Blink Web Design
At first glance, visitors to your website judge its value and decide if they want to stay or move on – failing the “blink test” can cost your company customers and revenue.
Blink is an open source rendering engine used by Google Chrome and other Chromium-based browsers, using WebCore for parsing HTML, laying out elements, and executing JavaScript script.
The Blink Test
Web design experts often say that visitors make snap decisions on your website within seconds, known as the blink test. That initial glance is when they determine whether your site deserves their time, as well as determine if they think it fits with them or not; failing the blink test could result in them leaving your site for one of its competitors instead. To make sure it passes this hurdle successfully, it’s essential that clear messaging conveys its value proposition quickly – in this post we will explore best practices for doing just this!
Research conducted to date indicates that viewers with developmental disabilities such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), blink less frequently when viewing content they perceive to be highly engaging.43,44 However, due to high inter-individual variability in blink rate it can be challenging to use this measure reliably as a gauge of viewer engagement.43,44
To overcome this obstacle, we investigated the relationship between blink rates and classifier performance for scenes of various lengths. To ensure classification results were not affected by choice of interval size to average blink rates, a range of plausible interval sizes was first identified via visual inspection. Deming regression analyses (which account for measurement error for both individual blink rates and log likelihood ratio (LR) variables) further confirmed this result for 1 second scenes.
We compared the indices of perceived salience across experimental groups and observed that participants blinked less frequently during scenes containing task-relevant content than scenes containing task-irrelevant material. Furthermore, we investigated the influence of individual blink rates on this association, concluding that its strength was unaffected by group membership assignment or assignment status.
To increase the efficiency of this approach, we identified features relevant to “blink-related” scenarios from data and built models that could predict viewer behavioral response based on these features. Training took only several hours and demonstrated high predictive validity on a dataset containing many one-second scenes.
Responsive Design
With mobile devices on the rise, web designers must reevaluate how their websites appear across a range of screen sizes. Users often switch between desktop computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones during browsing sessions – thus rendering responsive design an essential component of blink web design.
Responsive web design enables a single code base to support websites optimized for multiple device widths using responsive CSS rules that adjust and rearrange content and design elements based on the size of browser windows, also known as viewports.
As seen from the examples above, responsive design can be utilized effectively through image resizing and flexible content spaces to make sure that your website is mobile-friendly. Other techniques include using floats to provide for an organized layout; and making sure it’s easily navigable across devices.
For instance, The NY Times website looks similar to a newspaper with various sections and columns. Their design makes use of responsive techniques such as using float for the main header and adapting placement of elements such as column headings based on viewport size. Furthermore, using max-width on images allows them to scale without becoming pixelated when reduced in size.
Transport for London website serves as another great example of responsive design. The layout of this site is minimalistic, making a few subtle adjustments so it fits all device widths; when viewing on mobile, for instance, navigation menu moves up towards the top to make room for content column and keep logo legible if it becomes too narrow to read properly.
Responsive designs can save time and resources by eliminating the need to maintain separate versions of your website for mobile and desktop devices. Furthermore, having an engaging, modern site with responsive designs will improve SEO performance while users are more likely to trust companies that provide consistent experiences across devices.
Call-to-Actions
Call-to-actions (CTAs) serve as the gateways between each step in your conversion funnel and revenue conversions, so it is vitally important that they receive proper consideration on every page they appear on.
Your CTA should stand out from other elements on the page, with enough whitespace around it so as to draw users’ eyes to it and make it more visually appealing. Testing with CTA buttons is also advised as even minor tweaks can have significant effects. Try playing around with different button colors, positioning on page as well as text style and color for maximum effectiveness.
CTA text should be succinct and straightforward, clearly outlining what action the user will take when clicking on the button, and why they need to. Take this opportunity to employ some copy psychology – such as including words such as “free” to emphasize its worth!
Position is also key. In Western culture, people typically read from top to bottom and left to right; therefore placing your CTA somewhere that aligns with this reading flow may outperform other locations. This is particularly pertinent for mobile devices where the placement should make sense to users once they’ve finished reading about your offer or product. Half Price Books uses this strategy on desktop but their CTA becomes invisible on mobile.
Visual Storytelling
Visual storytelling takes advantage of our brain’s natural tendency to process visuals more quickly than text, to craft engaging narratives about brands, products and services in an entertaining and informative manner. Visual storytelling is an indispensable marketing strategy in an age of content overload and shrinking attention spans; therefore it must be practiced regularly by marketers in order to stay ahead.
Visual storytelling requires creativity, imagination and skill. Selecting appropriate images can take your audience on an engaging journey to gain a deeper understanding of your brand; on the other hand, poorly executed tales may cause them to lose interest altogether or alienate their target demographics altogether. Therefore, it is crucial that your message is carefully planned prior to execution, with visuals that match its brand identity as part of this strategy.
A great visual story must contain a clear subject and engaging plot, while providing tension and entertainment at just the right level. However, avoid being too obvious or your audience may quickly figure out what the plot of your tale is all about; remember: storytelling should bring people in rather than push them away!
Consumers find it easier to connect with stories featuring strong and relatable characters. Archetypes such as caregiver, explorer and hero can help viewers feel engaged with your narrative, while tapping into cultural events, timely occurrences and emerging trends is essential for creating engaging stories at just the right moment in time.
As with any story, authenticity should always come first when telling an authentic narrative. A fake joke or meme that uses cliched humor quickly loses its effect as soon as people recognize its cheap attempt at drawing in new customers – in other words, your audience quickly sees through this type of bait-and-switch marketing and recognizes when something doesn’t ring true for them.
Successful marketers understand their audience’s needs and motivations in order to create engaging marketing messages that resonate. Visual storytelling is an ideal way to do just this, showing your target market how your product or service can improve their lives in an entertaining, interactive fashion – remember Eric and Sacha’s presentation at Content Marketing World on how effective visual storytelling works: generate tension, entertain, educate, facilitate micro-interactions and issue a call-to-action!
