Years ago, I wrote about Designing for the Appearance of Speed, outlining some impetus and methods for creating the illusion of short page load times in apps and on the web. Shortly after that article was published, I had amazing conversations with fellow designers and engineers, largely around a single question — “how do we actually know that skeleton screens work?” A valid question — no definitive studies exist to validate the efficacy of the pattern (which, to us, seemed to make so much sense). Skeleton screens in different shapes and sizes are seemingly found everywhere across the web and apps — anywhere humans are forced to wait. But do they actually work? ?Research summary (TL;DR)
Skeleton screens: an overview ?Luke Wroblewski first coined the term “skeleton screen” in a blog postadvising that designers eschew the use of spinners (typically a graphical element that is animated rotating on its center point) in favour of visual placeholders. He referenced work he had done on a native mobile app called Polar, specifically around excessive wait times reported by users when loading the app’s web views. Initially, spinners were used to indicate that a web view was loading in. Luke said it best:
To mitigate focus on the loading process, versus the actual content that is loading, Wroblewski introduced a novel new design pattern — the skeleton screen. In his own words, they are “essentially a blank version of a page into which information is gradually loaded.” These visual placeholders were shown by Wroblewski to be light grey boxes that appeared instantly in areas where content had not yet completed loading. Shifting our focus to the content being loaded, and away from the actual loading itself — an almost Dickensian red herring. But what’s the actual impact? Explicit loading paradigmsInitially, spinners were used in the Polar app to communicate to users when the web view was pulling from a server. Let’s be clear here: in his post, Luke isn’t picking on the common place practice of using spinners — instead he is commenting (perhaps indirectly) on a natural human tendency to detest idle time, and the need to manage human perceptions. Spinners and progress bars are explicit loading paradigms in that they focus the user on communicating a loading period and, more often than not, are blocking user interaction until a layout has loaded enough to be useful. Skeleton screens definedSkeleton screens are blank pages that are progressively populated with content, such as text and images, as they become available (i.e. when network latency allows). Grey or neutral-toned filled shapes, commonly called placeholders, meet the user instantly upon user interaction with calls to action or links. The placeholders (the so-called “bones” of the skeleton) are then replaced with the actual site content, and the illusion is complete. That’s what skeleton screens do: create the illusion of an instant transition. Skeleton screens in the wildGoogle Drive YouTube CommonalitiesAll of these examples above employ common visual design approaches:
The study ?️The study is comprised of two primary phases: The first phase pits a common loading paradigm (a spinner) directly against the skeleton screen approach, and is described in more detail in the section titled “Paradigm vs Paradigm”. The second phase investigates variations on skeleton screens, gauging the effectiveness of each variation. I planned this study before knowing fully the outcomes of the first phase, as my assumption was that the skeleton trend would continue regardless of its assessed efficacy, and I wanted to see for myself what would be optimal in my own work. See the section titled “Implementation variables” for more on this phase of the study. Previous studiesLittle research has surfaced that shows the effectiveness of skeleton screens at reducing perceived queuing times. Viget released a 2017 study that speaks against the touted value of skeletons when compared to spinners and a blank screen (spoiler alert: skeleton screens performed the worst in terms of perceived duration of time). Yet even with the Viget study in hand with seemingly indicative results, I wanted to take things a bit further. Testing principlesI wanted to test skeleton screens as much as I could on a physical mobile device, as that best represents the “half-focussed” state that most of us are in when we’re on our mobile (half focussed on the device, and half focussed on traversing the streets or eating a bagel). I also wanted test participants that (preferably) did not work in the tech industry. So I took to the streets of downtown Vancouver and got to work talking to locals of all ages, genders, and life situations. In the second part of this study, I leveraged testers on UserTesting.com (sadly because the weather had turned and it was becoming increasingly unpleasant to sit and wait for research participants outside). Paradigm vs paradigmHypothesis: displaying a skeleton screen will cause humans to perceive a loading period as being shorter in duration. MethodologyIn considering how to best approach participants, I realized that past tests I had attempted against this hypothesis were rife with issues that could be easily mitigated, namely that:
To mitigate some of these issues, I decided that an app on a physical phone, presented to the test participant to complete on their own, was the best solution. Preliminary user testing of the testing app proved positive after several iterations and refinements. Once I approached a potential test participant on the street, I asked them to complete the tasks as instructed on the device and assured them that they could stop at anytime to ask any questions or rest. Once they completed the test, and offered any open ended comments on which paradigm they preferred, a donut was offered as a reward and my participants were sent on their way, happy in the knowledge that some odd fellow was on top of testing different loading methods with strangers. Hurrah! ? 126 total unique individuals were approached on the street from varying backgrounds, primarily from non-technology oriented backgrounds. The sample size was 80 individuals who have all had experience with mobile devices. The testing app?The app was written in the Swift programming language and was loaded onto an iPhone 7 (this is the form factor I felt would feel comfortable in most hands). When the participant completed their test, the results were sent to a Firebase database from where I could pull daily results into a CSV (comma separated values) file for analysis. Participants were asked to read the instructions presented in-app, and take their time when completing the presented tasks. Before beginning the tests, I ran the participants through a really quick warm-up, so that they knew what to expect. Here’s what our participants had to do:
In order to mitigate any bias, where seeing one pattern before another might skew the perceived duration, the app automatically randomized the order in which the different loading paradigms appeared. The app also randomized the actual duration presented for each loading paradigm, so the duration didn’t seem as if it was progressively getting longer, or shorter. ResultsWhen testing skeletons versus spinners and our blank control in random order, the skeleton performed the best in terms of perceived durationwhen shown to people using mobile devices (see the below table for a summary of the mean test results for a sample size of 80 individuals). Actual durations shown to these participants were randomized to prevent them from interpreting a progressive increase in duration. Our blank control performed worst overall. Skeleton screens also performed best on the emotional level, with participants being the most happy with skeleton screen loads, and least happy overall with a blank screen. After viewing each combination of duration and loading method, participants were asked to measure how each viewing made them feel using emoji, with 0 = Very happy, and 4 = Maximum frustration. Here’s what they were shown after each test: Analysis & interpretationWhen skeleton screens are used between page loads on mobile devices, the perceived elapsed time (duration) is shorter when compared to a spinner or a blank screen. In some instances, the skeleton is equivalent to the spinner, such as in our 5.5s duration tests, and indeed the superiority of skeletons over spinners is minor. One might hypothesize that different presentation methods of the spinner might affect results significantly. In our tests, I used a spinner that I thought was generic and looked most native to the platform (iOS in this case). In both dimensions (perceived performance and emotional impact) using any loading indicator is superior to a blank screen. Implementation variablesHypothesis: the visual presentation of skeleton screens will cause humans to perceive a loading time as being shorter in duration. I began hypothesizing how variations on the skeleton could affect perceived duration early on in this investigation (before I had results on whether skeletons were more performant than spinners). Early hints that the visual presentation of skeleton screens could affect perceived duration came from sources such as this 2010 study (in this study, progress bars presented with a “ribbing” animation proved superior in terms of perceived wait duration). Further reading can be done on the contrast of objects and how they impact human perception of speed. MethodologyIn order to determine the effectiveness of any particular visual presentation of skeleton screens, I spent time to collect the most popular approaches currently used in the market. Here are some common approaches:
With the weather turning outside (I had done all previous tests outdoors in downtown Vancouver, BC) I turned to 80 unique mobile devices users on UserTesting.com in order to test these implementation variables. Participants were from a largely North American audience and were asked to conduct the tests on mobile devices. To conduct the test, I mocked up a mobile product page for a make-believe footwear brand to make the comparison seem like a real-world example. Participants were shown one presentation, then another immediately after. The order in which I showed each presentation method was flipped in each “set” presented. For example, if I tested a static versus pulsing skeleton screen, the first 10 participants were shown the static version first, and the last 10 were shown the pulsing version first instead. This was done to mitigate any concerns that a bias may arise from seeing one method before the other. The participants were not told that the duration of each example they saw were exactly the same duration (all durations were 5 seconds in length). Upon viewing the two presentation methods, the participant was asked, “of the two page transitions you observed, which page transition was faster?” The testsI sequentially layered the implementation methods in order to move from macro variables into micro variables. Here’s the order of tests I went through:
Results: Static vs animated skeletons60% of test participants guessed that the animated skeletons represented a shorter duration. Sample size: 20 unique testers Results: Pulsing animation vs wave animation65% of test participants guessed that the wave animation represented a shorter duration. Sample size: 20 unique testers Results: Quick vs Slow and steady wave60% of test participants guessed that the slow wave animation represented a shorter duration. Sample size: 20 unique testers Results: Left to right wave animation vs right to left68% of test participants guessed that the left to right wave animation represented a shorter duration. Sample size: 20 unique testers Analysis & interpretationThe results from this grouping of tests is indicative but not conclusive by any means. What might throw some flavour into these results is that, when speaking aloud about why they decided the way they did, test participants were fairly indecisive when it came to more nuanced tests (for example the quick versus slow wave test). However, when it came to tests that were more obvious to discern (such as the pulsing versus wave animation test) testparticipants were decisive and fully convinced that one was shorter in duration than the other (even though the durations were all consistent across the board). How should we design skeleton screens?The key role of motionWhile further study of the efficacy and effectiveness skeleton screens is needed, this exercise has provided us with a few clues as to how we can make the most of this unique pattern, namely:
Use of dominant colorsThe use of dominant color based skeleton objects is a unique method of providing future context to objects that are loading, as if to imply more acutely the future loaded state. Google Photos uses this pattern, as does Pinterest. Skeleton screens are not splash screensBefore we dove into the details of this study, I mentioned that the vast majority of skeleton screens implemented today act exclusively as splash screens. When designing loading experiences, strive to progressively load content, replacing skeleton placeholder objects with content like real text and images as soon as they are available. Luke Wroblewski (the early pioneer of skeleton screens) speaks about this in detail at the 2018 Conversions at Google. Luke calls this “gradual content loading”. Future studies should compare a true gradually loaded skeleton with other loading indicators, while leveraging a larger sample size. Afterwards: on time perceptionAllow me to be real for several thousand milliseconds here: why would the mere perception of a site or app loading several hundred milliseconds faster, prompt such a deep personal investigation into something seemingly innocuous as skeleton screens? As part of the generation that inserted 13 floppy disks to install Windows 95, you would think that the LTE and fiber connections we enjoy today might make me nostalgic for simpler times, times when I could head to the fridge for pie while waiting for my favourite Geocities web page to finish loading in all its animated GIF glory. But alas no. I am as impatient as teenagers on the bus complaining about the 12mbps load of their Instagram feed. I cringe when the animation of a mobile navigation stutters along at sub-30 frames-per-second. I wonder why the payment terminal at the grocery store takes a full 2 seconds to actually get ready before I can tap my watch to pay. Our world and the society it hosts, now moves faster than large swathes of our species can process. Does it seem to you that our perception of time is accelerating beyond our ability to acclimate? You are not alone. Delving into how humans perceive time in the context of the pace of technology around us, has been an enlightening experience. But I am also filled with trepidation. As Peter Conrad best put it, “Modernity is about the acceleration of time”. From pure personal observation, the truth of this seems self-evident. Our culture’s patience thins daily, our walking pace has seemingly quickened to near jogging speeds, and our waning tolerance for all things even mildly idle in nature has given way to an entire industry of productivity pundits. This very article grew from my own personal awe as I beheld our collective impatience. In this human rebuke of slowness will undoubtedly arise new anxieties and irrational impulses. And perhaps new ways to stanch our fear that time is slipping from our grasp — as we sit and quietly contemplate skeleton screens. With gratitudeThis study would not have been possible if not for the hard work of my friend Karl Schmidt, an iOS developer who volunteered to code up an app to automate collecting results from research. Thanks to designers Jaybe Allanson, Mitch Lenton, and UX researcher Ben Cole for their guidance in collecting data used in this study. Special thanks go out to Michael Chung and Nikki An for reviewing ahead of publication. The post Everything you need to know about skeleton screens appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/user-interface-design/everything-you-need-to-know-about-skeleton-screens/
0 Comments
When you add Photoshop textures to your digital designs, you will be adding richness to your work. This is because textured Photoshop backgrounds add depth and atmosphere to your work. Searching for perfect Photoshop textures can be time-consuming. To help you out, we’ve put together a list of excellent quality free Photoshop textures to add a professional element to your designs. If you’re looking for great backgrounds for Photoshop, don’t miss out. Explore our list and select those which suit your designs. What is a texture?If you’re looking for Photoshop textures but would like to understand more, don’t worry. A texture is about the surface quality of an object and what it feels like to the touch. Think of the grainy texture of wood or the smoothness of polished concrete. Woolen blankets will have a different texture to fleece. Even the salt scrubs or soapy exfoliation gels you use in your bath will differ in texture. We make choices every day based on the textures which appeal to us. In graphic design, you can’t touch the textures you work with. Instead, a texture is simply visual. However, the textures you use will strike a memory within your viewer. Your viewer will be able to imagine the way your designs would actually feel. Photoshop textures, therefore, create an illusion for your viewers, adding an interesting dimension to your designs. What are Photoshop textures?Photoshop textures create backgrounds for your visual designs. They can add a range of different textures such as gritty concrete, smooth marble or polished wood. Photoshop textures use photo effects to add depth. When you use cool background designs you’ll be drawing on a very useful design element. You’ll be able to work with your Photoshop textures to create a range of different possibilities. Some designers may choose to create textures from scratch, while others prefer to work from photographic images. These images can either be downloaded or taken by a designer. Free Photoshop backgrounds can be complex and earthy, or they can be simple patterns such as dots and stripes. When you choose a background for Photoshop, take your design and the brand into consideration. You’ll be looking for a texture which works well with the style of your site as a whole. Great backgrounds will never distract from your site. Using Photoshop textures to enhance your portraitsIf you have a great portrait image and you’d like to add depth to your webpage, Photoshop textures add a new dimension. Before using a texture, have a look at the picture and how you would like to show it off. By applying great backgrounds you’ll be able to create a customized portrait that looks great on your site. Why use Photoshop textures?If you’d like to add an authentic appeal to a project, adding Photoshop textures gives visual appeal. Imagine a gritty concrete setting behind an urban design or a marble wall behind a site for a luxury spa. When creating a visual mockup of a site, Photoshop background textures help your clients to see where your work might be going. On a final product, a background texture adds polish to your designs. High-quality background textures make your site feel sensual and add atmosphere to your site. This will add a new dimension to your site. The high-quality Photoshop textures in this article have been designed to enhance photographs, illustrations, tutorials, and page layouts. They have been created by professional web designers to assist with creating wonderful sites. If you’re short of time, you may not be able to create your own background textures. This list will help you to add interest and a great atmosphere to your site designs. All are available for personal use, and many are available for commercial use. Check the terms and conditions of use before including them in your design projects. The very best Photoshop Textures availableFree Wood & Ink Texture PackIf you have been looking for a great wood type shop, this great Photoshop textures set offers a free sample. All you have to do is click on the link to download this great package. If you buy the full version of this set you’ll get over 60 different textures which have been made from ink, water wood and brushes. You’ll also get 20 Photoshop wood styles, 10 brushes, 15 patterns, 5 Wood Block brushes, 5 overlays with ink splatter designs and free updates. Artistic Textures And Art Deco PatternsDesignCuts has greated a great package filled with vintage and retro Photoshop textures. Artists include NKate and Umember, 2 Lil Owls, Artist Mef, LuOtero and Mix Pix Box. You’ll also get great art deco patterns from The Paper Town to add to your Photoshop textures collection. 23 Water Color TexturesGreat Photoshop background textures created in water color can be downloaded free. You can download individual files at SadMonkey’sDeviantArt Page. You can use these files for both personal and commercial use. You can also modify and redistribute them in any way you choose. Free VHS Texture PackAre you looking for great Photoshop backgrounds with a retro appeal? This great 10 texture pack designed by Timothy Swim is available free. You can add a great crackled effect to your designs. Download free on Dribble. DirtbagHdWould you like to add grungy Photoshop design textures to your site? If so, this 15 set package with free texture brushes is perfect for you. This package was created by UK designer Visual Idiot. 50 Outstanding Free Design TexturesHow would you like a super pack of 50 great Photoshop textures absolutely free? Create outstanding designs with this great library of cool background textures. You’ll get a range of different styles to suit every design. Free Pasta TexturesFood textures are not your usual option when creating websites. However, if you’re working on packaging designs, food sites or other commercial designs you may need pasta related textures. This 5 part collection has a range of different pasta designs, from farfalle to fusilli and twisted egg noodles. Use these simple textures to create a great site. Ending thoughts on these Photoshop texturesIf you want to create a great collection of Photoshop textures to use on a range of different site backgrounds, you’ll find a great selection to choose from. Save yourself time by exploring the above designs to see if you can find the pattern or texture you’ll need. Many great website designs use a cool texture background to add visual appeal. Photoshop textures are interesting and easy to use. You can also adjust your images to suit your unique needs. The possibilities for creating unique and customized designs are endless. We hope you enjoy these great Photoshop textures and use them to make incredible website designs. If you enjoyed reading this article about these Photoshop textures, you should read these as well:
The post 37 Photoshop textures that must be a part of your toolbox appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/graphic-design/photoshop-textures/ Productivity is a subject everyone talks about, but not everyone knows how to achieve it. Still, we try our best to find ways to do workplace activities more quickly. At the same time, do them as well as before or even better. The digital age has become both a curse and a blessing in this respect. It’s provided us with tools to become more productive; in some cases, almost instantly. The digital age has also given us more work to do and quite often less time to do it in. One area where technology helps us comes in the form of good productivity apps. They can help us organize, manage our workflows, give us a head’s up on actions to be taken. They can take care of a lot of areas in our work that might otherwise create stressful situations. We offer several of these top productivity apps for your inspection. MasonMason offers a platform on which product teams can come together to create robust and functionally precise front-end features for the applications they produce; economically and at lightning-speed. This modern productivity tool enables its users to bypass documentation, sequential wireframing and prototyping, and QA analysis. It also minimizes, and in many instances eliminates, the need to hand a project over to developers. Mason’s somewhat radical approach saves time and keeps budgets in bounds because of the way it streamlines the design/build process. It can also save engineering teams time and additional expense by shortening the software feature deployment process and in some cases, bypassing conventional deployment practices altogether. Anyone who has a Mason account and is authorized to make changes or add features to a live application can do so. This typically includes all team members and can also include post-deployment maintenance personnel and even clients. If you’ve been looking for a UI/UX productivity tool that can do things faster, with great precision, and save you money in the process, give Mason a good, hard look. Proto.ioProto.io provides an all-in-one solution for designers, entrepreneurs, developers, and product managers, or anyone else who relies on creating wireframes, mockups, or prototypes to support their software design and development process. In the early stages of design, you can create wireframes, mockups, or low-fidelity prototypes to test concepts and get feedback. During the later stages, you can use Proto.io to create high-fidelity prototypes that mimic the look, feel, and overall experience of a live application. The high-fidelity prototypes you build can be used for user testing on mobile devices, as well as to support design approval and signoff. Proto.io offers a wide spectrum of tools, features, and options. Its latest version, Proto.io 6, has a redesigned UI and other productivity-enhancing features including new state transitions, an interaction wizard, and enhanced user testing feedback capabilities. monday.commonday.com is a team management tool that gives teams ranging from two freelancers to thousands of teams working together around the globe a centralised platform to work from for project information sharing, collaboration, and workflow streamlining and improvement. monday.com promotes transparency. In doing so, it gives its users a greater sense of personal empowerment; making them feel more important than simply being owners of their individual tasks. Team leaders and members can easily track time, see who is working on what, and view project and task status. monday.com stores information securely while placing needed information at users’ fingertips when they need it. The number of teams currently using this team management tool exceeds 50,000 and is growing rapidly. In fact, this fast-growing company tripled its revenue and tripled its user base in the past year alone. ActiveCollabActiveCollab is a project management software for creative professionals that enables you to organize your entire work from start to finish. The latest update brought in some awesome new features and it now has a completely new look & feel. The star of the show, task dependencies with automatic task rescheduling, is a real game changer. When you modify a task, any tasks that are dependent on it are changed and rescheduled accordingly. There are many other neat surprises as well. Lucidchart.comLucidchart is aptly named. It’s one of the best ways, if not the best way, to communicate ideas visually. This is what Lucidchart does, and it does it to perfection. With this productivity application, you can present technical flows to non-technical types and better organize your ideas and personal goals. Lucidchart’s secret lies in its library of custom shapes, import and export features, and drag and drop diagram-creating interface. NutcacheLike the little mascot depicted in its logo, Nutcache saves and stores important things for you until you need them. This all-in-one project management software solution will help you and your team manage your projects more efficiently and with greater effectiveness. Nutcache integrates all aspects of a project including task management, budgeting, time tracking, expense management, and invoicing from estimating to final billing. 5 Productivity Tips to Help You Achieve More, Work Smarter, and Create Peace of Mind
Some people have elephant-like memories but most of us don’t. Trying to remember something can be a genuine time waster. Completely forgetting something you should not have can sometimes lead to bad situations. To repeat: write it down.
It’s remarkable that when you have a task you dread on your to-do list, it has a way of gravitating toward the bottom. You may forget some things, but a dreaded task is not one of them. Give yourself a break and do it first.
Even when you’re zeroed in on a task, it’s often a good time to take a break now and then. Experts say every 45 minutes is about right but do what works for you. This gives your brain a chance to recharge and you’ll be more effective at what you’re doing because of it. Make taking breaks a habit, and don’t feel guilty about it.
The reason for this is almost self-explanatory. Sound mind—sound body – synergy.
Say Yes all the time and you tend to put control over your work (and to some extent your life) in the hands of others. Do what’s important, what you’re comfortable managing, and what you prefer doing. ConclusionThere are many ways to boost your productivity or that of your team’s. But if you try too many different approaches, you’ll soon reach the point of diminishing returns. Use one or more of the top productivity tools we recommend. Couple them with the 5 little but super-important tips we shared. This should put you on the right path to greater productivity and the success that goes along with it. The post How do you tackle design projects? Start with these productivity apps. appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/resources/design-productivity-apps/ You need to agree, building a one-page website would be 10 times easier than building a 10-pager. Or not? Almost the exact opposite is true, however. The reason? It’s not all that easy to make a one-pager visually appealing and at the same time user-friendly. Just settling on a design can take up to 10 times the effort you would put into a multi-pager. It takes superb planning to stuff all the information you believe is important on a single page. Too much information and you’ll start to lose visitors by the third scroll. According to the ancients, and the less-informed, nature is made up of air, fire, water, earth, and spirit. One-page website design is also characterized by 5 critical elements. Follow them, and you will significantly reduce the bounce rate. Extensive scrolling-induced carpel tunnel syndrome will decline as well. 5 Critical Elements that Will Make or Break Your Design#1 The GOAL: Identify the Goal of the Website & Work Towards ItYou may be super-enthusiastic to get going. But that’s the #1 website design mistake you can make. It is starting out without first having a clear understanding of what your website is to achieve. You need to have a single goal in mind. One that drives the user journey, before you place your first design element on the canvas. Is the purpose of your website:
Now, let’s say you’ve identified the purpose of your site. It’s time to think about ways in which your design might chase visitors away before responding to your CTA. An example is using parallax effects. While they can be engaging, they typically slow down page load speeds. This is a situation that will cause lots of users to bail out. Here are several examples of techniques used to avoid load speed issues: This website’s interactive effects above the fold don’t drag down its load speed. The image on this BeTheme pre-built one-pager appears to be dynamic; it isn’t. Tiny animated items add to this page’s illustration without slowing down page loading. Here’s an example of where a page’s fresh look is all that’s needed. Here’s an outstanding example of how large images and sliding panels contribute to engaging site visitors. You don’t need a long list of technical details to promote an app. Vivid colors, neat effect, and a genuinely cool presentation will generally suffice. #2 TEXT: Keep It to the Minimum & Make It Easy to ReadAvoid clunky blocks of text on a one-pager. They will turn off a user almost immediately. The remedy? Use bold headlines, short paragraphs, and bullet lists. You need to totally avoid blocks of text. Use easy to follow sections and visuals to keep users entertained. You might like to bookmark some of these examples to use as references: This one-pager is about as entertaining as it gets. An example of what neat organization can accomplish. Key information is kept above the fold; and bullet lists aid in keeping the message concise. An illustration of how large attractive images help do the selling when accompanied by astutely placed paragraphs of text. When a vehicle has the stature Mercedes-Benz does, focusing more on high quality images than on text is usually more than sufficient. #3 VISUALS: Identify the Right Patterns & Use Negative Space WiselyThe “way” people read is important to take into account. Most read text in an F pattern and scan visual elements in a Z pattern. Being aware of this should help you maintain a nice flow as you mix elements. This flow leads people to the critical stuff and away from things of lesser importance. White space is useful here. You can use it to separate sections and make the text more readable. It can stoke reader’s curiosity about what they’ll find lower on the page, and help them avoid visual fatigue. An example using white space to create a sense of order. A wildly creative website using white space for its canvas. The white space in this pre-built one-pager maintains a sense of order and makes the different sections stand out. Here’s an example using a mix of design principles to create an amazing visual sensation. You would naturally expect a page promoting nasal drops to be dull. This page, with its ingenious mix of slides, white space, and animations is anything but. #4 NAVIGATION: Make It Easy to Navigate & Entertaining to ScrollIf you’re not careful, navigation can cause problems on long-form one pagers. Users can get hung up, sent to somewhere they didn’t intend to go, or simply leave. An alternative navigation scheme is a good practice for a one-pager. It could consist of either a classic horizontal sticky menu or a sidebar menu. As long as it enables users to quickly jump to a section of interest to them with a single click, it’s good. Auto-scrolling nav links can also be extremely helpful. This is if you let the visitor watch the page scrolling rather than jumping directly to the new section. You might find these examples of user-friendly navigation helpful: This website features 3 different auto-scrolling links. Be Game offers a navigation experience that’s more entertaining than most. Three things stand out, the layout structure, the color scheme, and the use of 3 mouse scrolls to scan the page. A menu on the top and one on the left provide a sure-fire way to help you navigate this site quickly. #5 CALL TO ACTION: Identify the Correct CTA & Don’t Be Afraid to Use ItDon’t be afraid to use CTA buttons. The CTA is the introduction to the endgame of your website’s raison d’etre. The beauty of a one-pager is that you’re typically directing people toward a single action. For this reason, it’s preferable to have the CTA button above the fold. This is especially if you’re presenting a portfolio. If, however, you’re selling several products or a range of services, you may need to use several CTA buttons. In this example the CTA button is above the fold along with one in the menu. The two CTA buttons above the fold allow users to choose where they want to go. This site employs a simple opt-in form with a bold CTA button. Reneza uses CTA buttons judiciously, with an optimum choice of colors and text sizes. Wrapping It Up5 critical elements? Maybe we should add “spirit”. Great designers seem to have it in abundance. Learn and master the 5 elements discussed here. They are key to providing engaging one-page website user experiences. They look simple, but once you try applying several or all 5 to a design, the going can get tough. You can also take a shortcut by using pre-built websites. These have incorporated these basic elements. Be Theme is a great resource for pre-built websites with its huge library of 60+ one-pagers to choose from. It has 400+ pre-built websites of all kinds to fit your needs. The post 24 Stunning Examples of Top Quality One-Page Website Designs appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/wp/24-examples-one-page-website-designs/ What is a logo? Logo designs are everywhere, but if you are not familiar with the term, you might be asking “what is a logo and why do you need one?” Well, logos are all around you. Everywhere you look, both online and off, you will find logos. A logo is a visual representation of a brand and it has the power to influence your choices. The easiest way to define logos is as a visual message a company uses to share its values. A logo therefore has meaning. Why Use A Logo?Producing logos means creating a symbol for a brand. This symbol can be used digitally on a company website. It is also used on letterheads and business cards. A logo is also known as a logotype. Logos make a company easy to recognize as the logo becomes increasingly familiar to the public. Identification logos are usually bespoke, and carefully designed for a company. They are specifically designed by a marketing or graphic design logo company to represent a brand. Great logos visually represent more than just a product or service. Instead they show a visual representation of the client’s aspirations or goals. A definition of logo is therefore a sign or emblem which identifies a company and expresses an associated meaning. Think of the bird logo associated with the social media platform Twitter. Logos do not only belong to businesses. Families often use crests or emblems as a means of identity. Logos are not necessarily visual art images. Some companies use letters or initials to share their work goals. At one time it was only large companies or organizations that could afford logo designs. Often family crests were considered a sign of wealth. They were very detailed and expensive. As human beings were drawn to signs, symbols and metaphor. Visual representation has been used to represent countries in the form of flags. Road signs tell us where to go and how to get there. Signs have therefore always directed our attention. Like ancient signs, logos use color and contrast to attract attention. Fortunately, logo designs have become less expensive and available to even small businesses. In a digital world where so much information is conveyed very quickly, a logo assists with putting across information at a glance. Our brain can pick up a visual image in the blink of an eye. Logos are therefore not easily overlooked and become a memorable part of a brand. When coming up with a logo, designers work on a concept which will make an impression on customers. The logo needs to both unique and stylish in order to make an effective impact. A logo needs to be both catching and memorable. It will also need to convey the message behind a brand. When creating a logo, it helps to look at the costs of reproduction. The more details a logo has and the more colors it uses, the more expensive it will be to reproduce. Simple logos are also more effective when reduced to small sizes. This is important in the digital era where people often use small screens and wearables to view a website. Your logo therefore needs to look as good on a watch screen or pen as it does on a billboard. Well-designed logos also take into consideration logo styles. Some logos use words or letters and initials. Others use pictures, abstract images or emblems. The age of a company, the company’s name and budget all impact on the design choices. Logo design styles are sometimes used in combination if a company has the budget. Think of the CK or HP logos, Coca Cola and Pepsi, Twitter, Adidas and Starbucks. What’s the purpose of a logo?The purpose of logos is to identify a brand. This way customers will know whether a pair of jeans is made by Levi’s or Guess and will choose accordingly. When customers recognize your brand, they can choose to purchase your products. Identification is therefore the most important aspect of logo design. Logo designs may be trendy or not, they may change with the times. As long as they identify the product, service, people or company behind the brand, they are effective. This means that before a designer works on possible logos, s/he needs to explore the contexts a logo will be used in and how it will be received. A designer needs to explore the competition, the message behind the brand and how symbols, colors or shapes have been used in the past. Who owns a specific design. How can an effective logo be designed to stand out from the crowd? Logo design is a well thought through strategy or technique rather than an art form. Although logos do have an artistic element, a logo’s purpose is commercial. Logos are not about personal taste but about an overall strategy. The goal is for the viewer to identify logo designs and link them to a service or product. Although aesthetics adds to logo design, this is not the most crucial element of the design. Logos need to stand out in order to extend the brand. The apple logo, for example, associated with creativity, stands out as an easily identifiable means of purchasing that specific brand of computer, tablet, mobile phone or watch. Identification is therefore the most critical element of logo design. While fine art often holds hidden meanings and deeper layers, logos communicate a very simple message. As long as the design is easily recognizable, the message associated with the brand will be passed along to viewers. Ongoing marketing and a deepening of the messages shared through adverts and social media will help to build the brand. The purpose of a logo is simply to represent or identify the brand. If we look at Apple or Nike, the logos hold meanings which have come with the advertising campaigns and, in Nike’s case, sponsorships. Why have a logo?A logo provides a representation of your brand. This will help you to stand out from the competition. By using a logo, you create a visual symbol which helps you to stand out from the competition. When a logo is easily recognizable, a customer is able to distinguish between products. A customer is able to choose between Nike and Adidas shoes based on the logo designs on both. When coming up with a logo, designers explore the competition and assess how a logo can stand out. Designers will work to create a logo which is both unique and familiar to the industry it represents. A logo sends a message about a businessWorking logos stand out and are easily recognizable. They also provide information about your company. Logos often help a customer to understand the business you are in. King Cake and Home Depot make it plain that their companies offer specific set products. Your logo will also appeal to a specific market or target audience. Corporate logos have a different purpose or design to logos which appeal to children. Imagery used in a logo will provide information about a company. Building plans in architect logos and a pair of spectacles in an optometrist’s logo give information about the products and services offered. Color also helps to appeal to a specific market or share a message. Green is often associated with the environmental movement while red is associated with passion, danger or romance. After a brand has been in existence for a while, has gained a reputation and has been part of a marketing campaign, the logo will become recognizable. A company can then make use of logo designs alone. The logo will remind clients that your company still exists. They, therefore, remain a crucial part of a brands identity. The importance of logos cannot be understated. A well-designed logo will be easy to remember. Customers will be reminded of the values you offer. Using pictures, shapes and abstract images makes a logo easy to recognize. This is because the brain processes visual images more quickly than words. A visual image will make a brand easy to recognize and identify. A logo is the visual face of your businessWhen you imagine a business, the logo often comes to mind first. The memorable Apple stands out in our minds as does the Nike swoosh. McDonalds Golden Arches are the first thing we think of when thinking of the brand. These images combine with our memories, experiences and perceptions to give meaning and resonance to a brand. This is the importance of logos. Logo design influences our decisionsWe need logos to represent a brand. This is because our minds continually use symbols and images, shapes and colors to interpret the world. By looking at a logo we shape meaning and connections which shape a wider world. These meanings are related to the fonts, shapes and colors which make up the logo. Single logos therefore cannot to wider meanings. From these impressions we make decisions about products or services. We consider how a company fits into our wider values. If a company has a conservative logo and we don’t endorse these values we may ignore it. If it represents our values, we will endorse it. A logo identifies a brand but it also fits in with our personal sense of identity. This is why it is so important that a logo accurately represents a brand. An on the go company needs an on the go logo and a corporate brand needs a corporate logo. This will help a company to attract the right audience. Logos define a company and if it sends out the wrong message, the company will not survive. Creating an effective and helpful design is therefore crucial. Logos create a first impressionWhat is a logo if not the opportunity to make a great first impression? With so much to distract us and so much competition, a logo gives a company the opportunity to attract attention. There is only a very short time space to attract attention and a good logo design gives you the opportunity to attract attention. A professional design enables us to communicate the message you need. Some businesses go down the DIY route without fully understanding what it takes to create an effective logo. The lost potential will cost a business more than a designer’s fees. Communicate brand values & additional meaningLogos send out a message about a brand. Although the most important purpose of a logo is to identify a brand, it will also send out a message. This message includes the brand’s values and purpose. Sticking to a simple idea will enable this message to be easily communicated. Coca Cola have communicated the importance of diversity while the Body Shop focuses on compassion. Amazon focuses on the happiness which comes with receiving something you really enjoy. The message is positive and the vibrant orange color expresses joy. Orange is a vibrant color associated with warmth and happiness. The logo directs the eye towards an A to Z catalogue which includes a wonderful range of products which promise happiness. We need logos to transcend simple products and create an emotional resonance. An effective logo enables a stronger brand identity. These identities transcend the image as well as the products sold to appeal to the hearts of viewers. What makes up an effective logo?Now that we have answered the question “why do we need a logo?” It is time to explore the different elements which combine in order to create a great logo design. The process of taking a logo apart is very much like taking apart the elements in a cake. The ingredients combine to create something new and unique. Let’s break down some common logo elements. These elements come together to create a wide range of different possibilities. TypographyWhile they may look like simple letters, typography is carefully chosen to send out a message. Clean, modern designs send messages of possibilities and development. Text is clean and simple. Traditional letters are associated with heritage, honesty and trust. From monogrammed letters to full words, typography makes a difference. ImageryImages are very often used in logo design. Some are easy to identify like the bird in the Twitter logo. Others are more abstract like the Nike swoosh. Some logos may include a pattern or punctuation marks. Not all images create a clear message. Some images are used simply to identify a brand. It is the combination of image, typography, color and context which shapes a larger message. ColorColor helps to share the purpose of the logo. Every color has a unique psychology which enables it to create an emotional resonance within the viewer. Some logos use a black and white color combination while others use monochromatic color. Contrasting colors create attention while complimentary colors create peaceful color combinations. When combined, color is used to send a message. From the calm, peaceful blues to the vibrant oranges and warm burgundies, each choice tells a story. ContextPossible logo designs are often connected to a larger context. Some logos will be used in print related material whilst others are used online. Advertising logos may be used on billboards while others are made for business cards. It important to think of where’ when and how a logo will be used. A logo created for a specific use such as coasters or bookmarks will have very different designs. Static or dynamic elementsSome logos will be used in a range of different contexts while others are changed according to context. Designs will look at whether it is more effective to create a static logo which would work across many contexts or a dynamic logo which will change according to context. What makes a good logo?Now that we know the various ingredients which combine to create a logo, it is time to look at the final results. Any number of factors can combine to create an The answer: any number of different things. Let’s look at some real-life examples and talk about which elements they employ to successfully communicate their messages. Some businesses have a name that plays a part in explaining the business and doesn’t need a logo that is overly designed. In the example above, the name “Rhythms” helps let the user know that this is a beat-making app. In this case the designer has filled in the blanks with some colored geometric broken lines. These elements help to communicate the idea that there are tracks and rhythm involved. Ultimately the design does a pretty good job of clueing in the user to what they are downloading.Some of the most successful logos are not conceptual or complex at all. How is a logo different from branding?One common confusion we see comes in understanding the difference between logos and branding. It sounds complicated but the difference is quite simple: Your brand is the set of perceptions people have about your company. In other words, it can be thought of as the big-picture impression that your company leaves on the customer. This impression can be left by many things, such as your advertisements, commercials, customer service, and yes, your logo as well. Characteristics of A Great LogoBelow are five characteristics of a great logo and some examples. SimpleSimple logos are easily to recognize and therefore help customers to identify your business. As images and logos are used online, in websites which have to be responsive, and these logos are showed in a range of different sizes, on wearables, mobile phones and computer screens, simple logos are becoming increasingly popular. ScalableA great logo should be able to be used on a billboard or a business card, but this is increasingly important as the world moves into the digital arena. A logo which is responsive and looks good in all shapes and sizes is a great business asset. Memorable / ImpactfulYou want your logo to be effective. This means it will need to be memorable in a positive way. A great design will stand out in the viewers’ minds. VersatileEffective logo designs should look great in print, online and on many different devices. RelevantThe best logo designs will help customers know what you do and why. This will help you to attract the right kinds of clients for your business. Ending thoughts on what is a logoWe hope this article answered your question and explained why a logo can be helpful when marketing your business. As a well thought through design, you’ll have more than a fine art logo. Instead, you will have a powerful marketing tool which will help you to grow your business effectively. If you enjoyed reading this article about what is a logo, you should read these as well:
The post What is a logo and why you need one appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/graphic-design/what-is-a-logo/ A story of failing to get animations into the productA few months ago, when I was designing the chat panel for a video conferencing desktop app, I included a “typing…” UI in the design mockup. During the design review, engineer colleagues told me that they couldn’t implement this animated UI. I felt bummed about it. When I put this UI component in the design mockup, I didn’t think much about why we needed that UI. It’s such a typical UI indicator to imply when “someone is typing…”. Since most chat apps (Facebook Messenger, Slack, Discord) have it, then why don’t we? I tried to push the idea to have this UI again with the engineers by stating that indicator creates an assuring feeling of receiving feedback. As a pending state, it alleviates the frustration, anxiety, and uncertainty on waiting for someone’s response. However, as many other product designers may also experience when working closely with engineers for implementing new features, I couldn’t get the design idea across and convince them how critical motion designs are as a part of the entire user experience. My colleagues pushed back and deprioritized the animation. In the end, the “typing…” UI didn’t get implemented in the product, and it resided in the design mockup forever. What I learnedI learned that implementing motion designs and micro-animations takes extra engineering efforts. Animations are not a part of UX flows, which demonstrate critical functionalities of a product feature. Also, animations don’t generate specific metrics for product KPIs. It’s hard to measure and say an animated Gif or a splash screen contributed to a Net Promoter Score. I also learned that I could improve communicating design ideas better in a more constructed way. I need to become an advocate and educator for my team to promote animations to my colleagues. I could include a section for motion designs in the design guidelines to introduce different types of animations, their use cases, and some examples of the Dos and Don’ts. Animations have contributive values to the usability of a product. They connect screens and UI elements to create a fluid and coherent user experience. They provide graceful degradation when a product is not performing at its best, and they add playfulness and a sense of human touch to screen interactions. Animations for chatbot designs ?Animations are a big part of the user experience for chatbot designs. Many software companies use chatbots to provide customer support and nourish the growth in the relationship with prospective and existing customers. When you visit a shopping website, if there’s a chat icon sits at the bottom right of the screen, it implies that there’s a chat service ready to bring you into a conversation. Chatting with a user and getting the user to purchase something at the end, the design of a chat experience is thoughtfully fleshed out through creative copywriting, UIs and animations. Instead of having the user mess around with navigating, typing and searching to find what he/she needs, chatting is a more intuitive and personalized experience. So what kind of animation and motion effects are must-haves when designing a chatbot? What are the attributes of the animations that contextualize a fluid chat experience? A list of must-have animations1. A warm welcome to put a grin on user’s faceHaving an animation or a graphic breaks the ice at the beginning of a conversation. When a chatbot characteristically introduces him/herself, it’s more powerful than just saying hi. It fills up the blank spot to help the user naturally familiarize its presence. A “Do” example is Poncho — a chatbot that delivers weather forecasts. Poncho’s character is a cat, and it welcomes you by sending you gifs and illustrations, just a like a friend who shares emojis and funny gifts with you daily. Oppositely, a “Don’t” example is the waving feature from Facebook Messenger, which is designed to represent the action of saying “hi” instead of saying “hi”. It receives critique as it’s a force interaction that requires a “wave back” response. It overuses animations to copy interactions that only make sense in face-to-face interactions. 2. Indicator to reconcile frustration during pendingA good conversation flows. Different from in-person communications, it takes a few seconds for a message to be received and reviewed. These few seconds create blank spots with zero feedback to inform users what’s going on, and they block a conversation flowing from one end to the other. An animated typing indicator reconciles the curiosity and frustration when a user is in a passive pending state — waiting for a response. To create the feeling of a constant presence for both ends is essential. The way we interact with a chatbot should be no different from chatting with our friends on messaging apps. 3. Cohesive transition in displaying contentWhen a user clicks on a card to view more detailed content, the transition from the main screen to the sub-screen helps users understand the in-depth correlation between screens. The transition for displaying content in a web browser to displaying content in a chat widget should be consistent. Here’s an example of applying this rule to a VUI interface. A beautiful transition makes it very enjoyable to receive content and feed from a chatbot. 4. Emphasize on users’ inputWhen a user is filling out a form, animations emphasize on the user’s input and provide instant feedback on the result of an action. This type of animations is an enhancement of user’s behaviors like swiping, tapping, and typing. They indicate a point of action and confirm that the action was received. Material Design has also specified this type of motion effects, and they call it creating choreography in motion. 5. Creation for displaying optionsMost chatbots are designed to assist users to accomplish tasks. In the context of a chat, a chatbot will use UI widgets to enable in-depth interactions like selecting, editing and purchasing. For example, Facebook Messenger bots support chat extensions that appear like a web-view interface in a chat thread. Chat extensions can display a list of options, allow single select or multi-select from an options menu, and provide a personalized message in response to the user’s input. Here’s an example of how the beauty chatbot Victoria Belle navigates the user to choose a free birthday gift based on a user’s information on gift and skin type. The use of animations here subscribes to the same interaction model when we browse and interact with a web page. We scroll down to view more content, tap on input fields to type in information, and tap on the back or close button to navigate between different screens. Closing thoughtsAnimations and motion effects are an essential subset of the static screen and flow designs. Sometimes the efforts on animation designs for the product development haven’t been recognized. Also, since the implementation of motion effects varies from one framework to another, the same animation that appears on the web could look differently on mobile. I’ve heard many times since last year that chat will become the new web. It’s not to say that chatbot services will replace websites and web applications, but it’s an on-going momentum when we see emerging services like e-commerce, customer support, collaboration and productivity tools are all branching out to chatbots. I can see animations will play a big part in a well-designed chat experience. Other great reads if you’re looking for references:Apple Human Interface Guidelines — Animation The post Must-have animations for Chatbots appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/user-interface-design/must-have-animations-for-chatbots/ This article is about a simple question with a surprisingly complex answer. The QuestionIt’s Monday afternoon and the air is starting to feel stuffy in our meeting room. We are standing in front of 20 marketing professionals, all of them representatives of individual countries of an international non profit organisation. We just finished presenting our new UX approach for their global website relaunch.
This question got us by surprise.
After some discussion the ‘scrolling problem’ our customer was referring to turned out to be the length of their current mobile site. The need to scroll more on mobile than on desktop was seen as a flaw that needed to be fixed.
So — Do we need to ‘fix’ scrolling? Scrolling doesn’t need to be fixedSeeing scrolling as a problem goes hand in hand with the much discussed ‘above the fold’ argument, the urge to place everything important in the initially visible area of a page. There are many interesting articles and UX studies about the topic, I’m going to link just two of them below. In a nutshell most of them prove that user engagement peaks exactly on or right below the fold, making the ‘above the fold’ argument invalid. http://blog.chartbeat.com/2013/08/12/scroll-behavior-across-the-web/ In my opinion this user behaviour comes down to two reasons: Users are impatient. They don’t wait until a page is fully loaded to scroll and discover the content. Users have learned to scroll. In a mobile-first world scrolling has become the number one interaction with digital content. Never-ending newsfeeds have taught this interaction to users over and over again. As a result, many pages and blogs (unknowingly) embrace this behaviour. Most of them, including the most popular WordPress themes around, feature a prominent media header at the top of the page. We call it ‘mood-setter’. It has no specific function attached to it but helps do prepare the user for the content that follows below, where engagement happens. So, users scroll. A lot. Does this mean there is no scrolling problem? Bad responsive design needs to be fixedOur customer has a point: When users want to skip a section (on their current page) that they are not interested in, they have to scroll through all of it’s content. As a result the organisation lost potential customers on the way. But the real problem isn’t scrolling, it’s lazy UX design: using the same old desktop design patterns and adapting them for mobile. There are hundreds of possible solutions to this problem, most of them feature a mobile-first approach and the idea of progressive enhancement. But just like many desktop navigation solutions don’t work on mobile, many mobile navigations don’t work great on desktop either. Take tab-bars for example: They are considered to be one of the most effective types of navigation for mobile applications. But still, they are quite uncommon on responsive websites. There is a lot of space available on desktop pages — why not use it to show content from different areas of your service instead of hiding it behind a navigation link? On the desktop it’s all about teasing different areas of your page to generate interest. On mobile it’s more about making a lot of content easy to navigate on a small screen. Responsive Design is always about compromises, it’s about finding adaptive navigation solutions, that work on all devices and all sizes. But our current desktop and mobile navigation patterns just seem to be incompatible. So how can we fix our customers responsive design? Bidirectional ScrollingThe ObjectiveOur task was to display a huge variety of content from different categories. There were 3 main conditions:
It all comes down to a basic marketing-based user journey:
The SolutionOut of all the ideas we considered, there was one solution that caught our attention. It’s the one we presented in that meeting room when we were asked about the ‘scrolling problem’. There is no standardised naming for the solution we proposed, some people might simply say ‘horizontal scrolling’, others might call it a slider, we called it ‘bidirectional scrolling’.
A bidirectional scrolling website is — just like the name implies — a page that scrolls in two directions. It’s important to distinct between primary and secondary scroll direction. The primary direction of scrolling should be vertical in most cases. This means the entire page will move on the vertical axis when a user scrolls. Many researches have shown that horizontal scrolling hurts the user experience and has lower engagement than vertical scrolling. But this doesn’t mean that you have to abandon horizontal scrolling completely. The secondary direction of scrolling for a bidirectionally scrolling website is horizontal. This direction is used by individual sections of the page, not the entire page. Each section can be scrolled individually. Why?This scrolling system allowed us to tease a lot of content from different sections without creating the need to scroll, without hiding things behind a menu and without visually cluttering the interface by showing too much content. And most importantly: it works on desktop and mobile. This way it’s easy for users to jump from section to section by scrolling vertically. Yet they still see what to expect inside each section by scrolling through it’s content-teasers horizontally. Teasing relevant content this way without forcing users to first choose a navigation point is important to generate interest. Users are used to seeing a variety of (personalised) content, e.g. when they open a social network. Facebook doesn’t ask you whether you want to see events, news or pictures. It just shows you a little bit of everything and gives you the option to view more content of each type. When designing an interface that is supposed to encourage users to discover your website it’s important to remove hurdles. Skip complex navigations, minimise clicks whenever possible and focus on the content that users might be interested in. How?There are many great articles on how to integrate horizontal scrolling into interfaces. Here are just two of them: Examples of bidirectional scrollingBidirectional scrolling isn’t a new idea. Interfaces like this have been around for quite some time, almost exclusively for media-libraries like Netflix or Amazon Video. With apple embracing bidirectional scrolling in their new apps like App Store, Music and Podcasts, more and more app developers started picking up the idea lately. The idea now starts to make the jump from native apps to web-interfaces. Also it is no longer limited to media-heavy interfaces. We are starting to see this UX pattern on news-websites, social networks, booking sites and many other digital services. The post Bidirectional Scrolling is here to save Responsive Design appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/user-experience/bidirectional-scrolling-is-here-to-save-responsive-design/ The default setting of a product may create a better or worse habit for your users. Nudging people with a message may increase their spendings. Or sometimes, creating an ambient environment may influence what you buy in a store. There are several principles that we interact with on a daily basis, which might help us design better products. Or not. Limit the number to increase the amount boughtWhen there are a limited or scarce resource and high demand, people are more willing to pay excessive amounts for the product or service. And the perceived fear of missing out on something is particularly motivating as we are loss-averse too. What this means is that we find losses roughly twice as painful as gains are pleasurable. One experiment tested the power of limiting the number of soup cans that a person could buy. When a limit was set, the amount of cans customers purchased went up. On average by 70% from their usual 2 or 3 cans.
Also, a great example here is Adidas with their NMD shoe collection. The company being on a decline for some time, a couple of years ago they decided to launch a new, now very successful, shoe collection called NMD. Besides the fact that the design was cool, they sold only a limited amount of shoes for each collection launch (10k of pair if not mistaken). So if you were one of those people who wanted to buy the shoes, they were sold in less than 24 hours. Context may influence your behaviourSensory Priming is about how our behaviour can be influenced by each of our 5 senses (sight, sound, smell, taste and touch). An experiment in the UK tested playing music from different countries in a wine shop. The research found that French wine easily outsold German wine when French music was playing and vice-versa. Only 2% of customers interviewed afterwards even mentioned the music; A similar thing happened to me. It was at Sephora in Amsterdam, and they were presenting a new collection of skin care and perfumes for men (inspired from Japanese culture). And they added decorations to the room in a Japanese style. And created an entirely new environment only for the collection. The music, the ambience, the smell. And in the end, I bought those items… Remove the symbol to reduce the “pain”Only thinking about spending money can make you experience a kind of physical pain. If you were to be put into a brain scanner right now and we played a game where you lost your money, the part of the brain that would light up is the same part that feels physical pain. Studies have shown that by removing the currency symbol ($) or the currency word (dollars) from menus, average spending can increase by 12%. This is because people who see only the numerical value, are less concerned about the price of what they are ordering. The same thing applies to paying with credit cards. Only the fact that we don’t see losing money (paying for something) makes the act of paying less painful and stressful. Which leads us to our next cognitive principle — loss aversion. We hate losing stuffLoss aversion refers to people’s tendency to prefer avoiding losses to acquiring equal gains. “It is better to not lose $5 than to find $5.” What distinguishes loss aversion from risk aversion? The utility of a monetary payoff depends on what was before experienced. Or was expected to happen. Some studies have suggested that losses are twice as powerful, psychologically, as gains. We are by nature loss averse. We hate losing stuff — no matter if it is money or simple points. An interesting experiment of gamification was applied and implemented in Italy for drivers. As a car driver, you receive a certain amount of points (20). And every time you violate a traffic rule, for example ignoring the traffic light, you lose points (in this case 6). This psycholgical trick decreases the chances that you will do it again. And due to its effectiveness, many countries applied this demerit point system (more info).
Increasing commitment with friendsI see this common mistakes in fitness apps. People think and believe that why people don’t stick with a plan or don’t finish one is because the workout is a problem. Or that you need some motivating music in the background to keep you encouraged. Or a new type of training or a library of quadrillion workouts that nobody will ever do or watch. But the problem lies in commitment. The problem is not in the training program, reps, how often, but whether are we socially committed to something. Whenever you train with a fitness trainer or with a friend, the chances that you will go to the gym and finish a training program increases by 90%. Think about that when you try to create a movement or community around your product. And the answer may be in the fact that we should do it with a friend. The power of a default optionAs humans, we like to go with the flow of a default setting. Whether you buy a new phone and don’t change the basic settings or shop in a supermarket. Thinking is an effort (which all should practice), so when we’re recommended an option, we’ll often take the path of least resistance for our brain. When the default size of the various types of stuff we use change, so do our actions and behaviour. For example, when supermarkets double the size of trolleys, people buy 40% more. The default portion sizes in cookery books since the 1930s have increased every decade, and so have the proportions of many people. We tend to choose the middle optionWhen given a range of options from high to low people tend to go for the middle option. This is known as The Goldilocks Effect. In a study at a McDonald’s outlet, people were asked to choose between a range of different drink size options. Regardless of the size options offered, 80% of them always chose the median size option. This happens because we assume the middle option is the typical option. We will always go with the option that requires less effort to think about. And which is most bought or chosen (social proof). Like reading about design?I’m sending out a 5 Week Design Newsletter. You’ll receive each Tuesday an email about the basics of design, mistakes we make and my own experience and learnings. The articles are exclusive to newsletter subscribers only. Sign up here. ❤ The post 7 Principles That Influence Our Behaviour appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/design/7-principles-that-influence-our-behaviour/ It’s possible to expand a website’s capabilities in almost any way you want. You can do that through coding or with the help of a developer. However, WordPress plugins give you a far easier, and quicker way. They generally provide a more effective path to achieve your objective. There are literally thousands of WordPress plugins on the market. All you have to do is find those that are the best fit for your website type or niche. That’s all and good if you don’t mind looking for a plugin in a haystack. Having a few “must-have” plugins on hand is always a good idea. Many of these “must-haves” are provided when you select a particular WordPress theme. Others are specialty plugins like those listed here. With these, you would have to do some searching to find ones that would serve you best. AmeliaSome plugins automate processes to make things easier for web designers or their clients. Others provide significant savings and an almost immediate ROI. Amelia does both. This WordPress plugin was designed for businesses that cater to large clienteles and rely heavily on scheduling bookings and appointments. Amelia automates the booking and appointment process, and in doing so enables business owners and employers to devote more time to their core tasks and responsibilities. Businesses like gyms, consulting firms, health and fitness centers, and beauty parlors will benefit from this system which takes bookings 24/7, fits appointments to employee availability, manages the appointments, and features an online payment process. Amelia eliminates phone tag issues, customers are never placed on hold, it can reschedule or cancel appointments when necessary, and it will even send appointment reminders to customers. This flawless booking specialist will keep your customers happy and save you time and money in the process. wpDataTablesIt’s not an easy task to summarize the multiplicity of table- and chart-building tools the wpDataTables plugin offers. Suffice it to say, it is an all-in-one solution for working with large amounts of data, neatly summarizing the results, and presenting to website visitors in responsive, interactive, and easily editable tables and charts. Even though wpDataTables is capable of creating tables and charts from huge amounts of complex data, and do so relatively quickly, this WordPress plugin is remarkably easy to work with. It accepts data in any of the common formats, including Excel, Google Sheets, MySQL, MS SQL, and SQL database information. Table-building features include front-end editing, the ability to customize table designs, and conditional formatting which allows you to highlight key data by cell, row, or column. The wpDataTables plugin integrates nicely with most of the popular form builder plugins such as Formidable Forms and Gravity Forms. Its community of more than 20,000 delighted users has given wpDataTables a 4.7 star average rating. NextGEN Gallery & NextGEN ProNextGEN Gallery is a free WordPress gallery plugin that makes it easy to build simple photo galleries, yet is powerful enough to create galleries that will satisfy the most demanding imaging professionals, visual artists, photographers, and other creative types. This popular plugin has been the industry’s standard WordPress gallery plugin for 12 years running, and it shows no sign of relinquishing that distinction. It enables you to manage huge amounts of images with ease, present them in a variety of gallery types and styles, and allow clients to download or purchase prints of their favorites. The premium version, NextGEN Pro, offers a wide range of additional options and extensions including eCommerce capabilities. NextGEN Gallery users can either upgrade to NextGEN Pro or purchase NextGEN Pro extension bundles for a fee. MapSVG WordPress map pluginMapSVG could well be the last WordPress mapping plugin you’ll ever need. It has everything. You can work with Google maps, image maps, customized interactive vector maps, and add markers and other useful information. You can upload SVG files and overlay SVG on user maps or create your own image maps from JPEG or PNG files. Search and filter features are there as well; everything to provide users with “perfect” maps. Logic Hop – Personalized Marketing for WordPressReady to have your mind blown? Imagine your website could automatically change for each visitor – Headlines, calls-to-action, images, even the CSS. Welcome to the future: Content personalization. If you’re familiar with it, you know it’s helping sites increase conversions by 200%. Sound difficult? Logic Hop for WordPress makes it easy with ready-made recipes and tons of powerful features. They’ll even help you get up and running. Working with clients? Check out their awesome affiliate program. Rank Math SEORank Math SEO is nothing less than a veritable Swiss Army Knife of SEO tools for WordPress and WordPress sites. This handy plugin loads fast, it’s extremely easy to use, it features a variety of different SEO tools, and it features a built-in Content Analysis function to help you write SEO-friendly content. Web design just became that much easier. WordLiftWordLift is a WordPress plugin to help you master the SEO challenges you face. This is the first WordPress plugin to use artificial intelligence for search engine optimization with a strong focus on structured data automation. WordLift also partners with WooRank to measure your content’s search engine friendliness along with other factors that influence and contribute to organic traffic. Is being ahead of the SEO one of your goal for 2019? Then consider giving AI and WordLift a try, you won’t regret it. Heroic FAQsBuilding an FAQ page might seem like a no-brainer, but doing it right, and building a professional-looking one usually requires some help – and that’s precisely what the Heroic FAQs WordPress plugin provides. Heroic FAQs will assist you in creating questions and answers, and grouping or reordering them and adding images or videos using drag and drop. Since most questions are repetitive, this plugin will save you and your users a ton of time and eliminate lots of frustration. Heroic Knowledge BaseHaving an online knowledge base can help a business grow by providing a self-service customer service capability. Creating a knowledge base with the Heroic Knowledge Base plugin is not any more difficult that creating a WordPress page or post. This plugin’s many features include allowing you to collect article feedback, a lightning-fast search capability for your users, drag and drop category ordering, and more. Blog2Social – Smart social media automation for WordPressBlog2Social is an all-purpose social media automation solution for small business owners, agencies, marketers, and teams that lets them share social media on up to 16 social media networks, e.g., Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Twitter, Instagram, and Flickr. Blog2Social is available as an integrated WordPress application or as an independent web app. With help of its drag and drop social media calendar, scheduling and cross-promoting content, including profiles, pages, and groups has never been easier. ConclusionFinding at least one plugin or tool among our selection that will reap immediate benefits is a given. With luck, you might find 2 or 3 that will save you a ton of time. They will relieve the stress that goes with most DIY approaches, and make users happy in the process. Plugins aren’t simply software extensions, although they’re often advertised as such. They extend your capabilities and that of your business as well. The post How many of these essential WordPress plugins are you using? appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/wp/essential-wordpress-plugins/ When you work with a red color palette, you’re working with extremes. From passionate love to dangerous liaisons, seductive overtures to anger or violent explosions, shades of red symbolize heartfelt passion, adventure and as well as a lack of control. In the past, red colors were associated with fires, flames and blood. The red color was associated with both life and danger. Many of the associations we form with red in the present come from the associations our ancestors once made. Red has both religious and heroic meanings. Greek gods and deities were often heroic and their super-human acts were related to the color red. Red is also the color of the crucifixion and the blood of Christ. In times gone by, red was a very expensive color – and this may be why red is seen to have superhuman and even magical qualities. In present times red is widely available. Red dyes are made from crushed insects. Table of contents
Using a red color palette: the global meanings of red
Why use the color red in your designsRed is an attention-grabbing color. It is striking in appearance and is one of the most highly visible colors. This is why stop signs, as well as fire engines, use red. Yellow and orange are equally visible, but red is also associated with danger and stresses the importance of staying alert. When we see red, our lenses literally pull forward. We see red as having a great deal of movement which draws us in. Perhaps this is why red grabs our attention so easily. Meanings of the color redWhen you draw on the color red, you’ll be using a striking and very emotional color. Red is passionate and alive, and symbolizes extreme emotions such as love and hate, Cupid and the devil. The red color palette is warm and passionate, exciting and full of movement. When we see red, our blood pressure rises, our libido increases and our metabolism increases. The color red causes us to breathe faster. Our confidence and our energy levels begin to increase. Too much of the color red and we might become agitated. When we see red, we lose our tempers, behave in an overbearing manner and partake in angry or demanding behaviors. When there is too little red in our lives, we may be too cool and lethargic, sad, cautious or manipulative. Green balances out red, creating a vibrant and relaxed atmosphere. If your designs are overly passionate, add green. To get rid of a lethargic or exhausted energy, add red. When used to express passion, red becomes the color of love. However, red is often far more representative of sexuality and lust. Pink is used to represent love. At its most positive, red symbolizes sexuality and a love of life. When used negatively, red is an angry and even violent color which carries dangerous meaning. The red color palette is often used in restaurants as it increases the metabolism. Alternate meanings associated with red shades
Shades of redThere are many different types of red. Some are a deep red color such as brick, Venetian red, crimson, maroon, and burgundy, while other colors of red are lighter, such as rose madder. Reds may be combined with a touch of orange, as in cinnabar, russet, or rust. Other reds are pure in color, such as tomato, Indian red, blood red, scarlet, and flame. Scarlet ColorHex #FF2400 Scarlet is a pure red color with a touch of orange. Scarlet is often considered to be a pure red shade. Perfectly balanced and deep in color, the scarlet color of red also contains a small tint of green. Indian Red ColorHex #CD5C5C Chilli Red ColorHex #C21807 Fire Brick ColorHex #B22222 Carmine Red ColorHex #960018 Carmine-Red is a bright color red which is vivid, with a dominant red light. It is close to a scarlet color. Maroon ColorHex #800000 Maroon is a red color which combines with a touch of black to create a deep red shade. Although it looks like a deep red color, maroon is really a pure shade of red. This is because it doesn’t have any blue or green light incorporated into the color red. Redwood ColorHex #A45A52 Desire ColorHex #EA3C53 Hibiscus ColorHex #B43757 Cerise ColorHex #D21F3C Cerise is a bright red color given the French word for ‘cherry’. We can, therefore, say that cerise is a cherry red color. Cerise has also been used to describe other red shades such as blood, raspberries, rubies, and tomatoes. Persian Red ColorHex #CA3433 USA Flag ColorHex #BF0A30 Mahogany ColorHex #420d09 Barn Red ColorHex #7C0A02 Ruby Red ColorHex #E0115F Vermilion Red ColorHex #7E191B Candy Apple ColorHex #FF0800 Ferrari Red ColorHex #FF2800 Crimson ColorHex #B80F0A ‘Crimson’ is a deep, blood red color which is associated with wine, sunsets and even blushing. Sangria ColorHex #5E1914 Burgundy ColorHex #8D021F Have you ever wondered about the difference between burgundy vs maroon? Both are deep, wine red colors. However, while maroon red shades are pure shades mixed with black, burgundy has a tinge or purple, making it one of the warmer shades of red. Rust ColorHex #933A16 Using a red color palette in graphic designHatchery Branding SystemFun & Games pt. IITokyo Travelers IdentityPixel SlayerLeading The Way Annual ReportExplorers Club: MesaWarped – Identity Preview 01SXSW’s Flatstock 59 in Austin, TXNXNE Opening Party PosterI-5K Poster SeriesExamples of a red color palette in web designDipseaShapeGilkRawwwPigeonMeasure that mattersEliumMindsetBodymovin SolutionsPulseTaabHiringPlanWFATrunkIconspaceJackieShowcase of a red color palette in UI designHotjar Mobile App ConceptTravel App UI DesignEntertainment AppUniqlo E-Commerce App ExplorationUX/UI iOS applicationThe wine shop appTasks Statistics ScreensCooking APPAgenda Mobile ApplicationCool Chat APPBike Community AppFitamin ModalsHealth AppMusic AppDignity of ChildrenMen’s Fashion iOS App ConceptToday’s ScheduleMake Steak ApplicationExpress Tracking App DesignCard App | iOSEnding thoughts on the different shades of redRed is a warm and passionate color which symbolizes both visual and emotional intensity. Red is the color of love, passion, violence, and adventure. Different shades have different meanings. As you can see from the gorgeous names given to shades of red, the red color remains a firm favorite amongst viewers. Used in your designs, you can use reds to create vibrant or sophisticated touches to your designs. By drawing on the different red shades, you will be able to create visual designs which are interesting and alive. The post Using a red color palette and the various shades of red appeared first on Design your way. from https://www.designyourway.net/blog/graphic-design/color-palette-shades-red/ |
AuthorPleasure to introduce myself I am Jamie 27 years old living in Searcy, AR. I am web developer and have developed over 50 sites for clients. Now a days I am focused on designing as I feel I am lacking it. Archives
April 2019
Categories |