automation-software

Over the last couple of years, we’ve continued to invest heavily in our platform to enable our customers to be more successful.

Since Webflow’s last pricing update in September 2022, we’ve shipped new features such as Localization, variables, page templates, and much more. Additionally, our recent acquisition of Intellimize marks a significant milestone in our efforts to expand the ways Webflow can empower teams to create and optimize website experiences.

As we’ve built more power into our platform, the way our customers use Webflow has also evolved. Today, we’re rolling out updates to our Site & Workspace plans to more accurately reflect what you need from the platform. These changes will give you access to more of Webflow’s advanced functionality, transparency into your site’s usage metrics, and more flexible ways to scale.

More advanced Webflow capabilities on plans

Over the last couple of months, we’ve increased custom code limits to 50,000 characters for all paid Site and Workspace plans, made HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) available on all sites for enhanced security, and given you the ability to convert your CMS images into WebP files across all Collections on your Webflow sites to help reduce bandwidth usage. 

For our Starter & CMS plan* customers, we’ve heard your feedback that our CMS limits have been too low. So, we’re increasing them to 60 Fields per Collection and 10 References per Collection for Starter & CMS plans*. This means more flexibility and improved management as you continue to scale your CMS in Webflow.

In addition, our Business plan* customers can now build bigger, more complex sites with the static page limit doubling from 150 to 300 for Business plans*. This means you can expand your content offerings, allow your teams to move quicker and continue to scale your business on Webflow.

Finally, later this summer, Growth & Agency plan customers will get access to a shareable Library of components and variables so that they can ensure brand consistency at scale across all of the sites in their Workspace.

Access to a usage dashboard for more transparency

We’ve also heard your feedback that our tools lacked visibility into your usage. It wasn’t clear when you were nearing your limits and you didn’t know what that would mean for your account.

To solve this and to provide transparency for all customers across all plans, we’re introducing a usage dashboard which gives you insights into your current bandwidth limits. 

Updated plan limits and added flexibility, especially for Business plan customers

Since over 96% of customers comfortably operate within the new, lowered bandwidth limits, this change will not impact the majority of customers.

We are removing limits for site visitors on all our Site plans at this time, making it easier for you to reach a broader audience without worrying about constraints. We’ve also decided to bring our bandwidth limits more in line with the market and as a result, we’re decreasing bandwidth limits for Basic, CMS, and Business Site plans.*

For the small number of customers that may be nearing their limits, we’ll be providing surge protection to give you additional confidence in your pricing. This will protect you from potentially incurring additional charges during temporary high bandwidth months.

To help create flexibility for Business plan* customers, we are also releasing two new add-ons for more bandwidth or CMS items. This provides Business plan* customers with more incremental options to grow with Webflow as their business scales. 

Building a better Webflow for our customers 

You’re bringing your most valuable asset — your website — to Webflow. We aim to be a platform that grows with you and your business, so we’ve added more power, transparency, and flexibility through additional add-ons and improved tiering of limits.

Later this year, we plan to reexamine and simplify the way seats and roles in Webflow map to your needs. We want to make it more straightforward to bring your entire team into Webflow to collaborate and scale with your business. 

This is especially important as we continue to release new collaboration features like edit mode and comments, and launch upcoming improvements that streamline design approvals and the ability to create landing pages in a drag-and-drop environment. We’re committed to continuously looking for ways to improve our pricing and packaging to ensure we are providing long-term scalable solutions for you.

*This only applies to Site plans that you purchase, upgrade, or downgrade — as well as sites that you transfer or that exceed limits — on or after July 15, 2024.

Sometimes, great ideas are hidden in plain sight. Take the alphabet, for example. With just 26 letters and a little punctuation, we can create countless words, sentences, and stories. The magic lies in its versatility — letters can be arranged in endless ways to express any idea or emotion. New words, like “generative AI” or “barbiecore,” are constantly added to the dictionary, but the alphabet remains unchanged. 

Imagine if we were restricted to using only a fixed set of words and could not adapt or add new words to the dictionary. Communication would be stifled, and creativity would grind to a halt. Unfortunately, this restrictive approach is how traditional UI design has operated for years. These systems often rely on a single source of truth for design decisions, which means a centralized, unchangeable repository for approved design elements that restricts flexibility and innovation.

Early in the development of a design system, many designers optimize for efficiency and consistency. However, as websites grow and new requests come in from marketing, the need for more composability to fit modern workflows becomes increasingly important. Like the alphabet, your design processes require composability. At Webflow, we approach design systems differently, embracing a fluid and dynamic methodology to meet the diverse demands of your design teams and ensure success in today’s fast-paced environment.

Design systems are not one-size-fits-all

What is a design system?

Figma defines a design system this way: At its core, a design system is a set of building blocks and standards that help keep the look and feel of products and experiences consistent. Think of it as a blueprint, offering a unified language and structured framework that guides teams through the complex process of creating digital products. A design system can assist in reducing the amount of time spent recreating elements and patterns while designing and building products and interfaces at scale.

A common goal for many designers looking to deliver greater consistency is to establish a rigid source of truth approach to provide a central repository where all design elements are stored. In theory, having one unchanging source for all design decisions would be a good way to control for any inconsistencies.

In reality, the assumption that a single design repository, or a one-size-fits-all design system, can meet the needs of all teams needs to be revisited, especially in larger organizations. Different teams, even those within the same marketing department, often require bespoke designs to address their specific goals and audiences. The rigidity of a typical design system can lead to inefficiencies, delays, and bottlenecks when changes require central approval.

Over indexing on consistency can result in creative and process constraints as teams wait for approval to make necessary changes. Ironically, the quest for consistency often leads to inefficiencies, transforming design systems into a bottleneck of “brand policing” that stifles innovation.

Importance of composability

It’s possible to maintain consistency while empowering colleagues and clients to create within clear guardrails. In modern design workflows, composability is essential. Different teams have unique needs, and no single solution fits all, especially with creative work. By incorporating composability into design systems, designs can maintain a unified language yet remain flexible enough to adapt to various situations. A composable approach not only prevents the system from becoming bloated but also reduces dependency on centralized approval processes, enabling quicker and more autonomous decision-making.

Today, marketing teams must act quickly, and websites that can adapt are becoming increasingly essential. According to Webflow’s annual survey of 500 marketing leaders across the US and Canada, “the need for marketing innovation is undeniable. Although 93% of marketing leaders recognize the critical need for innovation, a significant 61% of respondents say they struggle to manage their teams’ current workloads.”

Component slots are flexible placeholders within components that allow for customization while maintaining the overall structure and design framework. They provide a controlled environment where designers can adjust components to meet specific needs without disrupting the integrity of the design system. 

Originally introduced in the Web Component specification, slots have now been seamlessly integrated into Webflow’s components. This enhancement aligns Webflow’s capabilities more closely with established development standards.

Key benefits of Webflow’s component slots include: 

• Flexibility without sacrificing consistency
• Modular composability 
• Enhanced component reusability
• Fewer one-off or single use components
• Reduced dependency on unlinking components

Balancing flexibility with consistency 

Currently, Webflow allows for customization of components through properties, which can control elements like text, images, and buttons. However, this method can be limiting when more complex or varied changes are needed across different instances of the component.

Component slots introduce a more advanced level of customization as they allow entire components—such as images, videos, or forms—to be inserted right next to essential elements like headlines and subtitles. For instance, if you had a CTA section component that could feature either an image, a video, or a form alongside the headline and subtitle, traditionally, you would manage this through numerous props controlling the visibility of each variant, which can be a complex and cumbersome setup.

With slots, you can directly drop an image, video, or form component into the designated slot without needing additional props. You can reuse components more effectively and adapt them as needed, aligning with the evolving design and content needs of your campaigns or projects.

Composability means reusability and adaptability

Component slots simplify the reuse of components across large-scale websites, ensuring consistency while allowing for necessary adjustments. Traditionally, you might need separate card-style components for different content types—like a news card and a product card. With component slots, you use a universal card component with customizable slots. For example:

• Before: Separate components for each card type (e.g., news card, product card).
• After: One card component with slots that adapt to different content types, such as images or text, reducing the need to manage multiple similar components and maintaining a cohesive design across the site.

This approach saves time and enhances the adaptability of your designs, making your design system more efficient and scalable.

Building a composable with component slots

Integrating component slots into existing design systems greatly enhances the range of possible design outcomes. Rigid systems often struggle with frequent incremental updates, such as adjustments to column layouts. Component slots provide a solution by offering a flexible framework that supports various configurations within a single component, making updates easier and more efficient.

Incorporating flexible placeholders drastically cleans up design systems, enabling teams to achieve more with fewer components. Experienced content designers can create rich web pages without directly modifying HTML structures or CSS styles.

For instance, Marius Jurtz, Web Design Lead at Mural, said,

“Introducing slots drastically cleans up our design system. We need fewer components to achieve more. Slots also enable our experienced content designers to create rich web pages without touching the HTML structure in the navigator or styling CSS in the Styles panel.“

Similarly, Alessia Sannazzaro from Code and Wander highlights how slots have transformed their approach to structuring builds, 

“Slots completely changed the way we structure builds. It allows us to mix and match components to create new pages and layouts without creating new components. It allows for the flexibility of new variations while staying on brand and following design systems.”

Embracing composability: the key to future-proofing your design system

Adopting a lean design system flexible enough to encourage creativity and growth at the implementation level is a recipe for innovation. It might seem counterintuitive, but having fewer components is suitable over the bloated and rigid design systems many designers use to maintain absolute control and consistency.

Each organization can define the level of flexibility needed to suit their teams, ensuring the design system remains functional and adaptable. Whether a team needs a flexible eight-column layout or a more straightforward four-column structure, these adaptable elements provide the necessary versatility without requiring new components for every variation.

To learn more about how these flexible elements can be integrated into your projects at Webflow, visit Webflow University.

Content is paramount in digital marketing, where search engine optimization (SEO) and keywords determine crucial performance metrics like organic traffic and conversions. Marketing teams often try to cover a broad range of topics to boost these metrics, but casting too wide of a net can lead to significant gaps in your content offering.

A content gap analysis helps you discover opportunities for improving your content strategy. You can use information like topics and content types you’re missing to expand your organic search footprint and increase SEO traffic

Content gap analysis and its uses

A content gap analysis is an audit of your current content inventory for any missed opportunities or underperforming areas. Typically, you’ll perform a gap analysis using an SEO tool, like Ahrefs or Semrush. These SEO tools compare your keyword search rankings against competitors’ to find keywords and content ideas they cover that you don’t. Through this process, you discover what to inject into your content strategy to create high-ranking pages.

Content gap analyses are useful for any company with a content marketing strategy. Whether you are a scaling startup or established Saas company, read on to learn how you can benefit from identifying and rectifying gaps in your content. 

The benefits of conducting a content gap analysis

Understanding content trends helps marketers stay on top of changes in the ever-evolving SEO landscape, like trending topics and keywords. When well executed, a gap analysis results in the following benefits.

Increased organic traffic

To analyze content gaps, start by looking at your competitors’ content inventory. Note what works and what doesn’t, and apply these lessons to your strategy. For example, competitors might use certain keywords more often or cover niche topics you don’t. If you can use that same strategy more effectively, you can outrank them in search results to increase your organic traffic and click-through rates (CTRs).

Better conversion rates

If potential customers find your content offering too thin on a subject they’re exploring, they might bounce to a site with a more robust offering. Filling in the gaps in your content strategy ensures you’re meeting customers’ needs, and every new page they open gives you another chance to convert them into paying customers.

Tailored messaging for different segments

As you fine-tune your content plan to incorporate new keywords and topics, you’ll discover niche subtopics to cover. For example, if you’re marketing a project management platform, your content is probably centered around keywords like “task tracker” or “project management software.” Performing a content gap analysis could highlight more granular keywords like “Agile,” “Gantt charts,” and “Kanban boards.” You can lean into these subtopics to target specific audiences, like project managers and team leads.

Content repurposing opportunities

If your site has underperforming content, you can refocus it on a different keyword or search intent. Because these projects involve editing rather than creating content, they’re faster and can be done in larger quantities.

Data-driven decision-making

A content gap analysis examines search volume, organic traffic, and search intent to amass a database of promising keywords. Analysis tools like Ahrefs can even measure each keyword’s success rate. These valuable insights are integral to making data-driven decisions about your SEO strategy. They clearly define which topics have the best chance of success and their expected search volume.

How to do a content gap analysis: 6 steps

The gap analysis process involves assessing your content portfolio and developing a data-driven strategy to improve it. Here’s a six-step process for performing a content gap analysis and acting on the results.

1. Perform a content audit

A content audit involves creating a database or spreadsheet that outlines your current content offering and search rankings. Here’s how to compile one:

• List every content piece you have, including blog articles, landing pages, and support articles. Note the search queries each piece targets. 
• Categorize every content piece by topic for streamlined organization. 
• Run a search to determine each page’s ranking for relevant search queries. Paid SEO tools like Ahrefs and Semrush can do this for you, or you can use Google Search Console for free.
• Analyze each content piece’s general performance with a tool like Google Analytics, looking at key metrics like organic traffic, bounce rates, and engagement levels.
• Sort content within each topic according to its search ranking and other performance metrics, identifying under-performing pieces.

2. Identify target keywords

Use tools like Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs, or Semrush to find keyword gaps you ought to be ranking for based on your industry and audience. Prioritize researching long-tail keywords (longer and more detailed search queries), as these are often easier to rank for since they’re more specific. 

Take the keywords from your under-performing pieces and add these new untapped queries to this list.

3. Research your competitor’s content

Investigate your competitors’ content using tools like BuzzSumo to understand why certain pieces outperform yours. Here are a few crucial steps to take:

• Compare your low-performing content to competitors’ similar pieces, considering the quality, structure, depth, and keyword use to better understand why their content outranks yours.
• Use SEO and other website traffic tools to see which keywords and subtopics your competitors cover so you can better understand how their strategy differs from yours. 
• Note any content areas competitors don’t cover that you do (or could). Filling a neglected gap is a great way to win a high SERP ranking.

4. Check the SERP and research the audience

At this stage, you should have a list of underperforming keywords and a better understanding of why the content correlating with these keywords isn’t performing as well as competitors’. 

Now, input each keyword into Google and scour search results for new topic ideas. If you find a topic that’s ranking well that you could cover better (or write about for the first time), click on it and research the audience likely reading this material. Here are a few questions to consider:

• What age range might frequent this publication?
• What psychographics might be apparent in this audience?
• What problem does the reader hope to solve by reading this material?
• What’s the audience’s intent when searching for this query and clicking on this result?

5. Craft a strategy

You now have a list of underperforming keywords mapped to content you could optimize, as well as keywords you’re not targeting yet. These keywords have also led you to a list of new topics and a better understanding of the right audience for them.

Shape a content optimization strategy around this list of keywords. For each one, decide whether you’ll create new pages, write new content into existing pages, or make subtle copy edits to incorporate them into existing content. Then, prioritize each step so you’re handling the most impactful changes first. Review the best practices section below for guidance on how to decide.

6. Produce content

Begin creating and updating content based on your strategy:

• Create new content. Write articles that fill identified gaps, ensuring they’re well-researched and address the target reader’s needs. 
• Optimize existing content. Update old content to improve SEO, adding new keywords and enhancing readability with tools like Grammarly and Hemmingway. 
• Use SEO tools. Before publishing, analyze your content with tools like Semrush’s SEO Content Checker to maximize each piece’s potential. 
• Track progress. Publish new pieces and monitor their relevant search queries. After a few months, conduct another audit to assess improvements and refine your strategy as needed.

Best practices for conducting an advanced content gap analysis

Your content gap analysis will likely become a treasure trove of data. It might seem overwhelming initially, but try these best practices for an efficient approach.

Research many competitors

When researching possible content gaps, check different competitors to see what they’re doing. Don’t just analyze your biggest, direct competitors — smaller competitors in adjacent industries are probably trying to fill their own gaps so they can compete, too. Find out what they’re doing to ensure you’re casting a wide net and learning as much as possible early in the process.

Focus on audience intent

Search intent is a primary factor in determining search engine marketing scores and search rankings. It’s defined by operative keywords that indicate users’ goals when they search. Aligning your portfolio with these keywords can significantly impact your SEO, especially if you focus your cornerstone content on them. Here are a few examples:

• Buy. Create content that points users to where they can make purchases or recommends which products they should buy.
• Increase/Improve. Write lists of best practices and tips that help readers understand how to improve something they already have.
• How to. Publish guides that use the phrase “How to” in headings and subheadings and outline step-by-step processes to teach readers how to perform a task.

Prioritize high-impact opportunities

For new article topics, look for high-volume keywords where you have zero or very little presence. Filling these gaps should be your biggest priority so you can capture high demand. 

When adding content to existing articles, look for places where you’re in striking distance — either the second or third position of Google search results. You’ll gain much more traffic going from #3 to #1 than you will going from #7 to #5. And a 2024 First Page Sage study found that the first search result sees a 39.8% CTR compared to just 10.2% for the third.

Create content workflows

Over time, you’ll learn valuable information about what works for your audience (and content creation team). Use it to create templates and standardize processes that streamline content development. 

For example, you could create an outline for all “how to” articles that lists which headings those articles should feature, and write a standard process for drafting, editing, and publishing these articles.

Develop a style guide

Similarly, a style guide encourages consistency across content. It describes a tone, like conversational or friendly, that you want articles to convey. And it lays out numerous small rules, such as what case you use for headings, how to spell certain words, or whether you use the ever-divisive Oxford comma.

Host and grow your content with Webflow

As your content offering matures, you’ll need increasingly sophisticated tools to organize and optimize it. 

Webflow’s content management system (CMS) solution enables content teams to quickly add and edit content — without relying on code or developers. Plus, the suite of SEO tools in Webflow Enterprise — like auto-generated metadata and redirect management — empowers editors, marketers, and developers alike to optimize front-end and back-end SEO.

So many steps exist during content creation, including ideation, drafting, and graphic design. Getting stakeholder alignment throughout these stages and delivering content that hits the mark requires a thoughtful content creation process. Even the most free-form workflows benefit from some structure and intentional direction. 

Managing content workflows also becomes more efficient with a distinct process. When content teams have specific project milestones, they can quickly see where tasks are within the process.

Why should you implement a content workflow?

Content workflows outline a process teams follow when producing content, with descriptive guidelines for the most efficient way to perform each step. With a comprehensive workflow in place, teammates can work independently or collaborate to stitch their work together seamlessly.

Here are a few benefits of crafting and executing a thoughtful content workflow strategy:

• Greater content consistency: When every team member follows the same strategy and style guide, the resulting content is cohesive and consistent. Even as your content library grows, your brand’s look and feel remains the same.
• Better teamwork: Comprehensive content workflows improve collaboration by clearly defining task dependencies, go-to communication methods, and cadences. This reduces frustration and misunderstandings, which can slow down progress.
• Elevated quality: When missteps and off-brand output are reduced (or avoided entirely), you can expect better content quality.
• Repetitive task automation: To build efficient workflows, you can use workflow automation tools (like Jira and Monday.com) to move tasks through certain stages automatically. This could include delegating assignments to team members and pinging staff about upcoming deadlines. Automating workflows enables teams to focus less on repetitive tasks and more on the work that matters most.

What should an effective content workflow include?

Your content creation workflows will greatly depend on what you’re creating. For example, location page design looks very different from developing white papers. That said, here are a few features most workflows would include.

Project kickoff

At the start of a project, you’ll determine and align on initiative details — like goals, expectations (from clients, management, and other stakeholders), what deliverables your team will produce, available resources, and a basic timeline. A brainstorming call with contributing cross-functional teams — like editorial and design leaders — can also help clarify end goals. 

Step-by-step guidelines

A comprehensive content creation workflow includes specific instructions for completing the necessary steps, including: 

• Creating a content mock-up or outline
• Handling task assignments and updates
• Conducting editorial reviews
• Staging and publishing content
• Content auditing

A fully realized workflow outlines these steps in great detail. But you don’t want this thorough documentation to overwhelm your team. So, experiment with different levels of specificity and listen to valuable team member insights to improve this resource along the way.

Essential tools and resources

Workflow documentation should also define the tools and resources teammates, like writers and designers, should use during content creation. It’s best practice to create separate workflows for each content type your platform uses, especially for cornerstone content that establishes a baseline for everything else.

For example, if your website content includes blog articles and video tutorials, be sure to have defined content creation strategies for each. The standard operating process (SOP) for a blog article might outline the types of images to use, while a video tutorial resource might state the preferred video editing software. Both could link to shared folders for images, music, and other assets the team needs to complete their work.

How to create a content creation workflow in 5 steps

Creating a workflow involves experimentation and collaboration. Your first draft will differ from the final outline, since hands-on experience will reveal potential steps to add in and which processes could be more efficient.

Keeping that in mind, here’s a five-step guide you can follow to start — and improve upon — that first draft.

1. Identify content types

Start by establishing which content types you want to cover. Then, drop in all the format-specific resources your team needs for each type. Here are a few common content types that need separate workflows:

• Help center articles
• Troubleshooting guides and FAQs
• Videos
• Website blog articles
• Interactive tutorials

So, if you’re creating the SOP for writing API documentation, you might need workflow guidelines for help center articles, troubleshooting guides, and interactive tutorials.

2. Label each phase

Clearly label all the important milestones a content piece must go through, from ideation to completion. Here are some examples of typical phases you’ll want to include:

• Content planning
• Drafting
• Reviewing
• Publishing

3. Fill in the details

Now it’s time to dig into the details. Create detailed instructions for each phase, including all the steps each contributor (writer, designer, or developer) must complete.

For example, the drafting phase for a help center article might look like this:

• Change the status field in the task from “In queue” to “Writing.”
• Add the article to the content calendar.
• Create a new document and title it according to the title tag provided in the task.
• Copy the proposed outline from the task description into your document.
• Draft the content. Keep it as close as possible to the proposed outline.some text
  • Only use icons from the approved icons folder and images from the content marketing folder.
  • If you need screenshots, search the screenshots folder to see if one’s already available. If not, take one yourself and add it to the folder.

• Update the sharing settings in the document to “Anyone with a link can access.”
• Add a comment in the task with a link to the document.
• Reassign the task to the content strategist.

4. Test your workflow

With your first draft ready, test your workflow with team members to ensure it covers all the necessary steps. As you test, look for instances where you needed to perform a step that wasn’t outlined or where your proposed step didn’t provide enough detail. Correct these issues and continue your testing until you can complete the entire workflow without difficulty.

5. Establish a process for updating the workflow

Now that your workflow is ready, define a process for updating SOP documentation when needed. Here’s what this updating procedure might look like:

• Create a task outlining the proposed change and assign it to the team lead.
• The team lead reviews and approves or denies the change.
• If approved, the team lead reassigns the task to a writer.
• The writer makes suggested changes to the workflow document and reassigns the task to the team lead.
• The team lead reviews the changes. If revisions are necessary, they’ll reassign the task to the writer.
• When all revisions are approved, the team lead accepts the changes in the document and closes the task.

Building better content with smoother workflows

Defining an efficient workflow strategy leads to higher-quality content and more productive teams. And to empower your teams to publish content at scale, you’ll need a content management system that works for everyone: content strategists, editors, designers, and developers.

With Webflow, your content teams can build, launch, and maintain content that fuels business growth — without relying on developers. Empower your teams and unlock collaboration with Webflow’s visual development and content management platform.

From SaaS sites to ecommerce stores, websites require careful planning, regular adjustments, and constant maintenance to work smoothly.

With so many moving parts, web development is challenging — make it less so by finding the right web development tools for your needs.

What to look for in a web development tool

Your toolkit affects the quality of your projects. Here are key features to consider when selecting a reliable tool:

• User-friendliness. Choose platforms that have an accessible, navigable, and logically structured interface. A steep learning curve slows development, so consider intuitive tools that streamline the design process.
• Customization and flexibility. Look for software with customization options to change features to suit your specific needs. Whether these features are plugins, extensions, or adaptable in-tool settings, flexibility ensures you can perform multiple tasks with one program.
• Performance and speed. Tools should be able to handle large codebases and complex tasks without slowing down or crashing. High performance ensures you can work efficiently without unnecessary delays.
• Integrations. Ensure the tool integrates with other development-related software in your tech stack, like data systems, cybersecurity services, and collaboration platforms. Compatibility improves productivity by bringing all your workflows into a single location.
• Community support and documentation. Tools with active user communities provide forums, tutorials, and shared solutions to resolve issues quickly. Detailed documentation acts as a how-to manual, maximizing the platform’s potential.
• Security features. Choose a tool with robust security measures, including regular updates, vulnerability scanning, and secure authentication methods. Such safeguards protect your projects and sensitive information.

A comprehensive tool for website building and hosting

The right website builder and hosting solution ensures your site performs as intended and is up and running around the clock. Here’s why Webflow fits the bill.

Webflow

Webflow bridges the gap between web development and design thanks to the visual-first design environment. The built-in Designer tool allows you to create fully responsive websites while offering the flexibility and power of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript — without having to code. And Webflow’s integrated content management system (CMS) and hosting solutions make it an all-in-one platform for building, launching, and managing websites.

Key features:

• Visual canvas. The Designer allows you to add and style website components in a completely visual environment. When you’re ready to publish your site, Webflow translates your design into clean, production-ready code in the background. 
• Responsive design. Websites made in Webflow automatically adapt to different screen sizes, ensuring a consistent user experience across devices.
• Hosting and security. Webflow offers reliable, high-performance hosting with built-in security features like SSL certificates, daily backups, and SOC 2 Type II compliance. This hosting ensures your site is fast, secure, and always available.
• Search engine optimization (SEO). Built-in SEO tools improve your site’s visibility on search engines like Google and Bing.

CSS tools for web development

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are essential for styling your website with visually appealing and responsive layouts. Here are a few tools to improve your CSS workflow.

Sass

Syntactically Awesome Style Sheets (Sass) is a CSS preprocessor that offers features like variables, nested rules, and mixins. It’s compatible with all CSS versions and helps you write cleaner, more organized code to maintain and scale large style sheets. 

The program uses its own web development language, SassScript. Sass compiles SassScript into CSS code, which you can use to style and control HTML elements. 

Key features:

• Variables allow you to store values like colors, fonts, and sizes for consistent design and convenient updates. When you change a variable’s value, styles update across your website.
• Nesting lets you write CSS in a way that mirrors your HTML structure. It groups related styles, making the code more coherent.
• Mixins are reusable pieces of CSS code. If you have a set of frequently used styles, you can create a mixin and include it wherever you need to save time and reduce errors.
• Partials and imports break CSS code into smaller, more manageable files, which you can combine into a single file after building your site.

PostCSS

PostCSS is a web development tool that enhances CSS using JavaScript plugins. It allows you to add new features to your CSS code, optimize it for performance, and even use future CSS tools that aren’t widely compatible or supported yet.

Key features:

• Plugins. These add-ons improve existing CSS feature sets. For example, plugins can automatically add browser prefixes (like -moz or -webkit), ensuring compatibility with different browsers.
• Modular architecture. Independent modules control specific tasks, such as user authentication or payment processing. Add or remove these functions to customize your workflow.
• Future proofing. PostCSS lets you use the latest CSS features before they become standard. This feature helps you stay ahead of the curve and keep your website styling modern and updated.

Tailwind CSS

Tailwind CSS is a utility-first CSS framework. This platform provides small, single-purpose, low-level utility classes to build your designs directly into HTML. These building blocks, called helper classes, promote reusability while keeping CSS file sizes small.

Key features:

• Utility-first approach. Instead of writing custom CSS code for each element, you can use predefined classes, ensuring consistency and more straightforward management.
• Responsive design. Tailwind includes responsive utilities for creating designs that work consistently across devices.
• Performance. Tailwind reduces CSS file sizes by only using the classes you need, improving website loading speeds.

Web development tools for jQuery

jQuery is a free, open-source JavaScript library that streamlines HTML document traversal and manipulation. It uses code to navigate and change a web page’s elements, such as text, images, and buttons. Event handling makes a web page respond to user actions, like a message appearing after clicking a button. 

Here are some of the top jQuery development tools.

jQuery UI

jQuery UI offers a “write less, do more” approach, allowing you to build highly interactive websites with minimal effort. It takes common tasks that require multiple lines of JavaScript code and converts them into action-executing methods in a single line of code.

Key features:

• Widgets. jQuery UI provides various ready-made widgets like date pickers, sliders, and dialog boxes that you can quickly integrate into your website designs.
• Interactions. Interaction features like drag-and-drop, resizing, and sorting allow you to conveniently modify specific elements or layouts without manually rewriting code.
• Effects. jQuery UI has a collection of premade visual effects, such as show/hide, animations, and transitions. You can apply these effects to design elements for instant appearance or functionality changes.
• jQuery Mobile. jQuery Mobile is a touch-optimized framework for creating responsive designs. It has gesture-friendly UI components like buttons, popups, and navigation bars. Cross-platform compatibility also ensures your website works across all major operating systems, including iOS, macOS, Android, and Windows.

QUnit

QUnit is a JavaScript unit testing framework. In unit testing, you isolate individual features or design components and test them to check if they work. QUnit is suitable for testing any generic JavaScript code.

Key features:

• Comprehensive testing. Rigorous unit tests ensure the code works, allowing you to catch bugs early in development.
• Integrations. QUnit offers readily available integrations with other tools and frameworks, making it a versatile testing software.
• Detailed reports. QUnit provides detailed test reports, including which tests pass or fail according to your preferences and expectations.
• Asynchronous testing. You can test asynchronous operations to ensure your website can run multiple programs simultaneously without waiting for previous tasks to finish.

DataTables

DataTables is a jQuery plugin for JavaScript libraries that supports client-side and server-side processing. It displays tabular information and adds advanced interaction controls to HTML tables for better data management. For example, you can create dynamic tables with features like pagination, ordering, sorting, and searching.

Key features:

• Pagination automatically divides large tables into tables for quicker navigation and more convenient viewing.
• Sorting and ordering allow you to arrange table data by clicking on column headers, improving organization and accessibility.‍
• Searching and filtering provide a built-in search box with refinement options to quickly find specific data within the table.

Text editing tools for web development

A text editor is a computer program that allows you to create, edit, and view plain text files. While people typically use them for writing and note-taking, text editors are now mainstays for writing code. Most operating systems have their own text editors preinstalled, but here are the best ones for web developers.

Sublime Text

Sublime Text is a source code text editor for Windows, macOS, and Linux. It supports many web development languages and is known for its speed, user-friendliness, and customizability. Themes and plugins allow you to expand Sublime Text’s functionality with community-built add-ons.

Key features:

• Goto Anything. This feature lets you quickly navigate files, symbols, or coding lines. Multiple selections also allow you to make numerous changes at once, such as renaming variables or updating HTML tags.
• Context-aware autocomplete. The autocomplete functionality provides intelligent completions based on preexisting project code.
• Multi-select tabs. Sublime Text’s file tabs have split-view support throughout the UI. The sidebar, tab bar, autocomplete, and Goto Anything are all built into the tabs to make navigation quicker.

Notepad++

Notepad++ is a free, open-source code editor for Microsoft Windows. It’s lightweight, supports several web development languages, and has features for beginners and experienced developers alike. 

Like Sublime Text, Notepad++ has a tabbed editing option that allows you to work with multiple open files in one window.

Key features:

• Syntax highlighting displays coding lines in various colors and fonts according to specific categories, allowing you to quickly find and debug errors or broken source code.
• Auto-completion provides suggestions after you enter specific prefixes, words, or functions. This feature speeds up the coding process, as you don’t have to write the rest of the code manually.
• The multi-document interface lets you open different tabs and work on multiple documents simultaneously.
• Plugin support allows you to access the source code, modify it, and create your own plugins. The Notepad++ resource page offers multiple plugins to add new features to the text editor and customize it to your liking.

Visual Studio Code

Visual Studio Code (VS Code) is a free, open-source text editor developed by Microsoft and compatible with Windows, macOS, Linux, and web browsers. Well-loved features include syntax highlighting, debugging, and autocompletion. 

Key features:

• IntelliSense. This proprietary feature provides real-time error detection, syntax highlighting, and intelligent code completions.
• Integrated terminal. The built-in terminal allows you to run commands and scripts, detect links and errors, and manipulate files without leaving the code editor.
• Extensions marketplace. A vast library of extensions from the Microsoft Marketplace allows you to tailor VS Code to each project. Find languages, debuggers, and tools that suit your needs. 

Great web development resources for fonts

Fonts impact your site’s readability, accessibility, and visual appearance. Here are a few popular tools for managing fonts during website development.

Google Fonts

Google Fonts is a free, open-source web service that allows you to add attractive fonts to your websites without licensing issues. It has font families and typefaces in over 135 languages, and each description details the font’s creator, related work, and popularity and usage statistics.

Key features:

• Straightforward embedding. Google Fonts supports variable fonts in the CSS API update, allowing you to embed fonts directly into your website.
• Customization. You can change font weights and styles, including spacing, thickness, and slope.
• Cross-browser compatibility. Fonts work across all major browsers and devices, ensuring a consistent typography experience.
• Large collection. Google Fonts offers a vast library of traditional and modern styles, allowing you to pick fonts that suit your website and design projects.

Adobe Fonts

Adobe Fonts (formerly Typekit) is an online web service that’s included in Adobe Creative Cloud. A free Creative Cloud signup gives you access to over 1,000 high-quality fonts to use on your site and in Adobe apps. And opting for a subscription provides up to 20,000 fonts with a personal or commercial use license.

Key features:

• Vast selection. With thousands of fonts from renowned type foundries, you have many styles and designs to choose from.
• Seamless synchronization. Fonts sync with Adobe Creative Cloud apps and design software like Photoshop and Illustrator.
• Customizable subsets. Adobe Fonts lets you customize font subsets, reducing load times and improving website performance.

WhatFont

WhatFont is a browser extension created by Chengyin Liu and available on the Google Chrome Web Store and the Apple App Store. This tool lets you quickly identify and replicate fonts on any web page by hovering over the text.

Key features:

• Font details. The WhatFont browser extension quickly identifies fonts. It also provides information like font family, size, weight, color, source, and licensing details.
• Compatibility. The browser extension detects what font services you’re using and supports Adobe and Google’s font APIs.
• User-friendly. You don’t need prior web development experience to use WhatFont. Simply hovering over fonts will tell you all the details you need to know.

Other web development tools to add to your stack

In addition to the specialized tools mentioned above, here are a few additional resources for enhancing your web development and design workflows.

Bootstrap

Bootstrap is a front-end development CSS framework that creates responsive, mobile-friendly websites. This free and open-source toolkit has a library of reusable design elements to ensure a consistent appearance across your site. 

Key features:

• Premade elements. Bootstrap’s library contains predesigned components like buttons, forms, and navigation bars. Pulling from this library saves time and effort compared to building components from scratch.
• Customizable layouts. You can create variables, nests, and mixins to tailor frameworks to a specific project or branding guidelines.
• Responsive design. This software offers responsive grid systems, cross-browser compatibility, and adaptable layouts so websites look good on any device.

MySQL

MySQL is an open-source relational database management system for managing and storing website data. This program is scalable and has an active community, so your site can grow as your business develops.

Key features:

• Clear structure. MySQL organizes data into tables for quick retrieval, which is especially useful for large-scale databases.
• High security. This platform offers various ways to keep your data secure, such as user authentication, data encryption, and performance optimization. These features ensure your data remains safe and your website runs smoothly, even under heavy traffic.
• Broad compatibility. MySQL integrates well with popular programming languages and frameworks, so you can use the tools you’re comfortable with.

Chrome DevTools

Chrome DevTools is built into the Google Chrome browser to help you inspect and debug websites. 

Key features:

• Instant updates. The Element Inspector lets you view and modify a web page’s HTML and CSS code in real time. 
• Optimized web pages. DevTools includes a JavaScript console for running and debugging scripts. It also offers a network panel for monitoring network requests and performance tools for optimizing website speeds. 
• Safe browsing. A security panel checks your site’s security features to ensure compliance.

CodePen

CodePen is an online code editor for writing and testing HTML, CSS, and JavaScript snippets. 

Key features:

• Rapid prototyping. The platform’s interactive, live preview environment allows you to see the results of your code modifications in real time, providing immediate feedback.
• Tight-knit community. CodePen also serves as a community where you and other developers can share work and learn from each other. 
• Code samples. Explore a library of public code snippets, modify them, and see how they function on websites.

GitHub

GitHub is a cloud-based version control platform that allows developers to create and collaborate on coding projects by using open source Git software.

Key features:

• Version control. GitHub uses Git to track changes in your codebase, making it easier to rollback to previous versions and review a project’s change history.
• Collaboration tools. The platform offers features like pull requests, code reviews, and issue tracking to improve teamwork and streamline project management.
• Integrated services. GitHub integrates with various tools and services, like continuous integration and deployment pipelines, to enhance your development process.

Streamline your web dev workflow with Webflow

Building a website from scratch requires time, tools, and resources. To create a suitable suite of tools for your workflow, you may need to subscribe to multiple services and learn the ins and outs of each program — unless you choose Webflow.

Our comprehensive, scalable platform fits all your web development needs. Experienced developers and established enterprises can use Webflow’s built-in SEO, hosting, security, and CMS features. Meanwhile, those with limited technical expertise can design and build pages with the power of HTML, CSS, and Javascript — without needing to code.

Wherever you stand, Webflow has a solution for you.

This metric measures the number of prospects who convert—or complete a desired action—across a multitude of different marketing channels, including your website, ads, email, and more.

A desired action can be anything from signing up for an email newsletter, downloading a piece of content, requesting a demo, opting in to a free trial, or buying or renewing a subscription to a product.

Calculating a conversion rate is simple, and just requires you to divide the number of conversions you have with the total number of prospects, and then multiply it by 100 (shown in the formula below):

(number of conversions / total number of prospects in the audience) × 100

For marketing teams in particular, this metric is vital. At a high level, the effectiveness of an overall marketing program can be measured solely by the conversion rate. And on top of that, it’s imperative to understand the conversion rate of each marketing call to action (CTA), asset, channel, and audience segment. 

Ultimately, by measuring each of these conversion rates, your marketing team will have reliable data to better iterate and optimize marketing programs and campaigns to achieve your goals and drive revenue.

To help you better optimize your conversion rate, here’s a closer look at key SaaS conversion rate benchmarks that you can use as a starting point for your work.

Average conversion rates for SaaS businesses

There are two main categories of SaaS business models: low-touch and high-touch. Low-touch businesses focus on getting visitors to sign up for free trials and subscriptions through their website, whereas high-touch ones focus more on enterprise-level demo requests and direct sales. Because the sales process differs for each of these business models, they each focus on different conversion goals.‍

Low-touch business models

As we mentioned earlier, examples of conversion activities in low-touch business models include free trials with no credit card requirements, free trials with credit card requirements, and “freemium” models. The industry standard for conversion rates for each of those activities are: 

• Free trials with no credit card requirements: 8–10% (SmartKarrot)
• Free trials with credit card registration requirements: 25% (SmartKarrot)
• Freemiums: 1–10% (TechCrunch)

High-touch business models

For high-touch business models, here’s a breakdown of conversion rate benchmarks showing funnel metrics for each stage of the B2B inbound and outbound marketing funnels.

Inbound marketing funnel:

1. Nurturing new contacts and subscribers to become marketing qualified leads (MQLs): 5%
2. Scheduling a meeting with an MQL: 20%
3. Converting MQLs to sales accepted leads (SALs): 43.75%
4. Converting SALs to sales qualified leads (SQLs): 63.33%
5. Converting SQLs to opportunities and assigning revenue amount: 43.33%
6. Converting opportunities to wins and receiving revenue: 31.25%

From top to bottom of the funnel, the average conversion rate benchmark is 0.05%.

Outbound marketing funnel:

1. Performing targeted outreach to prospects to drive meetings: 15%
2. Converting to SALs: 42.5%
3. Converting SALs to SQLs: 55%
4. Converting SQLs to opportunities and assigning opportunity amount: 50%
5. Converting opportunities to wins and receiving revenue: 37.5%

From top to bottom of the funnel, the average conversion rate benchmark is 0.03%.

Additional metrics to consider

Although driving conversions and revenue is a marketer’s ultimate goal, there are other important metrics to consider along the way. Here are five additional metrics to keep in mind when building out your marketing strategy:

1. Revenue churn: This metric measures monthly or annual revenue losses from customer churn as a percentage of overall revenue. Customer churn – the monthly number of lost customers as a percentage of overall customer count – is also an important metric to track. A high churn rate may signify that you need to invest more in customer retention and product adoption programs.
2. Time to value: This is a critical moment in the user journey when a user realizes the value in your SaaS product. Knowing when that moment is can help a SaaS company optimize the user journey so that customers reach it more quickly. The quicker that a customer discovers the value of your product, the more likely you are to retain the customer and avoid churn.
3. Monthly recurring revenue (MRR) and annual recurring revenue (ARR): These metrics indicate the amount of monthly or annual revenue a SaaS company generates. Your marketing team should be aware of current MRR and ARR values and how you contribute to these values.
4. Customer acquisition cost (CAC): This metric measures the amount it costs to attract and acquire a new customer. To calculate customer acquisition cost, add up the total monthly sales and marketing costs as well as any other relevant costs like salaries and overhead, and divide the result by the number of customer acquisitions.
5. Customer lifetime value (CLTV): Customer lifetime value measures the total revenue a customer account generates over its lifetime. Customer lifetime value increases proportionately to customer account lifetime.

Factors that can limit SaaS conversion rates

Whether you’re trying to increase free trials or demo requests, improving your conversion rate begins with your website. There are various factors on your website that can impede your conversions, so marketers looking to optimize conversions should explore these areas if they’re trying to make improvements:

1. Poor communication of value proposition: Even if your SaaS product has a strong value proposition, communicating it poorly will lower conversions. Most importantly, you want to convey how, exactly, your product will benefit the prospect.
2. Unclear messaging: If your messaging is unclear, prospects won’t understand how your SaaS solution can solve their problems or is superior to competitors’ solutions. If you suspect there’s a disconnect with your messaging, it might be time to revisit user research and ensure you thoroughly understand your audience and their pain points.
3. Low SEO ranking: If you’re not optimizing your web pages for high performance in Google’s search-ranking systems, the search visibility of those web pages will be low. Using relevant keywords in title tags, in headings, and throughout landing page content will help to increase search visibility and conversion as a result.
4. Poor web content layout: Certain web page layouts can pull prospects’ attention away from where you want it and dilute the focus of your messaging. Consider how you want a visitor’s eyes to travel along your web page and make sure your main messaging and CTA stand out from the rest of the page.‍
5. No sense of urgency: If there’s no sense of urgency in your headlines or CTAs, prospects may not feel compelled to convert.

Conversion rate optimization for SaaS companies

Now that we’ve established the important role the website plays in overall conversion goals — and what some of the key performance metrics are — we can begin to optimize. Here are some conversion rate optimization (CRO) tips for SaaS marketers.

Conversion rate optimization tactics

The first step in any CRO program is to measure your current conversion rate, or your baseline rate. Then, you can set your goal conversion rate and start working on strategies and corresponding tactics to achieve that goal.

Some common CRO tactics include displaying customer testimonials on web pages to provide relevant proof points, adding chatbots to your website to encourage engagement, and testing above-the-fold headlines and CTAs to capture your prospect’s attention immediately.

Leveraging machine learning for SaaS conversion rate optimization

The best way to ensure you’re optimizing your SaaS conversion rate is by testing many of these types of CRO tactics at once to see what resonates and what doesn’t with your audience. At the same time, it’s critical that you provide each visitor to your website with a personalized experience that’s relevant to them, incorporating firmographic data like their job title, job level, or their company’s industry, as well as aligning to previous behaviors they’ve taken on your website or with your brand on other channels.

Create a highly personalized web experience

Ultimately, building out your website personalization strategy and partnering with a solution that leverages machine learning to automate many of these tests can accelerate your results and conversions — and accelerate your marketing team’s impact. To learn more about creating a highly personalized website experience for your customers and prospects, get in touch with our team today.

Effective lead generation involves considering every option at your disposal, including tactics like popups. They’re challenging to do right, but popups work as long as they’re carefully timed and presented well. Lightbox popups, in particular, use a modern, eye-catching web design that offers increased success.

Webflow provides a broad collection of templates you can customize to suit your style, but you can also make your own lightbox popups from scratch. All it takes is a modal, a trigger, and an animation, and you’re all set to grab your reader’s attention with a sleek lightbox popup ad.

Benefits of lightbox popups for websites

A lightbox popup is used to focus the reader’s attention on a modal that features a call-to-action (CTA). When used properly, they can convert website visitors from casual browsers to purchasers with just a few clicks.

Here are a few benefits of using this popup style.

More viewer attention

Lightbox popups are small modal windows that overlay the content on the screen and dim the background to focus the reader on a smaller modal window. Typically, the reader must click the cancel icon to close them, but you can set them to close when the reader clicks anywhere outside the popup. Either way, you’ll catch the reader’s full attention for that moment. 

Increased conversion rates

According to OptiMonk (a service that designs and personalizes popup ads), the average conversion rate for their popup ads is 11%. It fluctuates based on whether the ad has a lead magnet, image, or personalized experience, but an 11% average is impressive. The ads in their top 10% converted over 42% of readers, which shows how effective a well-calibrated popup can be.

Improved engagement

Most high-performing popups offer a personalized, conversational experience. They feature headlines that ask questions like “What are you searching for today?” and “Can we help you find something?” Readers can respond using interactive options like buttons or a search bar, and the best versions offer an incentive for doing so. The result is a personal, interactive experience that keeps the reader engaged.

More email subscribers

Signing visitors up for an email list is a great use case for lightbox popups. It’s a small ask (taking a few seconds to complete), which is a good fit for an ad that politely interrupts a reader’s activity.

Again, a little incentive goes a long way toward convincing website visitors to sign up, and it’s also an excellent way to compensate them for the momentary interruption.

Reduced bounce rates

Some popups, like an exit-intent popup, detect when a customer is about to leave a shopping cart behind. They appear at that moment to offer the customer an incentive in the hopes that they’ll complete their purchase. 

The lightbox appearance is uniquely suited to this interaction because the rest of the screen dims as the popup takes over the UI. Your popup gets centerstage attention to re-engage the customer.

How to make a lightbox popup in Webflow

A lightbox popup consists of three main components. You start with a customized modal, then set a trigger for it, and finally, configure how it animates. The following steps cover the process more generally, but check out Webflow University for a full tutorial.

1. Create a wrapper

You’ll first need a wrapper to place your popup in. In HTML, your lightbox code is wrapped in a

element, hence the name “wrapper.” Everything you place within the

is contained and only appears when triggered. 

Before you style the popup modal itself, configure it to place an overlay color over the rest of the screen. Set the overlay’s color to black and give it an opacity of around 80%. When the popup is triggered, its modal will appear at full brightness, and the overlay will cast an 80% shadow over the rest of the page.

2. Design your popup

Next, style the popup modal’s color, size, and content. If you’d like a headstart or want some inspiration, check out the Made in Webflow Marketplace for ready-made popup templates.

Give your popup a bold heading and an eye-catching color combination. Include a clear CTA and a compelling offer to entice readers to engage. Don’t forget to add a close button and, if possible, use a cookie to ensure the popup doesn’t show up again for the same user.

3. Set triggers

Set the trigger that determines when your popup modal will appear. Remember that the timing of a popup ad is crucial. Present it too soon, and readers will close it to return to what they were doing. On the other hand, readers who navigate away quickly won’t see it if it appears too late. Experiment or A/B test different options to find the timing that suits your site.

4. Set up animations

Add an animation to your trigger to give the popup some motion. One common animation is fading the popup in, but you can also have it slide or zoom in if that suits your site’s animation style. Don’t forget to add an animation to the close button, too. The close animation should reverse the open animation to give the popup a consistent look.

5. Test and deploy

Publish your changes and test the popup to ensure it works as intended. Try opening and closing it a few times to confirm that the animations are smooth and the modal styling is correct. Test submitting information through the form to make sure it arrives where it needs to, like in your customer relationship management (CRM) platform.

5 inspiring lightbox popup examples

There are a variety of ways to use lightbox popups. The following examples iterate on the basic design to create engaging, fresh experiences.

1. HubSpot

HubSpot is an all-in-one customer, sales, and marketing platform that hosts a blog with a deep content library. As you read their articles, this popup will appear to invite you to subscribe to their newsletter. Its single email field and simple subscribe CTA makes for a modest interruption that only adds the smallest distraction to the user experience. Placing the large close button so obviously invites customers to ignore the popup if they want to. This casual approach makes for a no-pressure experience.

2. Calm

Calm is a health and wellness app that offers personalized experiences to help users stress less and sleep better. Their blog covers many fascinating topics about healthy lifestyles and mindfulness practices. As you peruse their articles, a lightbox popup offers a steep discount on their premium tier. It seems more subtle than other popups because it’s animated to slide in rather than suddenly appear, and the colors match the muted blue palette the rest of the site uses.

3. Grey Cup Festival

The Grey Cup is a Canadian football league, and the festival brings in a substantial number of fans. To drive ticket sales and show off the event’s headliners, this site’s web designers opted to use a large, bold lightbox popup that triggers while navigating the homepage. The heading’s large block letters immediately grab readers’ attention, and the bright banner at the bottom directs their focus to the “Get the tickets” CTA.

4. Bubbles

Bubbles is an AI-powered note-taking and video conferencing platform that aims to improve team productivity. The lightbox popup their site employs as you scroll through their blogs has a concise headline that appeals to a wide audience: “Tired of scheduling meetings?” It also uses a simple CTA format, “Explore Bubbles,” that explicitly indicates that it directs users to more information about the product. 

5. Home Depot

Home Depot uses the lightbox popup in a slightly different fashion. Instead of advertising a newsletter or directing traffic, it offers an add-on to something the user is already purchasing. It features a compelling headline, “Protect Your Purchase,” that asks users to consider adding a protection plan. The clear CTA, “Add Protection Plan,” suits the same purpose, and all the copy clearly and transparently tells users what the plan offers. 

Design websites that convert with Webflow

Popups and other modals should enhance — rather than hinder or distract from — your web design and user experience. With a visual design interface and robust functionality, Webflow enables you to create and customize lightbox popups, so you can create a personalized web experience that drives leads — without extensive coding.

To learn more about crafting effective lightbox-style elements, head to Webflow University for an in-depth guide.

Adding schema markup to a page is like sticking labels to your content to identify essential features such as an article title, product price, or business location. Done correctly, schema markup gives search engines the information they need to deliver better search results.

While seemingly complex, you can create schema markup after learning just a few fundamentals and best practices. With these basics in mind, you’ll be well on your way to climbing the search results page.

Why is schema markup important for SEO?

Schema markup, also known as structured data, helps search engines better understand your content. Detailed schema markup helps search engines use this information to share rich results for their users on search result pages (SERPs). These rich results include more features, such as reviews, prices, and images, and they have a better click-through rate (CTR). As your CTR increases, your website earns higher search ranks — so having the right schema markup significantly impacts your SEO.

Common schema markup types

When you implement schema markup on your page, you’re labeling content using a consolidated library of item properties from Schema.org. Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and Yandex cooperatively developed the library to establish a unified vocabulary they could all use to interpret content and improve search results. 

There are 1,476 item properties available on Schema.org, including “aggregateRating,” “image,” and “price.” They’re organized into primary types, such as CreativeWork, Event, and Product. Then, they’re further separated into subtypes, like Article, Festival, and Vehicle. 

Some subtypes are associated with more than one primary type. For example, LocalBusiness has its own set of properties, but it also supports everything from Place and Organization, the two primary types it falls under.

Business websites use different schema types depending on the services and products they offer and how they describe them. Here are the most commonly used types of schema, along with a few suggestions for item properties to use from them:

• Organization — A primary type for institutions like businesses, schools, or clubs.
  • Common properties:
    • telephone
    • address
    • url
• LocalBusiness — A subtype of Place and Organization for places of business, such as a bank or restaurant.
  • Common properties:
    • openingHours
    • priceRange
    • address
• Review — A subtype of CreativeWork for critical reviews of movies, books, or restaurants.
  • Common properties:
    • reviewRating
    • reviewBody
    • positiveNotes
• Article — A subtype of CreativeWork for published writings, such as blog posts or news articles.
  • Common properties:
    • speakable
    • wordCount
    • articleBody
• Product — A primary type for products and services, such as guitars, hats, or car rentals.
  • Common properties:
    • aggregateRating
    • color
    • size
• Event — A primary type for events like concerts, debates, and festivals.
  • Common properties:
    • aggregateRating
    • about
    • location

How does schema markup work?

There are three popular formats for implementing schema markup: JSON-LD, Microdata, and RDFa. Other formats exist, like PageMaps, but search engines only use these three to generate rich results. Each format has pros and cons, but JSON-LD scales the best, making it excellent for large-scale SEO projects, where teams must apply structured data to hundreds or thousands of pages and product descriptions.

JSON-LD

The JSON-LD format involves placing a script tag in your page’s head or body element. You fill the script with name:value pairs that identify the properties you want to use and their values. It’s the most common method because it’s easier to read. The HTML tags in the other two formats quickly complicate the code, making it difficult to find values when updating them.

Here’s how the structured data might look for a page selling a Gillo GT 25” recurve riser, a popular choice among professional archers:

When Google pulls this structured data to create a rich result, it looks like this:

Microdata

Microdata and RDFa both use HTML attributes to label item properties. To use either, you’ll wrap everything on your page in

s that label the types you’re using, such as Product, Place, or Event. Then, you’ll use , , and tags to label individual strings. The difference between microdata and RDFa is the attributes they use. For example, microdata schema markup tags use “itemscope” and “itemtype” to reference the relevant types. 

Resource Description Framework in Attributes (RDFa)

RDFa was a precursor to Microdata, so they function very similarly. You still use

and tags to label strings, but the attributes differ slightly from Microdata’s. For example, with RDFa, you use “property” instead of “itemprop.”

How to validate your schema markup

Before you launch a page with structured data, run it through a testing tool to ensure search engines can surface all the item properties you labeled. Here are the two most popular free validators available online.

Schema.org

The Schema.org validator performs a basic check on your code to ensure it runs. You can use it on a code snippet or live URL. To check a snippet, place your code on the left side and click the arrow near the bottom of the screen. The output appears on the right. If your code runs, the validator lists all the item properties it detected. If not, it shows you the errors it encountered. 

Google’s rich results test

Google’s rich results test takes schema markup validation a step further. It can handle URLs or snippets just like Schema.org, and it checks the code to validate that it runs. Then, it also offers a preview showing how the content’s rich result might appear, and it gives recommendations for other properties to include. 

5 schema markup best practices

To ensure your schema markup gets results, follow these five fundamental principles.

1. Select the appropriate schema types

Always choose the most applicable types to ensure you can access all the item properties you need. For example, using LocalBusiness gives you access to “openingHours” and “priceRange,” two options you don’t get from Organization or Place. 

2. Keep your schema markup updated

If you change the content on a page, update the relevant schema markup, too. For example, if a product’s price changes, update its “price” property. If you don’t, the rich result won’t be accurate, leading to a poor user experience. 

3. Stay informed about Google updates

Google occasionally updates its structured data guidelines to make new recommendations, so check back periodically. When they do, you’ll be the first to know and can optimize your content to get better rich results.

4. Validate

Google’s rich result tool provides all the testing features you need to ensure your structured data is working, comprehensive, and creates the best possible rich result. Add it to your SEO checklist so you remember to check every page before it goes out. 

5. Use the JSON-LD format

JSON-LD is easier to read and update, making it the preferred schema markup format. It’s also what Google recommends, so it could play a part in search rankings in the future. Starting with the JSON-LD format primes you for that possibility and makes your markup more scalable.

Add schema markup to your website with Webflow

Adding schema markup is an excellent method for moving up the search results, and with the right tools, it’s a painless experience. 

With the Webflow CMS, you can incorporate structured data by adding custom code to the section using dynamic embeds, enabling you to scale schema markup across multiple pages. To learn more, check out our University tutorials or get started with Webflow today.