Author: UXPin

At the heart of every company, there is a critical function called product development that determines their long-term success. Regardless of what industry you operate in, your capacity to develop, validate, and bring new products to market is paramount. Research from the 280 Group showed that an optimized product development function on its own could increase company profits by 34.2%. This often comes down to having the right product development team on board. 

In today’s article, we’re going to discuss how you can build and manage a team that will effectively support you in digital product development. Let’s dive right in! 

Key Areas to Focus On While Building and Managing a Product Development Team

There are a few aspects that you need to consider from hiring and leadership all the way to career progression.

1. Hiring

It should go without saying that you want to assemble the best possible people as part of your product development team.  Here are some principles to keep in mind that will help you do exactly that:

Hire for both hard and soft skills

It’s not enough to just hire technical wonderkids. Apart from first-class hard skills, they should also possess the right soft skills including communication, teamwork and problem-solving abilities. Only then they will be able to positively contribute to product and design development.

Create a skills inventory

Work on identifying the skills that you currently have access to and those areas in which you’re lacking. This exercise will help you understand the sorts of skills that you should be looking to go out and hire.

Use the right skills assessment methods

When you’re evaluating potential hires, it’s crucial that you use the right type of skills assessment test for the specific use case. This will help you ensure that you aren’t wasting time and resources on irrelevant assessments or candidates that aren’t fit for the role. 

Be proactive when searching for talent

It’s important to remember that top performers almost never come through open job applications. They’re in high demand and usually, they can sit back and wait for opportunities to come to them. As such, it’s important that you use platforms like StackOverflow, LinkedIn, and referrals from your network to proactively search for the best talent and bring it into your team.

2. Leadership

The next important component to ensure smooth product planning and development is creating the right product culture. And that needs to be set from the very top.  Ben Horowitz, famed entrepreneur, and businessperson, explains it as follows:

“Culture isn’t a magical set of rules that makes everyone behave the way you’d like.  It’s a system of behaviors that you hope most people will follow most of the time.”

The way that you encourage these behaviors is by clearly communicating a vision for where you want the product and the team to go.  Everyone is looking to the leaders for this clarity and it helps to ensure that everyone is pulling in the same direction and working towards achieving the same goal. Without this alignment, your culture is left to the whims of the lowest common denominator and that can be very harmful to overall team dynamics.

Another important principle is that you should aim to empower your team rather than micromanage them.  The most talented designers and developers don’t want to feel like someone is watching over their shoulder all the time. They want to work independently and feel like they have the trust of their leaders. The role of a good leader is to support his team with whatever resources, direction, and incentives they can, but then step out of the way so that each person can do what they do best. 

3. Internal Processes

The next step is to make sure that your internal operations are set up in the most efficient and effective way possible to enable smooth product planning and development. Here are some of the things that you should be considering here:

Decide on the right team structure

To maximize the collaboration in your product development team, you need to have a solid structure that creates the space that your people need to do what they do best. This is key – if you get it wrong, you’ll find that your progress is impeded quite significantly, and you might not even realize it. Here are three common structures that could work for your team:

• Centralized Team Structure.  In this setup, your entire product development team works in one location, all under one key decision-maker.  When you do this, your developers work as mini-agencies, essentially being deployed to various projects as and when needed. You benefit from shared knowledge and experiences while also unifying the product development principles throughout the organization.  The downside is that your team is somewhat isolated from the rest of the business which can lead to misalignment.
• Embedded Team Structure.  Here individual product developers are integrated into teams across the organization in a cross-functional way. This means that each individual is deeply embedded in specific products which is great for focus, but it does result in some duplicated work because other developers might not know exactly what you’re working on.

• Flexible Team Structure.  This is where you combine the centralized approach with the embedded one. Developers are still integrated into specific teams, but they also report to a head of product development that seeks to align everyone and unify the approach. This flexibility is very valuable but also can result in wires being crossed when team members aren’t sure who to report to and who should be making the final decision.

There is no one right option here because everything will depend on your unique company circumstances and the sorts of products you’re working on. It’s worth revisiting this every now and then to find the right option for you, also don’t be shy to experiment.  A great example of this comes from Buffer, a social media automation company that has changed their product team setup multiple times until they stumbled across the right results in terms of effectiveness and information flow.

Use Tools That Improve Design-Development Team Collaboration

Great software can be a fantastic asset for improving the collaboration between your design and your development teams so that everything goes as smoothly as possible.  

• For brainstorming within the product development team you might want to consider tools like Miro that offer powerful visual collaboration spaces for teams of all sizes.
• For building error-free prototypes fast, UXPin Merge will help you leverage ready UI code components to accelerate the process while also simplifying a few traditional product development processes like handoff.

There are a wide variety of other technological tools  that could be helpful – so look out for those gaps in your processes, and see if there are solutions to help you tighten them up.

Create Product Briefs

Product development can very quickly expand beyond its original scope if you don’t have the right context and guardrails in place to keep the project on track. One of the best ways to do this is to codify your thinking and plans into comprehensive product briefs. These documents align everyone’s expectations and record the direction that the product is going in.

Nicole Burrow, design director for CX at Spotify articulated this perfectly when she said:

“A key ingredient in team success is ensuring they have all the context they need. I introduced this collaborative brief that designers develop alongside their product counterparts, so they always have the “why” defined before they start ideating. This helps us align on what problem we’re trying to solve and why this is important to the business at the outset of the hypothesis development stage.”

Organize Regular Meetings

Along the way, you should be looking to organize regular meetings for your product development team to come together and make sure that everyone is up to date with what’s going on.  These could include the following:

• Daily standup meetings to build accountability and ensure that the whole product development team knows what everyone else is working on.
• One-on-one meetings with the team leader to clarify direction and look for opportunities to improve.
• Team meetups to go through sprint planning exercises and retro meetings to assess progress.

These meetings are crucial to managing the project and should act as a valuable check and balance to keep everything in line.

Decide on Appropriate Performance Evaluations

It’s important that you select the right evaluation techniques to monitor and measure performance.  This needs to be done not just on an individual level, but also at a team level.  The most common framework implemented by great companies is the Objectives & Key Results framework (OKRs).  One example is Sears who saw an 8.5% increase in hourly sales within 18 months of introducing the system. And those results have been repeated by numerous other companies who have done the same thing.

OKRs are a robust method for setting and tracking goals. The objective states what is to be achieved, and the key results explain what it’s going to take to achieve that objective. This allows you to create cascading goals that are systematically linked – pushing you towards the north star mission while managing all the smaller steps along the way.

4. Career Progression

Lastly, if we zoom out from one specific project and think about your product development life cycle as a whole, it’s crucial that you give your top performers a clear path in terms of career progression. You want to design career paths that align with the goals of your team members so that they feel valued and purposeful. Spotify does this with their Y shape progression which gives designers the decision between moving into management or continuing to refine their design skills to become an expert.

Having a clear progression makes for a much more stable working environment where employees know where they stand.  This is critical for retention and for maintaining morale throughout each product development cycle.

Summary

And there you have it.  Those are some of the core principles that can help you build and manage an effective product development team.  When you implement these and focus on the key action steps – you’ll find that your digital product development moves to an entirely different level.

Operationally, there are few things that will deliver a better ROI on your time and investment than getting your product development team in sync.  Now is the time to rethink your processes and get these best practices into your organization as soon as you can. And if you’re looking for a tool that will help you further optimize your product and design development, then check out UXPin Merge! 

In today’s competitive digital landscape, success is a stream of fresh ideas. Innovative thinking. Audience-led and data-driven product design that meets the needs of your business and your customer – whether they knew they wanted it or not. 

But for every iPod, there’s a Zune. For every static, stifled Myspace or Friends Reunited, there’s a Facebook; creative, agile, and willing to adapt and improve to meet users’ constantly shifting digital demands. 

Whether you’re entering the marketplace with a creative new take or improving on an existing product, you can’t just jump in head-first and hope for the best. Success, however you define it, depends on a clear product design strategy. 

In this article, we’re going to discuss what a digital product design strategy is and what it takes to create a successful one.

What is a strategy for product development?

Product development strategy is the plan implemented by companies on their way towards successfully launching a new or modified product. Creating a successful digital product comes down to a number of methods and carefully planned steps. Just think of it – you wouldn’t build a house on a plot of land without a blueprint and the right foundations, and that’s what a strategy offers for businesses: stable foundations. 

Each stage of digital product design – from initial idea to final roll-out – should follow a roadmap with clear steps, objectives, and vision to keep the project focused and on track. 

A successful product design strategy will show an understanding of:

• Your customers
• Your business and teams
• Your industry and competitors
• The current marketplace
• The risks
• The opportunities.

With the above in mind, let’s answer another question:

Why do you need a product development strategy?

There are several actions that a product development strategy empowers you to do. Here are some of them:

Develop a vision

You have a vision. A new product, a new way of doing things. The exact details might be vague and hazy, but the idea itself is crystal clear – and it takes skilled teams to deliver it. 

Your product design strategy is a communication tool. A means to share your vision, and with the help of others, research it, refine it, and make it ready for market’s launch.

Here’s where the ‘design thinking’ mindset comes into play. Defined by David Kelley and Tim Brown, it’s ‘a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer’s toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.’ It encourages collaboration and the exchange of ideas between business, design, and development teams, which are all closely aligned and play towards a common objective. 

A common vision will also lower the risk of poor communication among team members, which is estimated to cost businesses $524,569 every year. 

Identify and prepare for risk 

If the last two years have shown us anything, it’s that we never know what life’s going to throw at us. But at least with a strategy for product development, you have the opportunity to:

• Examine potential threats – know what to expect
• Minimise risks – know how to prevent it
• Prepare for recovery – know what to do if the worst happens.

Assess major threats:

• Can your IT systems cope with a new service? 
• What data security compliance standards will your new app have to meet?

Also, take into account smaller threats and those that, left unchecked, might derail the whole project, including processes or team member availability.

Measure success

At the end of it all (and, even, at every step of the way) you and your teams should have a clear idea of what worked and what didn’t. During the initial stages, loosely define what success looks like. Depending on the project, prepare to adapt if the goal is unrealistic or simply impossible. 

Once the project develops beyond the discovery stage, begin setting Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and milestones to measure the success of your product. All teams should understand the goals that are being set, to facilitate collaboration and propel the product to a successful launch.

Tips to building a product development strategy

Your response to building a product design strategy hinges on whether you’re building a product from scratch or adding new features to your current one. With your approach in mind…

1. Gain a deep understanding of the problem you’re solving

During the early stages, you should be focusing on why you want to introduce or improve a product, and who it’s really for. A question Google Glass still appears to be struggling with. Is there a business need for your idea? Is there already a solution out there that achieves the same results? 

Best-selling author and marketer Neil Patel highlights five tools and techniques to understand your customers, which include creating buyer personas and engaging in customer journey mapping. 

Remember to dig into your existing data, drawn from website traffic, social media channels, and the likes. Build a clear picture of who your customers are and what they want. This should be data-driven and data-rich – avoid using broad, fictional personas. Ask yourself: why would a target user buy your solution instead of someone else’s?  

That being said, alongside customer analysis, research competitors. Find their strengths and weaknesses to identify your own product’s unique value proposition. 

When adding new features to your product, customer research lets you reassess your market positioning and current assumptions about what your product offers. Meanwhile, competitor analysis lets you see how developing new features and integrations can add value and make your product unique amongst rivals.

2. Define your product

You’ve identified the problem. Now, you need a solution. A real, precise, exact roadmap for solving the problem is required, detailing what features you’re going to include and how you’re going to achieve that. 

You should address:

• Functionality – your solution should do what it sets out to do, and genuinely solve the problem. Imagine if Facebook didn’t let you connect with friends, or Google scuppered its own search engine. 
• Usability – your product should be intuitive and easy to use. That’s what made both of the above companies so successful. Even if these sites aren’t your direct competitors, they’ve set user expectations on function and navigation. 
• Desirability – your idea should appeal to users, but it should also be desirable from a business standpoint. Consider performance, UI, costs, and resources.

If you’re modifying an existing product, look at each of these areas to discover which ones are under-performing. 

It’s not easy to get your product right the first time. For this reason, it’s worth investing time in minimum viable product (MVP) research. You will be able to see how your target audience responds to new ideas and modify them based on their feedback. 

3. Visualize the product

This is where the fun begins. You and your team should now have a pretty good idea of what to create, so you can start the design process. There are four stages:

Ideate

During ideation, your team will be running on concept drawings, prototypes, and concept revisions to test a product’s strengths and weaknesses. This stage is defined by innovation and creation. Encourage a stream of ideas (there are no bad ones, remember) and nurture the best, i.e., the ones that fulfill a need. 

Prove

Show there’s a business case for your solution. Gather user feedback across all channels and mediums – from surveys and social media conversations to face-to-face interviews and your own experience and observations. The trick is to find the right audience. Especially, if you’re modifying a product and have built up a user-base that may not be the target for any new features. Look to any past feedback for any valuable insights or recurring issues you may have already collected. 

Refine

Armed with actionable insights from your target audience, you can begin to tweak your product based on the responses. For example, simplifying the user interface, or adding quick actions and links to popular spaces within an app. Again, beware of project creep as you balance the desires of the user with business needs. Teamwork is important here, as changes and refinements must be communicated. To modify the product, it’s best to use a tool like UXPin Merge – and if you haven’t used a DesignOps tool like this before, you’ll be introducing a better way to collaborate on digital product designs with developers. 

Build

It’s time to bring your digital product design together. Whether it’s a fresh product or a cool, new update, achieving the best results depends on having the right teams, following the right strategy and using the right tools. In addition to using components you’ve already developed, you can take advantage of open-source UI libraries like Material Design and Fluent UI to build the best product without breaking the bank. 

4. Measure your product’s success

The no. 1 question any digital product development team will ask themselves is: was it worth it? The only way to really know is by measuring performance against KPIs. As briefly mentioned above, KPIs help you track outcomes at every stage, monitoring the performance of staff, but it’s especially critical once your product is rolled out. 

Now you can begin to learn why (or why not) the project was a success. You can also find out where you can improve in a future launch or update. At a minimum, KPIs should be realistic and measurable. Avoid so-called ‘vanity’ metrics that make you and your team look great, but tell you little about how a product has been received. 

When modifying your product, analyze previous KPIs and compare them over time for significant or avoidable changes. So, for instance, if you noticed your NPS is lower, or your app retention rate has decreased, it’s worth further investigating it to get feedback and take action.

Summary

A full product design strategy gives you an advantage in the competitive digital space. Not only should it result in an unmissable new product or a wildly creative update, but it’ll also help you explore your market and those operating within it. 

That being said, it’s worth recognizing that digital product design will only be as good as the tactics and tools you use. To create truly cross-functional teams, it’s essential to create the right communication guidelines and use powerful collaborative tools like UXPin Merge. It will help you achieve full consistency from design to development of the final product. 

Interested in learning more?

With the massive range of smartphones and screen sizes, creating and testing prototypes for mobile apps is a critical part of the design process. UX teams must thoroughly test designs and resolve usability issues before handing the final drafts over to engineering.

Developing an app is a time-consuming and expensive process. It’s much quicker and easier to redesign a prototype than it is to reengineer the final product.

UXPin enables UX designers to create fully functioning prototypes for mobile apps that look and perform like the final product. Sign up for a 14-day free trial and experience superior mobile app prototyping with UXPin.

What is a Mobile App Prototype?

A mobile app prototype demonstrates the functionality and aesthetics of a final product. With so many mobile devices on the market, a product must function effectively on every screen, including smartphones, tablets, and possibly a smartwatch.

These mobile app prototypes enable UX teams to see how design concepts and user flows look and operate on different screen sizes and how users interact with each one.

UX teams create mobile app prototypes throughout the design process—from lo-fi paper models to fully-functioning high-fidelity prototypes.

What is the Purpose of a Mobile App Prototype?

UX teams use mobile app prototypes for three primary purposes:

• Testing & validating ideas
• Usability studies
• Presenting to stakeholders and developers for handoffs

Testing & Validating Ideas

During the early stages of the design process, UX teams experiment with lots of design ideas. It’s an exciting part of the project where UX designers think out of the box, often imagining wild and seemingly impossible designs.

UX teams create low-fidelity mobile app prototypes to test and validate these ideas, often laying hand-draw paper screens in sequence to visualize user flows. 

Usability Studies

Usability studies allow UX teams to test user flows, screen layouts, interactions, accessibility issues, and the overall user experience. This user-centered approach enables designers to create a product that meets the user’s needs.

Presenting to Stakeholders

Mobile app prototypes also make excellent tools for presenting concepts and design ideas to stakeholders. These prototypes can also help startups acquire early-stage funding.

Engineers reference mobile app prototypes from the design handoff to develop the final product.

Using Spec Mode in UXPin lets developers view the project’s color palette, screen size, typography, and other essential data. In addition, developers can inspect each element for its dimensions, CSS, and content.

Types of Mobile App Prototypes

There are two types of mobile app prototypes:

• Low-fidelity prototypes
• High-fidelity prototypes

Low-Fidelity Prototypes

UX teams use low-fidelity mobile app prototypes during the early stages of design. Built using wireframes, the primary objective of these low-fidelity prototypes is to visualize screen layouts, organize information architecture, and simulate user flows.

These lo-fi prototypes come in two forms: low-fidelity paper prototypes and digital low-fidelity prototypes. Both use simple wireframes (usually black and white) with placeholder content.

Paper prototyping is a fast, collaborative process where UX teams turn ideas into working models using just a pen and paper. In some cases, designers will build cardboard mobile devices to simulate scrolling, swiping, and other navigation interactions.

UX designers create digital low-fidelity prototypes using design tools like UXPin. These hi-fi prototypes feature clickable elements so designers can test user flows.

High-Fidelity Prototypes

High-fidelity mobile app prototypes are functioning models of the final product, complete with color, content, animations, and interactions. 

Hi-fi prototypes help UX teams test how users interact with the mobile application. High-fidelity mobile app prototyping plays a critical role in solving usability issues before designers hand off to engineers.

Design teams also use high-fidelity mobile prototypes for presenting designs to stakeholders. With a fully functioning prototype, stakeholders can get a “final-product experience” and provide meaningful feedback.

5 Tips for Mobile App Prototyping

Mobile app prototyping is an exciting part of the design process. Designers get to see their ideas come to life while gathering valuable insights from usability testing.

Here are our 5 tips to improve your mobile app prototyping.

Tip 1 – Test Early, Test Often

Testing is a primary objective for teams creating mobile app prototypes. Without testing, UX teams can’t validate design ideas or expose usability issues. 

UX designers should use paper prototypes to test as many ideas as possible during the design concept stage. Teams must take advantage of the fact that testing with pen and paper is inexpensive. Trying even the craziest ideas ignites creative thinking, which could lead to innovative breakthroughs.

High-fidelity prototyping allows UX teams to optimize mobile applications to meet the user’s needs. Usability studies incur many costs (participants, tools, facilities, etc.), so researchers must set clear goals and objectives while ensuring they test the right participants to achieve meaningful feedback.

Tip 2 – Test Mobile App Prototypes on Multiple Devices

UX teams often make the costly mistake of not testing mobile app prototypes on enough devices or screen sizes. This mistake could result in poor product performance or some features not functioning.

If you’re operating in a competitive market, users might abandon your poor-performing product for the competition!

UXPin allows UX teams to test mobile app prototypes on iOS or Android using our Mirror app. Any changes you make will instantly update the Mirror app—perfect for making changes on the fly during usability studies or during feedback sessions with stakeholders.

Experience mobile app prototyping in UXPin with a 14-day free trial. You can start from scratch or import existing Sketch designs to test your prototypes on multiple devices.

Tip 3 – Use UXPin to Create Better Mobile App Prototypes

The ultimate goal for prototyping is to create a mobile app prototype that looks and functions as close to the final product as possible. Unfortunately, most vector-based design tools lack the capability to achieve this!

UXPin is the most advanced prototyping design tool on the market. UXPin is a code-based tool that lets UX teams design with fully interactive components that devs built through UXPin Merge.

Using fully functioning components, UX teams can create mobile app prototypes that perform like a coded application, thanks to Git and Storybook integrations

Instead of imagining what a feature might do, users and stakeholders can interact with the mobile application through UXPin Mirror as if it was the final product.

Mobile app prototyping in UXPin enables UX teams to get more meaningful feedback and detect usability issues other design tools cannot.

Using React components from a Git repo gives engineers less code to write, accelerating the development process for faster product and feature releases!

Tip 4 – Don’t Get Side-Tracked!

Designing high-fidelity mobile prototypes is a fun process. Designers get to create interactions, transitions, and animations to enhance the user experience.

However, without clear objectives, designers can get side-tracked designing irrelevant features and interactions.

DesignOps sets project goals and KPIs to ensure UX designers focus on designing prototypes that meet the requirements for usability testing— rather than adding redundant “nice-to-have” features that don’t serve the end-user.

Tip 5 – Involve Other Departments

UX teams shouldn’t only reserve testing for end-user participants. Involving team members from other departments is an excellent way to build excitement about a new product or feature within an organization.

Team members from outside of the UX department might provide valuable feedback that designers hadn’t considered. For example, the marketing department might point out that email forms need a first name and email field because personalizing correspondence increases conversions.

Internal prototype testing could provide valuable feedback to improve the product for the company that UX teams might not get from participants.

Final Thoughts on Creating Prototypes for Mobile Apps

Building native mobile applications is a challenging task! Designers and engineers have to consider how products will perform across multiple devices and screen sizes.

Mobile app prototyping enables UX teams to test designs across these devices with diverse participants to catch any usability issues before committing to code.

Creating Mobile App Prototypes with UXPin

Create advanced mobile app prototypes with UXPin that look and function like the final product—something other design tools cannot do!

Here are three powerful UXPin features that UX designers can use to build better prototypes:

• UXPin’s ready-to-use components inspire UX teams with screen layouts, interactions, transitions, animations, and more. These prototypes also enable designers to experience what’s possible when designing in UXPin.
• UXPin comes with several design systems pre-installed. Designers can drag and drop elements from popular design systems like iOS, Material Design, and Bootstrap to build mobile app prototypes fast! You can also create your own design system featuring your brand’s colors, typography, assets, and components.
• Using Variables, designers can store user inputs and take actions based on the provided data inside the prototype—tailoring the user experience as you would in a final product.
• UXPin Merge lets you design using code components from a Git repo or Storybook to create fully functioning high-fidelity mobile app prototypes. Prototyping with Merge provides participants with an accurate representation of the final product allowing researchers to get valuable feedback they can’t get from other design tools.

Try UXPin for Free

Ready to start designing in the UXPin prototyping tool? Get started with a 14-day free trial to experience UXPin’s powerful mobile app prototyping features!

A successful UX project relies heavily on testing to achieve a project’s goals and objectives. Wireframes, mockups, and prototypes allow designers to create blueprints and models of the final product for usability testing.

The problem is that many people use wireframes, mockups, and prototypes interchangeably, when in fact, they’re all different and used at separate stages of the design process.

UXPin is a powerful design tool for UX teams to use, from concept to wireframing, usability testing, and final handover to developers. Sign up for a 14-day free trial to start building better products faster with UXPin!

We will explore wireframes, mockups, and prototypes in the order they appear during the design process.

What are Wireframes?

Wireframes form the initial blueprint of a digital product—website, app, game, or other pieces of software. These illustrations use lines and shapes to outline each screen with annotations to explain functionality.

Designers can create wireframes using a pen and paper (paper wireframes) or a design tool like UXPin (digital wireframes).

UX teams use paper wireframes to develop concepts and ideas before committing time to design cleaner, more refined digital wireframes on the PC.

Whether paper or digital, wireframes are referred to as low-fidelity designs because they’re usually black and white with limited or no functionality.

UX teams rarely share wireframes outside their department because the designs lack fidelity, making it difficult to get meaningful feedback.

Designers use paper and digital wireframes during low-fidelity prototyping—which we cover later in this article.

Paper Wireframes

Paper wireframes are hand-drawn sketches UX designers use to visualize page layouts and ideas—often using a black marker and A4 printer paper.

Paper wireframing is often a collaborative effort where teams get together to share and sketch ideas often with annotations for clarity.

Remote teams might use digital whiteboards to replace physical paper wireframes with apps like Google Jamboard, Miro, or Mural.

The major benefit of paper wireframing is that teams can create tons of design ideas fast in a collaborative environment at a minimal cost. It’s easy to cross something out or grab another piece of paper (or digital whiteboard) and start again.

Digital Wireframes

Digital wireframes appear similar to their paper counterparts using simple lines and shapes. Many designers use their final paper wireframes to reference when creating a digital version in a design tool.

While digital wireframes lack color and features, they start to look like an app or website with buttons, inputs, text areas, and headings. Most designers use boxes (square or rectangle with an X through the middle) and dummy text as content placeholders.

UXPin comes ready with a library of inputs and icons, so designers don’t waste time drawing every wireframe element. You can edit these basic elements and save them as components to quickly copy/paste throughout your design. Sign up for a free trial to create your first digital wireframe with UXPin.

Once UX teams have finalized the information architecture and exhausted testing wireframes, UX designers can begin the next design phase—creating mockups!

What are Mockups?

Mockups are accurate visual representations of a final product, app, or website. These illustrations include color, contrast, content (text/images/video thumbnails), icons, and other design details.

Where wireframes are the blueprints, mockups are the artist’s representation.

Mockups are often referred to as high-fidelity designs because they include features that enable users and stakeholders to visualize the final product.

Unlike wireframes, UX designers can only create mockups digitally using a design tool like UXPin. Even full-color paper wireframes are still low-fidelity designs because they don’t accurately represent the final product.

UX teams often use mockups for presentations to stakeholders or clients because they can explain features and design concepts. Mockups are also useful for certain usability studies but lack functionality, limiting any meaningful testing or feedback.

Many people confuse mockups with prototypes. While mockups might look like the final product, they don’t have any navigation or functionality. It is true, however, that designers use mockups and wireframes to create prototypes.

What are Prototypes

A prototype is “A simulation or sample version of a final product, which UX teams use for testing before launch.”

Designers can create prototypes using a single wireframe or mockup. As soon as you add any functionality to a screen, it becomes a prototype—for example, a click or tap on a hamburger icon to open the navigation menu.

Prototypes come in two forms:

• Low-fidelity prototypes
• High-fidelity prototypes

Low-Fidelity Prototypes

Low-fidelity prototypes use paper or digital wireframes primarily to test user flows. These low-fidelity prototypes also play a crucial part in creating the information architecture for a product or website.

During the concept stage, UX teams will use paper prototypes to test concepts and ideas. Team members will spread paper “screens” out on a desk/floor or pin them to a whiteboard.

Paper prototyping sometimes gets quite adventurous, with team members simulating taps, scrolls, and swipes to visualize how users navigate a product.

Moving from paper to digital low-fidelity prototypes allows UX designers to add basic click/tap interactions to test user flows. Like paper prototypes, digital low-fidelity prototypes use wireframes without color or content.

High-Fidelity Prototypes

Once designers complete a design’s mockups, it’s time to connect all the buttons and links to create a functioning high-fidelity prototype. 

UX designers need high-fidelity prototypes to look and function as close to the final product as possible so they can fix any usability issues before shipping the final draft to engineering.

Most design tools lack the capability to display real data, capture information from inputs, play video/audio content, or complete other actions you can only achieve using code.

High-fidelity prototyping is where UXPin exceeds expectations. With UXPin Merge, UX teams can create prototypes that perform exactly like the final product. 

UXPin Merge allows designers to connect design elements to React components from a Git repository, thus bridging (or merging) the gap between design and code.

When a user clicks a video thumbnail, it plays like it would in the final product!

Using UXPin’s Variables feature, you can capture data from user inputs and take actions based on the provided data inside the prototype. Users can complete a signup form, and UXPin will capture all of that data to present it on a profile page, for example—something other design tools simply cannot do!

When to use Wireframe vs. Mockup vs. Prototype?

Now that we’ve defined wireframes, mockups, and prototypes, it’s time to consider where we might use them in the design process.

It’s important to emphasize that there are no rules for using these design elements in any specific order. It all depends on the project and its team. We’re simply outlining the standard process for most products or websites.

When to Use Wireframes

UX teams typically use wireframes in the early design stages. Once a wireframe becomes a mockup, there’s no reason to go back—unless you’re redesigning the product!

When to Use Mockups

UX designers will create mockups from wireframes in preparation for hi-fi prototyping. UX Teams also use mockups for presenting designs to stakeholders or clients.

When to Use Prototypes

You’ll find prototypes throughout the design process, from conception to final handover. Without prototypes, usability testing wouldn’t exist. UX teams create lo-fi and hi-fi prototypes at every stage to test, get feedback, make changes, and repeat.

Low-fidelity prototypes rarely leave the UX department, while teams regularly use high-fidelity prototypes for testing or presentations to clients and stakeholders. Read our article on how to shift from lo-fi to high-fi. 

Tools Used for Wireframe vs. Mockup vs. Prototype

UX teams use many tools throughout the design process, including designing, messaging, presenting, testing, not taking, and more. For this article, we’ll focus on design-specific tools.

• Paper wireframes use simple stationery items like pens, paper, and post-it notes. Sometimes teams will use cardboard to build a mobile device to hold paper screens.
• For remote collaborations, UX teams use Google Jamboard, Mirro, or Mural to outline concepts and ideas. These tools are also helpful for organizing notes collected from usability studies and stakeholders.
• There are many tools UX designers use to create wireframes, mockups, and prototypes, but most of these produce vector-based designs. UXPin is a full-stack, code-based tool that allows designers to build far superior mockups and prototypes. We’ve put together a comparison for many popular design tools, including Figma, Sketch, and Adobe XD to name a few. You can check these out to see how we (full)-stack up against the competition.
• There are tons of tools for usability studies (we could write a whole article), but here are just a few for remote testing: Lookback, Checkealos, and UsabilityHub.

Summary

Hopefully, this article has given you a better understanding of the differences between wireframes, mockups, and prototypes and where to use them in the design process.

Here is the TL;DR version:

• Wireframes use simple lines, shapes, and annotations to create screen layouts. UX teams use these low-fidelity designs in the early stages of the design process.
• Mockups are high-fidelity designs that look like the final product but without any functionality. 
• Prototypes are simulations of a final product used throughout the design process for usability testing. Low-fidelity prototypes use wireframes to test user flows and information architecture, while high-fidelity prototypes use mockups to test interactions, animations, transitions, and user interactions.

Getting Started with UXPin

UXPin provides designers with advanced tools and functionality to build better wireframes, mockups, and prototypes.

• Use ready-made forms, buttons, icons, and more to create wireframes fast.
• Build reusable high-fidelity components to create mockups of your final design.
• Lastly, use UXPin Merge to connect React components to design elements for fully functioning high-fidelity prototypes for accurate usability testing and meaningful feedback from participants and stakeholders.

Ready to get started with UXPin? Sign up for a free 14-day trial and explore the capability of a full-stack design tool.

Prototyping is an essential part of the UX design process. Prototypes allow designers to test design ideas and user flows before committing to the final product.

Prototypes help validate what works but also expose missing elements and features. Without the prototyping phase, companies would waste precious resources iterating over the final product. 

Low-fidelity prototypes allow teams to test information architecture and user flows, while high-fidelity prototypes introduce UI elements and how the user might interact with the final design.

In this article, we will explore low-fidelity and high-fidelity prototypes—which to use and when?

UXPin is a collaborative design tool allowing teams to create low-fidelity and high-fidelity prototypes to test at every stage of the design process. Sign up for a 14-day free trial today and start designing better products with UXPin.

Build advanced prototypes

Design better products with States, Variables, Auto Layout and more.

Try UXPin

What is a Prototype?

Before we begin, it’s important to define a prototype. Many people confuse prototypes with static wireframes and mockups. 

Prototypes use wireframes and mockups with clickable elements to simulate interactions and user flows.

UX teams might even create low-fidelity paper prototypes in the early design stages to demonstrate how a user might navigate through a product.

Low-Fidelity Prototyping

Whether UX designers use paper or digital wireframes, low-fidelity prototyping is the first step in testing design ideas and user flows.

Low-fidelity prototypes are either hand-drawn or basic digital wireframes without color or content. These low-tech designs allow UX teams to visualize each screen’s layout, test navigation, and experience user flows.

A great example of a digital low-fidelity prototype is a typical eCommerce checkout flow. After creating a wireframe or low-fidelity mockup, UX designers will use buttons or links to connect each screen and create a checkout flow.

The checkout flow might look something like this: 

home page > product page > cart > payment/checkout > confirmation > thank you.

Using a low-fidelity prototype, UX designers can experience the checkout flow—ensuring each screen has the correct elements and the user can navigate forwards and backward throughout the flow.

Types of Low-Fidelity Prototypes

• Paper prototypes are the fastest way for teams to create user flows and imagine interactions. Paper prototyping is particularly beneficial during design sprints when teams have limited time to develop flows and iterations. With paper “screens” laid out on the desk or whiteboard, teams can visualize flows together, allowing effective collaboration and idea-sharing. None of the elements are clickable, but paper prototypes enable teams to design screen layouts and flows, reducing the time needed to create initial digital wireframes. 
• Clickable wireframes are a low-fidelity digital representation of how screens and flows. Each frame will usually have simple lines and shapes with a prominent CTA for navigation. Modern UX tools like UXPin enable teams to collaborate effectively with comments, replicating the energy and excitement of a paper prototyping session.

Pros of Low-Fidelity Prototyping

• Designers can make low-fidelity prototypes fast! This speed allows designers to make quick changes during testing or meetings to visualize fresh ideas.
• Low-fidelity prototypes are time efficient – inexpensive, which means teams can test multiple variations and iterations at a low cost.
• Anyone can create low-fidelity prototypes because they only use simple lines and shapes—even non-design team members can provide valuable input.

Cons of Low-Fidelity Prototypes

• Due to the basic layout and functionality, low-fidelity prototypes don’t provide accurate results during testing. Stakeholders might also battle to visualize the final product resulting in poor feedback or confusion.
• Without color, interactions, transitions, or animations, low-fidelity prototypes can feel dull and underwhelming.

High-Fidelity Prototyping

High-fidelity prototyping is where a product begins to take shape. Using mockups with color and content, designers can create hi-fi prototypes that look and function as close to the final product as possible.

Now designers can add interactions, transitions, and animations to create an immersive user experience—making high-fidelity prototypes perfect for usability studies and presenting to stakeholders.

If we go back to our eCommerce example, designers can include product images and colored CTAs to entice users down a particular flow—like completing a checkout. 

UX designers can also add interactions, like an overlay showing the user’s cart when adding a new item. They might also add screen transitions to indicate a user’s movement through the checkout flow.

Types of High-Fidelity Prototypes

• A high-fidelity prototype using mockups gives users an accurate sense of how a product will look and function. The designs will include color and content, while every link and button should work as it would in the final product.
• A high-fidelity prototype using code takes prototyping one step further. For example, with UXPin Merge, designers can use React  or Storybook components to create prototypes that function exactly like the final product. Research teams using prototypes from UXPin Merge get better results from usability studies and testing and cut down time to market.

Pros of High-Fidelity Prototyping

• High-fidelity prototypes provide meaningful feedback during usability studies because participants can interact with the prototype like they would the final product.
• UX designers can test interactions, animations, and transitions.
• Hi-fi prototypes provide stakeholders with an accurate representation of the final product. These prototypes could help startups get early-stage funding or pitch product concepts to clients.

Cons of High-Fidelity Prototypes

• UX designers must spend more time making changes with greater detail, so high-fidelity prototypes cost more to produce.
• Without clear objectives, UX designers can get distracted trying to find the “perfect” interactions, animations, or transitions while creating high-fidelity prototypes. This fixation could lead to unnecessary delays.

Which Prototype to Use and When?

Now that you have a solid foundation of high-fidelity vs. low-fidelity prototyping, we can begin to explore which you would use and when.

When to Use Low-Fidelity Prototypes

Low-fidelity prototypes are best for the early stages of the design process. UX teams can use paper prototypes before they even sit down at the PC. These low-tech paper designs are also great for collaboration and exploring lots of ideas at speed—perfect for design sprints!

Digital low-fidelity prototypes help UX teams organize information architecture and user flows before committing to mockups.

When NOT to Use Low-Fidelity Prototypes

Unless you’re testing basic user flows, low-fidelity prototypes do not provide meaningful feedback during usability studies. Users might get distracted by the unfamiliarity of the product and thus focus on the wrong elements.

When to Use High-Fidelity Prototypes

UX teams should only move from lo-fi to hi-fi prototyping once designers have completed mockups to complete at least one user flow for testing. 

These mockups must include clickable links and elements, color, and content—but might not require interactions, animations, and transitions for the first round of usability studies.

High-fidelity prototypes are helpful for testing layouts and how page transitions or scrolling might affect content and elements. UX designers can also test how interactions, animations, and transitions affect the user experience.

High-fidelity prototypes should be the last stage of the design process before handing over to engineering.

When NOT to Use High-Fidelity Prototypes

UX designers must not build high-fidelity prototypes before researchers have thoroughly tested lo-fi prototypes and created mockups with content, and color.

If teams want to test design concepts fast, creating and editing high-fidelity prototypes will severely hamper progress.

UXPin – The Best Prototyping Tool

UXPin provides design teams with powerful tools for prototyping at every stage of the design process.

Teams can preview prototypes in the browser or scan a QR code to preview prototypes on any mobile device using UXPin Mirror—great for getting feedback from usability participants and stakeholders using multiple devices.

Lo-Fi Prototyping in UXPin

UX designers can design beautiful wireframes quickly with UXPin’s pre-built form fields and icons—create buttons, input fields, dropdowns, radios, checkboxes, icons, and more with just a few clicks.

With your wireframes complete, you can create basic lo-fi navigation between pages with tap/click interactions. Achieve vertical or horizontal scrolling with a single click.

With your lo-fi prototypes complete, you can preview your design in the browser or test on any device using UXPin Mirror.

Provide feedback and assign changes to designers using UXPin’s comments feature. Designers can create private notes for themselves and click resolve once complete.

Hi-Fi Prototyping in UXPin

With lo-fi prototyping complete, UX teams can begin high-fidelity prototyping in UXPin.

If you have ever worked with Figma, Adobe XD, and other popular design tools, then you’ll LOVE the added functionality UXPin provides—enabling you to take your high-fidelity prototyping to the next level and beyond!

Create reusable components to maintain consistency and build page layouts fast! If you need to make changes, simply edit the master, and the changes copy to all child components.

UXPin’s variables feature allows you to store data from user inputs and take actions based on the data provided. For example, on a signup page, the user enters their name. On the next page, you can use the name (let’s say John) to personalize the experience—Welcome to UXPin, John!

You might also want to store dummy credit card details so users can get a clearer sense of how the product will capture and display credit card information at checkout.

Start Prototyping with UXPin Today

Sign up for a 14-day free trial and experience the endless possibilities of prototyping with UXPin.

Of all the frameworks out there, React may be the best choice for beginners. React can do what other frameworks can, but it doesn’t obscure your code. It is easy to learn and equally easy to master, as opposed to some other frameworks which can sometimes be difficult to understand.

Take UI components directly from Git repo, Storybook, or through NPM and drag n’ drop the coded components to create your layout faster. Discover UXPin Merge.

Design UI with code-backed components.

Use the same components in design as in development. Keep UI consistency at scale.

Try UXPin Merge

What makes a React open-source project good?

Choose a project that will keep your needs fulfilled. Avoid picking an open source project that’s too uncomplicated to change or debug. Find a project that you think will look appealing and useful to others.

Best Practices In The Industry

Open source projects can serve as guidance in front-end development and UX design to new and seasoned developers, especially when working with React is a big advantage in a startup environment that is working on cross-platform app development projects that requires an all-around when it comes to both front and backend dev.

Improve Your Skills

Sharing your knowledge, experience, and code with others (while they share the same in return) can prove quite a unique and effective method of learning new things.

Networking And Self Promoting

Being a part of an active open source community is also often a great way to polish your skills! Taking opportunities to get acquainted with other open source developers can help you build and establish a reputation for yourself within your targeted field.

How To Choose Worthwhile React Open Source Project

Choosing the right project can be tough if you don’t know where to start looking. However, to be certain of selecting an appropriate open-source project in the React ecosystem, keep these things in mind:

Active Community

It turns out that it is crucial to discuss the project with someone if a difficult problem appears that needs resolving.

Project Popularity (think GitHub)

If there’s a lively community of contributors working on open-source React projects. You can be sure that the project has grown in popularity and there will be thorough documentation to help you out along with plenty of help from other contributors.

Organized Documentation

The last piece of the puzzle to look for in an open-source React project should be clear and concise documentation so you can read up on any issues with a specific codebase or library.

Best React Projects for Beginners

It is crucial to learn the basics before diving into more complicated projects. Before you learn the fundamentals of how to build a site, it’s best to have a good understanding of the tools you will be using.

React Bootstrap

React Bootstrap is available for free and it’s a powerful tool for building production-ready apps. If you’re looking for best practices for building the front-end framework for your project, check out React Bootstrap! It’s a great starting point for anyone looking to add interactivity and responsiveness to their app.

React Bootstrap gives you the freedom to choose how you want to build your app. You have the option of using the framework by itself or using it as a starting point for future integrations. Whether you’re looking for inspiration or you need a new tool to work with, React Bootstrap is a great option.

User Interface React Select

The team behind React.js has made a UI experiment for select inputs. See how it works and learn how to develop your own version. When it comes to making an application, it’s important to have a good user interface(UI). 

Re-select is a library that allows people to select options from a list. This is a great tool for people who are building websites or web applications. It has many different features that make it easy for developers to create a rich user interface. The best part is, it’s open-source and available for free on Github.

Storybook

Storybook is an open-source tool that allows you to develop UI components in isolation. One of the many benefits of this tool is that it doesn’t require a lot of overhead since it runs outside of your app and on a separate page. This helps you focus solely on the development process without worrying about application-specific dependencies.

Storybook creates test-driven projects by keeping track of different states or variations and helping product developers visually implement changes in each example without starting from scratch every time based on the end goal or specifications they must abide by.

Learn more from those resources:

• Storybook Tutorials
• What are Storybook Args?
• Storybook Design System
• Storybook Frameworks

4. Draft.js

Draft.js is a library you can use to create a new open-source project. It’s used for writing markdown and transforming it into a wide range of formats.

You can take what you’ve written, and export it to a website, PDF, ePub, or a blog post. It’s used for web and mobile development and is easily customizable with a vast library of plugins and components. It’s maintained by a small group of developers, and the community is very active in creating new plugins.

Try Open-Source React Project

Getting started with React.js can be overwhelming at first. And so, if you’re just starting out with coding, we highly recommend looking into open source projects on GitHub.com as a way to dip your toes in UI development and UX design or get adept at iOS web apps, and maybe even tackle full-stack dev.

You can learn a lot by working on a project that’s already been developed by other people & take your web development skills to the Next.js level (pun intended). Want to include your React components in the design process? Discover UXPin Merge.

Good website design must accomplish many functions—it’s an advertisement, but it’s also a tool. A website sells products and services, but it’s also a tool to acquire customers and educate users.

All of these examples provide a service to the user, so a good website starts with a user-centered design.

UXPin is a powerful collaborative design tool for web designers to create beautiful websites. Get a 14-day free trial and start designing better websites with UXPin today!

What is Good Website Design?

Good web design starts with two questions, “what is this website for?” and “who is this website for?”

Understanding the who and the what will enable you to design a website that best serves the user.

For a website to stand out, designers must use creativity but not at the expense of usability and utility. There’s a fine line between form and function. You want to impress visitors, but your web design must allow users to navigate to their end goal easily.

How Good Website Design Delivers Results

Good web design must perform across multiple metrics, including conversion rates (sales, email signups, etc.) and SEO.

And, to make things even more challenging, you have 15 seconds to grab the user’s attention and steer them towards a conversion. According to Crazy Egg, an industry-leading analytics tool, 15 seconds is the average time spent on a website.

Whether you’ve invested in content (SEO) or paid ads, you must ensure you optimize your web design for conversions. You must grab the user’s attention immediately and provide directions to solve their problem fast. And, you gotta look good doing it!

Designers must also consider responsive design and how a website will look and perform across multiple devices and screen sizes. 

10 Best Website Designs for 2021

We scoured the internet to find our 10 best website designs for 2021. We looked at how designers used visual assets, color palettes, and typography to deliver a strong user experience while exercising creativity and maintaining brand identity. 

We also considered each website’s call to actions (CTAs) and how the web design might inspire users to take action.

Fipadoc – France

Fipadoc is an international film festival in Biarritz, France. The website features a unique design with extra-large sans-serif headings to draw the user’s attention to take action.

Designers use smaller sans-serif typography for less important CTAs, but use a small rectangle to the right of the text to indicate a link. There are no buttons on the Fipadoc website, providing a clean aesthetic while elegant animations enhance the user experience.

The Fipadoc website features a black and white color palette with full-color images and video to create an engaging and immersive user experience—the perfect web design for a documentary website!

Spotify Design – Sweden

The Spotify Design website is an absolute gem to explore if you’re into art and pop culture! The vibrant colors and abstract shapes create excitement and intrigue that’s irresistible to explore.

The Spotify Design website is a window into Shopify’s global design team and how they create the streaming platform’s visuals and user interfaces.

The web design is clean with bold san-serif typography and large headings for CTAs. Spotify Design uses animations when loading a page or highlighting CTAs, like the eye-catching footer email signup. Every element and animation has a clear intent serving to guide the user through the website.

Slate Milk – United States

Slate Milk is a lactose-free, protein-rich chocolate milk brand. Their e-commerce website is a wonderful example of on-brand web design. 

Designers have captured Slate Milk’s brand image perfectly with color, custom animated icons, and bold typography. The website uses animations intelligently to draw the user’s attention to the product’s benefits.

Slate Milk’s product pages closely resemble the product itself, elevating the brand and making the website appear more professional. This professional aesthetic also helps establish trust with the user, which ultimately benefits conversion rates.

HALEYS – United States

HALEYS is a female-founded cruelty-free beauty brand from the United States. The website’s home page has an immersive scrolling effect taking the user on a journey through the brand and the product. Designers use a clever hero image where the model’s eyes steer the user to the “Shop Now” CTA.

The website’s color palette features earth tones to complement the brand’s cruelty-free, wholesome image. An elegant, custom icon set helps strengthen this brand image. The typography matches the product beautifully—a bold san-serif font with serif accents for product names.

HALEYS also does a fantastic job of using high-quality products and lifestyle images. Using a diverse mix of models, HALEYS demonstrates that the brand is fully inclusive with a product for every skin tone.

Wisr – Australia

Wisr is an Australian financial service company. In a highly competitive market, Wisr has intelligently used web design to separate itself from the competition.

The Wisr home page is one of the most innovative website designs we’ve seen, where users follow an animation as they scroll down, reading snippets of the company’s product offerings with relevant CTAs. It’s a truly immersive experience that instantly envokes interest and trust in the brand.

Even though Wisr uses several vibrant colors, the navy blue CTAs always stand out. The menu’s full-screen overlay allows the user to focus on the navigation and find precisely what they’re looking for. A light san-serif typeface helps deliver clear messaging and instructions to the user.

The unique page transitions and interesting scrolling effects provide interest and excitement, something you wouldn’t usually say about personal finance!

Krave Jerky – United States

Krave Jerky‘s website design captures the brand’s fun, energetic spirit wonderfully. The bright colors and prominent CTA’s help steer users toward checkout in an entertaining, interactive flow.

The large plus icons and vibrant hover effects for products on the shop page encourage users to add multiple mouth-watering flavors to the cart. The bright colors complement each product’s packaging, strengthening the brand experience.

Most of the website features a san-serif font with a custom typeface for product names or brand name. Custom bulky icons help give the web design professionalism and originality.

Singita – South Africa

Singita is a luxury resort group dedicated to “sustainability, environmentally conscious hospitality and the empowerment of local communities.”

The website’s earthy color palette and a mix of light san-serif for the copy with elegant serif headings complement the brand’s image. The home page features a soft scroll effect with HD images and video to tell the brand’s story and what guests can expect from a Singita African safari experience.

The website uses an off-white background with dark text using the brand’s light brown color for CTAs. As you scroll, a booking form appears, encouraging the user to explore and book one of Singita’s many African safari destinations.

Everything about the Singita website design exudes premium luxury, which closely aligns with the brand’s high-quality visuals and exquisitely furnished properties.

Au Club Alpin – Switzerland

Au Club Alpin is a Swiss resort with stunning Alpine scenery and luxury heavy wood accommodations. Designers have done a fantastic job capturing the resort’s atmosphere above the fold with short video clips and a prominent call to action to book a stay.

The Au Club Alpin web design uses black and white with slate grey accents, mimicking the resort’s minimalist luxury aesthetic. At the same time, custom icons enclosed in large boxes showcase Au Club Alpin’s activities and facilities.

The website uses beautiful pictures and videos with a vintage filter to support the brand’s rugged luxury aesthetic.

Superlist – United Kingdom

Superlist is a UK productivity startup “building the productivity tool of the future.” The futuristic loading sequence and website design with mouse tracking effects and scrolling animations help confirm the brand’s innovation statement.

The website features a blend of black-on-white and white-on-black with orange accents to attract users to important information and CTAs. Superlist’s minimalist sans-serif typeface complements the brand while delivering a clean, professional aesthetic.

Sneak in Peace – United Kingdom

Sneak in Peace is a premium sneaker merchant in the United Kingdom where customers can find the latest (and unreleased) sneakers. 

The clean and elegant home page shows a featured product with an attractive video sequence above the fold along with CTAs to men’s and woman’s sneakers. A sleek serif typeface establishes Sneak in Peace as a premium sneaker brand.

Immediately below are more featured collections, including “Upcoming Launches” to get the user shopping as quickly as possible. 

The clean layout and original product photography help establish Sneak in Peace as a premium, trustworthy brand. Clicking on any product opens a slide-in with the product’s details and more images. 

Sneak in Peace uses a black and white website design with the only color coming from the high-quality product images—effectively drawing the customer’s attention to the website’s premium offerings.

Final Thoughts on Good Website Design

We hope this article provided some fresh ideas for good website design. With multiple pre-installed canvas sizes, UXPin makes it easy to design beautiful, fully responsive websites.

UXPin also allows designers to set up Key Press, Scroll, Page Load, and many more interactions to visualize how the final website will perform.

Take your website design to the next level with UXPin—get a 14-day free trial and start designing better websites today!