wish to use a free 3D software!

Download Truespace : www.caligari.com

One of the recent updates in Zoho CRM is the “Change / Choose Owner” User interface. The user interface can now filter users into Active Users, Deactivated users and All users. Also the search option is now tweaked and performs better than the earlier search. Attached is the screenshot.

- Rajesh Sundaram

If there are any features that I would like to see in Firefox is - The ability to select a word and tell the browser to attach a “.com” to it and go to that site. Many articles, writeups, text in the web mention some name (brands, site names) but without proper links. I am too lazy to copy the text and search in google and then click on a search result.

This feature should also cover the texts which are not given as links. My idea is - the feature should be intelligent enough to identify if the selected word/text ends with a “.com / net / org ” and then it should add an item in the “right-click” menu as shown in the picture. This would save some precious time for busy browsers.

- Rajesh

Kebab Court - This one is located on top of Kalinga Dy-”nasty” restaurant, in the 100 ft road velachery.

A while back our team paid a visit to Kalinga and it proved to be a mediocre experience. The taste was just okay and the quantity is below average. This led to zero-satisfaction.

Yesterday I visited Kebab Court hoping that I can get some good authentic kebab experience. To my surprise I found Chinese food items in the menu. I thought KC specializes only in kebab. But this one is a MC restaurant.

The menu is exotically written, I mean the quality of writing is good. Every menu item has a short description along with a price tag that will make your heart to miss a beat. And remember, the price EXCLUDES 4% vat and 10% service charges.

The interiors are mostly contemporary with some designs that resemble a rural atmosphere. The uncomfortable 4 person tables along the glass windows are must-avoided. Occupy a table with normal chairs.

Hospitality is good and clearing for plates/cups are very prompt.

I ordered a Chicken Lollipop to check the chinese cuisine and Chicken Biryani and Chicken Shorba from the Indian cuisine. I must admit that my stars are on the downside. The one piece of Lollipop was improperly fried, the biryani is bland (must be a readymix preparation) and Shorba is not all that good.

I just wondered whether should I have opted for specialty lucknowi dishes instead of the usual ones. Anyway, the food is not good. Below average.

As I didn’t try many dishes in Kebab Court, I am unable to conclude anything on the quality and taste of the food. May be some time later, If I ever get another chance, I will post a detailed review. Summing up Kebab Court and Kalinga proved to be a costly experience offering mediocre food. Expensive dis-satisfaction.

Rating 2 / 5

Sometimes blind-shooted emails from marketing companies are useful. Two days back I received such an email to my personal ID. It was sent by a multi-brand laptop dealer in chennai. I was about to trash it, but just wanted to see the price list of the models. One of the model (a HP laptop) was tagged with Rs.27 K price tag. Since I was planning to buy a laptop for my wife, I decided to dig more. A quick search in HP’s website revealed that the laptop was priced around Rs.41 K. So I replied the dealer asking for the correct price.

Then later that evening, I received a reply saying the correct price is Rs.37K. There was no mentioning, whether if the price includes tax or not . So I asked them to send the complete laptop specification and a formal price quote. Today morning I received only the laptop speicification,sans the price quote. Boy! that was “awesome”. I wish I had not replied to that mail two days back. I lost interest in the HP laptop and this dealer. My next choice would be Fujitsu or Dell.

A good pre-sales experience ensures a guaranteed sale. If you do not execute that part well, you are sure to lose a customer, eventually lose your business too. Today, time is money. If you delay or take long time to respond, assume that your sales opportunity is slipping away.To turn a lead into sale, make sure you attend them properly. Find out what they want, offer your options that would suit their requirement, and be QUICK!!.  Throw some offers if possible,  to ensure the lead to turn into a sale. HP lost a sale because of their dealer’s in-adequate response.

Remember, good pre-sales  experience is one important factor that increases the chances of turning a lead into a sale. And a good after-sales experience is another factor to maintain a loyalty-base and return customers. Both are important for a product/brand to survive. If you screw one, you are lost.

- Dharma

PS Balaji of Zoho Sales, is an ardent fan of Smartphones. Everytime when a new smartphone is launched, he buys one. Except iPhone all his smartphones are running on Windows Mobile, right from the age old iMate, till the new HTC.

My experience with all the windows powered smartphones are not always happy. The first and foremost thing that annoys me is the performance. All the OMAP processors run extremely slow creating an impression that the mobile phone was hanged during operation. Then opening an application is another PITA. It behaves typically like a desktop and I wonder if anyone on the move can wait for that long? And another design flaw is using the Stylus. Without a stylus I am unable to touch the corners of the touch-screen. Again it is a PITA to point your nail and press the extreme corner of the touch-screen. It is a design flaw on both sides - Microsoft and Mobile Phone manufacturers. Why don’t they provide a Masking area? so that the UI doesnot flexes out to the corners-to-corners. Windows for Mobile is pathetic when comes to performance because of it’s hardware dependency. Unless intel or AMD creates a mobile phone processor that has some good power to run Windows efficiently, Windows Mobile will not catch up the heat.

- Rajesh Sundaram

The recent re-design of cnet.com is a pleasant surprise to me. cnet.com has switched to a new all-dark theme similar to IGN and many other hardware sites. For some strange reasons i feel the design is inspired by iphone’s look. May not be true.. but there is a chance that there is some iphone look infuence. Earlier I used to see a lot of contents per-page. But now, the contents has been reduced and the overall site looks chic! I don’t have much experience with the new site. But as far it goes.. I’d say the cnet.com is chic, clean and good.

And yes, there are some noticeable issues too. One prominent issue I faced is, the download  does not start automatically. Nor there is a direct link to download. I am sitting behind a firewall and this could be the reason, but why not give a direct link. Their help documentation says, scrolling past the sponsored ads will reveal the software developer’s site or download link. But the new design doesnt show any thing. If they could provide a direct download link, it would be very useful for people like me, who are sitting behind a corporate firewall. 

- Rajesh Sundaram