Suzanne Scacca is a freelance writer who specializes in web design, WordPress, and SEO. In her free time, she builds new websites, experiments with popular plugins, and muses about today’s technology.
If you want to maximize conversions or collect necessary user information for other purposes, a user onboarding flow is necessary. In this article, you will learn how, with the help of Feathery, to design an effective user onboarding flow for your app.
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57% of product professionals say that product research has a positive effect on customer satisfaction. 42% agree that it affects profitability. Imagine how much more successful your product would be if you did research continuously?
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Concerns over online privacy and security are nothing new. In this article, Suzanne Scacca explores how the right CSV importer can help businesses better prioritize user security.
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2020 was anything but normal. Consumers had their lives shaken up and many businesses experienced new challenges as well as opportunities thanks to the novel events of the year.
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Developing a Shopify app and being able to sell it are two different things. While you might be a very skilled app developer, that’s not always enough for Shopify merchants to decide to install a newly released and unreviewed app on their sites. If you want to give merchants a reason to install and use your Shopify app, there are four things you need to do.
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Today, we’re going to look at “The Website Dilemma”. In other words, is it possible to build an authoritative, lead generating, high converting website without manipulating visitors into doing what you want? If you follow social media’s lead, they’re one and the same. If you’d prefer not to trade your customers’ well-being for profit, keep reading.
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Software and apps often solve very complex problems for businesses and consumers in the way of sales, marketing, finances, and so on. But offering a product that solves your users’ problems isn’t enough. If the UI is just as complex as the original problem, user churn is going to be high. Today, we’re going to look at some tips for designing a simple UI regardless of your solution’s complexity.
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Even though the development of a data importer is a complex matter, you don’t want your users’ experience with it to be just as complex or complicated. The second they experience any friction or fault in data onboarding, the chances of them bailing from the software will skyrocket. So, in this post, we’re going to focus on how best to present your data importer to users.
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In this article, we look at three key parts of a digital store and what you can do to design each to help customers more quickly and effortlessly get to the checkout stage.
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Do you have a hard time throwing away mockups, logos and other content you’ve created for clients? Suzanne Scacca explains four ways to repurpose your unused designs and give them new life.
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Data onboarding with a custom-built solution can be a difficult and error-prone process. This article takes a closer look at how Flatfile Concierge deals with this particular problem.
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In this article, we’re going to look at four ways that web designers can contribute to getting more policy disclosure pages read and terms actually agreed to.
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By designing digital product pages for smartphone users who are in that early discovery and research phase, your clients can make more money off of their products. Today, we’ll look at how this is done.
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Icons have long held an important place in the design of mobile apps. But beyond using them to create larger and more attractive touch targets, there are other ways mobile app designers can use these tiny elements to make an app more engaging. This post will explore four ways to do this.
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A website earns a backlink whenever another website links to it. In this article, Suzanne Scacca explains why backlinks are so highly sought after in marketing, and why web designers should keep this in mind when designing websites for clients.
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Google knows exactly what consumers want and it has designed simple, intuitive, and useful solutions for them. This article explains why it’s a company whose product features you should be mirroring.
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In this article, we’ll take a look at five ways you can use the senses to put your visitors in a better headspace when they enter your site and interact with your brand.
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The Scrabble GO, Instacart and YouTube mobile apps have recently undergone disruptive redesigns. Were they worth it in the end? Let’s take a look at the mistakes made and the lessons we can extract from them.
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There was a time when marketers used things like urgency, scarcity and FOMO to drive online shoppers to a sale. But scare tactics can actually hurt a brand’s relationships with customers. By their very nature, we run into similar problems with shipping and inventory alerts. That said, there are ways that web designers can keep panic and frustration from seeping into the shopper’s experience.
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The restaurant industry has begun to undergo a major digital transformation. Those that want to survive will need a website that can handle the new way of operating, which means they can no longer afford to hold onto that cheap website built years ago.
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Stress isn’t just something that makes people feel uncomfortable. There are many things that might invoke this response from your visitors, including the design. In this article, we’re going to look at some ways to de-stress your design.
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Without a desk, you’d end up working from wobbly tables at cafes or staring down at your lap all day — uncomfortable options, to say the least. Then again, your desk could also cause you discomfort if you sit in it the wrong way or for too long.
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Designing a logo is just as complex a task as building a website. Not only do you need to understand what goes into making a great logo, but you need the right tools to create it.
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In this article, Suzanne Scacca proposes some ways to turn essential content into graphics to conserve space, create a more engaging UI and preserve the overall integrity of your content on mobile.
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Recent research has found that e-commerce category pages have higher click-through rates in search than individual category pages. So, if your e-commerce site is struggling to attract shoppers and convert them, your category pages (specifically, those on mobile) might be in need of a redesign.
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This article explains the process of usability testing: what it is, when you should use it and how to generate data-backed insights while developing your website using Indigo.Design.
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The word “SEO” holds a lot of weight. We know how critical it is to the success of a website and, yet, it often becomes one of those things that’s left until the very end of a web design project to deal with.
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Whether you’re building a new site or you’re managing a live one, you can’t afford to make any changes without a process for cross-browser testing.
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Does your website have a mascot that the audience isn’t responding well to or that outright hates it? Or maybe your new client has brought along a mascot that you’re unsure about? If a mascot’s design or messaging isn’t on point with an audience, there’s no sense in keeping it as is and losing business over it. Today, I’m going to give you four options for turning your hated brand mascot into one the people love.
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By using the Amelia booking plugin for WordPress, you can create booking widgets that collect more appointments (and revenue) for your clients. This article explains how.
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Want to build a website or PWA that attracts a large audience and then converts as much of that audience into paying customers as possible? If that’s the case, what you need to do is use storytelling in your design.
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Are you using sticky elements on your mobile website or PWA? If so, take a moment and ask yourself this question: Do you have anything in them besides your logo, hamburger menu or search bar?
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Have you ever looked at the design techniques and elements you use to build mobile apps and evaluated whether or not they’re still useful or relevant? If you haven’t done this in a while (or ever), stop what you’re doing and read this. We’re going to look at the 5 things mobile app designers should stop doing so they can create more streamlined and positive user experiences.
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You spend so much time focused on other people’s websites that it’s easy to put yours on the backburner and tell yourself, “I’ll fix it up someday soon.” But do you really want to wait to improve your professional portfolio site?
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Traffic surges happen, but rather than let your website become victim to them, this guide will show you how you can set it up to be the victor.
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Every website or PWA you build should automate as much prospecting and selling as possible. The only thing is that visitors enter websites with various mindsets, depending on which part of the buying stage they’re at. This means that you can’t just take every person who enters the site through the same path. You have to design a custom sales funnel (or pathway) for each kind of buyer. Here’s what you need to keep in mind.
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What if we removed “fear” from the “fear of missing out” and put the good parts of this marketing strategy to use in web and app design? This article unpacks four ways you can use (F)OMO when designing digital experiences.
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When it comes to putting our visitors on the spot, giving them too many options hurts their decision-making ability along with how they feel about the experience as a whole.
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What is it that makes a haunted house feel so disturbing? Is it the fact that it’s been long abandoned? That it’s riddled with dark and twisty hallways? That it simulates danger? Or maybe it’s the low-quality construction that makes people nervous? We’re going to take these frightening characteristics and spin them around for the web. After all, what is a website, but a digital house? (Let’s just make sure yours doesn’t feel haunted!)
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Images are a big part of the web and, yet, they can cause a lot of challenges for the user experience if not properly optimized or delivered. It’s been almost a decade since Google introduced the world to WebP as a solution to this problem. As more of our browsers, devices and software support it, it’s time that web designers started adopting it as their default image format.
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You want to build a mobile website or PWA that converts visitors into leads or customers. But with Google and consumers alike becoming ever more demanding when it comes to loading speeds, what more can you do? ImageKit, a digital image optimization service, might have the all-in-one hands-off solution you need.
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As a web designer, you’re probably all too familiar with feast or famine. Or with the dreaded scope creep that robs you of the profits you were so looking forward to pocketing. But that’s what happens when your ability to make money rides on how many hours you can work. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a steady flow of money coming in at all times? In this post, we’re going to look at how adding WordPress maintenance services might provide that solution.
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PWAs are supposed to provide visitors with a better experience than a mobile website. But just because PWAs will use sticky navigation the way that native apps do, that doesn’t make them as easy to get around. If you’re worried that your PWA is going to be difficult to navigate without some guidance, put breadcrumbs to work. You can use them to improve navigation, readability, conversions, and more.
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We don’t have any excuse for creating poor experiences today. Here’s what you need to know about designing complex tables for your mobile visitors in WordPress.
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Let’s face it: it’s never easy to deal with client feedback. Requests may be vague (“the form is broken”), too subjective (“the page doesn’t load fast enough”), or difficult to assess without seeing it yourself (“the page still isn’t updated”). You could schedule some time to walk through the issues or bugs with your client, but a better solution to this often disruptive and frustrating process is to create a fool-proof system that’s easy for clients to leave feedback and even easier for you to implement and resolve it.
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You don’t have much time to capture the attention of visitors to your PWA. Rather than waste that time with an overcrowded hero image or, even worse, disappoint them with a lackluster design, get creative with what little space you have above-the-fold. One of the best sources of inspiration for this? Movie posters.
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Customers’ loyalty does not come for free. While it would be nice if they were satisfied with a high-quality product with some extra bells-and-whistles thrown in, sometimes what’s needed to seal the deal is a rewards system. But when a client asks you to design the mechanism for their loyalty program, how do you decide which format it should take? Here’s what you need to know about designing mobile loyalty programs.
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Until now, the designer-developer handoff has been fraught with inefficiencies. Disparate platforms (namely, Sketch and Visual Studio Code) and incompatible workflows created tons of issues in how design was translated into code. But now, Indigo.Design offers a simple solution to fix this costly and time-consuming problem for software teams.
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Apps are no small undertaking. Nor are they cheap to build and maintain. So, before you move ahead with creating a new mobile app or SaaS for your client, perhaps you should consider launching a minimum viable product (MVP) instead.
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Social media communication is unlike any other. It’s abbreviated. It’s personal. And it’s driven by visuals. Doesn’t that sound a lot like what a mobile website or PWA would benefit from?
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Prospective clients are not easy to say “yes” to. You worry that your profit margins will be slim — if you end up making any money at all. But what if there were a site builder solution built specifically for that purpose?
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Web developers know what they’re doing in terms of optimizing a website for page speed, but is it enough in Google’s eyes? When it comes to mobile loading speeds, your website can always be faster. Find out how.
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Just as you now approach web design with a mobile-first mentality, the same switch should occur as you design email marketing campaigns for your clients. Here are some facts and tips you need to know for designing mobile-first emails.
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Have you noticed that many websites have replaced their forms with chatbots? Let’s explore what is happening to forms on the mobile web and why chatbots may or may not be a suitable replacement for them.
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Do you know what kinds of cookies collect information from your site? If your site is currently not in compliance, start using CookiePro’s cookie consent tool to get your sites moving in the right direction.
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Does the word “influencer” make you cringe? This article aims to show you some of the tricks most digital influencers use to establish authority through design.
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With the introduction of front-end-as-a-service, and a company like Mason pioneering the way, software development and maintenance doesn’t have to be a time-consuming and arduous process.
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A lead capture page greatly differs from a traditional web page in a number of ways. Put that lead generating page on mobile and you’ll see those differences expand and even test the limits of what you thought was possible for mobile. Today, we’re going to look at some tips for utilizing those differences to improve how well your lead capture pages convert on mobile.
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As Gen Z gets older, your clients are going to need you to design their websites in a way that appeals to their specific demands. This guide will show you how to do that.
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It might feel like there are some things outside of your control as a web designer or developer. Like web hosting. But what if you had a say in it? Today, we’re going to explore Plesk VPS hosting as an option.
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Slack has done a lot to bring teams and partners together online. It’s also done a lot to empower developers to build their own custom apps for it. Until recently, however, developers were limited by how much they could do to customize the design of those apps. That’s changing today with Block Kit.
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Have you ever considered how much it actually costs to build and maintain a mobile app? When you look at the big picture, you’ll soon realize that mobile apps aren’t a smart investment for most.
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In this mobile-first world, there is no such thing as designing a website near-perfectly the first time around. While we know that more experiences with websites begin on mobile, converting those users continues to be problematic. With proper A/B testing for mobile-first experiences, however, you can change that outcome for your clients.
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You’ve proven your expertise in designing mobile-first websites for clients. It might be time you made a move into designing mobile-first marketing campaigns for them as well. This guide explains how to do just that.
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As you work on creating better experiences for your mobile app users, spend some time thinking about the design of your app’s search bar. Things like placement, hint text, and the way search results are displayed contribute to how users engage with search as well as your app as a whole.
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As a web designer, you might think that what you get paid to build websites doesn’t matter so long as you have money in the bank. But it does. This guide breaks down three ways you can charge for your design services and help you find the perfect rate to charge clients in 2019.
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When it comes to the mobile user experience, are mobile websites all that bad? You hear so much about the benefits of building a dedicated native app, but that can become an incredibly costly gamble if users don’t take to it. That said, is the progressive web app the best choice? And will it eventually replace the mobile web and native apps? This article explores this idea.
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There’s no need to master new design techniques in 2019; most of what was on trend this year is going to stay on trend next year. Instead, think about ways in which you can set a better standard for mobile-first design.
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Ever since Pokémon Go brought augmented reality into consumers’ line of sight, marketers and developers have been looking for a way to hone AR’s power for their own purposes. If there ever was a time to jump on this game-changing bandwagon, it’s now. AR provides spatial and facial mapping technologies that will not only delight your users, but will improve the overall experience of interacting with your app’s brand.
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It’s an exciting time when your mobile app is ready to launch, but be careful. No matter how high you see those app store downloads go, don’t go rushing to celebrate just yet. There’s a more meaningful metric you should be paying attention to in order to determine the success of your app, and that’s the mobile app retention rate.
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The mobile web is a booming place right now, which means web designers are spending lots of time trying to figure out how to win over this particular class of users. One way not to do that? Dark patterns. While your company may get some superficial and short-term gains in the process, nothing good will come from it in the long-run.
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The 2017 holiday season proved — once again — that e-commerce has become a major part of consumers’ shopping habits. This guide will take a closer look at the role mobile websites played in sales from that time period and how to use that data to prepare your website for the 2018 holiday season.
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In Google’s never-ending journey to make the web a mobile-friendly place, we now have even greater insights into the four key reasons why consumers reach for their mobile devices. These are known as micro-moments, and this post aims to teach you how to design for micro-moments to increase website conversion rates.
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With mobile traffic increasing on local business websites, web developers and designers are now tasked with a new responsibility. It’s no longer enough for websites to rank well — they need to rank well in local search results, too.
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In terms of how to handle typography in mobile web design, it appears that simpler and safer works best. In this article, we will break down the elements you need to pay attention to in mobile typography and then visit what the research says about how to handle them.
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Data tells us that there are more mobile than desktop web visits. However, mobile conversion rates are still lagging behind those on desktop. This article will dig into why your mobile visitors are willing to ditch their purchases altogether.
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Are mobile pop-ups dying, or will they simply undergo another adaptation? If they continue to remain effective, how should designers make use of them, especially in mobile web design? Are there alternatives? Let’s see what the research says.
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As attention spans shorten and visitors just want to get to the good stuff on a website, designers have to get more creative in how they communicate their website’s “story.” This article suggests techniques that can be used in web design.
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Logic would dictate that ghost buttons are not good for web design. Yet, research shows us that visitors don’t necessarily see them that way.
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Making improvements to your mobile app’s design isn’t necessarily the easiest of tasks. In this article, Suzanne Scacca explains the six key ways in which dating app developers successfully use design to create an engaging and addictive experience for their users. Dating apps often get a bad rap for turning the dating scene into something superficial, mechanical and impersonal. Log in through Facebook. Swipe left. Swipe right. While it’s easy to write off these apps as fun little diversions for people trying to find love, they’re actually quite successful. So, what’s their secret?
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