According to a recent survey, 43% of all smartphone usage around the world is related to gaming. Even if you think you don't spend your time playing games, you might want to take a closer look at the apps and web apps you use regularly.

Increasingly, many of the techniques built into successful games are being used in the web apps of industries that aren't game-related, such as fitness, banking, education, and shopping. By utilizing features like rewards, points, challenges, badges, and leaderboards, you might be surprised to learn which web apps have been "gamified."

If you're looking to boost user engagement with your web app, increase customer loyalty, and create a long-term community surrounding your brand, gamifying your app can be an effective strategy.

Let's take a look at some of the most popular web apps that allow the user to enjoy a game-like experience.

Marketing professionals haven't been blind to the massive appeal of video games over the last several decades. For this reason, it's increasingly common for brands to incorporate game-like features into their web design.

Gamifying your web app doesn't necessarily mean that you are designing a video game for your audience to play. Instead, it simply refers to having some shared elements with games to help keep your visitors entertained and engaged.

Some features that a web app might incorporate that are similar to those found in a game include:

If this sounds silly to you, you might be interested to learn that many popular web apps have utilized some of these game-like features. After all, when a web app is well-designed, you might not even notice that the site has been gamified. In the most effective apps, it all seems so seamless and intuitive that you don't automatically make the connection that your favorite web app is gamified.

Starbucks is one of the major corporations that has made the switch over to a PWA. Their app is brilliantly designed to keep their loyal customers always coming back for more.

One game-like element of this web app is the "My Starbucks Rewards" program. Every time a customer uses the app to make a purchase, they earn stars. Depending on how many stars you've earned, you are ranked among others at different star levels.

Basically, you get better perks and rewards the more stars you earn. You might get merchandise, birthday beverages, free refills, and more.

If you're a coffee drinker, you can see how this could be very incentivizing. You might even be looking into downloading the app on your own phone right now!

The Starbucks app incorporates game-like elements in a truly effective way. It provides rewards that are meaningful enough to people that they are motivated to use the app. Once they have the app in place, they are compelled to specifically purchase from Starbucks rather than another coffee shop to increase their rewards.

Does Headspace represent the gamification of mindfulness? Maybe, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. After all, is it a problem if more people feel an urge to keep their streak going when it comes to meditation?

Headspace is definitely partially responsible for meditation becoming a mainstream activity. Considering how many mental and physical benefits meditation has, it's hard to argue that this hasn't been a net benefit for humanity.

Through the app, users can learn about the art of mindfulness and how to stay present as they go through their day. You'd think this might be a hard sell, but the app makes it easy, rewarding, and, yes, fun to learn how to be more mindful.

Using animations, friendly illustrations, and streaks in a game-like way, users are encouraged to wander around the site in a stress-free way.

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 to better understand the timeline you can expect when creating your new web app.

The tremendously popular language learning app Duolingo had 9.6 million daily active users around the world in 2021. A classic example of the gamification of apps, Duolingo makes it so learning a new language is competitive, engaging, and downright fun.

There are several important elements to why Duolingo is so successful in this regard. For one, the app constantly sends notifications (some would argue a bit too frequently) to remind users about their language learning goals. Speaking of goals, it also breaks all of the challenges down into different stages, allowing users to have a sense of accomplishment even for using the app for a few minutes a day. Every little win is celebrated, creating a reward cycle that keeps people coming back for more.

With progress bars, streaks, experience points, leaderboards, and leagues, Duolingo pulls out all the stops when it comes to gamification.

One of the most popular dating apps in the U.S., Tinder is a PWA that both desktop and mobile audiences can use.

Sure, you can argue about whether gamifying something as intimate as dating is a good thing for society, but you can't really argue against the fact that Tinder has been successful in creating a game-like experience for users.

Tinder completely transformed the online dating industry, which had previously emerged in the dot-com era as 

. Even though the app wasn't nearly as impressive from a technical standpoint, it blew the competition out of the water by appealing to a younger demographic and by gamifying online dating.

With features such as rewards and swiping, Tinder stepped into the digital dating realm and dramatically increased the number of online dating app users in the 18-24 year old demographic. One of the founders of Tinder, Sean Rad, even stated that they "always saw Tinder, the interface, as a game."

The success of Tinder is evidenced by the fact that the term "swipe right" has become a commonly used phrase in the vernacular of millennials. Through the gamification of their app, Tinder made it so dating as a younger person and Tinder were practically synonymous.

In 2018, Facebook started testing its own PWA as it grew in popularity. It's fair to say that a major reason behind the PWA revolution was the web application technology within the social media conglomerate of Facebook.

One of the most notable ways that Facebook offers a game-like experience is through its implementation of the "like button." The more "likes" a post you make gets, the more people will see what you've shared.

Since its inception, the ability to build a social network through Facebook was a way for people to display just how networked they were. However, with the ability to "friend" people and the total number of friends displayed on one page, showing others just how popular you are becomes a competitive aspect.

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As the second-largest sportswear manufacturer in the world and the largest in Europe, it's no surprise that Adidas made big waves in the world of web design when they adopted a PWA frontend. Before the switch, they had sixteen different native applications, none of which were receiving the engagement they anticipated or desired. Adopting a PWA frontend has paid off for Adidas, with their revenue growing 36% to more than $2 billion in 2018.

One of their popular apps is an activity tracker named Adidas Running. One of their successful campaigns, named Run For the Oceans, utilized many gamification features to boost engagement.

First of all, the campaign in itself was a challenge that allowed participants to test and motivate themselves.

Secondly, integrated community features allowed users to join local groups and organize running events. As you know, one of the best ways to achieve a goal is to tell someone else you're working towards it. When you feel a sense of accountability in this way, it can boost your motivation to achieve what you set out to do. By building this into the app, Adidas successfully boosted user engagement.

Thirdly, Adidas allowed users to build their goals right into the app. This provides both a sense of autonomy and a personalized purpose, both of which are hallmarks of app gamification. Each user can create customized targets with deadlines, allowing app users to see how far they are from achieving their goals visually.

As the fourth point of gamification, the Adidas running app instills a sense of competition between users, thanks to its leaderboards. When you use the app, you can share achievements, track your progress, and see how you stack up against other people in your community.

Lastly, the Adidas Running app also has a built-in reward system. This is a great way to boost user retention and encourage long-term thinking in the user. Thanks to the reward system, people are motivated to keep using the app and meet their goals while also feeling driven by a sense of challenge and competition.

 social media platform globally, anyone interested in gamifying their web app might want to take a few notes about the game-like user experience offered by Twitter.

Twitter users receive quantifiable feedback for the communications they send out into the world. When a person makes a tweet, they can receive Likes, Retweets, and an increased Follower count if their commentary is well-received. Users can even create polls for their followers to answer, allowing them to, in some respects, create their own game and data collection methods on the platform. This makes Twitter a platform that can be legitimately thrilling to the average user when their opinions and viewpoints are given affirmation by their following and the platform at large.

Much like how Tinder gamified online dating, one could argue that Twitter gamified digital communication. People have built entire careers based around Twitter, and the platform is used by 83% of journalists, saying that it's the most valuable social media platform. In fact, 

report, use Twitter as their first source of news.

Through the ability to receive direct feedback from one's communication, Twitter can offer a game-like experience to users and a powerful marketing tool to businesses and professional personalities alike.

One of the most uniquely designed apps out there today is Uber's PWA. First launched in 2018, the PWA loads quickly and only takes up 50 KB of storage space. This lightweight app makes it fast and easy to book a ride (or food delivery, bike and scooter rental, and more) even when your network connection is weak.

Though you might not think of such a utilitarian app as something that would need to include gamification features, game-like features can increase engagement even for something as practical as transportation.

One of the primary aspects of Uber's gamification is its Uber Rewards program. Built to incentivize loyalty to the ride-sharing company over their competition, this program unlocks benefits through a tiered system. The app even includes a progress bar to show you how close you are to moving up to the next rung of the ladder and visualizes your progress, so you understand how much more you need to invest to reap new rewards.

Is It Time for You to Turn Your Web App Dream Into a Reality?

As you can see, the elements of games are hidden in plain sight in some of the world's most popular web apps. Activities that one would think have nothing to do with gaming– everything from meditation and running to buying coffee and hailing a ride– can utilize game-like features to create an all-around improved experience for the user.

Only you can dream up your next brilliant web app idea. However, you don't have to go it alone when turning that dream into a reality. At Planetary, our team of globally-distributed experts specializes in helping you manifest your idea into a professional digital product.

Have you been searching for the perfect team to help you create your new web app? If so, 

8 Examples of Gamification in Popular Web Apps

According to some estimates, the carbon footprint of the internet, our various devices, and their supporting systems add up to about 

 globally. While many industries are searching for solutions to reduce their carbon dioxide input and increase efficiency, estimates suggest that emissions from the internet will dramatically grow in the years to come.

For this reason, many progressive businesses are looking to create green websites and web apps that work to achieve carbon-neutral status. When an individual uses the internet, the amount of electricity they are using and the carbon emissions they create are infinitesimal. However, in aggregate, it creates a substantial impact. In today's climate-conscious ecosystem, the impact of a web app on the climate cannot be ignored.

Are you wondering how you can reduce the carbon footprint of your web app to ensure that your company is a leader in creating a green internet? Read on while we give you all the important details.

How Does a Web App Impact the Environment?

Many consumers these days are very concerned with the environmental impact of the organizations they choose to do business with. Americans and people around the world are increasingly embracing eco-friendly products and sustainability, but they often require that these companies pay more than just lip service.

This is evidenced by the increasing number of corporations trying to meet the needs of consumers seeking earth-friendly products and services. For example, Adidas released a limited-edition sneaker design created using only plastic trash removed from the ocean. The nearly 7,000 pairs of sneakers sold out almost immediately after the launch.

Making your web app more sustainable doesn't just have a positive impact on the environment but also helps to earn consumer trust, increase conversions, and highlight your brand as a green leader in your industry.

So, how exactly does a web app impact the environment?

 used to generate electricity are coal, natural gas, and nuclear power. Wind and solar are gaining popularity as renewable resources for producing electricity, but they still only make up a small percentage of the resources used at this point.

Most of the electricity generated in the United States comes from centralized power plants. It then has to travel through high-voltage transmission lines until consumers receive lower voltage electricity through a network of distribution lines.

Even though there's a tendency to think of electric vehicles and tools as inherently green, it's important to remember that electricity is largely produced using non-renewable resources.

, the average website produces 1.76 grams of CO2 for every page view. This means that if a site receives 10,000 page views every month, its yearly CO2 emissions amount to 2,112 kilograms.

A site or web app will have a proportionately larger climate impact in relation to how complicated it is and how much energy it calls upon to load. When you consider just how many sites and apps there are on the internet, not to mention how many of them were designed inefficiently, you can start to see how the web could be detrimental to the desire to reduce carbon emissions.

The front end is where there is generally the highest potential for improvement in the world of carbon emissions. In addition to content, the front end also includes a wide variety of tracking scripts and tools that outline what's occurring on a website.

This aspect of your web app is essential to creating a rich user experience. However, it's also where you have the largest ability to make eco-friendly changes.

You can receive huge performance improvements by optimizing the network where your web app is hosted. Not only that, though, but it can also significantly reduce energy use. When you reduce the distance that data has to travel on a network, you also reduce how much energy is being consumed.

Both the server and the backend of websites and web apps also consume energy, contributing to carbon emissions globally. Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for organizations to over-provision resources compared to their servers because operation costs have significantly reduced. However, this also results in energy that is simply wasted.

Is It Worth Building a Sustainable Web App?

In short, yes, it is! Not only does reducing the carbon footprint of your web app become something that your brand can shout from the rooftops, but it also is inherently related to a more efficient and effective web app or site. Many of the methods that we'll outline below to improve the eco-friendliness of your web app are also best practices in the world of web app design.

Though it can mean being more deliberate in designing your web app and managing its growth, the time invested in building a sustainable web app is time well spent. You can appeal to your customers two-fold by going green. On the one hand, you can show that your brand is truly committed to protecting the environment rather than simply using it as a marketing strategy without anything to back it up. On the other hand, you can provide the best possible user experience by having web apps that perform optimally.

How Can You Reduce the Carbon Footprint of Your Web App?

Now that you're convinced that it's worth reducing the carbon footprint of your web app, you're likely starting to wonder precisely what you should do to put this dream into action. Let's take a look at some of the most approachable ways that you can create an eco-friendly web app.

With so much competition online, you're likely already concerned with keeping your website speed lightning fast. There are many different components of an app that can impact how long it takes to load, which means that there are several actions you can take to increase loading times and reduce your carbon footprint.

One method you can take is known as lazy loading. This practice delays the loading of objects or resources until they are actually needed as a part of your web app performance. This can help save system resources and reduce the amount of electricity being used.

You can also use caching solutions to optimize the performance of your site. Caching stores a copy of an app's static resources on the user's device temporarily, which can significantly decrease how much energy is used by the survey and improve page load speed.

Choosing lightweight fonts over personalized and custom fonts is another way you can reduce your carbon footprint through performance optimization, as well as creating accelerated mobile pages (AMP).

One thing that can have quite the impact on your web app's carbon footprint is the host that you select. Essentially, not all web hosting providers are created equal in this regard, and you might choose to select a host that is committed to energy efficiency as well as the performance of web apps and sites.

Are you designing your web app on your own? If so, we've created a list of 

In the back end, one of the ways that you can keep carbon emissions down is by keeping your code tidy and simple. While this is often a stated goal of website developers, it's sometimes easier said than done. The more straightforward and clean code is, the less energy is being wasted in the process of displaying a web app.

Optimize the Multimedia Content in Your App

If you've been staying in tune with the evolution of the internet, you've likely noticed that it's increasingly become a multimedia experience. Humans are visual creatures, and providing visually compelling content can help keep visitors on your site longer, drive traffic to your app, and positively impact your brand.

However, if you aren't careful, including images and videos on your app can hurt your page load times and your carbon footprint.

When you include images in your web app, you'll want to utilize vector graphics and CSS whenever possible to reduce the demand for resources. It's also essential to compress your images to improve page load times.

While video can be an excellent medium to include in your app, they do demand quite a bit from the CPU of the user in terms of energy. Be thoughtful when including videos in your app if you're committed to reducing your carbon emissions, and also choose to avoid having the videos auto-play when visitors use your app.

Tracking and advertising scripts can lead to slower web apps as well as increased file sizes. If you're not careful, these scripts can lead your pages to take twice as long to load than if they weren't included.

These scripts generally don't provide much benefit to the user, though they can be very valuable to the brand. For this reason, consider balancing your company's needs in terms of monitoring scripts with the needs of the user and your desire to be an eco-friendly pioneer in your field.

How much time users spend inside navigation has a lot to do with how you design your web app navigation. The goal for user experience and web app sustainability should be to build a simple and intuitive navigation bar. You ideally want visitors to know exactly how to get to the part of your web app they're looking for without having to dig around endlessly. This can also be aided by incorporating a search bar.

You might not think that SEO has anything to do with the efficiency of a web app. However, improving your SEO doesn't just help your business grow and thrive, but it also can lead to lower energy usage.

When internet search results return appropriate web apps and sites to meet the searcher's intent, it helps to reduce the number of times that users visit pages that don't fit their needs and cut bounce rates. Your web app's efficiency can also be improved by high-quality copy.

One of the most climate-friendly types of web apps is progressive web apps. Built to run on any platform, so users have the best possible performance no matter what device they're accessing your site from, PWAs can radically reduce how much data is loaded thanks to chasing files on the user's device.

Are you starting to think about the design of your web app? 

 of clean web app design for inspiration.

Are You Ready to Reduce the Carbon Footprint of Your Web App?

When you build a brand, your primary objective is to offer a product or service that solves a problem for your target demographic. If your audience is concerned with the effects of human activity on the environment, reducing the carbon footprint of your web app can be a compelling reason for potential customers to choose you over your competition. Consumers are often concerned with the actual steps that companies are taking to do their part in working towards a sustainable future, and being a pioneer in the creation of a greener internet can have a powerful impact on the awareness and growth of your brand.

At the same time, creating a green web app also goes hand in hand with optimizing its performance. This means that in addition to helping support the future of our global environment, you are also reaping the benefits of better search engine rankings, faster load times, fewer page bounces, increased conversions, and more.

Is it time for you to create your new web app with sustainability in mind? Our globally distributed team of experts specializes in helping our clients turn a great idea into a reality. If so, feel free to reach out and 

. We're experienced in creating top-shelf apps for a wide variety of industries, and we're more than happy to discuss your idea with you.

How to Reduce The Carbon Footprint of Your Web App

When you create a web app, you're creating a digital product that aims to solve the problems of your target audience. You've likely thought long and hard about the features and functions you want your app to have and have tirelessly worked with a development team to create the perfect app.

While you've likely tested how your app will perform under many different potential scenarios, it's also vital to test unusual or abnormal circumstances to find the limits of your app.

This is where stress testing comes in. When you perform a stress test, you are purposefully treating your app as if you are a malicious user determined to break it. By approaching testing in this way, you can gain valuable insight into potential issues with your app that you would never have discovered during more testing that only looks at expected or common scenarios.

Stress testing is the process of testing software to see how stable it is in the case of abnormal or unusual scenarios. You can perform this testing to determine the exact point when the system will break and the error handling for the number of server requests, users, and more.

When you stress test your web app, the app is completely bombarded with an extra heavy load for a specific time. This onslaught is done to figure out how well the app handles errors and at what point it breaks.

Obviously, when you create a web app, you are hoping that your users will be well-intentioned rather than malicious. However, you have to create your app with the expectation that someone with nothing better to do will exploit any weak points. Regardless of whether or not this is likely to actually occur, by testing your web app as if you were a mal-intentioned user, you can learn the limits of your app and act accordingly. This process can help you be prepared for circumstances that you might never anticipate and ensure that there aren't security threats or losses of data.

Why Is It a Good Idea to Stress Test Web Apps During Development?

No matter how bombproof your web app is, there is always the potential for web software to break. As a general rule, if users can break your software or abuse it, they eventually will.

When software crashes, some of the main problems include 

 and the possible loss of data during the shutdown. There are a lot of issues that might not ever make themselves known under normal load conditions, so stress testing allows teams to understand the issues that might crop up under peak load circumstances. They will then also evaluate which systems can keep functioning during these extreme loads or while some of their software is compromised.

To perform a stress test, loads that exceed reasonable estimates are simulated by specialists to test how well the web app does under stress. This can give you valuable information about how to prepare for extreme and unusual circumstances.

There is a lot of valuable information that stress testing can help you uncover, including:

The primary goal of stress testing is to ensure that the system will be able to recover smoothly after failure. This type of testing analyzes both user behavior and the system to determine precisely why the system crashed. By being able to collect errors and data during testing, you can take action to ensure recoverability in the case of a system crash.

When you perform stress testing, you can optimize your system to prevent breakdown.

In short, stress testing allows you to test your web app as if a malicious user were at the helm. This lets you understand which parts of your app will require hard limits to prevent breakdown.

For example, how many times can a user request a password reset email? In a typical scenario, a user would only need to do this once to reaccess your app. However, what if the user continuously requested a password reset repeatedly for three hours straight?

As another example, let's say that users can create new "characters" in your web app. A typical user might create one, five, or maybe ten characters. What if someone created 3,000 characters, though, or 3,000,000? Would it crash your database?

By performing stress testing, you can understand the hard limits you should set within your app to ensure that crashes and problems are avoided as much as possible. While stress testing is purposefully experimenting with unusual or even nearly impossible scenarios, it allows you to learn the limits of your app and optimize your app to avoid breakdowns.

What's the Difference Between Stress Testing and Load Testing?

It's worth noting that in the world of software testing, you'll often hear both the terms 

. While there are certainly similarities between these two different types of tests, they actually test for different types of conditions.

is a testing process that lets you measure your systems' behavior and its responses under peak load conditions. It does this by simulating high demand on the web application to verify the system's performance under high but expected load conditions.

is performed to find a system's breaking point. One of the primary purposes of this type of testing is to determine how the system will behave (and if it will behave as expected) if the load goes beyond the expected limit.

In stress testing, the stability of the systems is checked, and error handling is verified. It also involves checking for memory leaks, security threats, and more. This testing uses more than the maximum possible number of requests and users.

While stress testing is checking the stability of the system, 

 is checking the reliability of the system. Under load testing, error handling and security threats aren't necessarily tested. Load testing also only uses the maximum number of users and requests rather than exceeding the maximum number.

When Should You Conduct a Stress Test for Your Web App?

It's ideal to stress test your web app during the development phase to understand where the app's limits lie. This way, you can avoid potential problems before they crop up once your app is launched.

When you perform stress testing during development, you can detect issues early on in the process that could end up creating much bigger performance problems down the road.

Are you wondering how long it will take for your new web app to go from idea to reality? You can 

 about how much time it typically takes to build a web app from start to finish.

What Are the Different Types of Stress Testing?

As you might imagine, there are many moving parts when it comes to a web app breaking under abnormal and extreme conditions. It's therefore important to perform stress testing in a variety of ways to learn as much information as possible about the breaking point of the app. Let's take a look at some of the primary types of stress tests.

When you perform an application stress test, you aim to find network and data bottlenecks. By identifying these problem areas, you can optimize your app's performance.

This type of stress testing is used to simulate the stress on the system when multiple interconnected applications are performing at least one transaction with one another. This might be between your app and a third-party application or between multiple internal systems. The reason behind performing this type of stress testing is to help fine-tune an interrelated system and optimize that system.

Exploratory stress testing is a great way to learn valuable insight into your web app. In this type of testing, unusual conditions and abnormal parameters are put in place to test how the system responds. While these circumstances are extremely rare in the real world, they can let you know where the weak points are in the system that you would otherwise not identify.

For example, you might test what would happen if there were a ton of the read/write operations happening simultaneously, or you might test what would happen if a huge number of users decided to make a purchase simultaneously.

Systemic stress tests allow you to identify any trouble spots regarding different applications running on the same server.

Finally, distributed stress testing is a type of testing that allows you to investigate why certain clients would experience service interruption and the reasoning behind this. This is performed in a distributed client-server environment.

How Can You Optimize Your Stress Testing Strategy?

Like any software testing, you can go about it in a more or less organized manner. However, to get the most out of your stress testing, it's good to have a clear plan of action ahead of time.

It's common for applications to have many different types of users. For example, you might have return customers using your app and new users just checking out what you have to offer. In this scenario, you would generally consider that your return customers have a higher value than casual browsers, meaning that you would want to prioritize return customer workflows during stress tests.

You also might determine that some types of users are riskier than others. For example, some users might be saving more sensitive information and performing tasks on the app where security is of the utmost importance. As you might imagine, a crash for this type of user could be much more devastating and problematic than a crash for a user that isn't incorporating sensitive information that must be kept secure.

You're also going to want to think about network speed when performing stress tests. If your web app is a tool that helps drivers find the cheapest gas, for example, there's a good chance that most of your users access the app through their smartphone. In general, mobile traffic has increased tremendously in the last ten years, and you'll want to be aware of what percentage of your users are on mobile devices.

The reason for this is that a server-side slowdown can have a much bigger effect on people using a device connected to the LTE network. If mobile connections are slowed down, this could impact the number of connections available to the server at any time. This could affect the maximum number of simultaneous users because it takes longer for the user to progress through a workflow.

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When creating a plan for stress testing a web app, it's not uncommon for developers to consider the most typical user workflows. However, if you only test the most standard scenarios, you might be missing important weak points and potential spots where user workflow could be improved.

Make It a Part of the Development Process

It's common for development teams to run performance tests leading up to expected events. For example, if you have an eCommerce web app, you might run a test before the holiday season. While this is generally a good idea, you don't want to overlook the benefits of running stress tests as a part of the development process and in an ongoing way after your app has launched.

Are You Looking For The Right Team to Develop Your Web App?

Testing is an essential part of web app development, and stress testing can allow you to learn about the limits of your app in a way that normal load testing can't. When you incorporate stress testing into your development phase, you can ensure that your app runs as smoothly as possible, no matter the number of users and requests.

Have you been searching for the right team to create your next web app? If so, 

Why You Should Stress Test Web Apps During Development

In an increasingly digital world, having a robust online presence is essential for businesses of all shapes and sizes. If your site is outdated, not receiving as much traffic as you'd like, not optimized for mobile, or otherwise not performing in the ways you'd like, it might be time for a website redesign.

When you embark on the journey of redesigning your website, you're investing time, money, and effort towards the cause. However, revamping your site can be the precise tool you need to grow your business when done right.

Whether you have a brick-and-mortar store, an online business, or some combination of the two, redesigning your site can be absolutely essential when it comes to achieving success. A well-designed site can help you improve your search rankings, meet the needs of your visitors and team, increase your conversion rate, and more.

Are you wondering what steps you need to take when redesigning your site? Let's dive in and look at what you need to know.

Before you jump in and start brainstorming about the new UI you want to implement, you'll want to tackle the task of redesigning your website in a logical order. It's easy to get ahead of yourself when redesigning a site; after all, it's exciting! However, one of the first things you'll want to do is assemble your redesign task force.

How many people are required to redesign your site will depend on many different factors, and it's, of course, possible to redesign a site entirely on your own. However, the ideal number for a site redesign team is typically somewhere around five people, preferably from different departments.

Some of the key players you'll want to include on your team are a:

You'll also want to pick a point person in charge of the project from within this team. They will be responsible for ensuring that the project continues moving forward and making decisions and approvals within the group.

You might find that outsourcing your redesign is the most time- and cost-effective method for approaching the project.

"if one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable."

 Determining what you are looking to achieve with your website redesign is essential before getting too deep into the process.

Obviously, you want to redesign your site so that your business will be more successful. That's a little too vague to be useful, though.

There are three primary reasons you might be compelled to redesign your site.

The first is to repair issues that are negatively impacting your business

. For example, this might mean that your interface or content is outdated, your site isn't friendly to mobile devices, or your loading times are too slow.

fine from a nuts and bolts standpoint, but you want to increase your online presence or create a better user journey. If your site functions well, but you want to reach more target customers, website optimization might be the path for you.

Lastly, a redesign can also feel like the natural step when you've made changes to your company culture, marketing strategy, or branding

. Maybe your site doesn't have any functional or even design problems, but you're motivated to rebrand your site to reflect the growth and evolution of your company.

Once you've decided to redesign your website, assembled your team, and determined your goals, the next step is to audit the current version of your site thoroughly. This is an opportunity to determine what is working and what needs to be tweaked so that your redesign can be a success. Again, there's a high likelihood that there are vital parts of your site that you'll want to keep rather than tearing the whole thing down and starting from scratch.

So, what should you be looking for when auditing your existing site? Some of the steps you'll want to take include:

Assessing the current page performance of your site

Completing a full SEO audit of your entire website

Reviewing the copy that's currently on your site

A successful audit will help you obtain a bird's eye view of all your assets on the table.

Are you considering building a web app for your business? Take a look at 

 on how long the process takes from start to finish.

Research the Competition and Get Inspired

Analyzing your competition is one of the most informative steps you can take to determine what needs to change on your site (and what should definitely stay!). You'll want to compile a list of all of your competitor's sites and take notes on what seems to be working and what isn't.

Looking at your competitors doesn't just help you develop practical ideas for changes to your site, but it can also serve as a source of inspiration. It can be overwhelming trying to make all of the little decisions necessary when you redesign a site, and getting a sense of what the other players in the industry are doing can help get your creative juices flowing.

That being said, you don't want to copy the style and features of your competitor's sites. While you can glean valuable information from 

, it's important to stay true to your brand personality rather than trying to mimic your competition so precisely that you get lost in the crowd.

One of the key elements to redesigning your site includes mapping out the various stages that users will go through on their journey through your site. Two valuable tools to help you in this part of the process include customer interviews and user testing.

Without understanding what the user is looking for on your site, it's hard to achieve your desired goals with a redesign. Only then can you offer solutions to the problems they are there to solve.

When you performed your site audit, you probably found that there are some pages on your site that are performing great while others are floating around the ephemeral digital world of unvisited web pages. So take this opportunity to get rid of pages you no longer need, organize those you're going to keep, and add pages that should be there but aren't. Don't forget to implement proper redirects from old URLs to new ones, as necessary!

Keyword research and mapping can help you create a functional site structure by allowing you to create a content hierarchy. To ensure that your site has the highest possible amount of exposure, you'll want to identify the primary and secondary keywords that you'll want to include in your most prominent pages.

If you're undergoing the process of redesigning a site on your own, you'll want to make sure you understand the basic principles of design. While it's worth diving deeper into design theory before you start with your redesign, some important components include:

Utilizing contrast makes your website more usable due to accentuating the difference between two objects or elements.

Your site should have a well-balanced design, meaning elements are distributed in their visual weight.

This principle relates to having the elements displayed in relation to how important they are, i.e., using larger, bolder type for the subsection titles of a content article.

Incorporating high-quality, well-selected, relevant images is an important aspect of a visually pleasing site.

You'll want to decide on the chosen fonts for your site and maintain consistency across pages.

If you have a full team of experts working on the case, your designer will obviously already be familiar with the best design practices. However, if you're taking on the task yourself, it's worth learning as much as you can about how to create a visually appealing and usable site.

Are you looking for inspiration for your website redesign? Check out 

 of clean web app design to help you get your muse to start singing.

At first, you don't have to have your copy fully polished and finished. However, you will want to know what messages you are sending to the user on different pages and how you will help them navigate the site. Then, as you get closer to launch, you'll want to go back over your copy and make sure that everything is exactly as you want it.

Before you launch your site, you'll want to perform user testing to review your design and get actual feedback from your target demographic. This can help you make any last-minute tweaks or even head back to the drawing board if necessary. While having to make major changes after you've redesigned your site can be frustrating, it's important to understand that your site can't be as successful as you want it to be if your audience finds it difficult to use, ugly, or hard to navigate.

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