Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

During my stint working for a newspaper, I recall their simple design philosophy: Big, bold text headlines on a white background. As we well know, the web is a totally different animal than print. But many principles of good design are applicable to both mediums. The use of large headline text is one of them.

Typography on the web has changed a lot over the past decade or so. Whereas we used to have just a few basic fonts to choose from, we now have more than enough options to satisfy our appetites for beautiful, attention-grabbing headlines.

Unlike that newspaper (which generally used one font for its headlines), web designers are exercising their creative freedom to use different types of fonts. Some are using the more traditional bold, serif and sans-serif fonts while others take advantage of more modern styles and weights.

Let’s take a look at how designers are utilizing large headlines to convey a message. Most don’t apply to news, per se – they’re more about branding. But, as you’ll see, there is more than one way to successfully approach them....

This article is the third in a series devoted to the understanding of minimalism in web design. During the time, this trend has become very popular among the graphic designers and it will still be on top for the years that will come, regardless the influences it will have.

You might assume minimalism is easy – after all, fewer elements mean less work, right? In fact, the opposite is more accurate. Because you are restricted to a usage of few elements, they must be chosen and used with care and thoroughness, having a specific purpose as a starting point. If it’s done properly, minimalist design can be a stunning masterpiece, in terms of UI, visual design, UX and conveying your message to the users.

Minimalism works because it does what all design should do – it puts the emphasis on content....

So how do you visualize your ideas?

Your old standby bar graphs and pie charts are just the tip of the iceberg — it’s not uncommon now to see executives and professionals of all stripes working on visuals instead of hunkering down at the keyboard for a long session of pecking away in Word.

The people over at Funders & Founders shared this interesting infographic recently, with 33 different ways to visualize your ideas. Unleash your inner creative and challenge yourself to try one of these visual formats the next time you need to pitch your idea to a colleague or client....

If you’ve been on the Web in the past decade, you’ll likely have visited Reddit, Craigslist, Wikipedia, 4Chan, Hacker News, or The Drudge Report at some point. While these sites are all vastly different, they have two things in common: they’re all extremely popular among their audiences and they all look, well, terrible.

Web technologies have come so far in the past few years and designers now have a vast array of tools and techniques at their disposal. Yet these sites feature unflattering layouts that have no connection to the modern design philosophies seen around the Web today.

Craigslist’s current design is lacking, to say the least.

Why do some of these sites look like they were built in the 90s? Where are the clean layouts, carefully selected fonts and complementary colors?

For the record, The Drudge Report and Craigslist are indeed more than 20 years old — both were launched in 1995. Wikipedia just turned 15 last month. Reddit has now been around for 10 years, while image board 4chan is going on 13....

One of the most important skills you can learn as a designer is how to choose type. This is because text is one of the primary ways designers can communicate with users. Typography can make or break a design.

There’s a beauty and complexity to typography. Some people devote their entire careers to type. Thankfully, their work is well documented, so we have tons of online resources for typography.

This article is designed to serve as a starting point for helping you learn how to choose type for your designs. It will encourage you to explore fonts and font combinations beyond those you’re familiar with....

2017 is the year we return to the organic roots and we will see a return to the natural. In terms of colors, the start has been given by Pantone (as every year, in fact), who has crowned the color for 2017 as Greenery, based on it’s meaning of new beginning, freshness and environmentalism. Manifesting as a “fresh and zesty yellow-green shade that evokes the first days of spring”, Greenery envelops the notion of breathing, reinvigorating and appreciating the great outdoors.

That said, let’s take a closer look at the graphic design trends that define 2017. Most of them influence both print and web design, but some of them are just for the web....

If you’re hoping to boost your online traffic with better ads, you may be asking yourself: what is web banner design? Web banner design focuses on the systematic creation of effective web banner ads through the careful application of basic design guidelines.

Banner ads are one of the most prolific forms of marketing used in today’s online world. All companies use them in one form or another because they’re an affordable, measurable and effective medium to increase brand awareness. So how can you design and create web banner ads that will bring in those clicks? Below is a list of tips and general guidelines for designing banner ads....

We may not judge a book by the cover, but we always judge a business by its website. This is the reality and we have to deal with it.

Back in time, in the early days of the Internet, creating a website was something that only IT guys were capable of making. With today’s advancement of technology and increasing interest for better and easier solutions when designing websites, almost anyone can design websites without much effort or any coding know-how.

Before listing the worst websites I have found on the Internet, let me be clear about some things: Firstly, I don’t mean to cause any trouble or pain to anyone, and I am certainly not making fun of web designers. Therefore, I beg the developers of the listed sites not to take offense at my remarks. I am quite sure some of these sites are designed by beginner designers. We all have to start somewhere. Besides, mistakes easily occur if you don’t have any experience.

Websites that are considered as modern and fresh today, will not be treated in the same manner tomorrow because Web design trends are changing constantly with time. Professionals associated with the industry are aware of the fact that every year brings new challenges and opportunities in the field of web design and development.

Therefore, it is important to know how to make them flexible and adaptive towards the rapidly changing trends of website design. Here, we have put together a list of web design trends that will have a bigger impact in 2018....

While many imaging apps’ tools closely resemble those used by artists in the real world – such as brushes and pens – the color picker feels like a completely digital device. A new project from the folks at Adobe Research and University of Toronto reimagines it as a skeuomorphic palette that’s designed to be more natural and intuitive, while allowing for the creation of harmonious color schemes and works of art.

Instead of forcing users to choose from colors from across the entire spectrum, Playful Palette presents you with an interface that’s more like how you’d mix paint in real life. Pick a bunch of colors represented as paint blobs, make a puddle with them, blend them with lighter and darker hues by pushing in different directions and get a gradient of colors to work with. Hit ‘play’ on the clip for a better idea of what I’m talking about:...

One of the most fun things to do in design is swirling the latest color trends into your work. Color is a fascinating topic, and even a generator that understands color theory has recently been invented. Because they mean different things, companies also actively use color in their brand designs to encourage feelings and behaviors from customers. However, in different cultures, color theory isn’t all black-and-white. 

In this delightful infographic, SilverDoor describes color associations of different cultures, adding contrast to the way you think. Telling a person from another part of the world that you’re “feeling blue” may mean something entirely different to them. Is your favorite color offensive to another culture? Find out in the infographic below....

There are many new web tools and services for designers and developers launched every month, but how do you know which are the most useful? Which offers the best solution for a project? And which offers the most value for money?

We’ve managed to collect a mix of premium web tools and services covering many areas of web design, that are worth trying out. Take your time, go through the collection, and find the tool that best suits you. Here they are....