Ways to Break the Chains of Designers’ Block

Just as with writers’ block, designers experience their own design slumps and moments of lack of creativity and design inspiration.

Continue reading to see if you can tackle some of these ways to re-unleash your creativity and inspiration.

MAP YOUR THOUGHTS

Often times, designers have so many thoughts running through their mind, it can be difficult to compartmentalize them. If this is the case, mind maps are a great tool to help organize your ideas. A mind map is a visual representation of your thoughts and ideas. It can help you structure information which helps you better analyze, comprehend, and generate new ideas. Mind maps can be used in any stage of your design process and can help your creativeness flowing if used properly.

CREATE A DESIGN SYSTEM

Create a design process for yourself that helps you through each step of your design process. For example, if the first step of your design process is to choose patterns and colors, have pre-cut designs and color swatches set aside in a binder so when you need to, you can go through them to get your creativity flowing. Do this for each regular step of your design process so you can gain creativity each step of the way.

PARTICIPATE IN DESIGN EXPOS AND CONFERENCES

No one excels in their careers and expertise without attending expos and conferences. Doing so will expand your skills and networking will give you opportunities to work with key people in your field. Attending conferences and expos will also keep you abreast with latest design trends and see how other designers are mastering their trade. You will also be able to learn new techniques and strategies that will help you increase your design knowledge and skills.

SET UP A CONDUCIVE WORK SPACE

Its quite distracting to have a workspace that is cluttered and disorganized. It often leads to loss in productivity and unmet goals. Make yourself a list of what works for your work space and what is detracting from your workspace. A few ideas are to change the lighting, hang personal design pieces, and place items on your desk and in your space that speak to you.

FIND A HOBBY

Participating in a hobby and extracurricular activities can help boost workplace productivity. Refrain from going every day without a change in scenery and activity. Try a new hobby or participate in one you’re already passionate about. Breaking the mundane routine of your day will help you generate new, creative ideas.

Master these ideas and ways of driving your creativity before you ever find yourself in a design rut.

Choosing the Right Color Scheme for Your E-commerce Site and Why It Matters

Believe it or not, choosing the right color scheme can grow your ecommerce business. Make the time and effort into choosing the right colors when designing your website and you won’t regret it!

The perfect website color scheme:

• grabs attention
• engages your target audience
• gives people what they want
• turns viewers into customers
• encourages them to spread the word
• and makes people love your brand

Content is key and that also includes colors! Colors evoke emotions and are used wisely by many popular brands to entice people to buy. This goes far beyond just one main color. It’s the contrast of colors on your site and where and how they are used.

IMAGES

A critical component of ecommerce websites are product images. Images should be high quality, professional, and speak to your color scheme and brand. Let’s not forget that content is key and consumers are looking for high quality, meaningful content 100% of the time.

BUTTONS

Colors evoke emotions and actions from consumers so it’s no surprise that using the right colored buttons on your website can lead to even more conversions. Many websites use green buttons as it incites calm and peaceful feelings although if your buttons are not converting your consumers, it’s a good idea to experiment with different colors and track the results so you can choose the color that works best for your website and consumers.

BACKGROUNDS

Your website’s background color also speaks to your audience. White or light-colored backgrounds are great for ecommerce sites that list variety of products and really allows your audience to focus on the product images. Black backgrounds are also a great option for high-end or bright color products.

HEADERS

Your website should have an easily accessible header across the top of every page and making it the secondary color of your brand helps tie your website together.

If you are building a new website for your business or redesigning your current website, make sure to dedicate the time to choosing the right color scheme that will ultimately help grow your business.

The Absolute Don’ts in Website Design

Having a website for your business is key to success however, make these nine mistakes and your users are likely to head for the hills.

1. Poor navigation. Websites should deliver easy navigation on every page. If users can’t easily see where to go and how to get there, they’ll quickly head over to your competitor’s website. Place your navigation bar on the top of the page so it’s always visible and easy to get to.
2. Slow server times. Online users will wait only four seconds before they’re on to the next website! Don’t lose customers because your load time is slow. Work with your website designer to make sure your site and server are conducive to quick loading times.
3. Orphan pages. Every page on your website should have a link that takes your users home. Commonly, many websites link their logo image, usually in the upper left corner of the page, to their home page. This gives easy access to get back home.
4. Disabled back button. Nothing is more frustrating than being on a website that doesn’t allow you to use the back button. This is a sure way to get your users moving to your competitor’s website and they’ll remember not to go back.
5. No easily accessible contact information. Plain and simple, customers want to know they can contact you at any given moment. No contact information or hard to find contact information, sends a message of lack of service. Every page of your website should have your contact information.
6. Broken links. Your website should be regularly maintained for broken links. Every link on your site should be functioning and taking your users where you intend for them to go.
7. Outdated. Content is key, and the importance of content isn’t going anywhere any time soon. Dedicate one person on your team to keeping your site current with fresh, new content. Your business is sure to lose credibility if your content is dated and not updated regularly.
8. Too busy. Part of branding includes design, style, and fonts that are concise and cohesive. Sites shouldn’t contain more than three fonts and each piece of content should be in line with your branding. Consistency sends a message to users that your business and brand is stable and strong.
9. No links to social sites. Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter aren’t going anywhere anytime soon and are a great way to advertise your business. Make sure you provide links on your website that directs users right to your social sites.

Avoid these nine mistakes and your website will be on the right track to driving your business to success.

Steps to Start Your Blogging Journey Today

So you’ve finally decided to get on the blogging train, but you’re not exactly sure where to start. Follow these steps to get you on your way to blogging in no time!

Select a Blogging Platform

There is a wide selection of blog platforms to choose from. Tumblr, Weebly, Squarespace, and Wix. But the one that stands out above all the rest is WordPress. WordPress is user friendly, customizable, and FREE. Other good reasons to use WordPress is that there are 5,000+ free and paid themes available to make your design top-notch, they have a helpful forum and over 45,000 plugins to help your blog run more smoothly and efficiently. And the fact that 91% of blogs are running on WordPress is reason alone – that 91% knows there’s something good about WordPress.

Select a Domain Name

Choosing the right domain name is important for a few reasons. Your domain will create a first impression among your website visitors, it will affect your search engine ranking, and it will define your brand. You should take careful consideration in selecting the right domain name for your website. When brainstorming and selecting your domain name choose something that will be easy to brand, keep it simple and concise, and make sure it’s easy to type and pronounce. Each of these factors will make a big difference on the long-term impact of the success of your blog.

Choose a Website Host

You’ll need a good website host to house all your site’s files, so your blog is accessible to everyone. Without a host, your website will be inaccessible to both you and your readers. When choosing your host, take your time researching various hosts. Some hosts appear to have low monthly fees while secretly, they are charging a myriad of hidden feeds, have poor customer service, and cause your blog site to run slow.

Install Web Platform

After you’ve chosen your host and set it all up, make sure to install your blog platform. If you’ve chosen to use WordPress, WordPress has recommended Bluehost for web hosting for quite some time so the two should work very well together.

From this point forward, you can now choose your blog theme in your platform and begin customizing the blog of your dreams!

Is My Site Due for a Redesign? Ask Yourself These 7 Questions

If you’re feeling like it might be time to update and redesign your website, you’re probably right. But here’s 7 questions you can ask yourself to make sure it’s the right time.

1. Is my bounce rate high?

A bounce rate is a measurement of how many users landed on your website, but left before ever clicking on another page. So they came, looked quickly, and left. If you’re struggling with conversion rates, this must be resolved!

2. What is my site’s load time?

A startling 40% of customers will abandon a website if its load time is longer than 3 seconds. 3 seconds doesn’t seem long, but it is long in the world of consumerism. Consumers want to immediately get to where they’re going and if your site is slow, they’re quick to move on to the next.

3. Is my site mobile friendly?

Almost 50% of web traffic comes from mobile phones. Many consumers conduct research and transactions directly from their phones. Within seconds of a consumer going to your site, if it is not mobile friendly, they will leave your site and move on to your competitor. It is not worth risking a great loss of potential consumers.

4. Do my competitors have newer websites?

With easy web access in the palm of their hands, many consumers spend time researching companies and picking out what they need before ever making a purchase or stepping foot in a store front. Therefore, if your competitors have better, newer websites than yours, those consumers are likely to give their business to them. Don’t lag your competitors simply because your site isn’t updated!

5. Does my site offer a valuable user experience?

Content is key! Consumers want valuable and meaningful content that is applicable to them! Don’t just add fluff to your site to fill space. Consumers will easily see through this and ditch your site for your competitors. Focus on developing content specific for your target audience and it will pay off!

6. Is my web platform easy to manage?

If it difficult to make updates, revisions, or other changes to your website, it might be time to get a new web platform with your redesign. Changes, updates, and revisions should be simple and you should be able to make them yourself without having to get a third party involved!

7. Is my site more than 5 years old?

Sometimes, it seems the only consistent thing is change. Because technology capability, design, and functions change frequently, chances are, if your site is 5 years old without any updates or refreshing, your site is extremely outdated.

Hopefully answering these questions have helped you identify if your website needs to be redesigned and critical pain points that need to be resolved when developing and designing your new website.

 

 

 

5 Best Practices to Consider When Developing Push Notifications

As consumers, we know push notifications can be annoying, but as business owners, we love them. As business owners, how do we make our consumers respond to our push notifications?

Continue reading for best practices on push notifications.

RELEVANCE:

For push notifications to make an influence, they must be relevant and of value to your customers. A large portion of users will delete an app based on poor notifications. When developing your push notifications ask yourself, is this of value to our users? Is this relevant to our users? Will this be seen as spam?

PERSONALIZATION:

Messages that are personalized like using the user’s name, increases your chances of getting them to open the notification. In addition to personalizing, the notification text itself should be short enough that it fits within the notification box. Any longer and you risk losing your users’ interest.

TIMING:

Don’t spend your time and energy on developing push notifications only to send them at the wrong time. It seems obvious, but still, some developers and marketers are sending push notifications at times that make it easy for users to ignore and miss altogether. Sending notifications at night could mean waking up a user and irritating them or their phone is on silent and the notification is missed entirely.

The best times for notification engagement are mornings from 7-10am and nights from 6-10pm. Use this knowledge to your advantage and schedule your notifications during these times. In determining your best windows for engagement, it’s also a good idea to analyze your users specifically.

CALL TO ACTION:

Push notifications should direct your users to a specific page within your app and not just to the homepage. If users take the time to click on your notification, they want to know that it was worth their while.

STRATEGIZE:

Notifications should not be created, developed, or deployed without having an actual strategy in place. Don’t just blindly send notifications into the abyss and hope they get seen and opened by your users. Develop goals you want to achieve with your push notifications like getting “x” number of users to sign up for a service or your email list. The strategy shouldn’t end here. Test your notifications and the results you see to fine tune your strategy. You might learn that your messaging isn’t right or the messaging is right, but your process afterward has more steps than your users care to follow. Also, make sure to continually analyze and test your notification strategy to keep up with your users’ preferences.

Don’t Miss the Boat: Digital Advertising Trends in 2018

It’s critical to the success of your business to stay ahead of 2018’s best digital advertising trends or you risk falling quickly behind. These trends are sure to carry us into 2019.

Digital advertising is the use of technology to market your products to your customers. Specifically, through digital media, mobile phones, and the internet. Not to be confused with advertising via TV commercials or radio ads.

DIVERSITY

What is a digital ad without diversity? In today’s world, diversity is a hot topic and can be used to bring people together and feel connected to your brand. Digital ads connect deeper to customers when they bring diversity to the forefront. Not only diversity in the way we look, but the way we act and think as well.

BUILD BRAND LOYALTY

Gone are the days of using old advertising and sales pitches. Consumers are unlikely to fall for them. It’s time to get creative! Create ads that allow customers to learn and know your brand, so they feel connected and feel loyal to it. You might even consider creating an ad that very minimally mentions or shows your product. If you use people in your advertising, use regular every-day people your customers can relate to.

AUGMENTED REALITY

Augmented reality allows companies to use something that already exists but use it in a way for customers to see for themselves how certain products will look and fit into their lives and homes. Furniture and design brands are using augmented reality to do just that.

NATIVE ADS

Native advertising meets the need of being subtle, yet informative. Native ads are paid for by a company but placed into a digital content stream like websites and social feeds so the content fits in seamlessly and feels natural. 25% more users read native ads than they do traditional ad banners and 97% of mobile media buyers reported that native ads helped them achieve their brand goals. Those two reasons alone are reason enough to use native ads.

MOBILE VIDEO

Based on Cisco studies, it’s anticipated that by 2019, 80% of the world’s internet traffic will be video based. So don’t hesitate to incorporate various forms of videos when advertising your business. You’re better off getting started in the trend now!

Get ahead of these trends now and perfect them to make the most of your digital advertising.

 

 

5 Reasons a Mobile-Friendly Website is Critical to Success

When developing your website, you must consider its compatibility to smart phone users. Otherwise, you risk isolating and losing a sizable portion of your target audience.

Here are 6 reasons why you should go mobile-friendly or go home!

Mobile Internet Users

In early 2017, mobile devices accounted for almost 50% of web page views world-wide. While this number is world-wide, the American and European numbers alone are much higher! Many users conduct transactions directly from their phone bypassing a desktop computer altogether. If your website is not mobile-friendly, customers will turn away to your competitors within seconds.

Mobile Use is Continually on the Rise

The average cell phone users spend over four hours on their phone each day. That’s four hours of time you can put your business in front of every customer, every day. If you place a social media ad that directs customers to your site, but your site isn’t mobile-friendly, you may as well kiss your customers goodbye.

Google – A Phone Book in Your Palm

Nearly 60% of Google searches are performed on a mobile device and every year, the percentage of mobile users increases while the percentage of desktop users decrease. Customers, within seconds, can find your business on their phone. Having a mobile-friendly website will only increase the chances that they’ll choose your business.

Millennials are Mobile

Millennials are the most technologically advanced generation. That being said, they are the next generation of consumers. Businesses must gear their advertising and websites to the millennial audience or put themselves at risk of failure.

Internet Access

In addition, for many people, a mobile phone is their only means of internet access and is also their preferred method for using the internet. A mobile phone can be used on the go, in front of the TV, while you’re cooking in the kitchen, you name it! A mobile user is offered much more flexibility to use their phone.

If these reasons haven’t convinced you to have a mobile-friendly website, we don’t know what will!

4 Key Ingredients for the Best Web Design Experience

The web designer/client relationship will be most successful if collaboration is at the top of the priority list. Enhance your collaboration efforts using the information below.

AUDIENCE

A recurring theme in the web design arena is audience. Audience, audience, audience! Who is your audience? What are their demographics? What are their needs? Understanding your audience will better help you and your web designer to make decisions about the design, usability, and interface of your website.

TRUST

What is any relationship without trust? Believe it or not, trust between you and your web designer is at the core of a successful relationship and website. Give your web designer the opportunity to learn your business inside and out. This will enable them to make the best decisions for your design and keep consistency throughout.

In addition, you, as a client, must be able to feel comfortable in being open and honest with your web designer. And of course, trust doesn’t exist without open communication. Meetings should be held weekly to keep all parties up to date on tasks and deadlines. In addition to those weekly meetings, correspondence between client and web designer should occur between those weekly meetings. Having an open, honest environment will help all parties feel more at ease and comfortable in communicating with each other for the ultimate website design.

GOALS

Goals will be hard to meet if 1, they are not expressed, and 2, they are not agreed upon. Goals should be outlined and discussed in the preliminary design meetings. This will help limit any surprises in the future. Also, keep in mind that over the course of the design creation, conversations will arise and goals will adjust and shift. This will only make your website better.

DOCUMENTATION

Mapping your initial design and ideas will help foster a collaborative relationship. Giving both parties an opportunity to discuss their vision and any changes they see fit. This gives the perfect opportunity for open dialogue leading you and your designer on the road to a successful outcome and enjoyable experience.

Important Questions to Ask Your Potential Web Designer

As you would expect, the company you hire to develop and design your website can make or break your experience and the quality and functionality of your website.

Continue reading for important questions to ask your potential web designer.

What is your site build process?

Do you want a designer who is brand new to the field? Or a designer that has years of experience? The answer they give you regarding their site build process is sure to let you know what their level of experience is. Experienced web designers know their site build process by heart and with their eyes closed, they will be able to recite their process without referring to any materials. An experienced designer will be able to map out your site’s build process according to your due date and will keep the ball rolling to meet applicable deadlines.

Can I contact previous clients for testimonials?

An obvious red flag answer to this question is that they don’t have any clients you can contact for testimonials. If this is the case, run! An experienced web designer will happily and proudly provide you with referral contacts so you can obtain the information you need to make your hiring decision.

When is your next available design date?

Designers typically shouldn’t be immediately available to start your project today or even tomorrow! A good, experienced, reliable designer is already working on a client’s design and will be able to schedule you out in 1-3 weeks. On the same note, if you have a deadline of when you need to begin your website design, start looking a month in advance!

Do you outsource any of your work?

It is uncommon to find a single designer that can do everything asked of them like custom fonts, illustrations, logo design, and copywriting. A good designer will know their areas of expertise and know what needs to be outsourced and to who. Find out what they will outsource and where the work goes. If they outsource out of the country, you may want to do more homework before you make your final hiring decision.

How do I complete continued site maintenance?

While some designers will complete maintenance on your behalf for a fee, others will turn the reigns over to you so you can continue your own site maintenance. Whatever the case, just make sure the completion of future maintenance is something you’re comfortable with.