Importance of Design Quality on the Web
The Web is a crowded, confusing place. There are millions of blogs and websites competing for your attention at any given moment. Effective design can help your blog or website stand out from the crowd, keep readers on your site longer, and increase the odds they’ll come back again.
There is no single correct way to design a blog or website. However, there are some principles that will help make your design more effective at communicating with your audience.
Branding Resources
Branding is one of the most important aspects of any business, large or small, retail or B2B. An effective brand strategy gives you a major edge in increasingly competitive markets. But what exactly does "branding" mean? Simply put, your brand is your promise to your customer. It tells them what they can expect from your products and services, and it differentiates your offering from that of your competitors. Your brand is derived from who you are, who you want to be, and who people perceive you to be.
However, designing the color scheme, designs, font styles, and other elements of your brand can be a challenge. There are many resources available to help you with this, our favorite is Baseline, which automatically generates your brand based on customizable options. We've also compiled a few of the best resources we could find to help you get started.
Fonts CSS and Responsive Web Design
Responsive web design is the concept that websites should be able to display well on any device, regardless of screen size. The alternative to responsive design is adaptive, where content is displayed differently depending on what type of device it's accessed from. Responsive design works in a few different ways. First, images can be served at different sizes based on the screen resolution (1x for low-resolution screens and 2x for high-resolution screens). Second, page elements can be positioned in a way that makes sense regardless of screen size. Finally, text reflows as necessary so there's no unnecessary scrolling or zooming.
One great tool for designing responsive websites is the Slides by Design Modo. Slides is a free tool that allows you to create and share beautifully designed websites. It's a great tool for designing for multiple devices, and it's comes at no cost unless you want more advanced features.
Web fonts are an improvement over the standard fonts included with computers because they're more versatile and add visual interest to your designs. Google Fonts provides all sorts of free custom fonts that you can easily integrate into your website without needing to become a code wizard. CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets and it's basically a way to make all of your website design decisions in one place so they apply everywhere instead of having to mess with every single line you wrote like some kind of animal. A little CSS knowledge will go a long way towards making your life easier when designing websites!
Mocking it Up
There are tons of options for mockup generators out there, but here are a few of our favorites, which have easy-to-use user interfaces and lots of different templates.
Custom Design With Backgrounds
Backgrounds are a key part of making your web presence stand out from the crowd, and there's a number of resources and platforms available to help you do just that.
With so many different kinds of backgrounds—patterns, images, videos, and colors—and so many different uses for them—mobile, desktop, and print devices; headlines, callouts, and supporting content; accessibility guidelines; performance concerns—it can be difficult to know where to start.
Let us help you! We've compiled a list of the best resources we could find to help you select the perfect background[s] for your next project.
There are many great resources for designers.
While there are many other great resources for aspiring and experienced designers, SaaS Surf stands out because we publish so frequently on different aspects of design and list products that aren't as popular (yet!). If you want to stay current with the latest tools and products in UI/UX and design or if you'd like to find a starting point to brush up on your design skills, SaaS Surf has got you covered.