Declining Attention Spans And Your Design and Website Strategy: 9 Tips

Declining attention spans is one of the biggest threats to your website.

In fact, a Microsoft study found that the average human attention span is shorter than that of a goldfish. More surprisingly, a recent Jampp study found that most mobile app users suffer an 88 percent decrease in attention span on an annual basis.

As a webmaster, it is important to pay special attention to these statistics. We, as humans, are becoming increasingly impatient, and this can have great implications for your business. In fact, the following statistics show just how dangerous having a slow website can be:

• Slow loading websites cost the U.S. ecommerce market more than $500 billion annually
• A one second delay in your site load time can cost you 7 percent in conversions
• 40 percent of web users will abandon a website that takes longer than 3 seconds to load
• A site speed increase from 8 to 2 seconds can boost your conversion rate by 74 percent
• Google now uses site speed as a ranking factor

What a Slow Website Means for Your Business

If you have a slow website, here’s the impact it will have on your business:

It will cost you visitors: If you feel you’ve been doing your best but can’t seem to retain visitors to your website, perhaps it is time to address your website speed. As highlighted in the statistics above, at least 40 percent of visitors to your website will stop visiting if your website takes longer than 3 seconds to load.

It will cost you sales: Improving your website speed can dramatically boost sales on your website, even by as much as 74 percent as revealed in one of the statistics earlier referenced. It has also been established that a one second improvement in site speed can boost conversions by 7 percent.

It will cost you search engine rankings: Google has announced that they use site speed as a ranking factor and that faster sites will always outrank sites that are slow. If you’re not experiencing an improvement in your search engine rankings despite all your SEO efforts, then perhaps site speed is a culprit.

Thankfully, all hope is not lost. If your website is not fast enough, here are 9 practical tips guaranteed to insulate your website from declining attention spans:

1. Get a Good Web Host

Your web host is the foundation of all your site optimization efforts; your web host controls the server infrastructure and configuration — and these are factors that impact your website speed more than anything else. I’ve had great experience with both Bluehost and Hostgator, and I did a comparison here.

2. Get a Better Theme

You’ll be amazed to find out that many websites are ridiculously slow due to bloated code and poorly-constructed themes. More often than not, outside your web host, your website theme will determine your website speed.

3. Enable GZIP Compression for your Website

In an article for Smashing Magazine, Marcus Taylor reported being able to reduce the size of his client website from 63kb to 13kb. That’s basically around 400 percent reduction in the site size, resulting in a massive boost in site load time since a user’s browser has to download much less. What did he do differently? He enabled GZIP compression on his client’s website.

GZIP works in a similar way to ZIP compression on computers, but for websites; a group of files that will ordinarily be big when their individual size is added together can instantly be reduced to one small ZIP file, resulting in a faster site load time and an increase in site speed for your site visitors.

4. Optimize and Compress Your Images

Images alone can make your site a lot more slower; often, a site could be seven to ten times or more heavier due to images used on the website. The solution to this is to compress the images used on your website drastically; thankfully, there’s a way to do this without the quality of your images suffering much. If you use WordPress, the plugins Smush.it and/or EWWW Image Optimizer can help with compressing your images. If you don’t use WordPress you should check out the image compression tool offered by Kraken.io.

5. Combine Your Images into CSS Sprites

Often times the number of requests a user’s browser sends to your server will influence how long it takes to load your website; the more requests sent, the slower your website will be for visitors. Background images can result in a lot of server requests, especially if they are hosted individually and have to be requested individually from your server — this eventually results in a much slower website. The solution to this is to combine your images into Sprites; basically, when several individual images are combined into one main image, the end result is a Sprite. Once your Sprite is ready, you can use CSS commands to tell your user’s browser to interpret various parts of that image individually.

6. Use a CDN to Ensure Consistently Fast Access to Your Site Across All Locations

A CDN is a network of proxy servers in multiple locations that automatically serve users a version of your website closest to their location; for example, with a CDN, it isn’t unusual to have a version of your website hosted in all continents. So, someone trying to visit your website from India will be served a version of your website hosted in Asia instead of a version hosted in North America.

Two great CDN options are CloudFlare (both free and paid) and MaxCDN (paid).

7. Focus on Creating a Better User Experience

While making your website faster will solve some of the problems, ensuring you’re better able to retain people on your site goes beyond that. It is essential to also work on creating a better user experience for your audience; when people visit your website, what happens? Your goal should be to ensure they easily find what they want, and that their experience with your website is satisfactory. Here are a few tips:

• Pay special attention to your design; an appealing design won’t just make people love visiting your website, it will also make them likely to take the desired action you want them to.
• Besides having clean design, user experience matters; let your users inform the direction of your site. Embrace usability best practices to ensure your site is easy to use.

8. Introduce Elements of Social Proof

Thanks to technology and increasingly declining attention spans, we no longer have the patience to waste time with meaningless tasks. How do you then convince people to pay more attention to your website? By letting them know that they are not alone; research has shown that social proof is one of the biggest factors that influence human decisions; when we see that other people, like us, are doing something, we are more likely to do the same thing.

If you have a major achievement, or if you have a record number of people using your products, do not hesitate to indicate it on your website.

9. Don’t Waste People’s Time; Create a Point of Focus

This is especially important if your goal is to get people to take action. Don’t waste their time by rambling around and beating about the bush; it also won’t help to present them with too many options than is necessary. Instead, create a focus point; make it clear what you want them to do, and ensure that’s your focus. Conversion optimization experts recommend focusing on one goal for one page; do that, and – by preventing distractions – you’ll be able to get people to focus more on your offer.

 

Read More at Declining Attention Spans And Your Design and Website Strategy: 9 Tips

from Web Design Ledger https://webdesignledger.com/declining-attention-spans-and-your-design-and-website-strategy-9-tips/

15 Great Google Font Combinations For Your Next Project Design

For any website, content is the most important part. So, naturally, you would want it to be as simple and straightforward as possible, in order not to worry about viewers trying to understand the cryptic messages hidden behind poor color choices and messy fonts.

This is why not only the general design and imagery but also the font choices and the overall consideration for typography are important for conveying the right message to the audience. By choosing appropriate font combinations and assigning the right hierarchy where needed, you can decrease the confusion and let the viewers stay and read your content.

In terms of appealing visual language, your text should have few characteristics, of which the most important are a readable font, the high contrast, and the hierarchy.

Even if there is a large library of fonts out there, many designers choose a sans serif fonts such as Helvetica, Verdana or Arial as their main font because they are familiar, very easy to read and adaptable to any design project. They also come standard, so by choosing fonts as these, they can be sure that the text will visually be the same not just for print, but also for web design.

Thankfully, the design world has advanced to the point where fonts are not nearly as limited as they once were. Starting with 2010 the Google Fonts were released, making the process of choosing and pairing fonts easier and quicker.

However, you should be aware that not every font combination in Google’s library is a recipe for typographical success. With the right font pairings and usage considerations, your brand will convey the right message to your audience, professionalism, and reader friendliness without the need for expensive customized fonts.

In this article, I’ll show you 15 great Google Font combinations that will help you to accomplish all this.

You will find below 15 spectacular Google Font combinations that together with images and graphics, will help you define your brand’s personality.

Open Sans Condensed + Open Sans

Open Sans Condensed / Open Sans

Here’s the easiest combination that works wonderfully for nearly any design project. Open Sans is one of—if not the—most versatile font in the entire collection of Google Fonts. It’s extremely easy to read in large blocks of text, at the same time being salient enough for headlines.

I can’t imagine any scenario where Open Sans would go wrong. Unless you’re looking specifically for a serif font, this one will serve perfectly almost any business, blog, landing page, or web app.

Simple. Elegant. Familiar.

Montserrat + Merriweather

Monserrat / Merriweather

Montserrat is a very appreciated font among designers for its versatility and simplicity, and Merriweather pairs wonderfully with it because its contrasting style and easy readability. It doean’t matter if you interchange them as headlines or paragraph text—they both work great as either!

This particular combination is a nice balance of modern and classic design. Therefore, its variety of uses could support many types of businesses.

Raleway + Roboto Slab

Raleway / Roboto Slab

Roboto Slab is a versatile font,  yet a bit more classical in style. When paired with the distinctive and bold Raleway, we can see an amazing match of clean and refined typography.

Raleway is one of those fonts that defines sophistication. When used as an all-caps headline, it works beautifully for luxury items like jewelry, designer clothing, perfumes and so on. Roboto Slab supports it well with simple and approachable descriptive text.

Playfair Display + Source Sans Pro

Playfair Display / Source Sans Pro

Playfair Display was inspired by the letterforms of the 18th century during the transition from quills to steel-tipped pens. So, it’s no surprise that this font expresses an old charm while having a modern twist.

This font adds a personal touch to something like a tagline or product description. If you use its currency symbols, you’ll immediately see why it’s the perfect choice for a product or service centered around luxury and appearances.

At the same time, Source Sans Pro keeps the text grounded in a modern and clean presentation, while pushes things a little further into the future and creates an intriguing combination.

Alegreya + Lato

Alegreya / Lato

Alegreya is a font without no pretense about its personality; what you see is what you get. On the other side, Lato could be champion of all-purpose fonts in Google’s library. Together they make for a combination that is fun, easy to read, and pragmatic.

This combination is great for small local businesses like cafes, or professionals who want to suggest a warm feeling to their clients’ design projects.

Fjalla One + Cantarell

Fjalla One / Cantarell

Maybe it’s not one of the most versatile fonts, but Fjalla One creates headlines that demand attention. Small or large, lowercase or all caps, those letters are hypnotic no matter what you do with them. Similarly, Cantarell has a charm that seems to attract the same attention that Fjalla One draws for headlines.

This pairing works extremely well for blogs, landing pages or anything else that includes long bodies of text that needs noticeable subheadings to break up content.

Roboto Condensed + Roboto

Roboto Condensed / Roboto

The Roboto font-family is extremely versatile, having many font weights, there’s practically no limitation to what the font could be used for. Modern and geometric, yet somehow friendly and dependable, Roboto is an exceed in terms of forms and functions.

Here’s another pairing that you could use. While Roboto works for just about anything, but it would work particularly for tech startups, modern small businesses, or any type of brand that looks into the future.

Amatic SC + Josefin Sans

Amatic SC / Josefin Sans

This is more for people with artistic inclinations. Obviously, the combination won’t work for everyone, but the bizarre nature of both Amatic SC and Josefin Sans create something that for sure will stand out, as long as you don’t overdo it.

If you’re a fun-spirited artist, musician or entertainer, you could use this pairing to capture your unique personality. Depending on the niche, tone, and topics, this combination could also work for a blog.

Oswald + Droid Serif

Oswald / Droid Serif

Regardless the font-weight or use of caps, Oswald is a great font for headlines. Its condensed nature helps it grab attention and pop, but it also makes for a pleasant text, if you use it as your main body’s font. On the other side, Droid Serif has a classic look, similar to Garamond. Used properly, this serif font can bring a nice elegance to your professional appearance.

The versatility of Oswald and the timelessness of Droid Serif make this combination great for professionals dealing with high-end clientele or for product descriptions where the text is important to emphasize a premium quality.

Unica One + Vollkorn

Unica One / Vollkorn

Unica One can be pretty funky on its own, but when used as all caps it becomes a headline that is all business. Vollkorn is a font reminiscent of classical literature. Contemporary and impactful, when they are used in this combination, somehow the two of them work amazingly together.

Archivo Black + Tenor Sans

Archivo Black / Tenor Sans

Archivo Black was designed to meet the intensive needs of print and digital platforms. Originally created for headlines and highlights, this font is ideal for high-geared press work.

On the other hand, Tenor Sans has as purpose to aid page body text setting. Because of its legible characters, this font gives an elegant and relaxed feel and it can also be applied to headlines. Combining these two fonts, you will have a highly legible and well-crafted typography that’s a recipe for high-performance typesetting.

Pathway Gothic One + Cardo

Pathway Gothic One / Cardo

Cardo is a large font perfect for linguists, classicists, medieval specialists and biblical scholars.  It is largely used for documentation and other extensive publications. It offers a variety of punctuation techniques, text figures, and ligatures.

Pathway Gothic One is a stylish font with an outlandish compressed design. It is an attractive choice among typesetting and typography experts. The result of combining these two fonts is nothing short of amazing.

Six Caps + Archivo Narrow

Six Caps / Archivo Narrow

Six Caps is a highly condensed and tight display font. It is a stripped down and normalized version of classic grotesque display letterforms.

Archivo Narrow was designed to be used simultaneously in print and digital platforms and it was originally created for highlights and headlines. The technical and aesthetic characteristics of the font are both crafted for high-performance typography.

With a warm and modern feeling, the combination works perfectly for design projects related to the entertainment industry.

Oswald + Open Sans

Oswald / Open Sans

Here again Open Sans. This humanist sans serif typeface was designed with an upright stress, open forms and a neutral, yet friendly appearance. It was optimized for print, web, and mobile interfaces, and has excellent legibility characteristics in its letterforms.

Regardless the font-weight or use of caps, Oswald is great for headlines, so pairing them will bring you the timeless feeling of elegance and refinement.

Poppins + Sintony

Poppins / Sintony

Sintony is a modern sans serif typeface, drawn with a slightly square structure and smooth stroke modulation. It’s great for long passages of text, providing any text with a calm and clear feeling.

On the other side, Poppins is one of the newcomers to the long tradition of the geometric sans serif fonts. These typefaces have been a popular design tool ever since these actors took to the world’s stage.

The combination works perfectly and can serve almost any business, blog, landing page, or web app.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read More at 15 Great Google Font Combinations For Your Next Project Design

from Web Design Ledger https://webdesignledger.com/15-great-google-font-combinations-for-your-next-project-design/

How to Engage With Your Social Media Followers Quickly and Authentically

How do you feel when people comment on your social media posts?

Awesome, right?

A comment is or some form of engagement is usually a sign that people love your social media content. And it’s important to reciprocate and respond to these interactions.

But at the same time, engaging with your followers can be time-consuming. If you are a solo social media manager or a small business owner, you know you don’t have the whole day to engage with your followers.

So how can you minimize the time it takes to engage with your followers and still be authentic at the same time?

In this post, we’ll share the tactics and tools we use to engage with our amazing social media followers quickly and authentically. 

5 creative types of replies you can use

If you have been replying to comments and mentions with a thank you, that’s a great first step. But it can be easy to fall into the habit of using a few standard replies. I’m definitely guilty of that!

There are many ways you can spice up your replies, show your brand’s personality, and delight your followers. Here are some that I like:

1. Questions

That’s awesome! Any top books in your program? – Bonnie

— Buffer (@buffer) September 11, 2017

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Instead of a simple “Thank you”, I love to engage with the person further and continue the discussion. A great method is to ask for her or his opinions on the topic.

For example, if someone commented on your social media post that links to a blog post, you could ask the following questions:

• What is your favorite part of the blog post?
• What’s your main takeaway from the blog post?
• Do you agree with the idea mentioned in the blog post?
• How has your experience with (a strategy or tool) been like?
• Have you tried any of the tips in the blog post before? If yes, how did it go?

If they reply to your questions, that’s awesome! You can continue the conversation and build a good relationship with them.

2. Emojis

The easiest way to make your replies a little more fun is to include emojis. 

As emojis become part of the social media language, most people are used to seeing and using emojis in their social media posts and comments.

It is also an efficient way to convey your tone and emotions in your replies. Unlike talking face-to-face or on the phone, it’s not easy for your followers to pick up your tone and emotions in a text reply. But with a happy emoji such as , your followers would know instantly that you’re smiling while replying.

Both Mac and Windows have a shortcut for adding emojis. If you’re on a Mac, an emoji app that I would recommend is Rocket. It allows you to quickly type emojis by starting with a colon (:). Here’s a demo from the website:

3. Images

You can also schedule posts for custom days and times by clicking on the small arrow next to “Add to Queue” -Kelly pic.twitter.com/m3Jxfd8icy

— Buffer (@buffer) August 31, 2017

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

Sometimes, the fastest and easiest way to show or explain something on social media is to use an image — especially on Twitter where you have only 140 characters.

We found that images are generally best for answering support questions where we have to show or point to something.

Tools like CloudApp, Nimbus, and Droplr (which we’ll discuss below) allow you to add annotations to your images, making your explanation clearer.

4. GIFs

Woohoo!! :cue the happy music: We’re thrilled to have you with us on Awesome, Tobias! Shout if any questions come up -Kelly pic.twitter.com/uo3UvjZZKb

— Buffer (@buffer) August 25, 2017

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

Using GIFs is our favorite way of thanking people who shared our content, gave us a shout out, and more.

With the new GIF button on Twitter and Facebook, you can easily find and add a GIF to your replies.

If you would like to create your own GIFs, here’s our guide on how to create your own GIFs in minutes.

5. Videos

@sippey we miss you #askmedium pic.twitter.com/maV5NwdJFf

— Medium (@Medium) February 10, 2015

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

In 2015, the User Happiness team at Medium did a #AskMedium campaign where they answered questions with video replies. And their followers loved it!

In a blog post about Twitter’s video feature, Gary Vaynerchuck explained why video replies are great for engagement:

It takes me nine to twelve seconds to make a video and reply, but those extra seconds hold a lot of meaning. Not to mention it’s more personal, visual, and we are living in a world where the visual is often regarded as a better engagement than the written.

It’s easy to Like a comment or reply with “Thank you!”. Recording a video reply — even a short one — takes a little more effort, which shows your followers how much you care about them.

6 ways to save time while engaging with your followers

While engaging with your followers is important, you likely also have many other important things to do, such as creating content, planning, or running your business.

Here are six strategies to help you save time while you engage with your followers.

1. Craft your replies to common comments in advance

Thanks for sharing this informative video!

How do you work as a social media team of one?

Do you have any tips for growing an Instagram account?

These are some of the common comments we get, and you likely have yours.

Preparing the answers to these common comments and questions can help you reply faster as you don’t have to think on your feet.

I would recommend coming up with a few variations so that you aren’t always replying with the same phrases. For example, instead of saying “Thanks for reading our blog post!”, you could also say the following:

• Yay! Thanks for reading this! (GIF)
• You rock for reading our blog post!
• Thank you for checking it out! Will you be trying any of the tips mentioned?
• Thanks! Have you tried any of the tactics before? It’ll be great to hear how it went for you!

2. Have a handy list of GIFs, emojis, and more

Besides searching for GIFs on Twitter and Facebook, I have a folder of my favorite GIFs for various types of replies. This way, I can grab and use them quickly without having to search. (There have been times when I was looking for a particular GIF and just couldn’t find it through search).

Here are some of my favorites:

Aww, thank you:

http://giphy.com/embed/NjjvZdmoVhgrK

You’re welcome:

http://giphy.com/embed/3oEduNDk23BaPKTVT2

Awesome:

http://giphy.com/embed/dkGhBWE3SyzXW

Excited:

http://giphy.com/embed/IxKt9HOM1mI80

You could download your favorite GIFs into an easily-accessible folder so that you can grab one quickly whenever you are replying to comments on your social media posts.

To download a GIF from GIPHY, click on “Download” on the right of the GIF and select the file type you want.

You could do the same for commonly-used screenshots and videos and also create a list of your favorite emojis in an Evernote note (or your preferred note-taking app) for quick access.

3. Use productivity tools

Using tools is another great way to help you reply your followers faster. Here are a few tools that we use:

Text Expander: Instantly insert snippets of text

With Text Expander, you can quickly type commonly-used phrases with just a few characters. For example, instead of typing “Thank you for sharing this post”, you could type “tks1” and Text Expander would automatically expand it.

If you have come up with a list of replies according to tip 1 above, you could add them to this app. You can customize the abbreviation for each of your snippets.

Other tools like Text Expander: Alfred, Typinator, and Phrase Express

CloudApp: Quickly create & share GIFs, annotated screenshots, and more

With CloudApp, you can capture anything on your screen as an image, GIF, or video in just seconds. You can even record a video of yourself — which is great for creating video replies!

CloudApp will automatically add a link to your file to your clipboard. You can then paste it into your reply or download the file and add it to your reply.

What I love about CloudApp is that I can access its features by just hitting a few keys on my keyboard.

• Cmd/Alt + Shift + 5: Take a screenshot
• Cmd/Alt + Shift + a: Take a screenshot and add annotations
• Cmd/Alt + Shift + 6: Take a screen recording (as a GIF or HD video)
• Cmd/Alt + Shift + 8: Record a video with your computer’s camera

Other tools like CloudApp: Nimbus, Droplr, and Dropbox

4. Use a social media engagement tool

Our top tip for engaging with social media followers quickly is to use a tool that’s built specifically for social media engagement.

Instead of having to log in to each social media platform and open each notification in a new tab, you can efficiently reply to comments and mentions from a single place.

Our favorite social media engagement tool is Buffer Reply.

With Buffer Reply, you can have all your Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram conversations in a single inbox. It works even better if you are in a team as you can respond to conversations together.

There are also many other social media engagement tools out there, such as Facebook’s unified inbox, Hootsuite, and TweetDeck.

5. Use automation to assist you

This is where a social media engagement tool can be super helpful. For example, we set up automation rules with Buffer Reply, such as the following, so that we can respond to social media conversations as quickly as possible.

• Filter out spam and automated tweets and automatically close those conversations – so that we can focus on those that require a reply
• Move Facebook and Instagram comments into a separate folder – so that Brian Peters, who manages our Facebook Page and Instagram account, can focus on them
• Move tweets with our support hashtag, #BufferSupport, into a separate folder – so that our Customer Advocates can reply to them as soon as possible

Automation tools like Zapier and IFTTT can also be useful here. The way they work is that an activity in an app will trigger another activity in another app. For example, if you want to reply as soon as someone mentions your brand on Twitter, you could use Zapier to send any Twitter mentions into your Slack.

Here are more social media engagement and monitoring automation by Zapier.

6. Schedule time to engage

It’s great to jump onto any comments immediately and give a prompt reply. If it doesn’t disrupt to your workflow, you should probably keep it up!

But for many of us who wear multiple hats, constantly stopping our work to reply to a comment can affect our productivity (unless your main role is to reply and help customers on social media).

One thing that Brian, who manages our social media profiles, do is this: he schedules two 30-minutes time blocks every day to respond and engage with our community. Here’s how engaging with our community fits into his morning schedule:

How do you engage with your followers?

Engaging with your followers is a great way to build your brand. While the process can sometimes be time-consuming, there are tactics and tools that can help to minimize the time it takes for you to engage with your followers while staying authentic:

• Craft your replies to common comments in advance
• Have a handy list of GIFs, emojis, and more
• Use productivity tools like TextExpander
• Use a social media engagement tool
• Use automation to assist you
• Schedule time to engage

I would also love to learn from you. How do you engage with your followers? What tips do you have for those who want to minimize the time it takes to engage with their followers? 

—

Image credit: Unsplash

from Social https://blog.bufferapp.com/engage-quickly-authentically

35 Design Jokes That Will Make You Laugh

Have you ever had one of those bad days when it seems that everything is crashing around you? Fatigue, stress, nerves, tight deadlines or a difficult client often makes us want to escape. Regardless of the jobs we have, we are all human and we need from time to time a bit of relaxation to change our mood. This is where design jokes come along. It not only helps us overcome the difficult moments but also reload our batteries and focus on the projects we have to do. There are many ways to get ahead of the difficult moments: some of us listen to music, others do sports, others go for a walk, or others just dream eyes open J. But I think the simplest and easiest way to change our mood (or not even get into the dark and cold cave of the bad mood) is, well, to laugh.

As the saying goes, a day without laughter is a day wasted! And well, once again, we all need a good laugh to break up the ho-hum and the stress of everyday life.

Cheer up with these 35 funny design jokes that will definitely make you laugh! I selected some really funny jokes turned into images, cartoons, memes, photos, posters, drawings and many other funny images. All of them are about subjects such as Photoshop, designer school, designer work, freelancing, fonts, clients, icons, creative process, and so on!

Check them out and enjoy!

Designers vs regular people

Some people say the graphic designers are extremely complicated human beings. Let’s take a look at this real proof of how they perceive the colors.

Photoshop always works

I don’t know what’s in the mind of this patient, but for sure, he would like the surgeon to be as good as the graphic designer.

Gotcha!

That delightful moment when you get the invoice from your web designer :). Some pills against heart attack, please!

Why Photoshop is more powerful than Sketch

It could be a good thing if the designer knows what he is doing. And it seems is for free, so… I would expect a lot of people to park there :).

What’s your ideal client?

You know the life of a graphic designer is pretty hard, but… you can keep dreaming, right?

How to piss the Rock

Relax, this is almost the regular conversation between a graphic designer and his client, especially when the last one doesn’t know what’s all about!

Thanks to the Courier, we have different fonts

Sometimes, the regular people ask themselves why we love so much to be a graphic designer….. conferring character to the fonts is just one of the reasons.

How web designers ask for help

Maybe you should think better if you have the crazy idea of web designer from drowning. Unless you are not a web designer also, God knows what you could understand!

The difference between doctors and web designers

Thankfully, the doctors are not treated like web designers. Otherwise, we would have just designers and no doctors :).

What’s missing here?

Life isn’t always #000000 and #FFFFFF…. even if we would want this. Does someone see the missing of the gray area?

Comic Sans walks into a bar….

Even if the characters have a modern twist here….. does someone see the picture of a classic western?

Font guide

I might be taught, but I just hope you’ll never follow this guide when you’ll choose the font for your next design project.

The Little Mermaid

If the Little Mermaid would have been a font…. Probably she would have looked like this. Fortunately, she’s just a character of Hans Christian Andersen’s imagination and a beautiful story. Let’s stay to the origins.

Corporate graphic design guide

Maybe you know this process… Maybe you experience this process… But don’t be sad, you are not alone :(.

Did you know?????

….. the most regular people don’t have any idea what’s going on if you speak Klingon with them? Please repeat it in English! Please….

How people see the design

Do you see the process here? Wow! This is actually happening! Don’t tell me I haven’t warned you!

Self-discipline according to web designers

I know the web designers could be the hardest workers on the planet, but…. Do you need a time management app? An efficient one?

There are always two sides of a coin

 

The most important part is to find the balance between both of them…. Can you see the picture???

The many emotions of a programmer

Like all of us, the programmers are also people. They live their emotions like all people. So, do not wonder why their invoices are so big. Just see what happens to them after they complete a project…

When a client says “We love your style”……

…. You could expect something like this. Don’t tell me I haven’t warned you! Just 1 question: do you think it could be better NOT to like your style???

Starting another side project

Just remember to keep the track of them, even if this could be a daunting task. In the end, you don’t want your projects to look like a war field, do you?

This is the eternal question….

For civilians, it’s a matter of imagination…. But…. does the equation make sense to you? Maybe someone can explain it to us, novices :).

Sex and design

From time to time, we should go back to the basics and listen to the advice of the wisest ones than us. This is one of those situations…..

Don’t use that tone with me!

The designers always say the colors have a voice and express a message. But….. can you imagine a real conversation between them? This could be an option :).

Make the logo bigger

….. But, please keep it in your mind that it should fit somewhere….. on print…. or in some different screen sizes….

Can you turn this around…

…. so, we can see more of the front? Again, a very-often heard question…. This is happening when the clients don’t know Photoshop is a design software, not a cloning or a 3D printing one :).

The designer has many faces…

… I’m sure you know this. Just pick how many you want and tell us which are yours :).

The creative process

You shouldn’t believe what you hear: the creative process is nice, smooth and you have time for everything. Rather, it looks like here :).

The real life of a graphic designer

Never, but never…. do not take into account what your friends think you do. It might be a huge difference.

Every designer in this world knows this

I’m sure you have been there with at least one of your client. But here’s the tip: save just the last two files and maybe you’ll not suffer anymore.

This is how they did it

Back to the origins…. Does someone remember how to do some handcraft work?

We are designers, not tools

This is a global message for clients around the world who think the designers are just some tools ready to execute their weird and ugly ideas. We don’t have any problems with the screwdrivers.

The Unforgiven

And now? What’s next? Or even better: what’s the reward?

The best endorser

Sometimes, a barter could be a smart choice. Especially when your client is Santa Clause.

Why we call it italic

This is what italic looks like in real life. Does anyone have any doubt?

Let us know which one of these designer jokes you liked most. Do you know more jokes? Don’t be shy – let us know in the comments!

Read More at 35 Design Jokes That Will Make You Laugh

from Web Design Ledger https://webdesignledger.com/35-design-jokes-will-make-you-laugh/

The Ideal Cover Photo Size for Each of the Major Social Media Platforms

One of the first few things people see when they visit your social media profiles is your cover photo.

Whether it’s your Facebook Page, LinkedIn Company Page, or YouTube channel, your cover photo is the biggest image on the page. And people will see your cover photo even before they see any of your posts.

So how do you make your cover photo show up the exact way you want it to be?

One of the key factors is the size. Without the correct dimensions (width and height), your cover photo might be cropped to fit the space available and people will miss the important details on your photo.

While there isn’t a one-size-fits-all cover photo size for all the social media platforms, the information is out there.

We’ve collected all the answers here so that you can have a single point of reference for all cover photo sizes.

The best cover photo size for all major social media platform

Some social media platforms display cover photos slightly different on the desktop and on mobile. But in general, here are the ideal cover photo sizes for the platforms with a cover photo.

(Feel free to click on a social media platform to see more details for that particular platform.)

Facebook – 820px x 462px (Profile, Page, and Group), 820px by 465px (Page video), 1920px by 1080px (Event)

LinkedIn – 1584px x 396px (Profile), 1536px x 768px (Company Page)

YouTube – 2560px x 1440px

Twitter – 1,500px x 500px

Google+ – 1600px x 900px (Profile and Page), 368px x 207px (Collection and community)

Tumblr – 1600px x 900px

If you spot an error or an outdated information, I’m be grateful if you could let me know in the comments section below. Thanks!

Ideal cover photo size for Facebook

Facebook profile cover photo – 820px x 462px

The ideal size for your Facebook (personal) profile cover photo is 820 pixels wide by 462 pixels tall. According to Facebook, your cover photo has to be at least 720 pixels wide.

There are four important details to take note of when creating a cover photo for your Facebook profile:

1. Your cover photo will look slightly different on mobile. 

On mobile, Facebook shows your cover photo at a different dimension — slightly taller or narrower. Facebook will either show more of your image if your image is tall enough or crop the sides away.

From my tests, 820 pixels wide by 462 pixels tall is an ideal size for both desktop and mobile. Facebook will show the blue section on the desktop and both the green and blue sections on mobile.

You can grab a Photoshop file of this template here.

2. You can reposition your cover photo on the desktop.

In case you have any important details at the top or bottom of your cover photo and you worry that Facebook will crop them away on the desktop, Facebook allows you to reposition your cover photo by dragging it up or down.

3. Your profile photo, your name, and a few buttons overlay your cover photo.

As you might have noticed in the example above, several things overlay the cover photo. You might want to take this into consideration when choosing or creating your cover photo. On mobile, your profile photo will overlay your cover photo in the middle.

A good rule-of-thumb is to avoid having any important details in the lower half of your cover photo that might be hidden behind your profile photo.

4. Facebook shows only about half of your cover photo when someone lands on your profile.

When someone navigates to your Facebook profile, Facebook would not show your entire cover photo immediately. She or he has to scroll up a little to see the full image.

To encourage people to scroll up and check out your full cover photo, you might want to have something attractive enough in the bottom-half of your cover photo.

Facebook Page cover photo – 820px x 462px

We have a post that goes into more detail about the Facebook Page cover photo. Here are some of the key points:

1. Unlike your profile cover photo, nothing overlays your Facebook Page cover photo.

This is great because you don’t have to worry about anything blocking important details on your cover photo.

2. Like your profile cover photo, your Facebook Page cover photo will look slightly different on mobile. 

According to Facebook, your Facebook Page cover photo displays at 820 pixels wide by 312 pixels tall on desktops and 640 pixels wide by 360 pixels tall on mobile.

From my tests, I found that it’s best to use an image that is 820 pixels wide by 462 pixels tall and to have what you want to show up on the desktop within a 820-pixels wide-by-312-pixels tall box (or the blue section).

You can grab a template of the ideal Facebook Page cover photo here.

3. Use a PNG file for better resolution.

According to Facebook, if your cover photo has your logo or text, your logo or text might show up better when you use a PNG file.

Facebook Page cover video – 820px by 465px

Yes! You can use a video for your cover photo. Isn’t that amazing?

Here are the recommendations by Facebook for your Facebook Page cover video:

• Your video should be at least 820 pixels wide by 312 pixels tall. For best results, upload a cover video that’s 820 pixels wide and 456 pixels tall.
• Your video should be between 20 and 90 seconds.

As for the video file format, I believe MP4 or MOV is recommended; though any of the formats on this list should work, too.

Facebook Group cover photo – 820px x 462px

The Facebook Group cover photo is almost identical to the Facebook Page cover photo — just a little shorter.

The ideal cover photo size is 820 pixels wide by 462 pixels tall (similar to the Facebook Page cover photo). But the area visible on the desktop is 820 pixels wide by 250 pixels tall (slightly shorter than the Facebook Page cover photo). Your photo has to be at least 400 pixels wide and 150 pixels tall, according to Facebook.

Feel free to grab a template of the ideal Facebook Group cover photo here.

One thing to bear in mind is that while nothing overlays your Facebook Group cover photo on the desktop, your Facebook Group name will overlay your cover photo on mobile.

Another thing you might want to think about is how your cover photo shows up in the Groups section of the Facebook mobile app.

According to Marie Page, it’s best to have your copy in the center of your cover photo for the copy to show up nicely.

Facebook event photo – 1920px by 1080px

The recommended size for the event photo, according to Facebook, is 1920 pixels wide by 1080 pixels tall (a 16:9 aspect ratio).

For a public event, anyone who views the event can see the event photo. For a private event, only people who are invited to the event can see the event photo.

 

Ideal cover photo size for LinkedIn

LinkedIn profile background photo – 1584px x 396px

1. The ideal aspect ratio is 4:1.

Your LinkedIn profile background photo is displayed at a 4:1 aspect ratio. LinkedIn recommends using photos that are 1584 pixels wide and 396 pixels tall.

If your background photo looks blurry after uploading, LinkedIn has some suggestions for you:

If your background image appears blurry or pixelated, please choose an image with a file size as close to the maximum as possible [8MB], as images with larger file sizes typically look better. Photos will also look better than images with logos. If your image is still blurry or pixelated, you may want to run it through a compression tool such as Trimage for Windows or ImageOptim for Mac before uploading it to LinkedIn.

2. LinkedIn will crop your background photo on mobile.

In its mobile app, LinkedIn will crop away the sides of your background photo, as seen in the screenshot below.

LinkedIn Company Page cover photo – 1536px x 768px

1. LinkedIn will crop your cover photo on the desktop.

While LinkedIn recommends the dimensions of 1536 pixels wide by 768 pixels tall, it seems to crop away the top and bottom of the photo on the desktop, as seen in the screenshot above.

So it might be best to keep the important aspects of your photo to the middle of the photo if possible.

(The minimum dimensions required by LinkedIn is 1192 pixels tall by 220 pixels wide.)

2. LinkedIn will show a bigger cover photo on mobile.

The reason LinkedIn recommends those dimensions might be because it displays a bigger cover photo in the mobile app.

Ideal channel art size for YouTube

2560px x 1440px

1. Your channel art looks differently on the desktop, mobile, and TV.

The cover photo for your YouTube channel is known as the channel art.

Because YouTube can be viewed on a desktop, mobile, and even TV, your channel art will be displayed differently on different devices. The ideal dimensions that YouTube recommends are 2560 pixels wide by 1440 pixels tall.

Here are a few more details to take note of:

• Minimum dimension for upload: 2048 x 1152 px.
• Minimum safe area for text and logos: 1546 x 423 px. Larger images may get cropped on certain views or devices.
• Maximum width: 2560 x 423 px. This means that the “safe area” is always visible regardless of screen size. The areas to each side of the channel art are visible or cropped depending on browser size.
• File size: 4MB or smaller.

YouTube has created an awesome channel art template that you can use to see how your channel art will look like on various devices.

The template comes in a Photoshop file and a Fireworks file so you can overlay it on your image to get a sense of how your image will be cropped and displayed. Here’s an example that Ash created previously:

2. Be mindful of your profile image and channel links.

When you are creating your channel art, you might want to avoid having any important details in the upper-left and lower-right corners of your channel art.

That’s because your profile image and channel links will be placed on top of your channel art when viewed on the desktop and mobile.

Here’s how your channel art will look like on the desktop and mobile with your profile image:

For tips on optimizing your YouTube channel, you might like our guide on creating a YouTube channel.

Ideal header photo size for Twitter

1500px x 500px

Twitter recommends that your header photo be 1500 pixels wide by 500 pixels tall — much wider than it is tall, compared to most cover photos.

It’ll be great to use an image that is wide enough to prevent Twitter from stretching the image and making it blurry.

1. Your profile photo overlays your header photo.

Just like your Facebook profile, your Twitter profile photo will cover a tiny part of your header photo. It’s great to be mindful of this so that your profile photo doesn’t cover anything important in your header photo.

2. Twitter allows you to reposition and scale your image.

Something nice about Twitter’s header photo is that Twitter allows you to reposition and scale the photo you uploaded to your liking.

3. Your header photo is slightly bigger on mobile.

On mobile, Twitter seems to show a little more of your photo on the top and bottom if it is tall enough. (Notice how you can see my shoes in the mobile header photo but not in the desktop header photo.)

If your header photo is 500 pixels tall (or shorter), Twitter might scale your photo up and crop a little of the sides away.

Ideal cover photo size for Google+

Google+ profile and page cover photo – 1600px x 900px

Google+ cover photos seem to be displayed at 1084 pixels wide and 610 pixels tall, which is very close to the aspect ratio of 16:9. To ensure that your cover photo looks clear on your profile, it might be best to use an image that is 1600 pixels wide and 900 pixels tall.

1. Keep the important details in the middle of the cover photo.

Here’s something amazing about Google+ cover photos: they are responsive. Your cover photo will automatically crop as you scroll down the page so that the middle of the cover photo will always be in focus.

2. Google+ lets you crop your image according to its recommended dimensions.

When you upload your cover photo, Google+ allows you to edit the crop of the image if it doesn’t fit the aspect ratio of 16:9.

3. Your cover photo looks and behaves the same on mobile.

On mobile, the cover photo seems to appear at the same aspect ratio (16:9) without any crop. It also automatically crops as you scroll down.

Google+ collection and community cover photo – 368px x 207px

For Google+ collections and communities, your cover photo will show up as a small image in the upper-left corner, at 368 pixels wide by 207 pixels tall (which is a 16:9 aspect ratio again).

On mobile, your cover photo will show up with the same aspect ratio without any crop.

Ideal header image size for Tumblr

1600px x 900px

1. Most people won’t see your Tumblr header image.

Tumblr is an interesting case: Unless you are using the official Tumblr blog theme, people will only see your header image when they view your blog within Tumblr itself — when your blog shows up in their search result (screenshot above) or when they hover over your profile image (screenshot below).

According to Morgana Johnson, Tumblr will display your header image at various sizes on the desktop and on mobile with a fixed aspect ratio of 16:9.

2. There might not be an ideal size.

If you are using the official Tumblr blog theme, there might not be an ideal size for your header image. I noticed that the size of the header image and the crop change as I change the size of the browser.

From my tests, it seems best to use an image with an aspect ratio of 16:9 that has the important information in the middle of the image.

Over to you

I hope you found this resource useful for creating the perfect cover photo for your social media profiles.

Do you have any tips and tricks for creating cover photos? It’ll be great to hear from you in the comments section below!

Finally, I would love to keep this resource updated. If you spot any outdated information (or mistakes), would you be up for letting me know in the comments section below, too? Thank you!

—

Image credit: Unsplash, Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook profile, TED YouTube channel, The Late Late Show with James Corden YouTube Channel, Social Media Examiner Google+ Page, Our Universe Google+ collection, Tumblr

from Social https://blog.bufferapp.com/ideal-cover-photo-size

The infamous Brexit Bus is now being used to promote a fintech startup

Remember the Brexit Bus? During the fraught campaigning surrounding the UK’s referendum on its EU-membership, the Vote Leave campaign hired a bus, and plastered on it the words “We send the EU £350 million a week. Let’s fund our NHS instead.” They didn’t realize it at the time, but this would come to symbolize the fact-free nature of the Leave campaign. For starters, there was no £350 million; when you subtract the UK’s rebate, the real figure is much lower. And courtesy of higher costs following the post-Brexit drop in the pound, and the troubling matter of the “divorce bill,”…

This story continues at The Next Web

from UK – The Next Web https://thenextweb.com/money/2017/09/25/the-infamous-brexit-bus-is-now-being-used-to-promote-a-fintech-startup/

Dear Engineering Students, Here’s How you Land Your Next Engineering Job

The Telecom Industry is a fast progressive field, where the Graduates, especially Engineers can work with fast-evolving technology. The Telecommunications Engineers are the experts, who actually are from Electrical and Electronics department and specialize in various technologies related to telecommunications.

With the Mobile technology progressing at unprecedented speed, the need of engineers for carrying out various jobs is also on the rise. Getting accustomed to the technology and the specialized in certain field areas like Networks and broadband is the need of today.It’s the high time when you must know how to find jobs in the telecom industry and how the latest technology is helping the job seekers in their search for jobs.

In this article, we will focus on how to land your next engineering job:

 

Getting an entry into the telecom industry

A few years back, there was a scenario, when getting into the telecom industry was a little complicated as compared today. Today, with the advent of new technologies and with the evolution of several platforms, offering the jobs, especially in the field of telecom, the hard task of getting entry has become easy.

Requirements variation

The entry requirement varies Pan India, depending upon the entry levels, positions & experience and the company you are applying in. You must remember that the work experience is useful, but also never an essential requirement.

 

Trends of telecom industry

The trend of the telecom industry is fast changing. As the technology is fast progressing, the big trend in the Information technology, which is the virtualization as highly seen in cloud computing is the face of change.

The engineers are getting hired in bulk numbers for the purpose. The hiring is now, being done either through recruitment drive, through job portals or direct application to the company.

 

Changing face of Telecom

The working in telecoms has also gained a new face in the past few years. The role, which was largely based as the field engineer, has turned more into office based. There are now even possibilities of traveling abroad and also you can work at home.

Now, the mobility is usually not a requirement. The focus of the telecom has changed since the installation of the towers to the teamwork, designing and developing new products, testing of those products and setting up infrastructure and supporting and satisfying customers. Also, we have seen that over the years, this sector has grown itself to the recession-proof.

 

Finding jobs in telecom sector

The hard task of finding jobs in the telecom sector is now an easy one. Now, with the availability of several job portals, recruitment drives, several social media platforms, online notifications of jobs have become the favor the country among the pass out engineers.

Lending jobs in the sector have become too easy, with several companies eager to provide the required training to the candidates seeking the telecom jobs. There is no dearth of the platform in the form of Linkedin, Field Engineer etc., which are paving the quick and easy way for the engineers to get a job in the Telecom sector.

Short term skill training in specific job roles is the way to meet the demand at any point in time. With the resources of the company gaining an expansion, they are not afraid to bridge the gap between the skills required by the company and already posed skills of the candidates.

 

Field Engineer – A trendsetter in Telecom sector

Field Engineer is an online resource for connecting field engineers and the businesses/companies, which hire them has unleashed a new era in the field of telecom. Providing a powerful platform for businesses and the job seekers, the company is involved in the process of interviewing, vetting, hiring and paying and thus offers a platform, indispensable to the field of the telecom industry.

Offering a revolutionary platform meant just for the telecom industry, Field Engineer has revolutionized the telecom world by providing the works to the work seekers for the telecom field engineers, who are constantly, looking to gain experience work wise and connect with the business all over the world.

With the focus of the company to connect the engineers and telecoms every day, it does not matter where you are in the world. You can be anywhere and still can remain connected. With Field Engineer, you can easily handle the remote jobs with much ease through the robust and easy to use platform

Field Engineer – A Platform for all

With the company focusing on the telecom engineers, the platform is great especially for Technicians, Network Engineers and Architects, Project Engineers, Security Engineers, Voice Engineers, Wireless Engineers, Data Center Engineers and VMware Engineers.

With the availability of the Field Engineer at apps, both at IOS and Android, the company offers a completely flexible approach towards the better connection of the field engineers and the companies involved in the business. Fairly straightforward platform and easy to use, along with the secure payment services, the employees, and employers, both are benefiting from such an initiative, one of a kind in the world.

The Field Engineer is focused on providing a well-built platform to the technical talents to go ahead in the future and have a direct access to the work. With the rising digital aspects, the company is focused on providing the best platform to tap into the best talents from all around the world and make this world, a really small place to work, where talents meet the destination, it should be.

As telecom veterans, the company is focused on harnessing the best talents and providing them a platform, where they can showcase the skills and talents & can earn a handsome salary for themselves and can connect with the companies of the world and thus can expand their wings.

Thus, providing the streamlined platform, the Field Engineer is, in fact, a revolutionary step in the telecom industry and can inspire towards a better future ahead in the telecommunications industry!

Read More at Dear Engineering Students, Here’s How you Land Your Next Engineering Job 

from Web Design Ledger https://webdesignledger.com/dear-engineering-students-heres-how-you-land-your-next-engineering-job/

Breaking: Uber loses its license to operate in London

London’s transport authority, Transport for London (TfL), has said it will not renew Uber’s license to operate in the city, which expires September 30. In a statement shared on its official Twitter account, TfL said that “Uber London Limited is not fit and proper to hold a private hire operator license,” saying that its “approach and conduct demonstrate a lack of corporate responsibility in relation to a number of issues.” TfL has today informed Uber that it will not be issued with a private hire operator licence. pic.twitter.com/nlYD0ny2qo — Transport for London (@TfL) September 22, 2017 TfL mentioned Uber’s approach…

This story continues at The Next Web

Or just read more coverage about: Uber

from UK – The Next Web https://thenextweb.com/uk/2017/09/22/breaking-uber-loses-license-operate-london/

Top Prototyping Tools And The Importance Of Prototyping In Your Workflow

Did you ever try to work in a straight line from the beginning to the end of a design project? If yes, you may have discovered that your design concept didn’t work out quite as planned. Perhaps, it didn’t even work out at all.

Prototyping is an effective way to prevent such occurrences from happening. Any extra work involved in building a prototype usually pays good dividends!

Prototyping significantly speeds up the design process. Moreover, it helps spot errors that would involve greater expense during later stages.

Finding the right prototyping tool need not take a lot of your time. The three featured here, are the best of the best.

Proto.io

Both low- and high-fidelity prototypes serve useful purposes. Whether you want verification that your design concept is valid and workable, or you wish to user test your design before handing it over to a developer, Proto.io will be a great choice. It is a powerful and easy-to-use prototyping tool.

You can start using it right away, since design or coding skills are not required to use it.Once you add Proto.io to your toolkit, you’ll be able to do your design and prototyping work, share information, provide previews, and collaborate with project stockholders – all on a single platform.

Proto.io’s Dashboard helps you maintain strict version control and supports your collaboration tasks. The Editor provides the functionality needed to build your prototype(s). The Playerplays an essential role when you need to share a prototype with others, conduct testing, or view change results on your browser.

You have the option of designing a prototype from scratch using the Editor, or importing design and design information from Photoshop or Sketch.

Design Systems by UXPin

If you’re in the market for an end-to-end UX design tool, UXPin is your best bet. The market is saturated with prototyping tools, but UXPin seems to be the only tool that doesn’t just excel at prototyping, but also tackles the more complex challenges of workflow, design consistency, and developer collaboration.

This cloud-based platform supports the whole UX process in one place: design systems, prototyping, documentation, collaboration, and developer handoffs. UXPin also integrates with Photoshop, Sketch, Jira, and Slack to create a more connected workflow.

One simplified workflow we found useful was creating your design system in UXPin with Sketch assets, then quickly prototyping in UXPin, collecting feedback in UXPin and sharing in Jira, then generating specs and style guides for developers in UXPin.

Fluid UI

Fluid UI is a user-friendly wireframing and prototyping tool designed to improve communication between web designers, developers and product managers.

Without ever leaving the platform, you can design, start interactive video sessions and chat and comment in real time whether designing or just previewing. Fluid UI is especially effective when working with distributed teams – whether in the same office, or on the other side of the planet, it doesn’t matter.

Fluid UI also contains a comprehensive series of built-in libraries that support wireframe and prototype design, material design, and design on iOS or the web. You can also upload your existing designs.

Three subscription plans are available, but you might first want to see what Fluid UI has to offer by signing up for its single project, “Free Forever” plan. Unlike other tools, Fluid UI also has the advantage of allowing you to store your data for free between projects.

Why Prototyping is so Important

To ensure you’ll accomplish your goals, it’s important to test your ideas as you progress. This is much more preferable than work straight through.

Prototypes provide insight into the performance of a site’s functionality. They tell you when changes are needed to ensure the product will be a pleasure to use.

Prototypes help you:

1. Define your design goals and ideas, refine them, and allow them to evolve

How to get the maximum benefit from prototypes? You need to create a series of them to check your design as you progress.

This process is often referred to as rapid prototyping. Such approach will help you deliver a high-quality design in less time.

2. Determine what works, what doesn’t, and what could be made to work better

A cool idea doesn’t always magically morph into a stellar design. If you’re going to make a pitch to a client, it’s not a bad idea to first see if your design idea is practical and feasible. Low-fidelity prototypes are particularly effective in demonstrating the practicality of a design concept.

Once practicality established, further prototyping can be extremely useful. Use it to validate and improve your design’s performance characteristics and functionality!

3. Identify easy to overlook design errors or problems

You don’t have to wait until user testing to uncover any remaining problems. Doing so can cost you extra in terms of time and money.

Problems detected early on are generally easiest to fix. By using prototypes, you’re more apt to detect problems that would otherwise go unnoticed.

4. Collaborate and communicate more effectively

Prototypes, especially interactive ones, contain vastly more valuable information than text or slideshows.

Prototyping can reduce a day-long product review meeting to an hour or less in many instances. This is also relevant when communication tools like video or live chat are put into play.

Summary

A prototype can be viewed simply as a useful design aide, but a good prototyping tool offers much more. It does not only speed up the design process! It provides an excellent means for early-on detection of hard-to-find design errors.

Those chosen here, stand for the best of the best in terms of functionality and performance.

Read More at Top Prototyping Tools And The Importance Of Prototyping In Your Workflow

from Web Design Ledger https://webdesignledger.com/top-prototyping-tools-and-the-importance-of-prototyping-in-your-workflow/

How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy From Scratch

This post originally published on July 16, 2014. We’ve updated it here with new research and stats and a cool new infographic.

When I went rock climbing for the first time, I had no idea what I was doing. My friends and I were complete newbies about ropes and rappelling and every other bit of jargon and technique that goes with climbing. We saw others doing it spectacularly well. We were thrilled at the thought of reaching the top of the climbing wall; we had no idea how to get there.

I’d imagine that a social media marketing strategy could feel the same way.

If you’re starting from square one, it might feel equal parts thrilling and overwhelming. You know what you want to do and why. You can see that others have climbed the social media mountain; you’ve got few ideas how to get there yourself.

It’d help to have a plan.

We’ve shared before about different parts of a social media strategy—the data and research and personal experience behind what works on social media.

Now we’re pleased to put it all into a cohesive, step-by-step blueprint that you can use to get started. If you need a social media marketing plan, start here.

Social Media Marketing Plan

Starting at the ground floor and building up, here is our overview of how to create a social media marketing plan from scratch.

I like to think of this plan like a road trip. Start out by pointing yourself in the right direction, then choose the way you’re going to get there, check in regularly to make sure you’re on track, and have some fun along the way.

Step 1: Choose your social networks

Step 2: Fill out your profiles completely

Step 3: Find your voice and tone

Step 4: Pick your posting strategy

Step 5: Analyze and test

Step 6: Automate and engage

Step 1: Which social media sites you should use

Social media is as homogenous from network to network as soda pop is from brand to brand. Sure, it’s all social media, but Google+ and Twitter might as well be Mountain Dew and Pepsi. Each network is unique, with its own best practices, own style, and own audience.

You should choose the social networks that best fit your strategy and the goals you want to achieve on social media.

You don’t have to be on them all—just the ones that matter to you and your audience.

Some things to consider that can help you choose not only which social networks to try but also how many to try.

Audience – Where do your potential customers hang out? Which social network has the right demographics?

Time – How much time can you devote to a social network? Plan on at least an hour per day per social network, at least at the start. (Once you get going, tools like Buffer can help you save a bit of time.)

Resources – What personnel and skills do you have to work with? Social networks like Facebook emphasize quality content. Visual social networks like Pinterest and Instagram require images and videos. Do you have the resources to create what’s needed?

For the first part of this decision, you can reference the audience research and demographics from surveys like those conducted by Pew Research. For instance, Pew has complete data, collected last year, of the demographics for Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Pinterest. Here is a side-by-side comparison of the major social media platforms’ user demographics.

For Snapchat’s user demographics, you can check out this “Who’s on Snapchat, anyway?” blog post by Snapchat.

Step 2: Fill out your profiles completely

One of our monthly checks here at Buffer is to visit each of our social media profiles and make sure that our profile photos, cover photos, bio, and profile info are up-to-date and complete. It’s a key part to our social media audit. A completed profile shows professionalism, cohesive branding, and a signal to visitors that you’re serious about engaging.

Profiles will require two parts: visuals and text.

For visuals, we aim for consistency and familiarity with the visuals we use on social media. Our profile photo on Instagram matches our profile photo on Facebook. Our cover photo on Twitter is similar to our cover on LinkedIn.

To create these images, you can consult a social media image size chart that will show you the exact breakdown of dimensions for each photo on each network. For an even easier time of it, you can use a tool like Crello or Canva, which comes with prebuilt templates that set the proper sizes for you.

For text, your main area to customize is the bio/info section. Creating a professional social media bio can be broken down into six simple rules.

1. Show, don’t tell: “What have I done” often works better than “Who I am”
2. Tailor your keywords to your audience
3. Keep language fresh; avoid buzzwords
4. Answer the question of your potential followers: “What’s in it for me?”
5. Be personal and personable
6. Revisit often

Step 3: Find your marketing voice and tone

The temptation at this point might be to jump right in and start sharing. Just one more step before you do. Your foray into social media will be more focused and more on point if you come up with a voice and tone for your content right off the bat.

To do so, you could spend time coming up with marketing personas and debating the finer points of your mission statement and customer base. These are all well and good. But for a social media marketing plan just getting off the ground, you can make this process a bit easier.

Start with questions like these:

• If your brand was a person, what kind of personality would it have?
• If your brand was a person, what’s their relationship to the consumer? (a coach, friend, teacher, dad, etc)
• Describe in adjectives what your company’s personality is not.
• Are there any companies that have a similar personality to yours? Why are they similar?
• How do you want your customers to think about your company?

At the end of this exercise, you should end up with a handful of adjectives that describe the voice and tone of your marketing. Consider this to keep you on track:

Voice is the mission statement; tone is the implementation of that mission.

MailChimp has created a standalone website simply for its voice and tone. Here’s an example of how they implement these qualities into their communication:

Cultivate a voice that delights your customers, then your customers will be thrilled to spread the love about you.

Step 4: Pick your posting strategy

What’s the ideal amount to post per day? How often should you post? When should you post? What should you post? The solid gold, ironclad answer for questions like these is:

It depends.

So much of the social media experience is about your individual audience and niche. What works for you might not work for me, and you never know until you try (we’ll get to trying in step five).

That being said, there is some pretty good data and insight about where to start. Here’s what we’ve found to be good jumping off points.

What should you be posting?

Videos are ideal for engagement.

The push toward video content has plenty of anecdotal evidence—as you browse your Facebook News Feed and Twitter timeline, you’re likely to see videos all over. There’s data to back up this trend: Videos posts get more views, shares, and Likes than any other type of post. And it’s not even close.

On Facebook, video posts get higher average engagement than link posts or image posts, according to BuzzSumo who analyzed 68 million Facebook posts.

On Twitter, videos are six times more likely to be retweeted than photos and three times more likely to be retweeted than GIFs, according to Twitter.

If you want to get started on creating social videos, here’s our video marketing guide on creating epic content on Facebook, Twitter, and more.

The 4:1 Strategy

Now that you know what works, you can place these different types of updates into a consistent strategy. One of my favorite systems is the one used by Buffer’s co-founder Joel Gascoigne. It works like this:

1. Start with the basic six types of updates we all post: Links, videos, images, quotes, reshares, plain-text updates
2. Choose a “staple” update, a single type that will make up the majority of your shares
3. Create a 4:1 ratio of sharing: for every four “staple” updates, publish one different type for variety

This way your followers know what to expect from you, and you can hone your sharing to a specific type, making it easier to perfect and to experiment.

(Note: You might not want to post the exact same updates across each of your social networks. Consider composing your updates in a unique way to complement each network’s own best practices, culture, and language.)

How often should you be posting?

There’s been a lot of interesting data out there about how often to post to social media. Some of the factors that might impact your specific sharing frequency may include your industry, your reach, your resources, and the quality of your updates. The social network you’re using will have its own best practices, too.

If people love your updates, you can typically always get away with posting more.

For a specific number, here’re some guidelines we’ve put together based on some really helpful research into how often to post to social media.

• Facebook – Once or twice per day
• Instagram – Once or twice per day
• Instagram Stories – Eight to 16 Stories, twice per week
• Twitter – Three to ten times per day
• LinkedIn – Once or twice per day
• Pinterest – Five to ten times per day
• Snapchat – Five to 20 times per week

When should you be posting?

There are many neat tools to show you the best time of day to post to Facebook, Twitter, and more. These tools look at your followers and your history of posts to see when your audience is online and when historically have been your best times to share.

So what’s someone to do who’s just starting out on these social networks, with no audience and no history?

Again, this is where best practices come in. Perhaps the most helpful (and adorable) infographic I’ve seen about timing comes from SumAll, which compiled timing research from sites like Visual.ly, Search Engine Watch, and Social Media Today to create its awesome visual. Here’s an overview of what they found in terms of timing (all times are Eastern Time).

• Twitter – 1-3pm weekdays
• Facebook – 1-4pm and 2-5pm weekdays
• LinkedIn – 7-8:30am and 5-6pm Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday
• Tumblr – 7-10pm weekdays and 4pm on Fridays
• Instagram – 5-6pm weekdays and 8pm on Mondays with a sweet spot at 6pm
• Pinterest – 2-4pm and 8-11pm weekdays with weekends being the best
• Google+ – 9-11am weekdays

I would recommend experimenting with these times (in your local time) and a few randomly-picked times as you’re starting out.

Once you have been posting a while, you can use your own data and tools like Facebook Insights, Instagram Insights, and Followerwonk to find your brand’s best time to post and refine your posting strategy.

Step 5: Analyze, test, and iterate

Remember how we talked about social media sharing being a very individual, specific endeavor? Your stats will likely start to bear this out.

The more you post, the more you’ll discover which content, timing, and frequency is right for you.

How will you know? It’s best to get a social media analytics tool. Most major social networks will have basic analytics built into the site; it’s just a little easier to seek and find this information from an all-encompassing dashboard.

These tools (I’ll use Buffer’s analytics as an example) can show you a breakdown of how each post performed in the important areas of views, clicks, shares, Likes, and comments.

Which social media stats are best? We’ve gained some insight from looking at each of these main statistics and the composite engagement statistic on a per-post basis. The resulting stat gives us a great look, over time, of how our social media content tends to perform, and we can then test and iterate from there.

Here’s one way to analyze your performance.

Set a benchmark. After two weeks or a month of sharing, you can go back through your stats and find the average number of clicks, shares, likes, and comments per post. This’ll be your benchmark going forward. You can come back and update this number at any time as your following and influence grow.

Test something new. We’re open to testing just about anything at Buffer. We’re in the midst of some tests right now on our Facebook account. Do Facebook Live videos get more views than non-live videos? Does the video length matter? We’ll often hear about someone’s new strategy or get a new idea and then test right away.

Did it work? Check the stats from your test versus the stats of your benchmark. If your test performed well, then you can implement the changes into your regular strategy. And once your test is over, test something new!

Step 6: Automate, engage, and listen

The final piece of a social media marketing plan involves having a system you can follow to help you stay on top of updates and engage with your community.

To start with, automate posting of your social media content.

Tools like Buffer allow you to create all the content that you want to, all at once, and then place everything into a queue to be sent out according to whatever schedule you choose. Automation is the secret weapon for consistently excellent sharing, day after day.

Your plan doesn’t end with automation, though. Social media requires engagement, too.

When people talk to you, talk back. Set aside time during your day to follow up with conversations that are happening on social media. These are conversations with potential customers, references, friends, and colleagues. They’re too important to ignore.

One way to stay up on all the conversations that are happening around you and your company is to create a system for listening and engaging. Tools like Buffer Reply and Mention will collect all social media mentions and comments on your posts in a single place, where you can quickly reply your followers.

What would you share with someone new to social media?

Coming up with a social media marketing plan is a great step toward diving in to social. If social media looks thrilling and overwhelming all at once, start with a plan. Once you see the blueprint in front of you, it’s a little easier to see what lies ahead.

1. Pick your networks
2. Fill out your info
3. Find your voice
4. Choose your strategy
5. Analyze and test
6. Automate and engage

Bingo!

How did you develop your social media strategy? I’d love to keep the conversation going in the comments. If you know someone who could use this, feel free to pass this along. If you can use it yourself, let me know how it goes!

Want more social media tips? Take our free email course!

I’ve put together a list of 25 practical social media strategies that work for us here at Buffer—and I’d love to share them with you via email.

Join here

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This post originally published on July 16, 2014. We’ve updated it with new research, statistics, and a cool new infographic on September 2017.

Image sources: Will Scullin, MailChimp, Crello, SumAll, and Pew Research

from Social https://blog.bufferapp.com/social-media-marketing-plan