Get notified of site availability issues
Knowing when your site is unavailable is critical to any business. That’s why Pingdom will immediately alert you in a way that suits you via email, SMS, push notification to your mobile device and integration with your favorite app! Before alerting you we always perform a second check on every incident from to filter out false positives, so we don’t unnecessarily disturb you.

With customizable alerting, you can choose to get alerted immediately for very critical services or delay alerts by any interval up to 1 hour. Alerts can also be resent at an interval up to 4 times after the initial alert.

Monitor your site from almost everywhere

With over 70+ test servers worldwide, you can monitor your site availability from where it matters most

Get to the root of the problem

If you want to make sure that your website performs well, there are a few essential basics that you have to get right. There is no point investing loads of time and effort into developing a website if nobody can find it through the search engines and that work is a continual effort, not just a one off piece of work at the start. So what we are saying really is that you can’t simply set up a website and expect it to continue to perform well, you need to keep updating content and using SEO methods.

Lets look at some of the key factors in having a site that performs well. One of the first things you need to think about is getting a good web host, so don’t be tempted to just opt for the cheapest deal that you come across. You need to make sure that the host will be able to support any future website requirements that you may have. It usually helps if you draw out a plan for your website strategy including usage targets and content updates etc. to help you keep on track.

When you get to actually building your website, you need the content to be of very good quality. If you compromise on the quality, your website will look unprofessional and people will form an opinion on your entire company based on this.

As well as getting the content right, you should also make sure that you think about the positioning of content. This is a really important factor and you can use this infographic 25 features every online business must have in 2017. This will help you to ensure that your content is in the best place for maximum effect for example, where to add your call to action to get the best response rate.

Getting a website up and running isn’t easy, anyone who has tried doing it can tell you that. Even for people who have been working with websites for years, there are still new concepts and trends that emerge or new and better ways of doing things. Whether it is a new web host package, the latest WordPress theme or the latest SEO algorithm, you really have to stay on your toes to keep up.

If you are building a website as a one-off and you don’t have much experience in this area then you will benefit from getting some information from top digital experts. You can follow the latest website news and trends through reputable websites and pick up some tips that way. Even the most experienced of website developers struggle with some of the basics, so there is no harm in getting a helping hand.

One of the most important factors in a successful website is the placement of content. Believe it or not but you could have a really professional looking website, with great content and attractive features but it could be flawed by ineffective content positioning. Getting your content placed in the right area has a huge influence on key measures like how make people click on your call to action.

If you want some useful information on how to place your content so that you drive more business through your website, take a look at this infographic. The 25 features every online business must have in 2017 will take the hard work out of deciding on your content layout. With key guidance on what to put in your header, what to sit below the fold and other crucial pointers, your website will soon start converting those visitors into customers.

Website designing is not child’s play. It definitely helps to have a couple of smart tools to help you with the design process from time to time. You will especially feel the need of tools when you are designing a responsive website within a short period of time. Adding tools and plugins to your repository will make the designing process more precise and less time consuming.

That being said, here’s a list of the top 40 tools every designer must have to make the design process faster, smoother and error-free.

• Atomic

1. This website design tool helps you create website designs on your browser. You can also create designs on your PC and Mac and then share them on multiple mobile devices including the Apple Watch. You can import pre-made designs from Adobe Photoshop and Sketch for creating high-end website designs and layouts within a jiffy.

• Form

1. This free tool will keep you on top of the material design trend. You can create prototypes for various devices including iOS, and add animations to keep your websites lively and trendy.

• Frontify

1. This is a neat style guide tool. Frontify gives you a direct glimpse of your font designs, colors and other elements of your website design. This one comes with a prototyping tool called Workspace that allows you and your team to share designs and changes on your website framework.

• Marvel

1. The free basic version of this tool is ideal for prototyping and sharing website designs. You can use timers to handle transition effects between pages, photos and slides. The files are supported on Apple Watch as well.

• Golden Grid System

1. This is made for responsive designs. It splits the screen into 18 columns. You can access 16 columns as the two extreme ones are reserved for outer margins of the website. This is ideal for making product-based website designs that involves multiple columns.

• Origami

1. Origami is free for everyone. This tool was created by the Facebook team for design purposes. In fact, Instagram and Messenger were created with Origami. You can use this tool on Mac and iOS.

• PowerMockup

1. This is an add-on for all PowerPoint users. It includes over 800 UI features made from PowerPoint shapes. This tool has free trial versions and this will help you create amazing, PowerPoint presentations for demonstrating your app and website prototypes.

• Relay

1. If you have already been acquainted with Slack then you will find Relay quite interesting. You can run Relay along with Adobe CC web designer and Chrome. You can import design elements from Sketch and Mac OS X.

• UXPin

1. This is your complete design tool that will guide you through planning into execution. You can choose from hundreds of templates or you can start your design from scratch. UXPin helps you create high-fidelity mockups for your websites.

• Wire Flow

1. This helps you create wireframes on mobile devices. You can create a new UI from scratch using this Android-only tool.

• Webflow

1. This is a simplistic approach to wireframe designs. You can create prototypes using drag-and-drop elements. This is part-CMS. You can use it for free.

• Bootstrap

1. This is ubiquitous for all smart designers. Bootstrap is a smart and powerful front-end framework. It is maintained by Twitter.

• Frameless

1. This is NOT an actual framework. It is used for building layouts for uncountable number of viewports. You can add columns whenever required.

• 320 and Up

1. This is a tool most professional website designers use for content first designs. You can see a wonderful example of such a design at US bases site on the inner post of Debt Company. This is both lightweight and extremely easy to use.

• Wirefy

1. Wirefy is the go-to solution for all designers who build websites content first. This has a prime focus on layouts and base styles.

• Gridless

1. This is a platform cum tool for creating mobile responsive website designs in a short notice. This uses HTML5 and CSS3 for creating websites.

• Adobe Edge Inspect

1. If you want to inspect and browse website designs on the go, this is your tool. Adobe Edge Inspect also allows you to preview designs before publication.

• Screenqueri.es

1. This is a Pixel Perfect tool that can test the responsive nature of your design. You can select from pre-defined screen resolutions for your website.

• Browser Calories

1. When installed this tool places a small icon beside the address bar. The user can see the page weight and load time just in case they are on a poor Wi-Fi network.

• Firebug

1. This comes from the developers of Firefox. Firebug helps you debug codes and monitor HTML, CSS live and JavaScript for your website.

• –prefix-free

1. This is a wonderful tool that works behind the scenes. This allows you to add current browser’s prefix to all CSS codes and allows you to use unprefixed CSS codes.

• Foundation

1. This is a prototyping tool. Foundation is a blueprint for all website design projects. This judges the responsive nature and works with SASS and CSS.

• Fontello

1. This complete icon generator complies all icons into web fonts. You can edit and customize names and symbol codes on Fontello as well.

• Cloud Comp

1. This tool helps designers present their comps to client parties. This provides a realistic device shell for the presentation.

• BLOKK

1. This is a handy tool that replaces all demo texts with blocks inside the website layouts. This is amazing for “clients who don’t get Latin”.

• Basecamp

1. Just like Relay this tool help designers collaborate on joint projects. You can share your progress and discuss changes on your website design to keep clients updated via Basecamp.

• FavIcon Generator

1. This is an easy favicon generator for all kinds of websites. If you are a designer in need for creating “favorites icon” you need this one!

• Load Impact

1. This is a cloud-based tool that tests your website loading speed and optimization strategies before you launch the website.

• Lorem Ipsum Generator

1. This is a fun and must-have tool that can be used instead of BLOKK. It includes a random generator that replaces all demo with new text.

• Typetester

1. This is a browser tool that helps you compare different kinds of fonts and typeface. You can choose text color, size and size from a piece of text before applying it globally.

• Pingdom

1. If you want to track the uptime, downtime and the complete performance of your website, Pingdom is the tool for you. Test your website performance with this JavaScript, CSS and RSS ready tool.

• CSS Sprite Generator

1. You can reduce the number of HTTP requests using this tool. This will speed up your website loading speed. This includes all codes and images to judge the speed of your website.

• Font Flame

1. If you want your website fonts to be on fleek, this is the tool for you. You can see all chosen fonts at once so you don’t make any design mistakes when it comes to typography.

• Codesign

1. This is a platform that will enable you to get visual feedback of your designs. This provides complete, comprehensive feedbacks from other designers, experts and clients. It connects people and ideas that inspire innovation.

• Drop.js

1. This is a fast, dropdown library. You can create instant dropdowns and several floating elements for your websites using this tool. It saves tons of time and effort that would be otherwise required to create dropdowns from scratch. This is ideal for multiple grid-based designs like the one we see here at TopTenReviews. You can like compare plugins which has been used.

• XposIt

1. This is a HTML editing tool. This makes your HTML files dynamic without including any actual code. It is also an open-source CMS platform.

• CodeDoodle

1. CodeDoodle is one platform where you can find curated coding sketches. It includes awesome design elements and incredibly smooth animations for your website layout.

• Wallop

1. This is a fun and must-have slider. This is just 4 Kb in size and it comes with a small library for hiding and showing design elements.

• CrazyEgg

1. This is a web-based tool that you can use to analyze your website. You can log in to see website heat-maps or interest zones. You can see where your users are most likely to click and which areas will attract least attention using CrazyEgg before your website goes live.

• Web-developer toolbar

1. This is a comprehensive plugin from Firefox that provides a collection of tools for website designers and developers. You can use it for inspecting your XHTML and HTTP header on a daily basis.

These 40 tools are amazing for making the entire website designing process rewarding. Most of these tools are either free or they come with free trial versions. You can easily use a combination of more than one tool to create a perfectly working, responsive website within a couple of hours.

Forget hours of debugging and optimizing HTML codes. A couple of these tools can cut your work hours down to a bare minimum, by eliminating errors.

Author bio: Isabella Rossellini is an experienced web designer and freelance writer. She has worked with various clients. In her spare time, She likes to update her blog with web design and finance related articles.

Blogging is all about readership, the process of getting content right into the eyes of your readers after you have finished writing and publishing.

Not everyone uses RSS readers, or checks your website on a daily basis, or gives you their email address for your list, and posting on social media can often be overlooked as the influx of content is at such a high rate.

Over the years, a new alternative has sprung open, something that some of us have known about since the inception of smartphones, but today push notifications have been brought to desktop browsers, and they’re easier than ever to set up.

With the right tools, you can start collecting push notification subscribers within a few minutes. First, let’s take a look at what they are.

What are push notifications?

Push notifications are specific messages that can be sent to the browser for those who have enabled notifications for your website. This is the same approach that you would see smartphones using (where an app would send you a push notification of an update, or important news), but the main difference with website push notifications is that they work virtually anywhere, on desktop computers, mobile devices, and tablets included.

In marketing terms, these work similarly to that of an email campaign, however the main difference is that you can notify users instantly on their devices as they are interacting with it.

There have been numerous case studies from leading tech brands, which have shown higher than average reader engagement rates using push notifications alone. At its core, push notifications is just like any other subscriber list, and you ought to treat it with custom goals and business targets based on the content that you’re providing.

So, having learned a little more about that, how do you set up push notifications on your WordPress blog?

Thankfully, there are numerous reliable services and plugins that can make all this possible within a few clicks.

#1: Push Notifications with Roost

There are a number of services out there that provide push notification services, but Roost stands out with its extensive list of features, and a fair pricing module that will be comfortable for beginner bloggers, too.

So, what makes Roost one of the better choices?

Here is a list of the most significant features,

• AdBlock Protection — Roost can automatically detect visitors that are using any type of ad blocking software, and individually segment them. This doesn’t stop you from sending those users notifications, as Roost can bypass the ad blockers firewall.
• Localization — Roost includes a filter that can detect the geolocation of a new subscriber, letting you tailor custom notifications and messages based on user location.
• Comprehensive Segmentation — Being able to segment your site subscribers based on their interests and pages they signed up from can be crucial to increase engagement.
• API for Developers — Those with development experience can tap into the Roost API to make even more meaningful alterations to the way that the system is built.

The reason for mentioning a premium service right out of the bat is simple, majority of free WordPress plugins for push notifications come only as Lite versions, meaning you eventually have to buy the premium version if you want to use more features.

With that in mind, Roost is a no-brainer for those who want to create a serious environment for using push notifications as a means to increase engagement, but also sales in the long run.

They’ve written a simple tutorial on how to get Roost working for your WordPress blog, read it here.

#2: Web Push Notifications by OneSignal

OneSignal provides a free service for getting push notifications up and running on your blog, and has a distinctly unique list of features, too.

With a lovely web interface, and a flexible set of features, OneSignal has helped hundreds of thousands of websites and blogs to get started with their push notification segments.

You can download the WordPress plugin here, and it only takes a few minutes to set it all up. Here’s a list of some of the best features,

• High Performance — OneSignal caters to some brands that have millions of subscribers, and their service can easily scale for the needs of big brands.
• Real-Time Analysis — Find out how well your push notifications are performing in real-time, likewise use your history data to understand which content works the best.
• A/B Testing — Absolutely remarkable feature, which lets you test different styles of messages to different segments of users, letting you understand which types of notifications convert the best.
• Personalization — Custom filters for creating user segments and sending specific messages to that particular group.

You can always check the Documentation page for OneSignal to better understand how the service works, and how you can make the most out of your push notification campaigns. Also Best Walkie Talkies for Kids

Closing words

While push notifications are not an entirely new concept, they’re swiftly gaining popularity amongst all niches, and can be a wonderful addition to your existing marketing efforts to promote your content, and ultimately the products and services that you provide.

Both of these recommended solutions have world-class developers behind them, ensuring that you’re getting a stellar result out of each push notification that you send out.

Alex Ivanovs is a freelance contract writer who specializes in web design, small business, web development, and WordPress subjects. Find more of his work on Colorlib, and connect with him on LinkedIn.

The true mojo of a great WordPress website lies in its visual appeal and the smooth functioning when it comes to a visitor’s choice of revisiting the website. Everything can be in its right place, yet the magic might fail. As a website owner, you would want a lot of people to visit your site again and again. And why not! You have shredded the last piece of your mental creativity to infuse all your efforts into your dream website.

You put up great content, and you update the old ones; not to forget that you have got your SEO game on point too. But, why is it so that in spite of the huge bounce rate, there are fewer conversions. We believe that the following reasons lead to lesser page views.Your website loading time is slow. To fix this issue, you must give thorough research before finalizing web hosting company.Your target audience has lost the enthusiasm to re-visit your site or for that matter, recommend it to other users. No matter, what factor could be playing the culprit here, you and your website are at the receiving end of this nightmare.You have failed to interlink the pages in your website with each-other and hence the users are not redirected towards the purpose.Displaying related posts at the end of your website posts is an important strategy. This will further redirect site visitors to more content on your site, giving the site an extended site visit time by every other site visitor.Page views tend to get lower when the social engagement of the website is not capable enough of internet exposure. You post content that isn’t binding enough and fails to entertain the visitor to lead them to stay.

Now that we are aware of the possible reasons for less page views, it’s time to get to the solution rundown as well. With so many tools and tips at your disposal, we hope that following these 7 ways will boost the page views of your WordPress site.

Give your website design a thought

If you are doing everything right, and the problem exists; chances are that your website designing and formatting need levelling up. They say that the first impression is the last one, too; and that goes for your WordPress site as well. The internet audience is a rude species, given the humongous amount of online content which is available for them to consume. If you fail to impress them on the first visit, they are gone.

So, if your site is experiencing fewer page views, you must consider getting a fresh formatting. Change the sidebars, or entirely change the theme. Give all the essential, trendy elements for your website so that it can drive in more and more audience. A functional and trendy UI will work just the right way to charm your visitors.

Load your website faster

This is the most important factor in this list that determines the whole game of page views. Online visitors are in haste and will wait for 2-3 seconds, on a maximum scale – in order to check out whatever you have to offer. If your website crawls like a snail, they will hardly stay to see what’s under the curtain even if it’s worth the wait.

Use tools like Pingdom to determine your website loading time along with identifying the critical issues that are slowing your website down.

Create compelling content

Ever gave a thought to the factors that make your website standout in the crowd? Does your website really standout? If the answer is in the negatives, your site endeavours are in deep sinking waters. Don’t just put up content for the sake of some words – they are what your website is all about. Make sure that the content you craft appeals to the masses that are relevant to your industry or sector.

Understand your audience expectations and then get to the action part. Present the information in a way which is less tedious to go through and in fact has a playful undertone. Infuse elements like infographics, short videos, and slideshows to hit the visual appeal nerve of your target audience. Do not overdo the length of your content.

Cleverly engage the audience

Now, this is a huge bird to catch because it comprises of several points that have to be taken care of. It gets imperative to hold your visitor for a while onto your website and prompt them to explore the maximum amount of sections and pages. These tips can help.Always keep your best posts as featured content on your site. If they have been hugely shared by users on social networking sites, they will leave a good impression on unique visitors.If you interlink the pages in the right manner, your task is half done. You can send them to your blog page or just some other relevant link from your own site.Make website navigation easier. If a new viewer visits your site and gets confused when they can’t find your sidebar (because you got too creative with the sidebar’s position), they will run away.So, you post two times a day and just get away with doing so, if you don’t find time. That is the worst thing that you can do to your website. Make sure that you engage your existing audience regularly to earn their loyal engagement and site visits.

Always use excerpts

If you haven’t, you must consider getting excerpts on the home page of your website or the blog site. In WordPress, each post has an excerpt section that can do wonders into driving the viewer to click the link to your page from the search results. If you handcraft the best excerpt, this can be huge help to your site’s page views.

SEO of the website

You can never get away with a bad SEO strategy for your precious WordPress site. Get Yoast SEO plugin for your site to help you optimize the content of your website pages. This plugin will take care of all the important post elements that will help the search engines to produce your site in the search results whenever someone is looking for related information.

Social engagement

After you have made all the right moves, it is important that you distribute the content of your site in a manner that it reaches the right audience. Using social networking platforms along with tried and tested social sharing plugins will help the users reach your website, thereby increasing the number of page views.

Conclusion

Employing the best user-oriented website strategies is the key to satisfying the site visitor to utmost content. If you succeed in impressing a few unique visitors for regular engagement, then you will definitely nail the high points that we have mentioned in the list above. Also, increased page views will mean a higher probability of increased website conversions. All you will need to do is identify your target audience and act in accordance with the list to achieve substantial user engagement for your wonderful WordPress site.

So, if you think these points were helpful for you, let us know in the comments below. Also, feel free to share any tips that we might have missed. We always appreciate your feedback.

Author Bio:

Catherrine Garcia is a passionate blogger and a freelance Web Developer. She along with her group of freelance developers, are experts of creating Websites on CMS.

You can be a blogger for years and yet go on without knowing the difference between a WordPress plugin and a theme. Well, we have met quite a few bloggers and WordPress users in real life, who have no clue about the differences between WordPress themes and plugins.

Let is read this account from a designer who learnt the existence of the two separate identities in the hard way –
“When my website gave up on me” – this is an account by Neil Winston, who started only a couple of years ago as a website designer. When he built his first website, he almost“built it by fluke”. He had no idea what the plugins were and how they could be used to complement his WordPress theme. Therefore, when he started off with a fashion designer’s website, he chose a theme that was around $40.99. He had found the perfect theme for a bargain price, or so he thought. It had drag-and-drop editors, built in revolution sliders and gallery options. It was perfect for a website designer.

He spent over 4 weeks fine-tuning each feature and then handed the site over to his clients. The clients were happy and left satisfied.

The problem arose when they returned after 4 months. They were rebranding their label and wantedto change in the old theme. Therefore, when Neil tried out new themes he found that the sliders had disappeared and the drag-and-drop editor morphed itself into a bunch of shortcodes. Even the gallery was all hotchpotch. He was in a fix! He had a deadline to meet and there was no way he could tell his clients that he knew nothing about WordPress. So he turned to BigDropInc.com.

What actually happened to Neil’s website?
Neil was not a hardcore developer so it took him some time to understand that themes and plugins are completely separate entities. His website theme was quite awesome at first, since it included quite a few functionalities including drag-and-drop editors and listing charts. The moment he shifted to a new theme that didn’t have the supporting codes, these features were not integrated and were merely represented as shortcodes.
What’s a theme?

If WordPress websites are like houses, then your theme is like the exterior. It controls the visual parts like color, layouts, and design. In a WordPress site, the theme controls the “display logic”. The theme takes care of information organization and representation in front of your visitors. It takes care of your pages, posts and sidebars.

If you are currently operating a blog page, your theme will control all aspects like the header, footer and post display. It will also control the images and the snippets of posts displayed on the sidebars. Even the author detail displayed on each post comes with these themes.

What’s a WordPress plugin?

Now, going back to the house metaphor – if themes are the exterior, the plugins are the interior upgrades. For example – modular kitchen, mahogany polished antique furniture and marble bath fittings are an upgrade to your home interiors. Similarly, the plugins upgrade the interior functions of your website.

Plugins can modify core codes of WordPress themes in quite a few ways. You can add, remove and change codes to modify website functionalities.
Why are some of us still confused?

Sometimes the line between plugins and themes is not as defined as we would want them to be. There are themes that help with SEO and then there are plugins that help with visual properties. There are quite a few themes that we see today, which lets users to add listings and pricing tables to their own websites.

We are not saying that it is unethical to use such themes and plugins that blur the line between the two entities. All we are saying is, if you use a theme that takes care of functionalities other than visual appearance, you may face the same problem as Neil. His website started acting crazy because his first theme of choice had added functionalities. The moment he made his shift to a newer theme, these features fell apart since the new theme did not have these built-in functionalities.

Therefore, using plugins that act on visual traits are all right. Since you can carry over your plugins to a new theme.Nevertheless, if you use a website theme that also modifies functionality, you may be calling for trouble. You should ideally look for a theme that concentrates on optimizing the visual aspects of your websites and leaves the functionalities to your plugins.

Do codes in themes perform better than plugins?

Well, we do not blame you if you believe this to be true from time to time. We keep hearing how plugins can cause performance issues and we end up thinking that maybe codes are better off with themes. The action of plugins should be as minimized as possible.

However, this belief is quite baseless. A plugin code is executed quite similar to a theme code. The only difference is the timing. They are executed at the same rate and none of them has any advantage over the other. So one thing can be said for sure, that themes are not better than plugins when it comes to executing codes.

Why are plugins better than themes?

You may think, this is like comparing apples to oranges. Or like comparing 0’s to 1’s. However, we say, it is quite possible in the binary world. So if you ask, “are plugins better than themes when it comes to functionality?” we will answer it with a “Yes”.
Here are the reasons why –

1. Your plugins will help you to convert your codes into chunks. This is necessary when you are working on a large project. Debugging and maintenance becomes a lot easier when you break your code down to small chunks. In fact, since you can maintain each plugin individually you can always track down the ones that are malfunctioning.

2. If your functionality is plugin based, you can simply remove or monitor it by modifying the plugin. If your plugin relation features are breaking down, you will not have to delve deep into the core code. You can simply open the plugins directory and deactivate and remove the concerned plugins. Plugins create a compartmentalization of labor that is necessary for efficient management of website.

3. Changing themes are challenging if your website functionality resides in the theme code. Most of your functionality should reside with the plugins. When you shift from one theme to another, you will be able to easily migrate all functionalities to your new themes. If you have all shortcodes inside your plugins, you can just upload a new theme and activate the plugins.

4. Have you ever seen a designer add customizations to functions.php and style.css? This is possible because they can add new improvements without having to migrate each and every change manually. It is ideally possible to update and enhance your plugins separately. You can add them to new themes, remove them from old ones and even update them without touching the theme. Storing your website shortcodes inside plugins can also mean, updating them from time to time without creating a butterfly effect on the theme core code.

5. You can run a 100 plugins on your website without any impact and we are not making this up! Plugins do not slow your website down. They do not perform queries on your website database and they do not load resources. Many active and super successful websites currently run over a 100 plugins all the time. Maintaining so many plugins is also possible since they can be accessed through the plugin directory. You can directly see their performance, database usage and functionalities from one platform.

So if you are still confused about plugins and themes, and would rather have a theme with all the shortcodes, think again! A plugin can only be evil when they are built incorrectly. If you are choosing a WordPress plugin from a reliable website/directory or WordPress plugins library, be sure to read the reviews thoroughly before adding it and activating it.

If you are looking for a theme for your website, we would suggest you stick to one that has minimum functionalities. Lots of shortcodes within the theme core code won’t do you any good when you have to change themes. There are plugins to take care of all functionalities including listings and inventories. So why burden your theme code with unnecessary frills? After all, you can add as many plugins as you want and your website will still run as smoothly (if not more) as it did before.

Author Bio: Evans Walsh is an author, blogger and designer. He started off as a freelance website designer is the late 90s. He has seen the rise and fall of many website design trends, including the minimalist design of the 90s and the glam trend of the 2000s. He has collaborated on several design optimization projects with BigDropInc.com over the last couple of years.

Running an online business is like keeping an eye on every web design trend that put forth an ultimate level of comfort in searching for products. The common search method includes typing a word or phrase related to a product a user need. And, the website returns with a variety of search results, which may or may not match the users’ requirements. The visual search comes to rescue the users who are looking for their desired store items, but unable to find enter the right key term.

The online store often focuses the quality and presentation of its products, but forgets to each the users in finding an item they are craving for. To improve the user experience, the eCommerce websites clarify the call to actions, educate users, or simply add custom options for product personalization.

The addition of such a valuable feature either requires code modification or installation of an extension either you use WooCommerce, Magento, WordPress, or PrestaShop. The WooCommerce Product Addon is a recommended solution for adding consumer-centered options that allow them to personalize the end product. By adding custom options, you can define different product attributes to facilitate the visual search. For example, a user uploads image of white frock with tussles for 10-12 years old kids, the visual search will only return with an exact match if you have defined the attributes.

What is visual search and how it works?

Visual search is an amazing technology that allows a user to search an online store by an image or short video. Finding a product becomes difficult in an online store that rack hundreds of items and each varies in color, style, and design. A visual search takes an image and matches it with the product gallery to come up with the most matching results.

The excessive use of mobile technology and social media, the users are more attracted towards the visuals of a brand. And, they often remember a favorite product by its appearance. Defining such an appearance in words is difficult, which makes it hard to enter the query that lands them on their required product pages.

The visual search relieves the users in memorizing the name, style, model, make or additional features of a product. All they have to do is take a snap, upload it to an eCommerce website and find the available variety. You might agree to the fact that you come across a lovely shirt that is in use by one of your Facebook friends. It is not right to ask him, so you take the picture and visual search it at your favorite store. And, you find an exact match.

Should you incorporate visual search in your store?

The visual search technology is a step forward in enhancing the user experience. In general, a potential buyer is not aware of the product classification. It is often difficult to click the right category and find a list of relevant products. For the same reasons, the search option by word was introduced. It is quite successful to the extent of user understand. A user can enter a query as long as he has sound knowledge about a product. In contrast to this, the visual search seems to be quite rewarding.

The decision either you should incorporate the technology of visual search into your store depends on you. If you are dealing with a set of products that are attractive, catchy and frequently followed by users, then you need to consider it soon. For instance, a ladies purse shop must provide such an opportunity to allow the users to find a variety of purse that matches in style, color, and design with the one they are looking for. Following are some of the benefits that may help you decide the implementation of such a technology to your online shop. You can also try Shopify plus to open an online store.

It’s more natural

An online store lists products with relevant images. The users who directly reach a landing page may not face the difficult. But, a great majority visits the eCommerce websites to browse the categories or enter a word or phrase about the product. It could be a painstaking job for the person who neither knows the name nor any attribute of the product he needs.

Browsing products through images is a natural process. It gives the users the real understanding about the fabric, makes and manufacture of the product. By allowing them to search by images of their own, they can screen out all the irrelevant products and reach the items they need the most.

Increased accuracy in real time

If you want your users to find exactly what they are looking for, the visual search technology is here to relieve them. The eCommerce websites are optimized for a set of keywords, and common phrases. What if the user types something out of the context? What if a user is completely ignorant of the common words that are in practice for a specific product? He will input a self-coined phrase and get disappointed to the list of irrelevant products.

The user of keywords is quite successful to grab higher search engine rankings and reach a well-educated community. You might be busy in adjusting the common search terms in the product page title, description, and meta details, whereas a set of users might be struggling to enter a term relevant to the product.

It streamlines product images

We often populate landing pages with as much product images as we can, just to provide a better picture to the audience. By implementing the visual search technology, you can get rid of most of the similar images on product pages that are overburdening the store uselessly.

Remove the excessive images and provide one clear image that may match to the one a user is expected to upload. The user, most probably, will have an idea what the product, so showing a few images can do the game rather than creating an entire gallery. The creation and maintenance of product image galleries are among hectic jobs. It may cost you numerous valuable hours of your staff. To cut short the entire process, you can replace multiple similar images with a glorified one.

It is a modern day need

The online shopping is a multi-billion dollar industry and is expected to expand with the increased use of mobile technology. The ease of capturing images on smartphones and easily sends it to friends has resulted in a magnanimous growth in eCommerce. The visual search can be another sensation by allowing the users to capture their favorite items and find them without any hassle.

The mobile and smartphone users can avail the opportunity to easy and fast search. They can roam around their schools and college, and quickly take a snap of a dress, shoes, or anything they like. Upload the image and get matching products on the go.

Final Thoughts

We, the human beings, are always attracted to the visuals. A product that is defined in a text may not be as appealing as in a quality image. The same happens in real world. The eCommerce websites try to reach a concerned audience, but they get mesmerized by the products they see practically. With a visual search, you can allow them to grab that product in the picture and get a matching piece for themselves. It removes the hassle of asking the details. It is a way forward in taking care of your valuable customers. They will feel obliged by such an option and would like to revisit.

Author bio:

Paul Simmons is an eCommerce web development enthusiast. He has lots of themes and extensions to his credit that are developed for the prominent platforms, including WooCommerce, WordPress, Magento and Joomla. These days, he is overlooking the web development team at FMEAddon.