The Mako Strategy Team on How to Create an Efficient Product Design

The product design phase is one of the most important phases and times when creating a product. Not only does the phase set out your intentions for what you want your product to be, do, and look like, but it also shows how your product will be made.

An important aspect to consider when creating an efficient product design is keeping it simple and straightforward. Not only does keeping your product design efficient help in making your product as fast as possible, but it also keeps your design goal clear and concise and the communication between yourself, the designers, and the engineers straightforward so that everyone is on the same page.

Keeping efficiency at the forefront of your product design goals will make the process of creating your product and invention quick, easy, and focused! Here are some helpful product design tips on how to create an efficient product design.

An Efficient Product Design is Backed by a Strong Idea

One of the most important things needed when creating a new product design is to have a strong idea of what you want to make. Having a general idea can help when thinking about what you want your product idea to do, but there are a lot more important aspects that come with product design than just a simple idea!

When thinking about your product design idea, make sure to keep in mind certain factors that can affect your product design idea, such as the market for your product, the audience to which you want your product to attract, and an idea about who your current competitors are.

With all of these factors in mind, you can specifically narrow down the exact idea of not only what you want your product to be but how it will be special and distinct enough from other products on the market to appeal to your target audiences.

Moreover, having a strong idea of your product design will allow you to create an efficient product design because you understand all aspects of what you want your product to do and look like. The clearer your idea of your product design will be, the more you will create an efficient product design.

The Material of Your Design Dictates Your Efficient Product Design

Another huge aspect of your product design relies on the material of your product. Not only can the material of your product hugely impact the way your product works and functions, but it will create a strong impression on your audiences when they use your product.

Having an efficient product design means understanding which materials will perform best with your product design, and understanding the exact idea of your product design and how you want it to perform, feel, and look like will all affect the considerations you make for the material of your product design.

Building an efficient product design means making a product that is efficient, and the best way to make sure that your product is efficient is to make sure that the material you choose for your product makes it easy to use and function and that it feels good to use.

Discussing with your design team about what is possible for your design is a great way to understand what is possible for your design given your product function, as well as testing out a couple of different prototypes of your product design.

Choose Functionality over Aesthetics to Make an Efficient Product Design

A huge design strategy that we love to mention and preach to our clients is to design with simplicity in mind. We also call this the ‘MVP’ method. When you create an efficient product design, you should have in mind the goal of designing something as simple as possible before focusing on the details of your product. In this case, to create a simple and efficient product design, you must prioritize focusing on the functionality of your product before the aesthetics and extras.

Although it is important to create a product that has fun and appealing details with a cool design, a product’s main purpose is to fulfil a function that will help solve a major issue, problem or inconvenience in others’ lives and make their day more efficient.

So, with this same mentality, focus your product design on creating some simple and efficient that won’t take your focus away from the purpose of your product. You may find that focusing on the details and looks of your product may distract you from creating a concise product design and achieving the ultimate goal for your product’s function.

An Efficient Product Design Requires Prototyping!

An important phase during the product design process of creating any efficient product design is prototyping. Prototyping your product design not only gives you the opportunity to test out and see different versions of your product design but also allows you to see which version and what improvements can be made to your current product design in order to make it more efficient and simple.

Through having different prototypes, you can see what works and what doesn’t and quickly fix the things that can make your product either harder to use or less efficient than it can be. Whether this means simplifying your product and removing unnecessary details or improving the overall aesthetic design and material, prototyping gives you a hands-on approach to trying out the product design that you can review in order to redesign for more efficient product design.

If you have a great new invention and you’d like to learn more about this process, get in touch with MAKO today and visit our website to find out more. Or feel free to give us a call at 1-888-MAKO, and we can set you up on a call with our Senior Product Strategist!

About: MAKO Design + Invent is the original firm providing world-class consumer product development services tailored to startups, small manufacturers, and inventors. Simply put, we are the leading one-stop-shop for developing your physical product from idea to store shelves, all in a high-quality, cost-effective, and timely manner. We operate as one powerhouse 30-person product design team spread across 4 offices to serve you (Austin, Miami, San Francisco, & Toronto). We have full-stack in-house industrial design, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, patent referral, prototyping, and manufacturing services. To assist our startup and inventor clients, in addition to above, we help with business strategy, product strategy, marketing, and sales/distribution for all consumer product categories. Also, our founder Kevin Mako hosts The Product Startup Podcast, the industry's leading hardware podcast. Check it out for tips, interviews, and best practices for hardware startups, inventors, and product developers. Click HERE to learn more about MAKO Design + Invent!