Category: Web Designing

Five Core Elements That Are Essential For Creating A Good Website Design

Introduction

If you want to create the best online presence, you need to start with a business website. It needs to be informative, engaging, and technically optimized. While most of us know what are the basics and essentials of a good website design, multiple examples on the internet show otherwise.

A good website design is essential for any business looking to-

  1. Improve its website traffic
  2. Grow customers and sales
  3. Create a brand over a period
  4. Have a successful online presence
  5. Emerge as an authority site in the niche

In this article, we speak to expert designers at a leading web design agency. We ask them to share the five core elements that are essential for creating a good website design.

List of the 5 Core Elements that are Essential for Creating a Good Website Design

1. A Simple, Clean, and Minimal Design

Cluttering your website design is the worst thing you can do to your website. Ditch complicated designs, color schemes, and distractions for a simple, clean, and minimal-looking website. You need to understand that your product or service and the content need to be the hero element. The design should not be too noisy to distract audiences from your products and services.

2. Interactive and SEO-Optimized Website Content

Content is as important as the design. You need to understand that the algorithms of search engines read content and then rank your website accordingly. This means that not only does your website content need to be engaging, it also needs to be optimized for search engines and be SEO-friendly. Working with an expert SEO content writer can help you achieve this.

3. Mobile Optimization and Responsiveness

With more than 70% of all searches taking place on mobile devices, the need of the hour is mobile optimization. You need to ensure that the mobile version of your website is completely optimized across all screen sizes and operating systems. This is going to help you in multiple ways. This is also very important when it comes to search engine performance.

4. Technical Optimizations, UI and UX

Your website needs to be technically optimized and fulfill all the best practices of what search engines are looking for. This means that it should have a fast-loading speed in milliseconds. It also needs to have a great user experience so that probable consumers can navigate the length and breadth of your website easily. This is a core foundation of great website design. You should hire UX design agency to get your work done professionally.

5.Working with an Expert Web Design Agency

The worst thing you can do to your brand website is asking a freelancer to create one for you. Just like you would not hire anyone to build your physical showroom, so to you should contact experts and specialists to work on your website design. Check for years of experience, familiarity with your business niche, and successful case studies.

Why Website Design is Important for your Brand?

Why should I spend so much money on a stupid brand website?

This is a question that several website design agencies must have faced. To be very honest, it deserves quite a simplistic explanation.

A good website is like an online shop for your business. Imagine your shop or showroom without any of the staff to explain to the customers what the brand, its store, and products are all about. Chances are you will find it very difficult to explain.

The same goes for your brand website. You need to ensure that your probable customers understand what your brand is about. Identify all the products within reasonable reach and if interested contact you. All this is a function of website design.

The website needs to speak for itself about your brand without you having to move a muscle. When a customer is engaging with your brand or is buying something online from the website, you might be asleep!

Choosing a Website Design Agency to Create your Brand Website

Once you have realized the importance of creating a brand website, the next step involves selecting a website design agency. You need to make sure that you are checking for the following-

  • The first thing that you should look for is the number of successful websites that have been created by the agency. Ask them for a list of websites that they have created. Better still, ask them for the PSDs of the design. Many design agencies can claim something to be their own when in reality, it has been done by someone else.
  • You need to check whether the web design agency has experience in creating websites in your industry niches. This is important as there are specific kinds of designs that are more attuned to particular industry niches. If they have worked on a business similar to yours, they already know what it is to be done.
  • Ask them about their turnaround times. If you do not want to wait indefinitely for an agency to create your website, make them write down when they will be able to deliver the final design. This is an area that gets plagues by multiple extensions. You do not want this to happen under any circumstances.

 These three points will help you narrow down the best website design agency for your needs and requirements.

The Final Word

In addition to the above-mentioned points, a solid color scheme can help you with the design. Experts suggest that you should avoid using more than three colors on a website. This helps maintain consistency, create a visual attraction and allow for better performance.

A good website design is not only for all the visitors who come to your website. It is also to help search engines locate your website, understand what is it all about, and direct people that are looking for similar products and services to your brand website.

If you want our experts to answer any more questions on website design, drop them in the comments below. We will try our best to answer as many of them as possible. Till then pay attention to all the points in the article to help create the best website design for your online platform.

5 Web Design Best Practices For 2021

Introduction

Each year brings new web design for the industry to follow. 2021 is not different in any. With 2021 breezing through, we have made few predictions regarding the web design’s best practices.

According to Igloo web design company, 2021’s web design trends will share a common theme. Rather than looking for technological-based web design, web designers are looking at the reality to create the next level of web designs.

The pandemic has given the designer ample time to think about new web design that could become the next big thing in the web design industry.

Best Web Design Practices For 2021

You all must be wondering why the website’s design matters. Well, let us tell you that it takes only 0.05 seconds for the visitors to form an opinion about your brands on the basis of your brand websites.

Yes, you read it correctly. It only takes 50 milliseconds for the visitors to rate your business. Hence, now you understand why web design matters. Here is something to consider: after a bad experience with a website, 88% of consumers are unlikely to visit your website.

The bottom line is that if your website is not optimized for user experience, it will affect your business success.

That being said, you can use the following checklist of best practices to ensure that you have a winning website design.

1. Minimize Texts

Text is the very first element of your website design. Don’t fill your web design with massive blocks of texts. No, don’t get me wrong. We are not talking about the blog posts and articles. Those are different things. We are talking about the web content (Home page, Contact us, About us, etc.).

Yes, it is important that you educate your audiences about your business and brand, but that doesn’t mean you will fill your design with large chunks of text. Learn to use infographics and less text to convey your message.

2. Try Shorter Paragraphs

Paragraph length plays an important role in making your audience read the full thing. If you are jotting down long paragraphs, it can feel boring while reading. However, if you can shorten the paragraph, the reader will find it interesting to read.

Start each paragraph with new information to keep your reader engaged with new information every time they read a new paragraph.

3. Choose The Right Colors

The color you select for your website is more important than you can think. Visitors judge your website based on your color code. The best way to choose the right color code is to pick colors from the logo.

By keeping color consistent throughout the website and relevant to your logo, you can retain the visitors on your website for a longer period of time.

4. Make Your CTA Obvious

CTA stands for call to action and is important for the websites. Do not bury your CTA button with extra content on the website. If you are hiding your main button, you are losing some of the conversions.

Keep the CTA button on the home page at a place where it can be seen easily. This way you will be able to ensure more customers. Talk with the website designers for the best placement of the CTA button.

5. Reinforce Action

If you maintain the same message for a different action, you might not sound trustable enough for the customers to take action. Think about how people navigate your website, track the flow of data and come up with messages that sound reinforce able to some extent and ask the visitors to take action.

For instance:

  • Home Page: Check Out Now.
  • Category Page: Buy It Now.
  • Product Page: Click To Purchase.

Conclusion

Saying that the design of a website is important would actually be an understatement. Your website design will have a direct impact on building your brand/business reputation.

Remember that every website is a work in progress. A website cannot be complete. There is always a new trending thing to add to your website. Keep track of the new trends and implement them into the website to stay relevant with your audience.

Why You Should Use WordPress for Your Next Web Redesign

Your website is one of the first things many consumers will see about your business. If it isn’t easily navigable, it doesn’t load quickly, or doesn’t have a mobile version, consumers can easily move to the next company. Maybe you’ve noticed these things about your current website, or maybe you noticed it has just started looking dated. What is considered “cool” in web design is constantly changing. If you have not updated your website in the past 5-10 years, it may be time for a web redesign.

Maybe you want to add additional capabilities to your website but aren’t sure how or don’t think it’s possible. Many small to mid-sized businesses think that their websites can’t possibly compete with larger businesses. This does not have to be true and the reason is WordPress. If you are looking to improve your website, a web redesign using WordPress might be the best option.

So why should you use WordPress for your web redesign? This article will share ten of the most important WordPress benefits you should take into account before starting a redesign.

1. WordPress is free

WordPress is a free platform that is usually referred to as a content management system or CMS. A content management system provides the ability to edit and change the appearance and content of your website. You may have heard the name WordPress before when talking about blogs, but its capabilities go much further than that. You can easily create and organize every page and all the content you want to include on your website. 

2. WordPress is an All-In-One Platform

Although many people still think only of blogs when they think of WordPress, it has come a long way since then. Perhaps you are looking for just a blog to expand your website’s reach. WordPress can do this. Or maybe you are looking for a full-service website with multiple pages of both static and dynamic content. WordPress can do this too. As your needs change, your WordPress website can change along with them.

3. WordPress is Mature

WordPress has been around for over 17 years and has gone through many reinventions and undergone many improvements since then. It has been tested by millions and then refined many times since its original launch to keep up with business’ changing needs. This can give you the peace of mind that it is a truly reliable platform to support all your website needs.

4. WordPress is Easy to Use

A web redesign can be a complicated process when you have a lot of moving parts to your website. However, an important WordPress benefit is that it is very easy to use. You do not need to be an experienced website developer to be able to use it effectively. WordPress is even known for its 5 Minute Install. Once you have installed it, everything you need to access or edit will be available directly from the dashboard. None of the changes you may want to make are going to require knowledge of coding. Even the most inexperienced user will be able to navigate their way through the process. In the event that you do need assistance, WordPress is known for its extensive online community. There are countless support forums where you can quickly find answers to your questions. 

5. WordPress is Open Source

Almost all other website building tools and services have some restrictions on what you can and can’t do. You will not encounter these limitations on WordPress because it is open source. This means developers all over the world can contribute to its software, any time. This can be in the form of plugins, themes, and security and safety updates. But what does this mean for you and your web redesign? It means that the platform is constantly getting better and you will never have to pay for these changes.

6. WordPress is Constantly Updating

The best part about the changes that come because of WordPress’s open source structure is that they occur automatically. While it averages over 20 updates every year, you never have to worry about remembering to update it. As each update is available, the platform will automatically update itself. Plus, the updates mainly focus on safety and security. Having constant updates gives you the confidence that your website and all its data is always up to date. It will always be in line with the best, most current practices. 

7. WordPress is SEO Friendly

If you want your web redesign to give you the most benefits, you need to make it SEO friendly. In fact, 70% of marketers say SEO is a more effective way to drive sales than PPC. A true SEO strategy can require a lot of time and effort, but WordPress can give you a great place to start. One of the biggest WordPress benefits is the fact that the platform itself is inherently SEO friendly. It has been designed so the framework is easy for search engines to crawl. You can rest assured that your WordPress redesign will not compromise on SEO. For additional help improve your site’s SEO, there are numerous plugins available. Yoast SEO is one of the most popular plugins. This app will give you step-by-step information showing you how your content ranks. It also gives you clear guides for how to improve your site’s readability for search engines and users.

8 – WordPress Has Inexpensive, Professional Themes

One of the best parts about a WordPress redesign is that you don’t have to spend a ton of time building it from scratch. Thousands of themes can be found from WordPress or from other third-party websites like Onewp and MOJO Marketplace. The price for a theme generally ranges from free to about $300, with the average being $40. This is significantly more affordable than a fully custom site. 

If you are concerned about your site looking just like everyone else’s because you used a theme, don’t worry. Every theme can easily be further customized so it looks exactly the way you want. This will give your website the ability to reflect your branding and the overall personality of your business. Colors, text, fonts, and images are just some of the things that can be changed to customize your site. In addition, you can add additional features to your website using plugins. Plugins are like apps that you can add to a website to expand its features. As previously mentioned, there are SEO plugins that can assist you in improving your SEO ranking. Another popular type of plugin are security ones that can further the safety of all the data on your website. You can also find plugins for contact forms, payment gateways, foreign language translation, and social media integration.

Even with this ability, many people may still be overwhelmed at the prospect of designing their website. SEO Design Chicago has experienced WordPress developers and designers that can help you create a website that fits all your needs.

9 – WordPress is Mobile Friendly

More and more people are using their phones to search the internet every day. Your website needs to be attractive and easy to use on mobile devices to keep users there. Most consumers will not hesitate to leave a website that doesn’t load or doesn’t look attractive on their mobile device. With millions of results every time you search on Google, it is easy to simply look elsewhere for the same information. Most of the themes you will find for your WordPress redesign will be mobile friendly by design. Designers and developers know that websites need to be mobile optimized in order to stay relevant.

WordPress has also designed its dashboard to be mobile-friendly. This allows you to manage and update your website anywhere, whether it is on your phone or your desktop.

10 – WordPress is Trusted by Many

If you are still unsure about choosing WordPress for your web redesign, consider that it is the most commonly used CMS around. At last count, it powers over 35% of all websites today. Not only do small and mid-sized businesses like WordPress, but some of the largest companies in the world do as well. The New York Times, Microsoft, Vogue, and Disney are just some of the big, global businesses that utilize WordPress.

WordPress has everything your small business needs to create a visually appealing, fully functioning, scalable website. And clearly since it can support websites like Disney, it is also able to support growing traffic and budgets. WordPress will allow your website and its capabilities to grow just like your business does. 

Redesign Your Site

If your business is looking to undergo a web redesign, WordPress should without a doubt be at the top of your list. A redesign can be very time consuming, with numerous moving parts. With WordPress, you can quickly take your website from unappealing and boring to attractive and engaging. It has the capabilities to satisfy your business’s needs, whether you are looking for a static website or a dynamic one. Whether you are at the beginning of the process or in the middle of it, reach out to the professionals to help guide you through your web redesign. 

WordPress vs Drupal: Explaining The Differences

Creating and managing a website has never been easier. Thanks to Content Management System (CMS) software, today anyone can easily build and manage a website with any CMS software. By doing this there is no more hard nut to crack. It takes no time to create a fully functional website with CMS and users do not need to have any coding knowledge. However, the availability of different types of CMS these days also raises the question of which website development services to choose. You can use a CMS to create a full range of websites such as blogs, business portals, e-commerce websites, social media platforms, and more.

WordPress and Drupal are the big brands in the CMS world today. The combined users for these two platforms constitute more than half of the total CMS users worldwide. There are many similarities between WordPress and Drupal such that they are both open-source, provide modules/plugins to increase functionality, have great community support for both. However, many disparities also exist between WordPress Vs Drupal which makes one of them the best choice compared to the other. We will note some differences between WordPress vs Drupal and check for apart them.

Which one is easier?

Drupal is considered as a more complex CMS due to its intimidating interface. Compared to WordPress, this is relatively difficult to deal with. However, it is easy to install Drupal on the host as the hosting services provide different options to install different CMS including Drupal. You may need to hire a Drupal developer to create a custom theme as it can be difficult to work with Drupal. WordPress makes it easy to develop a fully functional website even from scratch with minimal effort.

Which is more secure?

Drupal is a very secure platform and also has a lower user base than WordPress which is less vulnerable to cyber threats than WP. Of course, it is considered a more secure platform than WordPress. However, anything that is not 100% secure can have some vulnerabilities with a Drupal website that can be exploited. On the other hand, being the most popular CMS, WordPress is the main target of most hacking and malware attacks. WP Core is very secure and most of the risks originate from the user.

Which is easier to customize?

The ease of adaptability depends on the availability of resources to enhance the existing functionality of your site. Using modules and themes, you can customize a Drupal website but finding an appropriate theme or module is not easy. Due to the complexity of the Drupal platform, optimizing is a challenging task for a beginner. Also, fewer themes and modules are available for customization for Drupal users compared to WordPress. There is a huge range of plugins and website themes for WP users that can be used to customize the site. With the help of a WordPress developer.

Which one is faster?

For a delightful user experience as well as a good ranking on a search engine, a site needs fast loading speed, and it’s really important. It does not matter how beautiful and attractive your site is if visitors are taking ages to load they will leave the site and go for another one. Website speed is an essential consideration when choosing a CMS. Drupal is lighter than WordPress because it is not resource-intensive. So, Drupal development services are ideal for building a heavy website with hundreds or thousands of pages. When it comes to speed, WordPress is somewhat disappointing. However, WordPress websites can also be very fast, most of the time users fail to optimize their website properly, and also add useless plugins which makes the website speed relatively slow.

Which has greater community support?

Although it has been mentioned before, WordPress still has the largest platform of community support. WordPress is open-source software with a vast community of developers, experts, webmasters, learners, etc., who are either providing or seeking some solutions. Do you have problems with your WordPress website? You can easily find a solution for this that someone may have already provided. However, this is not the case with Drupal as there is less community support than WP. But it is evolving and more solutions are being prepared.

Wrapping up

Content management systems have emerged as real lifeboats as they provide a simple way to create and manage websites. Another benefit of using CMS is creating custom websites by converting Photoshop files for WordPress, Drupal, or other CMS. There are a lot of CMS to choose from Drupal, WordPress, Wix, Joomla, PrestaShop, etc. Drupal and WordPress are the major content management systems and have huge user bases around the world. There are many factors that are common in both platforms, yet there are many subtle differences that distinguish them. We hope that the differences we have discussed between these platforms will help you build a strong custom website development solution.

Hottest Web Design Trends in 2020

Your business’s online presence has never been more critical. With more and more online sales being carried out and many areas of the world still under some lockdown restrictions, whether you are building a website for the first time or redesigning your old, underperforming one, it is vitally important that you know the hottest web design trends of 2020.

Like other aspects of business, website design fluctuates and changes in its trends, with something that is aesthetically desired one year suddenly outdated the next. Using professional website designers or high-quality web design tools will help keep you on top of the game, maintain your search engine optimization and retain your place above your competitors.

Bright colors

Using bright colors is extremely popular in modern website design and shows no sign of letting up. Websites need to catch the eye with popping shades, but there is a fine balance to be had. A too offensive color will adversely affect some customers’ eyes and make it difficult to read the text. That is where caution has to be taken or plain-colored text boxes implemented. Whatever type of palette you go for when designing your website, simply ensure it isn’t dull.

Bold logos

Customers want to see logos they recognize and trust. If you are a company who might not have that sort of instant recognition, your logo should still be simple and obvious. Do not confuse new customers with complicated logos that they will need to decipher before they understand what it is your business does. Your website colors should offset your logo nicely, helping it stand out while not contrasting too jarringly. 

Translation services

One aspect of web design that is growing in popularity is including translation services. Google translate can change your site into; currently, 109 languages but it is unreliable and sometimes bugs, changing how aesthetically good your website appears. Therefore, including a function to change the language of your website is a fantastic tool to offer, especially if you are a multinational business or operating in a country with more than one widely spoken tongue.

Overlapping layers

Overlapping layers is a design feature that will take hold in 2020. This adds texture to your website, but it can be challenging to get right for an amateur. Finding website design Wolverhampton or other locations that you might be focusing your business on will bring a professional element to your website and help implement advanced trends such as overlapping layers to your online presence.

3D artwork

Design capabilities continue to advance, and one of the trickier trends to replicate is 3D artwork. This can be used in the illustrations for your website, your brand’s logo or simply as the backdrop of your homepage. Artwork such as this can be combined with animations to give your website an interactive, alive feel for visitors, drawing attention to tiny or huge aspects of your webpage alike.

Gradients

With all the bold, brash colors and exciting logos and artwork being bandied around websites in 2020, it is this trend of using gradients that allow the eye to relax and be softened by blended colors. Gradients help block colored text to stand out and can guide a visitor’s vision to one side of your website or the other. Gradients work particularly well when used in small, isolated locations such as for buttons or tabs. 

Night mode

Finally, night mode is the trend that has taken both web and app design by storm. Night modes, ambient modes or dark modes, depending on what you want to call them, take the usual white-dominated pages and turn them black, grey or navy blue. This has been a particular hit on Twitter and Facebook, while Apple products have offered “night shift” – the ability to set a time, say 8pm, where the colors of your display or toned down and become less harsh – for some time now.

Offering a night mode for your website provides visitors with a browsing experience more suited to lying in bed at night or commuting early in the morning.

Web design trends are forever changing, and you must not be left behind. Be innovative and creative in your designs and do not be afraid of becoming the next trendsetter. Some trends are aesthetic while others are functional, but all should make your website a welcoming and easy to use platform for all. Also make sure that you have read how to write a web design rfp in the Ramotion blog.

The 10 Most Common UI Components for Designers

You cannot build a website or an app without user interface components. They take your design from flat to engaging by incorporating an interactive aspect to the interface. Without them, your users would have no way to navigate around, and visually, there wouldn’t be much going on. UI components provide a range of touch points to guide your user around your site or app. They make it user-friendly, seamless, and visually engaging.

Knowing the most common UI components will allow you, as a designer, to integrate them effectively into your interface design. Here are ten of the components you are most likely to encounter.

Button

Buttons are arguably the most common and most essential UI component to have in your toolkit. While UI frameworks are different for programs, you’ll always find buttons on their component list. Buttons are essentially a shape, with a label. They encourage a user to perform a particular action by clicking on it. They can be any shape or size, and contain any label that you want. The most common buttons include submit, apply, book now, subscribe, etc.

Accordion

An accordion will allow the user to both expand content and collapse it. It’s an especially useful component when you need to include large quantities of content within a small space. By expanding the accordion, users can access a list of topics or more information.

Toggles

A toggle is a type of switch which allows the user to turn things on and off. You can include them in forms, where a user needs to decide between two options. Users can also use a toggle to enable or disable a feature of the app or website, such as location tracking.

Notifications

Notifications will let the user know when there is something new, such as if there’s a new post, or they’ve received a message. They can also indicate an error or that something is complete. You can use them to notify your users of just about anything, and they can take whatever form you wish. Typically, they are represented as a small red dot, as it is the universally recognized sign of a notification.

Form

Forms are one of the most useful UI components in the library, and one that every designer will use. A form allows users to submit personal information as required by your interface. They can sign up for subscription lists, put in their shipping details, or send a query to be answered by the website/app host.

Comment

There are comments sections on a variety of different types of media. Comments allow users to engage with the host, other users and provide feedback. You’ll often see comments sections on social media, blogs, and video or music sharing sites. As a designer, adding comments sections will encourage user engagement.

Feeds

A feed is an unavoidable component when you’re designing an app or website. It displays all user activity in the order of which it took place. Users can also filter feeds to re-order in the specific way they want to. On a blog, the feed will auto-display with the most recent post, but it can be filtered to display based on the topic or category. Social media revolves around feeds, all presented chronologically, such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

Search field

The search field is an essential component that allows the user to locate information. It includes a little bar with a magnifying glass beside it and an input field. Users can type in what type of content they are looking for precisely, and it will automatically direct them to the relevant information. As an example, if the website or app is selling clothing, users can type in a “black knit sweater” and find a related item without scrolling through pages of products.

Tags

Tags will allow users to label their content to make it easier to find. You can tag a blog, picture, or video with relevant keywords. When users browse that keyword, they will see the content and other pieces of content with the same tag.

Modal

A modal is a window that pops up on the interface containing a short message. The user is required to interact with this window before they can continue to browse on the website or app. An example of this is if you are editing content and attempt to navigate away from the page, a pop-up will say, “if you exit now, your content may not be saved.” Use this component to relay a message that you need the user to see. 

Final Words

User interface components are the most important part of your website. It defines how your visitors can interact with your website to reach your products, services or your creative work. UI components also play important role in look and feel of your website so this part should be taken care by professional and experienced team or individual. You should look for the best UI/UX Design agency to ensure that your app not only looks good but also feels good.

If you are looking for any creative agency in San Francisco, you can check list of the top creative agency in San Francisco.

3 Reasons Everyone Needs To Have A Personal Website

When thinking about a website, usually businesses come to mind. However, believe it or not, websites are also beneficial for personal use. More specifically, they are useful for displaying career-related information. These days, with cheap hosting available that can easily accommodate a personal website, it’s easier than ever to get a personal website set up. You will also need to build your website, but as you will see, this is also easier than ever. Here we will cover 3 reasons why everyone needs to have a personal website. Before we get started, let’s quickly cover the basics of getting your website set up.

Setting Up Your Website

Before you get started, it might be a good idea to check out some personal websites and personal website templates for inspiration. After you have an idea of the type of look you want to go for, you can get started by using a site builder service like Wix, Weebly, or Siteground. These services don’t require much technical knowledge. You just need to drag and drop content and type to get started.

You could also choose to be more involved in the building of your website and set up a self-hosted WordPress website quickly with little technical knowledge. You’ll need to handle buying a web domain and a hosting package, but doing things this way gives you more control over how your site looks.

You can use an online image editing service for your graphic design stuff. This will help you to create stellar graphics without needing to learn how to be a professional graphic designer.

After you get your website set up, it’s also useful to get feedback on its appearance from trusted colleagues and friends. From there, you can then make any changes needed.

Reasons for Setting up a Personal Website

We thought it was necessary to share a little information with you on how to actually get a website set up. With that out of the way, here are 3 reasons why you need to have a personal website.

A Personal Website Makes You Stand Out From the Competition

In an increasingly competitive job market, it’s important to stay ahead of your competition. Having a personal website allows you to promote yourself more effectively. A website can act as an online resume and makes it easy to display testimonials and a portfolio.

It also makes it easier for employers to find out more about you online. This is preferable to them having to wade through social media to find your profile. After all, let’s face it, in this day and age employers will be looking at your online presence. Having your information readily accessible online makes it easy for employers to find out about you. This is a big advantage in today’s job market.

A Personal Website Is More Flexible Than a Traditional Resume

You are always evolving as a person. Your evolution includes things like additional job experience and additional training. It’s easy to add details like this to your website. In addition, when you make changes, they are immediately visible. This is useful if you’re pursuing employment opportunities since it makes it easy to make information relevant to employers readily available.

If you share information about yourself with employers using a resume, you will have to tweak your resume for each employer and worry about sharing the correct version. Using a website for this purpose simplifies things since you will have all of the relevant information right there on your website.

You Gain New Skills in the Process of Creating and Maintaining a Personal Website

Building and maintaining a personal website will teach you several new skills. Learning how to build a website is priceless in this day and age since a website is basically a necessity for businesses these days. Potential employers will find this skill to be very valuable since you will have the knowledge to help them out with their websites.

You will also learn a lot about communicating effectively through the medium of writing when creating your website. You will have to create content that is well written and presented in a way that it can be quickly absorbed by readers. Learning how to write effectively is an invaluable skill for anyone, especially someone seeking to be as competitive as possible in the job market.

Final Thoughts

A personal website isn’t a luxury. It’s a useful tool that you can use to set yourself apart from others in a competitive job market. It’s dynamic, allowing you to easily change and add new information. In addition, in the process of setting up your personal website, you will even gain new skills! Furthermore, setting up a personal website isn’t difficult and there are lots of resources out there on how to do this. Thank you for reading, and we hope that we have inspired you to get out there and create your personal website today.

9 Design Tips For Creating Digital Products People Want To Buy

Creating digital products can be a great way to increase passive income and offer evergreen informational products to your audience without a ton of regular work on your end.

However, you want to make sure of two things when you’re creating your digital products – that they’re both incredibly informative and beautifully designed.

Give your audience the best of both worlds by providing the content in a visually appealing way that makes it much easier to understand and digest than a basic ebook full of text.

While you might have a really winning digital product filled with useful information for your audience, you could be hindering their learning by not putting just as much focus on the design of that information.

This is why we wanted to put together a list of design tips for creating digital products people want to buy and can actually learn from.

What is a Digital Product?

First things first, if you have no idea what I’m talking about, let’s cover the basics. What is a digital product?

A digital product is pretty much any product that is transferable online, and can be downloaded and used immediately by the people who purchase it. Physical products are tangible goods, while digital products are intangible goods that are sold and sent online.

These can be great options to create for your customers, as there is no overhead involved to continually send your product over each time someone buys it. They’re also great to sell through your blog.

While there is of course time involved in creating a digital product, once it’s done, everything else is automated with absolutely no other time or cost to you. Sounds like a big win, right? This is why these can be great tools to create for your business.

Types of Digital Products

There isn’t really a one-size-fits-all option when it comes to digital products. Really anything that can be bought, sold and delivered virtually is a digital product.

But here are a few different types of digital informational products that you might be considering creating and selling to your audience.

Printables

A printable is anything that you create for the purpose of your customer printing it off and filling it out.

A great example of a fun and useful printable is this mood tracker that comes as a part of a self-care digital printable package.

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Printables should be useful, but also something that you know your audience will actually print out and do, like a fitness log, goal tracker or mood tracker.

Ebooks

Ebooks are another great type of digital product. While printables are often a single page, ebooks are much more comprehensive. These will often range from 10 to even 100+ pages, depending on the topic, amount of content and price point.

You want to create an engaging cover page for your ebook and match the rest of your content to your chosen colors and fonts.

Here’s a great example of an ebook cover that will grab attention.

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Workbooks

Workbooks are similar to printables in that many of them are intended to be printed off and completed, but these tend to be larger projects to help customers complete something.

Workbooks can be anything from creating a landing page, finding your brand voice, or this Thought Workbook below to help with reframing negative thoughts and improving mental health.

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If your business often helps walk people through creating something, providing a hands-on workbook can be a great digital product to help.

Templates

A template is like a sample document or design that is pre-formatted and set up as a starting point for you to make edits and customize.

Design software – like Visme – often have templates to help users find a starting point in a new design without having to create everything from scratch.

There are other templates that can be offered as digital products, like website themes, email pitch copy, strategies, and more.

Here’s an example of a resume template that’s being sold as a digital product.

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Online Courses

Online courses are one of the most popular types of digital products because they include a plethora of different learning materials all in one, tend to teach a lot about a subject, and often have a relatively high price point.

Online courses like this example below also often have printables or digital PDFs as a part of their curriculum, as well as other formats like video or audio.

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Online courses are also one of the most time intensive digital products when it comes to their initial creation, which is why they can be sold for a more high-level price.

Selling online courses can also be one of the easier strategies when it comes to making sales from your digital products.

Plan Outlines

By plan outlines, we mean things like business plans, marketing plans, workout plans, meal plans, etc., that are created to help people outline plans and strategies before putting them into practice.

Here’s a great example of a marketing plan outline to help businesses properly utilize digital marketing. It offers a ton of guidance for creating marketing materials.

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These work for a variety of different niches and can be extremely helpful to customers all at the same time.

9 Design Tips for Your Digital Products

After you’ve decided which type of digital product you want to create, it’s time to start thinking about your design. Let’s go over our top nine design tips to improve your digital products.

1. Create an eye-catching cover.

Not only is your cover page the first thing anyone who buys your digital product sees, it can also be a great asset to use for promoting your digital product.

You’ll want to create a cover for pretty much any type of digital product you create, even a webinar or set of printables.

To create an eye-catching cover page, you’ll want to make sure you use high-quality, beautiful imagery alongside fonts and colors that pop.

Take a look at this cover page example.

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The bright, beautiful flatlay of a healthy breakfast is the perfect accent photo for an ebook on nutrition.

Consider the visuals that would best accompany your topic and tie those into your cover page. You can use stock photos, icons, or illustrated graphics to create your eye-catching digital product cover. You can find a number of websites across the web, from which you can instantly download graphic elements for free and use them to create eye-catching covers.

2. Use no more than 2-3 colors.

You should have one or two main colors throughout your digital product, then a single accent color to use for elements you want to accentuate.

If you’re struggling to come up with a color scheme, simply using your brand colors is a great way to match your digital product to your brand.

When choosing colors, make sure you consider color psychology and the message that each of your digital product’s colors might be giving off. You don’t want to use a harsh color in a product all about self care and mental health.

Take a look at how keeping color to a minimum in this ebook page helps the various design elements to pop even more.

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If each icon was a different color, it would appear cluttered and overwhelming. This is why sticking to a single color scheme of two or three colors (in this case, orange and grey) is ideal.

3. Use no more than 2-3 fonts.

In a similar vein, you also don’t want to overload your digital product with too many fonts. A good rule of thumb is to use one font for headers, one font for body copy, then an accent font for labels, sidenotes, etc., if you have any.

Again, you can incorporate your brand fonts here as well if you don’t want to spend the time finding the perfect pair of fonts.

While it’s smart to stick to serif and sans serif fonts throughout your digital products, take a look at how a script font can also make a great typeface for your headers in the below ebook page.

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Make sure you’re using fonts in sizes large enough that they’re easily legible by all of your customers.

4. Include margins.

You would not believe the difference between the overall look and feel of a digital product that has content and copy going from edge to edge and one that has 1-inch margins on all sides.

Leaving out margins will cause your content to look cluttered and sloppy, so do everyone a favor and make sure you add some white space around your product pages.

Notice how the content on this ebook page is focused on the center of the page, leaving tons of space around it to ease your readers’ eyes.

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Each element also has white space around it so that the bullets aren’t crowded together in one section of the page.

5. Make your headings stand out.

Your headings should always be in a large, bold serif or sans serif font so that they’re easily legible. As I mentioned earlier, you can also use a script font for your headings only, as long as it’s used sparingly and can still be read.

Here’s an example of a digital product page with bold, easy-to-read headings.

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Notice how the bold, all caps text really grabs your attention? You want your headings to be obviously different from your body content.

6. Break your body content up into sections.

Stay away from walls of text as best you can. Break your copy up into paragraphs and use visual elements to offer more than just text.

Take a look at how the blocks of text are separated in this digital product page below.

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By separating the text with lines, visuals, and various paragraphs, it’s much easier to follow along and read the content without getting distracted or bored.

7. Incorporate visuals into your digital product.

There are so many different types of visuals that you can incorporate into your digital products. Use stock photography, icons, graphic illustrations, data visualizations, and more to strike a visual balance between design and copy.

In larger digital products like online courses, you can even include presentation slides, videos, and audio clips.

Incorporating photos into your digital product pages is a great way to create accents without crowding your content with too much text, like in the example below.

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You can even share data and statistics with a variety of charts and graphs within your digital product, showcasing even more valuable information in a digestible format.

Here’s a great example of a bar graph helping to offset the text in a digital product page.

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This is why infographics are so popular – the balance of data visualizations and content really helps to create a digestible product.

8. Use the same style icon and illustration throughout.

If you start to use icons or illustrations within your design, make sure that you stick with a similar look and feel for each icon used throughout the digital product.

If you start with isometric icons and illustrations, stick with isometric icons and illustrations. The same goes with outline and flat. Achieve visual consistency by sticking with the same style throughout your digital product.

And just so you’re not left wondering what these different types of icons are, we’ll show you an example.

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See how the above icons all focus on the outline of an object, with small lime green accents within? These are obviously all the same style of icon.

If one of those icons were filled in or had a 3D look to it, the design wouldn’t match and it wouldn’t look as cohesive.

This is why it’s important to stick to a single style of icon or illustration throughout your design.

9. Start with a template.

Want to make your overall design even easier? Use a template to help you create your digital products!

You can use a graphic design tool like Visme that offers several different digital product templates to choose from as a starting point for your design.

When you utilize a template, you likely already have the content blocks, margins, visuals, headings, and more put in place for you. All you need to do is add your information in.

This makes the design side of creating and selling digital products much simpler so that you can minimize your creation time and start selling faster. It also provides a DIY option rather than outsourcing your digital design.

Create Your Own Stunning Digital Products

Get started creating your own digital products that your audience can’t wait to buy. Be sure to find the perfect WordPress theme or plugin to help you seamlessly sell your digital products right on your website.

Chloe is a Content Marketing Manager at Visme, an online graphic design software. She loves to write about digital marketing and design and find new ways to engage audiences through content. Chloe is based in Charleston, SC, where she loves exploring her city with her son.

How To Create Coming Soon Page With HTML And Bootstrap

If you are familiar with websites and apps you probably know about coming soon pages. It creates a brand value for your website when your website is not ready for launch. Coming soon pages also help to Keep users aware of your existence and let them know exactly when you go live. With an awesome countdown timer you can create a stunning coming soon or under construction template on your website.

Why Do You Need a Coming Soon Page?

  1. You can convert your visitors into subscribers with a subscription form on coming soon page.
  2. You can promote your social links
  3. You can increase site ranking by choosing specific keywords

Coming soon pages notify people when you will go live with your websites and you will get more time to focus on your website launch.

Creating Coming Soon Page with HTML CSS and JavaScript

Create an Html file Ex: (commingsoon.html) 

<div class="bgimg">
  <div class="topleft">
    <p>Logo</p>
  </div>
  <div class="middle">
    <h1>COMING SOON</h1>
    <hr>
    <p>35 days</p>
  </div>
  <div class="bottomleft">
    <p>Some text</p>
  </div>

Add CSS

Note: If you want to use CSS with same HTML file then you have to use CSS code in <Style> tag or if you are using external css file then you need to name with .css extension like comingsoonpages.css

<style> /* code goes here */ </style>
/* Set height to 100% for body and html to enable the background image to cover the whole page: */
body, html {
  height: 100%
}

.bgimg {
  /* Background image */
  background-image: url('/w3images/forestbridge.jpg');
  /* Full-screen */
  height: 100%;
  /* Center the background image */
  background-position: center;
  /* Scale and zoom in the image */
  background-size: cover;
  /* Add position: relative to enable absolutely positioned elements inside the image (place text) */
  position: relative;
  /* Add a white text color to all elements inside the .bgimg container */
  color: white;
  /* Add a font */
  font-family: "Courier New", Courier, monospace;
  /* Set the font-size to 25 pixels */
  font-size: 25px;
}

/* Position text in the top-left corner */
.topleft {
  position: absolute;
  top: 0;
  left: 16px;
}

/* Position text in the bottom-left corner */
.bottomleft {
  position: absolute;
  bottom: 0;
  left: 16px;
}

/* Position text in the middle */
.middle {
  position: absolute;
  top: 50%;
  left: 50%;
  transform: translate(-50%, -50%);
  text-align: center;
}

/* Style the <hr> element */
hr {
  margin: auto;
  width: 40%;
}

Add JavaScript

Note: If you want to use below Javascript with same HTML file then you have to use Javascript code in <script> tag or if you are using external JavaScript file then you need to name with .js extension like comingsoonpages.js

<script> // code goes here </script>
// Set the date we're counting down to
var countDownDate = new Date("Jan 5, 2021 15:37:25").getTime();

// Update the count down every 1 second
var x = setInterval(function() {

  // Get todays date and time
  var now = new Date().getTime();

  // Get the distance between now an the count down date
  var distance = countDownDate - now;

  // Calculations of time for days, hours, minutes and seconds
  var days = Math.floor(distance / (1000 * 60 * 60 * 24));
  var hours = Math.floor((distance % (1000 * 60 * 60 * 24)) / (1000 * 60 * 60));
  var minutes = Math.floor((distance % (1000 * 60 * 60)) / (1000 * 60));
  var seconds = Math.floor((distance % (1000 * 60)) / 1000);

  // Display the result in an element (demo) with id="demo"
  document.getElementById("demo").innerHTML = days + "d " + hours + "h "
  + minutes + "m " + seconds + "s ";

  // If the count down is finished, show some text
  if (distance < 0) {
    clearInterval(x);
    document.getElementById("demo").innerHTML = "EXPIRED";
  }
}, 1000);

We are thankful to w3schools for a great tutorial for coming soon page you can check out if you want to test live this tutorial on W3schools

Ready to use pre-made HTML templates

If you don’t want to create your own template or you have don’t any coding skills then you would love to choose ready to use HTML templates.

Here are some stunning and totally free HTML templates for coming soon page

1. Soon – Free HTML5 Bootstrap Coming Soon Template

Soon is a free template for Coming Soon page based on bootstrap. This template is given a great look at your site when before launch. It has a countdown timer where you can specify notify the visitor about the launch date of your site and it comes with a subscription form you can collect the visitor’s email to notify them.

Info | Demo

2. Imminent 3D Parallax Coming Soon Template

Imminent is a 3D Parallax bootstrap free coming soon template created with HTML5 and CSS3. Great looking minimal and creative design, you will not find any free coming soon template available with Parallax 3D effect in!  A premium looking template but it is available for free!

Info | Demo

3.    Coming Soon Template by Colorlib V05

The version five template is designed something as a flash sale type that you may see in e-commerce website templates. At the top of the page, you get a countdown. This template uses gradient as the background. You can use this as an app launching page, modern app landing pages, a business or commercial websites. You also have the option of a subscription form. The subscription form button has hover effects. The form fields also support field validation.

Info | Demo | WordPress Version

If you are using WordPress then you can use WordPress plugin for coming soon and maintenance mode.

Coming Soon Page and Under Construction & Maintenance Mode design by SeedProd

BENEFITS, FEATURES AND OPTIONS:

  • Works with any WordPress Theme
  • Responsive
  • Customize the Look and Feel
  • Easily add Custom CSS and HTML
  • Uses HTML5 & CSS3
  • Translation Ready, i18n Support
  • Multisite Support
  • BuddyPress Support
  • Uses WordPress Best Practices

Free WordPress Plugin For Comming Soon

4. Minimal Coming Soon & Maintenance Mode – Coming Soon Page

Minimal Coming Soon plugin is minimal but elegant with great features and works with any WordPress theme. You’ll have full control over the frontend of the website and can modify almost every aspect of the template as your needs. Easily connect with MailChimp and collect emails from visitors. A perfect Coming Soon Page done in minutes!

Info| Demo

Hope you like our post please share your thoughts and feedback in the comment section. Thank you!

Career As A Web Developer: Role, Skills & Scope

Web developers build web pages as well as web-based applications that comprise the Internet. Starting your career as a web developer can either be about working independently as freelancers or for a company. Depending upon the nature of the job these professionals may focus on front end development or back-end development. Front end involves designing sites and producing content while back end development involves writing code to make website features work.

In some cases, web developers also become webmasters. As webmasters, they tend to provide maintenance, updates as well as troubleshooting services.

Also, click here to find the list of 2020 highest paying jobs in India for freshers & experienced.

Role of a Web Developer

Web Developers are generally a part of the marketing or IT departments in a company. A career as a web developer might require an overlap in web design as well.  Web development is all about building technical front end code, back end code or both, for site function.

  • Front End Developers: Front end web developers are fluent in languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. They build the visible parts of a website that we see when viewing through a web browser. Front end web developers can do everything from working for an established company to freelancing and being self-employed and strengthening their skills while working for individual clients. Hence, front end web development is a great and flexible way to break into the tech field.
  • Back End Developers: While the front end of a website incorporates everything that a user can interact with directly, the back end includes everything that users can’t see or interact with. However, back end web developers have to make those parts run smoothly for the overall efficiency of the website.
  • Full Stack Developers: A Full Stack Developer is a combination of front end and back end developer. They carry the experience of both the fields and also provide support for applications.

Skills of A Web Developer

The skills required to become a web developer can be divided into two broad categories, hard skills, and soft skills.

Hard Skills: Hard skills consist mainly of programming languages. Front end Developers usually are fluent in HTML, CSS as well as JavaScripts while back end developers use PHP, Python, Java, etc. They often use popular software like WordPress and photoshop as well. A list of some of the main programming languages used by web developers are:

  • HTML
  • PHP
  • Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
  • JavaScript
  • ASP.NET
  • Angular.js
  • Python
  • Ruby

Soft Skills: In addition to learning the above programming languages, web developers also need to possess a bunch of soft skills to function efficiently. They often work individually and as a result, they must conduct quality control and manage their own projects. Some of the main soft skills that will be beneficial for web developers include:

  • Attention to Detail
  • Multitasking
  • Organizational Skills
  • Self Driven and highly motivated
  • Creativity
  • Communication Skills
  • Customer Service Skills

Duties & Responsibilities

The daily duties of a web developer depend strongly on the job position, as well as the project they are working on. However, in a general sense, these are the tasks they are responsible for:

  • Communicate with clients and understand their expectations
  • Plan web layouts
  • Compose code to enable site functions
  • Add verbal or visual content into the code structure
  • Test website functions
  • Take charge of building, maintaining, updating, as well as troubleshooting websites
  • Write well designed and dynamic code by practicing the best software development practices
  • Create the website layout or user interface by employing standard HTML/CSS practices
  • Combine data from various back-end services and databases
  • Collect and refine terms and conditions based on the technical needs
  • Design and maintain software documentation
  • Be responsible for maintaining, expanding, and scaling websites
  • Stay plugged into emerging technologies as well as industry trends and apply them into operations and day to day activities
  • Collaborate with web designers to meet their visual design intent

Career Outlook

In this new age of e-commerce, the demand for web developers is on the rise (there are a lot of IT companies near me). In fact, the employment of web developers is predicted to see a rise of 13% in the span of the next ten years. This is way faster than the average for all other occupations. Online purchasing is presumed to increase faster than the entire retail industry. In addition, the rise in the usage of mobile devices to search the web will also lead to increased demand for web developers. This is because instead of creating a website for desktops, developers will create sites that are compatible with mobile devices. Unlike desktops, mobile devices come with a wider variety of resolutions and screen sizes, which will lead to more work for web developers.

Since Web Developers can work from any location in the world, they must understand cultural differences and nuances that allow websites to interact with users.

Salary

Since a career as a web developer is so in demand, the starting salary of these professionals is around 3 LPA. With the right kind of exposure and experience, they can double this salary within a few years of working. These figures are however given on an average and may vary in terms of companies, job location as well as the candidate himself. A highly skilled fresher can easily earn more than an average candidate with minimal skill set. Additionally, relevant experience can add a good hike to the salary as well.

 About the Author

Washija is a content specialist at Receptix. She has an MBA in Tourism and a passion for creating web content. She is an avid reader, a traveler, and a versatile writer. She has been writing on the topics of education, career advice, and related areas for the past 3 years.