Webflow

We wanted to prioritize the needs of the growing community of developers and entrepreneurs surrounding Webflow. Many of them were finding creative ways to work around our existing API limitations in order to launch powerful products for the broader Webflow community and we knew we needed to provide the community with a better way to build on top of the Webflow platform.‍

We set out as a small group with one core focus: “How do we build a strong, reliable and extensible foundation for developers to bring amazing App experiences directly into Webflow’s Designer, in a way that Webflow can support and scale?”

Our approach

To get started, we gathered all the Webflow Chrome extensions we could find, and dug up all the usage stats that we could get our hands on.

With the research in-hand, we were able to map out the entire developer journey and shine a spotlight on use cases like localization, design workflows, and component creation that were enabled by these third-party Chrome extensions. We then connected the dots to showcase the developer’s POV, laying out their pain points, opportunities, and the workarounds they currently used to create tools that extended Webflow’s Designer. 

As we began to explore potential product solutions, we quickly turned to prototyping to help streamline our exploration and improve decision-making for our team. The prototypes allowed us to move from abstract ideas to productive conversations and feedback cycles on something much more tangible. During this process, it became clear that when people have something concrete to react to — discussions are able to gain momentum and propel teams forward in the process of building great products.

Our prototyping process

As we dove into rapid prototyping, the range of ideas were broad. Some ideas were gold and, to be honest, a few went straight to the trash. For us, it was important to solidify the concept of in-Designer extensibility so we could have discussions framed around real-life use cases.

So, we focused our prototyping on building out concrete use-cases, ranging from AI text generation to SVG injection and style management. This gave birth to the idea of a Digital Asset Manager, which essentially separated the App layer into its own window. 

The Digital Asset Manager prototype was an ‘aha’ moment for our team. It made it clear that there needed to be a dedicated, customizable space that could seamlessly interact with the Designer canvas. With it, users now had the freedom to build workflows and configure settings directly within an App window. 

It also meant that users could move the window around, allowing them to shift the App out of the way and focus on their current task. Creating this flexible space benefited developers and customers alike.

Once the prototypes were complete, the engineering team took the prototypes and started building a functional proof of concept for us to test internally. This proof of concept became the foundation for the Designer Extensions Javascript APIs, which allowed us to create a floating window that could interact with the Webflow canvas through an API bridge. We started on a smaller scale by first prioritizing the ability to select and read canvas nodes, and then moved onto manipulation and creation experiences.

While the engineers were busy with building the proof of concept, we —the product and design teams — continued prototyping concepts to broaden our use cases and pinpoint technical needs and constraints for discussion. 

Some concepts, like a link validator, sparked engaging discussions on the extent of power we should grant to the Designer Extension API and the level of access an App should have within the Designer. These explorations helped us solidify our principle that a Designer Extension should extend anything a designer could do within the Designer’s canvas. However, for more global events, leveraging our REST APIs would be necessary to enable an additional layer of authorization.

Feedback and iteration 

Once we felt confident in our direction, we rolled out a beta to a select group of customers and developers. This step proved invaluable in shedding light on limitations in our API capabilities and user experience. We received a lot of great feedback, including one critical piece of feedback that we needed to offer more flexibility around the size of the App window size.

To address this, we started prototyping concepts allowing users to resize the App window to address window size concerns. With additional customer and developer research, giving developers control over the window size proved to be the best path to improve the overall experience. We wanted to empower developers to create the optimal user experience for their App, and wanted to recognize that some Apps required minimal surface area while others needed a larger, focused window.

We identified the benefits of introducing constraints and settled on letting developers set their default window size from three predefined options. This was so we could strike a balance between developer flexibility and user predictability when using a tool like Webflow. 

We also recognized the importance of providing escape hatches for focused workflows. While an App might function well with a small window for the majority of its tasks, there were valid reasons to expand it midway for specific steps in a flow. With this in mind, we then built an API allowing developers to dynamically increase the size of an App at any point for an even better user experience. 

How our community responded

Since launching our new Designer Extension APIs with our revamped developer platform we have almost doubled the number of Apps in our Marketplace, seen thousands of App downloads, witnessed Webflow Experts build new revenue streams with Apps, and added multiple partner SASS Apps to our Marketplace. 

Best of all, our community is absolutely thrilled:

To learn more and check out all that Webflow Apps have to offer, click here.

They can help with everything from keyword strategies and on-page optimizations to competitor analysis and content opportunities.

However, ranking on the first page of Google is easier said than done. It’s a competitive place, and all your competitors want to be there, too. That’s why you’ll need a well-thought-out SEO strategy and the best-of-the-best SEO tools to win organic traffic.

SEO refers to the process of improving your website to make it more visible on search engine results pages (SERPs) for queries about products, services, or information associated with your company or brand. 

The better a web page ranks, the higher its visibility. High-ranking web pages often draw the most attention and are considered reliable brands because Google and other search engines place them at the top of search results pages. And because people trust the browser to show them the most relevant content first, this is highly beneficial.

If you’re brand new to search engine optimization tools and how they work — or just looking for a refresher on what tools are out there — you’ve come to the right place. Below, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know about website optimization and SEO tools to improve your site’s content and boost your organic search rankings.

How does SEO work?

Google, Bing, and other search engines use algorithms to crawl web pages on the internet. The algorithms use bots to move from site to site, gathering data and indexing them. 

Imagine an indexing database as a huge library where you can search for a specific book or topic. The librarian is the algorithm and, having read every book in the library, can pinpoint the exact books to help you find the necessary information.

In a nutshell, that’s how search engines work.

SEO is commonly grouped into three categories:

• On-page SEO: On-page SEO includes the content on your web page, such as title tags, meta descriptions, and keywords. Keywords are topics and themes that describe the subject matter of your content, also known as “search queries,” as they refer to the words and phrases people type into search engines to find information. This text-based content (plus other on-page factors, including links, images, site navigation, and page responsiveness) shapes SEO. If your web page has high-quality, informative, and relevant content, it will generally rank better. 
• Off-page SEO: Off-page SEO includes the content not on your site. Having backlinks — places where other websites link back to your content or webpage — significantly improves your SEO. Search engines like Google view these links as votes of confidence in your content. If someone wants their content to redirect to your website, it’s because they see value in your page’s content and trust their readers can rely on your site for additional information. 
• Technical SEO: Technical SEO involves “behind-the-scenes” factors like page speeds, responsive web design, image optimization, and more. Google penalizes websites with slow page loading times or images that aren’t optimized for multiple devices. This is the process of indexing — the Google crawler analyzes the page for content and meaning and then stores it in the Google index according to its quality and relevance.

To avoid a poor ranking by Google and other search engines, follow these best practices and trends for all SEO types.

What is a search engine optimization tool? 

A search engine optimization tool is a platform or application used to help website owners, marketers, and SEO professionals analyze and improve a website’s visibility in search engine results pages. While every SEO tool is different, here’s what you can expect most to provide:

• Keyword research: Identify high-value keywords to target, based on search volume, difficulty, and competitive landscape.
• Competitor analysis: Gain insights into your competitors’ SEO strategies, including their top keywords, backlink profiles, and content performance.
• Content opportunities: Discover keyword ideas and gaps in your strategy to attract and engage your target audience effectively.
• Backlink analysis: Analyze your backlink profile to identify and manage internal links and external links to ensure they contribute positively to your site’s authority and keyword rankings.
• Site health audits: Perform comprehensive scans of your website to identify technical issues that could be hindering its search engine performance, such as slow loading times, broken links, or crawl errors.
• On-page SEO optimization: Get recommendations for optimizing your website’s content and structure, including meta tags, headings, and images, to improve relevancy and user experience.
• Tracking and reporting: Monitor your website’s rank tracking, organic traffic, and SEO progress over time with detailed analytics and reports.
• Local SEO: Boost your visibility in local search results to attract customers in specific geographic areas.
• Mobile optimization: Double-check that your website is optimized for mobile devices and showing up competitively in mobile searches.

Some tools operate as website development plugins, while others have stand-alone platforms where you link your website’s details through a URL or Google Analytics login. 

Why do you need SEO tools for your website?

Quality content is the foundation of SEO. The words, pictures, links, and videos on your website are the primary information it shares with visitors. Visitors search for high-quality content and accurate information, and search engines know this — that’s why SERPs prioritize pages that meet rigorous expectations.

With the help of SEO tools, you can identify which target keywords and content satisfy search intent and which don’t so you can tweak the latter to improve your site’s ranking. The best SEO tools also offer insights into your website’s performance compared to competitors and allow you to filter search metrics by country, language, age, and other relevant factors.

If you run multiple websites, SEO tools help evaluate each site’s performance at a glance. They take away the tedious and time-consuming task of manually entering data and metrics in spreadsheets, a method that can produce inaccurate results. SEO tools save you hours of work and instantly generate precise data with a few clicks.

Ultimately, the objective is to rank high, draw people to your site, and increase organic conversions. SEO tools support you in this process and even make your work more efficient, effective, and meaningful. They cut out the labor of trying to optimize content on your own. Instead, the tools act as guides and resources, showing you where and how your rankings can be improved.

11 SEO tools you should know about

Available SEO tools come with different features and pricing. We’ve shortlisted eleven of our favorites that suit a variety of experience levels and budgets to help narrow down your search.

1. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is an excellent all-in-one web crawler to improve SEO. One of its best features is the Site Audit tool, which highlights the areas of your website that need improvement to rank higher. It’s great for conducting competitor analyses for SEO to identify competitor backlinks and find link-building opportunities.

Ahrefs SEO tool also checks your website for broken links, which are void links that have been moved or changed. It also provides an in-depth report of your best-performing web pages so you can examine and replicate the content attracting the most traffic. With this information, you make informed decisions about which content to drive traffic toward and change existing content to perform better.

Plans and pricing: 

• Lite (starts at $99 per month)
• Standard (starts at $199 per month)
• Advanced (starts at $399 per month)
• Enterprise (starts at $999 per month)

2. SEMrush

SEMrush is a useful tool that evaluates your domain authority, alerts you of movements on SERPs, and provides insight into new ranking opportunities.

SEMRush checks for broken links, HTML tags, and your site’s suitability for crawling. HTML tags function similarly to keywords, but instead of words and phrases, they specify how a web browser will structure and present content. These tags help a browser tell the difference between “regular” keyword content and HTML content, then display them accordingly.

Once the tool identifies SEO issues related to links and tags, it provides recommendations for improvements. Plus, you can use the tool’s search functionality to filter content and find exactly what you want, including keyword difficulty, monthly search traffic, search volume, and more.

A stand-out feature is the 360 View Competitive Analysis, which uses competitors’ SEO reports to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the existing content on the web.

Plans and pricing per month when billed annually:

• Free trial (for seven days)
• Pro ($99.95)
• Guru ($191.62)
• Business ($374.95)

3. Google Search Console

Google Search Console is one of the best free SEO tools available. It allows you to track and analyze your website’s SEO performance on Google’s Search Engine Results Page (SERP). This is a huge advantage, as Google is the largest search engine on the internet with over 8.5 billion daily search terms. Simply add a verification code to authenticate your website and upload your XML sitemap. 

A sitemap is a file that contains information about your website’s content, including pages, text, images, videos, and more. Based on the content, the sitemap informs Google about your site’s eligibility for crawling. If there aren’t any broken links or void HTML tags, you’re good to go. 

Search Console also provides insight into how people using Google — and Google itself — perceive your website. Based on the data, you can optimize your website’s content for Google’s SERP to achieve a higher ranking. For example, if you’re writing a blog post on the best dog shampoos, Google might recognize that you don’t have as many keywords as competitors and recommend adding a few more.

It’s worth noting that Search Console is compatible with Google Analytics, which is another free Google tool that provides information on your site’s web traffic with data, insights, and reports.

Pricing: Free

4. Moz Pro

Google frequently updates its search engine algorithm, making it challenging to plan content ahead of time. Moz Pro stays on top of Google’s algorithm and studies its behavior to give you the best route for SEO optimization.

The search engine ranking tool offers standard features, such as site crawls and keyword suggestions, but it also boasts the free MozBar toolbar which allows you to view SEO metrics like page and domain authority in real time. Domain authority is a score that Moz developed to provide information on a page’s potential ranking in SERPs. 

The toolbar is convenient to use with a free Google Chrome extension that you can add to your browser. For additional features, you can upgrade to MozBar Pro.

Plans and pricing per month when billed annually:

• Free trial (for 30 days)
• Standard ($79)
• Medium ($143)
• Large ($239)
• Premium ($479)

5. WooRank

SEO experts love WooRank’s popular SEO tool as it provides free and paid features for tracking and reporting digital marketing data. It scans your website’s technical and content efficacy and provides recommendations for improvement based on the data.

WooRank’s SEO analysis allows you to enter competitors’ names to find the keywords they’re using, which you can study to optimize your content. 

As an SEO powerhouse, WooRank is suitable for most niches. However, we recommend it for websites with marketing resources and blogs. It’s best for content optimization and checking for duplicate content to ensure you’re hitting all the right keywords to increase organic traffic.

Plans and pricing per month when billed annually:

• Free trial (for 14 days)
• Pro ($53.25)
• Premium ($133.25)
• Enterprise (Custom pricing depending on your needs)

6. Clearscope

Clearscope is an on-page SEO software that helps content marketing teams write better web pages and blog posts. It primarily scans other top-performing content to find trends in keyword and header usage. 

Unlike other tools that may concentrate on broader aspects of SEO, such as backlinking or technical audits, Clearscope hones in on ensuring your content is as keyword-optimized as possible. It uses advanced natural language processing algorithms to analyze top-performing content in your niche, providing clear recommendations on how to make your content more comprehensive and relevant.

Clearscope evaluates your content and assigns a grade based on its optimization level. It then offers specific recommendations to improve readability, keyword usage, and overall relevance. You can use Clearscope’s application to write your content, and you can also use its Google Docs plugin or content management systems (CMS) integration to use it directly within your existing workflows.

Plans and pricing: 

• Essentials ($199/month)
• Business ($599/month)
• Enterprise (Custom pricing)

7. Google Trends

Google Trends is a free tool provided by Google that allows users to see how often specific keywords, subjects, and phrases have been queried over a specific period. Many tools only show how much a keyword is being searched for right now, but Google Trends lets you see historical search volume — and this tells you if a specific keyword is picking up steam or losing traction.

This tool is incredibly valuable for marketers, journalists, researchers, and anyone looking to understand shifts in search behaviors or to identify trending topics and interests in real-time or over periods.

What makes Google Trends distinct is its ability to offer a macro-level view of search interest trends across the globe. Unlike tools that focus on keyword optimization or site performance, Google Trends zooms out, giving users a broader perspective on what’s capturing the public’s interest. This can inform content strategies, product launches, and marketing campaigns by aligning them with actual user interest and search behavior patterns.

Plans and pricing:

8. Screaming Frog

Screaming Frog is a powerful website-crawling SEO audit tool that lets you do quick audits of your site at scale. These analysis tools help you identify technical SEO problems and optimize your websites for better search engine ranking. Screaming Frog focuses on technical, back-end site audits. It crawls your site like a search engine, gathering data on every URL and analyzing SEO elements like:

• Broken links
• Redirect issues
• Meta tags
• Response codes
• Duplicate content
• Cannibalization
• Loading times 

Plans and pricing: 

• Free
• Paid ($259/year)

9. AnswerThePublic

AnswerThePublic is a unique and visually engaging keyword research tool that provides insights into the exact questions people are asking online. It collects search questions and suggested autocomplete searches from Google and Bing to help you better understand the exact queries your audience uses.

This tool focuses on the human element behind search queries.  It doesn’t just present keywords or phrases — it reveals the questions and topics that real people are actively seeking answers to. This approach helps content creators and marketers better understand the intent behind searches, empowering them to produce content that resonates on a deeper level with their audience. The tool’s intuitive visualizations make it easy to identify patterns and trends in consumer inquiries, providing a rich source of inspiration for content.

Plans and pricing: 

• Individual ($9/month)
• Pro ($99/month)
• Expert ($199/month)

Note: AnswerThePublic also offers Lifetime subscriptions that provide incredible discounts if you decide to use this tool (and others by NP digital) for the long haul. 

10. Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is a plug-in directly embedded within most WordPress instances. It analyzes your current content and makes recommendations to simplify the complex aspects of SEO into actionable steps for website owners, bloggers, and digital marketers.

It demystifies SEO by breaking down optimization into understandable components, directly influencing how content is created and managed. With its focus on readability, keyword optimization, and technical site improvements, Yoast SEO ensures that even those with minimal SEO knowledge can implement best practices.

Plans and pricing:

• Yoast SEO (free)
• Yoast SEO Premium ($99/year)

11. SEOquake

SEOquake is a browser extension SEO tool that provides immediate SEO insights about any webpage you visit. It’s quick, convenient, and powerful — you get data immediately rather than copying and pasting URLs into your other search engine optimization tools. It’s the best way to do on-the-fly analysis of web pages and their SEO parameters.

Plans and pricing: 

How to choose the right tools for SEO optimization

We won’t beat around the bush — SEO tools aren’t cheap. Most teams can’t afford to use a handful of different tools, and they shouldn’t have to. If you do your research, everyone from your web development team to your creatives and content team should be able to use the same SEO tool. 

Not sure which tool will be the best fit for your business? While there’s no one-size-fits-all answer, here are a few factors to consider before you make an investment:

• Pricing: Assess the tool’s cost against your available budget. Consider both upfront and ongoing expenses, and look for tools that offer the best value for money, including any free versions or trial periods that allow you to test before committing.
• Features and functionality: Evaluate the tool’s features. Does it cover all the SEO bases you need, such as keyword research, competitor analysis, site audits, and reporting? Ensure the tool aligns with your specific SEO objectives and workflow requirements.
• Ease of use: The tool should have a user-friendly interface that your team can navigate easily. A steep learning curve can hinder productivity, so consider the ease of use and available support or training materials.
• Integration capabilities: Check if the tool can integrate with other platforms and tools you already use, such as content management systems, analytics software, and social media platforms. Integration can streamline your workflow and enhance data analysis.
• Reliability and accuracy: The tool’s data should be reliable and accurate. Look for reviews or case studies that can attest to its performance. Inaccurate data can lead to misguided SEO strategies.
• Collaboration features: If your team involves multiple members working on SEO, consider tools that facilitate collaboration. Features like task assignments, shared dashboards, and report sharing can improve team efficiency.
• Scalability: The tool should be able to grow with your business. Consider whether it can handle increased workloads and additional websites as your online presence expands.

Optimize your SEO with Webflow

SEO optimization is crucial to maintaining a relevant digital presence for your brand in an ever-shifting landscape. It’s challenging, but Webflow has the tools to support you.

With Webflow’s visual development platform, you can create a dynamic website with stunning, clean, and relevant content and a user-friendly interface. We even offer our own in-product SEO controls to help you improve performance.

Get building — before you know it, you could be ranking on Google’s first page.

New technology and the internet allow businesses to bridge geographic distances, and this presents unique opportunities for brands to amplify their global presence. However, reaching international audiences is just the first step — the real challenge lies in forging lasting, meaningful connections across diverse cultural contexts.

A well-thought-out international marketing strategy addresses this struggle by embracing the subtleties of culture, language, and regional market dynamics. By fine-tuning your strategy to these aspects, you convert potential customers into loyal advocates and position your brand as a globally aware, culturally attuned market player.

Benefits of reaching global markets

Adopting an international digital marketing strategy broadens your brand’s global footprint and makes your brand more dynamic and culturally relevant. Here’s a closer look at this expansion’s benefits:

Global visibility and increased traffic

Reaching foreign markets enhances your business’s global visibility by presenting more opportunities to impress and engage a broader audience. For instance, by tailoring your website’s structure to accommodate various language preferences and cultural nuances through localization strategies, you’ll ensure a seamless and engaging experience for site visitors worldwide — significantly increasing web traffic and bringing in new customers.

Diversified revenue stream

Expanding into international markets broadens your revenue sources and spreads your income generation across different regions and throughout the calendar year. This reduces dependence on a single market or season.

For example, you can adapt your sales strategy to align with local holidays and events by tapping into heightened purchasing activity during Black Friday in the United States or Diwali in India. This localized approach keeps your business relevant and appealing across diverse cultural landscapes so you can maximize sales opportunities.

Enhanced brand loyalty

When you tailor your brand messaging to reflect the traditions and norms of each audience, you demonstrate that your brand respects cultural diversity. This encourages brand loyalty among global customers who feel you care about understanding their preferences and needs.

Competitive edge

Reaching foreign markets gives your business a competitive edge by showcasing your brand’s adaptability, innovation, and commitment to meeting diverse customer needs. This global outreach enhances your brand’s reputation and builds user trust, which is crucial for customer loyalty and retention. Over time, this ultimately contributes to a higher return on investment (ROI), solidifies your brand’s position in the global marketplace, and paves the way for continued growth and success.

Top 8 international digital marketing strategies

A global marketing strategy goes beyond linguistic translation — it involves deeply understanding and connecting with each target demographic. This means crafting advertising campaigns and content that resonate with local values, customs, and languages, and balancing global brand consistency with localized appeal.

Here are eight international digital marketing techniques to implement.

1. International SEO strategy

An international search engine optimization (SEO) strategy optimizes your site’s visibility and reputation across regions where your business operates. SEO improves how search engines perceive your site — as a credible, authoritative source or a platform with low-quality content of little relevance to your audience.

Key aspects of an effective international SEO strategy include:

• Choosing the right URL structure. Using a subdirectory URL structure for localized sites (website.com/es for your Spanish site) helps you retain domain authority compared to a subdomain structure (es.website.com). However, in some cases, you may need localized sites on different domains — for example, if a business has a unique brand in certain countries.
• Creating a robust sitemap. Organizing your website’s content streamlines search engine indexing. A well-structured sitemap ensures that all regional website variations are accessible and correctly categorized.
• Using region-specific keywords. Conduct thorough keyword research to identify terms that resonate with each target audience in their local context. Incorporating these keywords into your website’s content and metadata enhances visibility in local search results.
• Adjusting for location. Tailor your website to match each visitor’s location, which includes language preferences, date formats, and currency. This makes navigation clearer for international visitors and increases the chance search engines will showcase your site when someone from that location searches for a keyword you want to rank for.
• Adopting international SEO tags. Use SEO identifiers, like hreflang HTML tags, that communicate your site’s language and regional variations to search engines. This helps search engines deliver the most fitting site version to users — one that fits their location and language preferences.
• Optimizing meta tags and structured data. Tailor metadata like meta descriptions, title tags, and structured data for each regional site variation. Doing so helps search engines understand the context and relevance of your content to specific geographic locations.

2. Search engine marketing

Search engine marketing (SEM) uses paid advertising to target region-specific audiences on search engines and guide them to dedicated landing pages. Create landing pages for each region you operate in to ensure you bring site visitors to region-specific content that’s aligned with their cultural or linguistic preferences.

This approach also empowers you to boost your click-through rate (CTR) and reduce your bounce rate. By reaching out to audiences with content that resonates with their local interests and needs, you increase the likelihood of engagement and conversion, optimizing your advertising spend.

3. Multilingual website

Creating a multilingual website enhances accessibility and engagement for linguistically diverse global audiences by breaking down language barriers and demonstrating your commitment to inclusivity and cultural sensitivity. Internationalization and localization strategies, such as language toggles and dynamic content, are crucial for this process because they encourage longer visits and deeper engagement with your brand.

Beyond improving the user experience, a multilingual website also positively impacts your SEO rankings in different regions by aligning with local search preferences. A website communicating in a user’s native language fosters familiarity and trust, further reinforcing your brand’s global presence.

4. Affiliate marketing

Expand your reach through affiliate marketing, a strategy that involves collaborating with individuals or businesses around the globe to promote your products or services. By developing an affiliate portal — a dedicated platform on your website that lets these partners access marketing materials, track sales, and monitor their commissions — you effectively harness their regional influence and trust with local audiences. Such collaboration transforms your partners into brand advocates and helps you enhance web traffic, conversions, and your brand’s global recognition.

5. Email marketing and automation

Automated emails — triggered by user actions or preferences, such as signing up for a newsletter, making a purchase, or abandoning a shopping cart — help maintain consistent and personalized communication. User preferences, such as receiving updates about specific product categories or in a particular language, can also trigger tailored communications. This ensures your email marketing content adapts to meet each individual’s interests and needs, and this personalization enhances brand engagement and nurtures customer relationships wherever those customers may be.

6. Culturally sensitive content marketing

Culturally sensitive content marketing involves crafting visual content and messaging that acknowledges and respects the cultural identities of different regions.

For example, a campaign targeting Japanese audiences might incorporate traditional Japanese aesthetics and values, emphasizing respect and harmony. Conversely, for Brazilian markets, your strategy might involve vibrant visuals and storytelling that resonate with Brazil’s dynamic cultural landscape, known for its emphasis on community and festivity.

By taking this tailored approach to content marketing, you demonstrate your brand’s cultural awareness and deepen the connection with diverse audiences. When consumers see their culture reflected across your messaging and visuals, they’re likely to feel a personal connection to your brand. As your content becomes more relevant and shareable among local audiences, this deeper engagement increases brand loyalty and cultivates a stronger market presence.

7. Influencer marketing

Influencer marketing leverages the power of local influencers to amplify your brand’s global impact. This strategy involves identifying and collaborating with influencers who hold sway in specific cultural or regional contexts.

For instance, partnering with a popular lifestyle influencer in France can introduce your brand to the French market in a way that feels more authentic and relatable than other marketing forms, like advertisements. Similarly, teaming up with a tech influencer in South Korea might significantly boost your tech product’s visibility in a market known for its tech-savviness.

These partnerships grant your business direct access to localized influence, credibility, and reach. Influencers often deeply understand their audience’s preferences and cultural nuances, and leveraging their insights helps your brand deliver tailored messages that resonate with specific demographics.

8. Online reputation management

Online reputation management goes beyond monitoring reviews — it’s about building and maintaining trust worldwide. Integrating website features like customer review sections or testimonial pages provides social proof that resonates with all audiences by showcasing positive user experiences from users around the world.

Actively managing your brand’s online reputation involves constructively addressing negative feedback, highlighting positive customer stories, and showcasing your responsiveness and commitment to customer satisfaction. By taking a global approach to reputation management, you ensure that users from different regions perceive your business as trustworthy and reliable — creating a universally positive brand image that appeals to all markets. A strong, authentic online reputation also influences customer loyalty and is often a deciding factor in a consumer’s choice to engage with your brand.

How to implement a global digital marketing strategy in 5 steps

Strategic digital marketing requires a keen understanding of cultural sensitivities, local market dynamics, and the unique characteristics that distinguish one audience from another.

Here are five steps for carrying out an effective international digital marketing strategy.

1. Conduct market research

Initiating global digital marketing campaigns starts with comprehensive market research. Delve into the intricacies of cultural norms, local values, and purchasing behaviors specific to each regional demographic you plan to target. Employ customer surveys, analyze market data, and engage local marketing consultants to ensure your efforts are culturally sensitive, respectful, and resonant with region-specific audiences.

For example, if your brand expands into the Norwegian market, you might explore local shopping trends, popular digital platforms, and cultural preferences. A survey could reveal that Norwegian consumers highly value detailed product information and a minimalist aesthetic in web design. Equipped with this knowledge, you can tailor the website and advertising campaigns to resonate with Norwegian consumers by aligning your content and approach with their expectations and preferences.

2. Determine your objectives

With insights into regional markets, you’re ready to set clear, measurable objectives for your global marketing strategy. This includes defining what success means for your brand in each market, whether it’s expanding brand awareness, increasing sales, or enhancing customer engagement.

For example, in a market like Germany, which highly values data privacy, your objective might be building trust and transparency to foster brand loyalty. In contrast, a rapidly growing market like India might have you prioritizing sales and capturing market share. These objectives should guide your marketing strategy so you can create focused and effective marketing campaigns tailored to achieve region-specific goals.

3. Set the scope

Since your resources, like marketing budget and personnel availability, are limited, you’ll need to establish the scope of your digital marketing strategy. Determine the specific geographical regions you’ll target and understand the unique attributes of each market, considering aspects like language differences, cultural preferences, and market behaviors.

For instance, when focusing on the German market, you might emphasize efficiency and precision in your campaigns, as these values resonate more strongly there. Conversely, a more emotion-driven, lifestyle-centric approach might prove more effective in Italy, given the cultural emphasis on “la dolce vita,” or living life slowly to enjoy it to the fullest.

Setting a clear scope fine-tunes your content and marketing efforts to speak directly to your intended audiences, which will optimize your resource use and enhance your campaigns’ effectiveness.

4. Identify appropriate strategies

Choosing the right marketing strategies that align with your objectives requires a deep understanding of various digital marketing channels, including SEO and SEM and social media and email marketing. Delve into comprehensive analytics, market research, and competitor analysis to identify the most suitable approaches and ensure they align with your business goals and effectively engage your target audiences.

For example, your analysis might reveal that a particular market responds better to visually driven social media campaigns while another shows higher engagement with email marketing.

5. Don’t forget about web development

When planning out your international marketing strategies, include comprehensive web development resources. Site updates are often integral to strategy efficacy, and you don’t want to skimp on important changes like location-specific SEO tags and culturally appropriate graphics.

Let’s say you implement an SEM strategy that directs visitors to specific landing pages. From a web development standpoint, you’ll want to ensure there are region-specific pages and that your main site has proper internationalization and localization to support multiple languages and region-specific dynamic content. This strategic alignment between your website’s functionality and your marketing campaigns creates a cohesive experience for the user.

Streamline your website internationalization efforts with Webflow

A great website speaks to its audience — and that often requires creating unique site experiences for different global users.

From design to translation to built-in SEO tools, Webflow Localization unlocks full customization of your site for your target audience — no matter where they are.

Expanding into international markets is about more than just widening your reach — it’s about forging deep, authentic connections in each locale. With website localization services, you go beyond mere language translations by crafting content that feels inherently familiar to an audience and imbuing it with the richness of local context and cultural nuances. It’s a strategy that boosts engagement and positions your brand as culturally attuned, paving the way for success in new markets.

Read on to learn how to localize your website and capture new markets successfully.

What’s website localization, and why is it important?

Website localization (l10n) adapts your website to mirror different target markets’ unique cultural and linguistic nuances. Beyond literal website translations, localization fine-tunes visual design elements like color schemes and layouts while adapting practical details like currency, date formats, and measurement units to align with the local audience’s preferences and norms.

This strategic adaptation aims to resonate personally with each user by presenting your offerings in an understandable, culturally relevant, and engaging way. At its core, localization makes every user feel that you designed the website with their specific cultural context in mind, which fosters a sense of belonging and increases user satisfaction. And since 76% of consumers prefer to make purchases in their native language, website localization ultimately leads to higher conversion rates. 

How is localization different from globalization, internationalization, and translation?

Localization involves modifying your content, products, and services, whether online or offline. However, similar terms may overlap with localization despite having distinct definitions and purposes, including:

• Internationalization (i18n). Internationalization is the preparatory step that makes products or content adaptable to different languages, regions, and cultures without losing its essence and structure. For example, rather than hard-coding a specific date format (like MM/DD/YYYY), you can dynamically adjust to the user’s locale, displaying a format used in their region, such as DD/MM/YYYY or YYYY/MM/DD. The application adapts to different cultural conventions without requiring extensive changes during localization.
• Globalization (g11n). Unlike localization, globalization doesn’t focus on adapting to local nuances. Instead, it involves optimizing for an international audience. More of a marketing strategy than a process, you focus on making a product or service universally relevant and efficient so users in different countries and regions can and want to interact with it. A global brand, such as Apple or Android, maintains a consistent presence with minimal adjustments, like SIM versus eSIM options, to cater to varying technical standards.
• Translation (t9n). Translation converts text from one language to another while preserving the original content’s meaning and context. While it’s critical for localization, translation focuses solely on language conversion. For example, translating a website from English to Spanish means changing the language to suit Spanish-speaking audiences while preserving the original message, tone, and context.

What are the benefits of website localization?

Embracing website localization offers multiple advantages that are crucial for businesses aiming to expand their global footprint, such as:

Higher SEO rankings

Localizing your website optimizes it for region-specific keywords and phrases commonly used in search engines like Google and Bing. This localization leads to better search engine optimization (SEO) and visibility in local search results, drawing in audiences actively searching in their native language.

For example, incorporating popular Japanese search terms into your website will boost its rankings on Japanese search engine results pages (SERPs), which drives more targeted and organic traffic.

Enhanced brand image

Adapting your website to respect and reflect your target audience’s local culture and language demonstrates a commitment to understanding their unique needs and preferences. This level of personalization shows cultural sensitivity and fosters trust and loyalty among your audience, helping create stronger, more meaningful connections with existing and potential customers. Consider how a website that reflects local holidays and traditions in its content and design can significantly improve the audience’s perception of the brand as empathetic and considerate.

For example, an ecommerce platform might adapt its color scheme and imagery to appeal to Japanese cultural preferences. It could introduce red to symbolize excitement and energy and white to create a sense of space and simplicity, aligning the site’s aesthetic with Japanese cultural values.

Expanded audience reach

Each new localized site version opens doors to a new demographic, complete with its own market dynamics and consumer preferences. By breaking down linguistic and cultural barriers, website localization enables you to connect with consumers who might otherwise be inaccessible or not interact with a non-localized website. This enhances your market penetration and brand reach.

Increased customer engagement

When users can navigate your site in their native language and effortlessly comprehend its contents, they’re more likely to interact with your offerings. This increased familiarity leads to longer browsing sessions, more satisfying user experiences, and higher conversion rates.

For example, the ecommerce store localizing for a Japanese audience might showcase products in settings familiar to Japanese customers, using local living contexts and backgrounds in its product images. Doing so enhances product relatability and integrates products into the Japanese lifestyle narrative, making them more appealing to Japanese consumers. Additionally, the brand can reconfigure the website’s layout and visual hierarchy to support right-to-left reading patterns to meet the standard Japanese navigation expectations.

Alignment with local buying habits

Tailoring your website to regional preferences and buying habits includes customizing payment methods, shipping options, product page layouts, and even promotional activities like seasonal discounts. This customization ensures that your website aligns with the local market’s shopping behavior, making it more user-friendly and increasing the likelihood of conversions.

With the example of an ecommerce store localizing for a Japanese market, the platform might update its pricing to include Japanese currency symbols and adopt local pricing conventions for quick comprehension. 

A competitive edge in global markets

By presenting a website that speaks directly to local audiences, your brand distinguishes itself from competitors who have yet to make similar efforts. This strategic approach positions your brand as more accessible and relatable because it resonates with each region’s cultural and practical preferences. Such positioning not only enhances brand loyalty but also helps attract new customers who appreciate the tailored experience.

Such targeted localization efforts help transform a company’s website design into a culturally relevant, user-friendly destination for international customers. It overcomes language barriers and cultural differences to offer an easy-to-navigate, engaging experience that enhances brand loyalty and helps attract new customers who appreciate the tailored experience.

How to implement website localization in 9 steps

Planning your website is as important as the execution. Here are nine website localization best practices to consider so you can create a practical road map to follow.

1. Plan strategically

Effective localization strategy hinges on choosing a target location and effectively understanding its local compliance requirements, including specific laws governing online content, data protection, and privacy. By adhering to these regulations, you help prevent future legal complications and foster trust among the local audience.

After identifying these requirements, draft a comprehensive plan that outlines the project’s scope, objectives, and timeline. This plan should cover aspects of content adaptation and technical adjustments, including both back-end and front-end development, as well as an in-depth analysis of the local market.

For example, a German localization plan would start with translating text into German, using culturally relevant expressions and idioms, and adjusting the tone and style to resonate with German speakers. Regarding technical adjustments, you might need to integrate popular German payment options, such as SEPA Direct Debit, and ensure your site complies with the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) for data protection and privacy.

2. Conduct thorough market research

Comprehensive market research helps you understand the specific trends, needs, and preferences of your target region and provides you with valuable insights to tailor your website to the local audience effectively.

Additionally, thorough competitor analysis is integral to this research. By examining competitors’ strategies in your target market, you identify what works well and where gaps or opportunities may exist. This analysis helps you pinpoint unique selling points that you can leverage in your marketing strategies to enable better website and brand differentiation in the new market.

For example, suppose you’re localizing your website for the Brazilian market. Your research might reveal that local competitors focus heavily on social media integration and mobile-friendly designs due to high mobile device and social media platform usage. With this insight, you can develop your website to prominently feature these elements, aligning it with local user habits and preferences to deliver a more resonant experience.

3. Build a capable team

Assemble a team of linguists, translators, developers, UI/UX designers, project managers, and cultural experts. This specialized team ensures accurate translation, culturally relevant design, and technical adaptability. Effective collaboration among these experts accelerates the localization process and helps you enter new markets faster and more efficiently.

4. Perform keyword research

Keyword research is essential for optimizing your site for local search engines. By identifying and leveraging the terms and phrases that your target audience commonly uses in online searches, you can dramatically increase the traffic your site receives.

To facilitate this research process, engage your team of linguists, translators, and cultural experts. Their expertise is invaluable in understanding the nuances of popular search terms, including their context and usage within the local language and culture. This in-depth understanding ensures your selected keywords are accurate and resonate with regional audiences.

After identifying these keywords, optimize your website’s content, metadata, and links to include them. This optimization should be holistic and encompass website elements such as page titles, descriptions, blog posts, and product listings. By strategically embedding these keywords throughout your site, you enhance its relevance and visibility in local SERPs.

For example, consider a travel agency aiming to expand into Spanish-speaking markets. Through keyword research, the agency identifies popular travel-related search terms specific to this audience, including “vacaciones económicas” (affordable vacations) or “destinos populares en España” (popular destinations in Spain). The agency then integrates these keywords into its website — from the homepage all the way down to specific travel package descriptions. Doing so improves the site’s SERP ranking in Spanish-speaking regions and attracts local travelers searching for relevant travel options, ultimately increasing site traffic.

5. Automate the website localization process

Automating the localization process is key to reducing manual errors and efficiently managing multilingual content. Automation ensures consistent and seamless user experiences across different site language versions.

To streamline the localization process, consider investing in a robust content management system (CMS) like Webflow. Such systems let you integrate plugins and automated tools to handle tasks like translation, content updates, and format adjustments, speeding up the process while ensuring uniformity and accuracy across all localized website versions.

6. Incorporate website internationalization

Internationalization makes adding new localized versions of your website simpler, easing the expansion process. To support future localization efforts, ensure your website is flexible enough to accommodate diverse content, date formats, and other area-specific elements.

Consider an ecommerce site that plans to expand to different countries. By internationalizing its code, the site can support multiple languages and currencies to allow for a smooth transition as it expands into new markets. Here, internationalization involves implementing a flexible template system and database structure that dynamically changes according to the user’s location to ensure the site automatically displays the appropriate language, currency, and cultural references.

7. Localize the user experience and user interface

After establishing a flexible coding structure, focus on localizing the user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) to make the site intuitive and culturally relevant for each specific audience. This includes customizing visuals, colors, icons, fonts, and layouts to match regional design preferences. You should also adjust navigation elements like menus and button placements to reflect regional user interactions.

For example, while some cultures prefer more visual menus, others opt for text-heavy, straightforward navigation. If you’re localizing for a Middle Eastern audience, you might consider a right-to-left layout to accommodate languages like Arabic and Hebrew, which read differently from the left-to-right orientation of many Western languages. A localized UX/UI contributes to good website design and creates a familiar and user-friendly interface, which drives increased engagement and user satisfaction.

8. Test and launch your website

Before going live, test your localized website to identify and resolve any issues. Check that all features function correctly, including language accuracy and design elements. You can also perform A/B testing by creating two website versions and seeing which performs better with your target audience.

Test your site on different devices and browsers to ensure compatibility, and ask native speakers, linguists, translators, and cultural experts for feedback. Modify your website based on their insights and suggestions to offer your target market a smooth user experience.

9. Market your localized website

Marketing your localized website attracts visitors and makes your target audience aware of your online presence. To market your localized website, launch advertising campaigns on platforms popular in the local market, collaborate with regional influencers, and use social media channels and search engines for outreach.

For instance, if you’re targeting the Japanese market, consider using local social media platforms like LINE for promotions because it boasts a significant Japanese user base. These targeted marketing efforts help communicate your website’s value to the local audience.

Add localization to your Webflow site

Website localization is the gateway to new markets and audiences — and Webflow’s native localization features ensure you cover all your bases. Whether it’s changing your site structure or tweaking content for regional relevance, Webflow’s user-friendly design tools and CMS make it effortless.

If you’re ready to scale globally, discover how Webflow Localization can help you build a more engaging and inclusive digital presence today.

At its highest level, email marketing is about using a combination of text and visuals to create a connection with your audience and have them complete an action— anything from redeeming an offer, downloading your latest how-to guide, or reading your latest newsletter. Success in an email campaign, subsequently, is measured by the number of actions taken, otherwise known as conversion.  

Your ability to generate conversions hinges not only on the design of the email, but also what you say. It’s important to think beyond color choices, theme, and branding and more so how the overall visuals and text come together. 

But there’s much more to it — here’s our guide on what you should consider when it comes to the design of your email campaign. 

First impressions happen faster than you think.

At any given time users can have 20, 50, or even hundreds  of unread emails. Oftentimes, to find emails of interest, a user skims or scans through their inbox to see what catches their eye. The different intents of someone who’s skimming versus scanning however, varies: 

• Skimming:  To read rapidly in order to get a general overview of the material.
• Scanning:  To read rapidly in order to find specific facts.  

In other words skimmers are looking for something of interest and scanners are looking for something of value.  Both are collecting information quickly, so the challenge is to capture each one, and get them to pause when they get to your email. 

It starts with your subject line

On the surface, having a good subject line appears to be a no-brainer, but as the first touchpoint with your audience — it matters a lot, and requires thought and consideration during the creation process   

Consider these stats: 

• 64% of recipients decide to open or delete emails based on subject lines
• 33% of users choose to open emails because of catchy subject lines
• A subject line alone is enough to entice 47% of email recipients to open the email
• 69% of email recipients will report spam based on the email subject line

Given that email consistently ranks at or near the top in terms of ROI versus other digital channels  — with $36 returned for every $1 spent — getting someone’s attention with your subject line can make a big impact on your ROI.  

To get started,  we’d recommend tapping into the wealth of free subject line tools available such as SubjectLine.com. 

Give equal weight to images and text

Images in your email are always a good idea, but make sure they tie directly to your message. As users skim or scan an email, they’ll look for things to “line up.” On a psychological level, this is due to brains needing to connect images with text in order to create meaning.  When images and words work together the intended message comes through loud and clear  — making it much more likely that readers will convert. 

Here are some tried-and-true best practices:

• Design for a vertical layout rather than horizontal
• Use properly-sized images for optimal rendering and to ensure the email loads quickly
• Put buttons in prominent places with clear call-outs
• Be concise – too much text is overwhelming
• Use spaces, images, or dividing lines to create breaks in content
• Make your email mobile-responsive (most email providers do this by default)

Remember, brevity is your friend. If you have a lot to say, use email as a sneak peek and entice the reader to click through for more information.

Animation can be a difference maker

When used properly, animation can be incredibly effective. It catches the reader’s eye and can be used to convey a lot of information very quickly.  We like using it subtly — more as a  gentle guide to your CTA or intended action versus something that is loud and bold. 

When using animations, avoid the temptation of using it simply for the sake of trying to catch the reader’s eye. Like images, it’s important that any animations match the context of the overall message.  

For some great examples of animation in email, click here or here. 

Make it personal

One of the easiest ways to capture a reader’s attention is through personalizing elements of your email.  Most email service providers —including Campaigner — offer ways to help you with everything. This includes ensuring the greeting in the email includes a recipient’s first name, to using dynamic content to pull in product recommendations, to content specific to the city they live in.  

Some personalization stats to consider:

• Marketers report a remarkable 760% increase in email revenue from adopting personalized and segmented campaigns
• Emails featuring personalized subjects are 50% more likely to be opened
• Personalized emails achieve an impressive open rate of 29% and an outstanding click-through rate of 41% 
• 60% of consumers are inclined to become repeat buyers after enjoying a personalized shopping experience with a retailer  
• 57% of marketers attribute improved visitor engagement to the implementation of email personalization

Test, learn, repeat

Though you’re probably well acquainted with your subscribers and customers — interests and buying habits can change.  As a result a certain type of email style or content that once brought a large number of conversions may prove less effective over time.  

This is where A/B testing is an excellent way to stay on top of how your audience’s interests may be changing over time.  By testing subtle variations of the same email campaign, you can see which resonates most and use the winning version either for your current campaign or for your next one.

The good news is, most email service providers offer A/B testing as a standard feature, allowing you to test different subject lines, images, content and other elements of your email campaigns.  This is one of your most effective tools in understanding how to optimize your email design (and email content) to produce the best results possible.

Emails are a powerful marketing asset — design them wisely 

Most digital marketing channels are noisy, especially in the “endless scroll” world that we live in. When you get someone to stop, open and read your email, you are now in a 1:1 conversation with that person.  

So, it’s absolutely vital to  design your emails thoughtfully and strategically. When images and words work together in a clean, consumable design, the power of a message is undeniable. 

For more insights on email marketing, be sure to check out the Campaigner blog.

In a virtual environment where trust is essential but elusive, real reviews from real people are invaluable tools for fostering credibility and brand confidence. Customer testimonials are powerful narratives that reflect a user’s experience with your brand. They infuse a personal touch into your online reputation that potential customers can connect with.

But asking for testimonials and effectively collating this social proof presents unique challenges, like ineffective feedback forums and choosing where to share your testimonials. Read on to learn how to get started.

Why testimonials are important in digital marketing

We covered what a customer testimonial is — here’s why they’re important. If you were running a brick-and-mortar store, potential customers could drive down, browse, interact with your staff, speak to fellow customers, and examine your products in person before deciding to purchase. But these interactions aren’t possible for companies that only sell online. Potential clients can reach out to your sales team or request a product demo, but it’s not easy for them to connect with past customers. 

This disconnect is where client testimonials become valuable. Here are some ways reviews are a game-changer for your online marketing strategies.

Build trust

In place of face-to-face conversations, testimonials act as compelling endorsements that vouch for the credibility and reliability of your brand. These endorsements, in turn, foster a sense of trust in your product or service and build an online community of users who promote this trust.

Say a potential customer is on the fence about purchasing a subscription to your project management software. They’ll likely look online to find out what others say about your product. If they immediately find testimonials from users who enjoy it, they’ll feel more confident about trusting your brand. This phenomenon is known as social proof — evidence that someone else has purchased and benefited from the same product or service.

Improve your online presence

Client testimonials play a pivotal role in shaping and elevating your online presence. A BrightLocal study found that 98% of consumers read reviews — these reviews are just another chance to get people learning and talking about your product or service. And these testimonials often tell readers more about your offering than a website or social post can. This content builds on branding information you’ve already put out there to increase overall brand awareness and recognition.

Identify improvement areas

Thus far, we’ve focused on positive customer testimonials. But less-than-stellar reviews are just as valuable — if not more so. These testimonials offer valuable insights into your company’s improvement areas. By implementing these fixes, you directly meet customer pain points and reduce user friction. 

You can create a blog post or case study highlighting how you’ve made improvements based on customer feedback. This strategy simultaneously shows customers you care about their user experience and value their feedback. And these responses could make them more willing to offer feedback in the future.

Common types of website testimonials

Each of the following testimonial types serves a unique purpose and provides distinct insights into your brand’s impact on customers. Your testimonials might range from success stories that narrate transformative experiences to feature-specific reviews that zoom in on particular aspects.

Here are the most common types and how you might leverage the insights each offers.

Quote testimonials

Quote testimonials are concise, written snippets that capture a customer’s experience. You can use these quote testimonials across your website, your marketing material, and even within product descriptions. They serve as quick, digestible affirmations potential customers can easily absorb.

Video testimonials

Testimonial videos add a human touch by enabling customers to express their experiences verbally. These videos create a stronger emotional connection and give potential customers a real person to relate to and trust. 

But while testimonial videos are powerful, they have a higher overhead to solicit, produce, and present. Keep these costs in mind when deciding what type of testimonial to use. The video format makes excellent content for landing pages, social media channels, and video ads.

Case study testimonials

Case study testimonials provide an in-depth exploration of success stories. These reviews dive deep into the customer’s journey, detailing their challenges, how your solution addressed them, and the positive outcomes. Case study testimonials are ideal for showcasing the transformative power of your products or services.

Say you run a branding company where people can only purchase merchandise online. You can include a case study testimonial outlining how a customer placed a bulk order for a corporate event while praising the material quality and designs.

This long-form testimonial type requires more reader time and attention, so you might place these on a dedicated testimonials page, unpack them in a blog post, or turn them into video testimonials. For example, you can ask the customer to record a 30-second video of them wearing your merchandise while discussing their positive experience. 

Social media testimonials

Social media testimonials can take the form of comments, reels, tweets, or posts on platforms like Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), TikTok, and Facebook. These reviews are authentic, real-time endorsements that contribute to your brand’s online presence — and they’re particularly powerful because they enable you to reach your customer’s community. 

Consider including social media testimonials by reposting them on your company’s social media page or including them on your website.

How to highlight testimonials

Once you’ve gathered user testimonials, it’s important to help potential customers find them. Here are some strategic ideas on where to place testimonials on your website.

Homepage

Your homepage is the digital front door to your business, making it a prime location for testimonials. Visitors often land on the home page first; a well-placed testimonial can create an immediate positive impression. 

Consider incorporating a dynamic testimonial section that rotates through a selection of quotes to create a stream of positive reinforcement. Or, use a carefully placed video testimonial.

Product description

Embedding testimonials within product descriptions offers potential customers real insights into the benefits and satisfaction levels specific products bring. This strategic placement can influence purchasing decisions by providing social proof while customers actively consider a product. You might preface your testimonials with the words, “Don’t just take our word for it. Read what our customers are saying.”

Product review

Besides including quote testimonials in product descriptions, try providing a place for customers to leave reviews on every product page. This approach encourages happy customers to share their enthusiasm for your product or service.

Testimonials page

A dedicated testimonials page offers a centralized location to showcase all your customer reviews. These hubs are especially effective when your testimonials are long-form, like case studies.

How to solicit testimonials: 4 steps

While every business and customer interaction is unique, check out these four steps to help you ask for customer testimonials.

1. Define the type of testimonial you’re looking for

Start by setting a goal for what you want to achieve with testimonials. You might wish to highlight customer experiences or emphasize the environmental impact of your services. Then, use this information to determine if you need a quote, case study, social media, or video testimonial.

2. Create a testimonial process

Like any other user flow on your platform, you’ll want to create a testimonial process that minimizes user friction. Make it convenient for customers to share their experiences so they’re motivated to complete the process. You can minimize the number of steps customers need to leave their testimonials or use authentication methods that can verify a user is a real person without asking them to go through a lengthy signup process. By creating user-friendly flows, you invite customers to participate.

3. Set up a way to collect testimonials

Another way to reduce user friction in the testimonial process is to give customers options for how to share their testimonials. Tailor your collection process based on the preferences and engagement patterns of your community of users.

For instance, you could send personalized requests via an email campaign or offer options like in-person interviews and phone conversations. If many of your users frequent social media, you could also create a hashtag customers can use to leave reviews. And you might set up a dedicated online forum to collect feedback.

4. Define touchpoints

Identify strategic touchpoints in the customer journey when it makes sense to request testimonials. These touchpoints could be after a successful purchase, project completion, or a positive customer service interaction. 

Selecting opportune moments increases the likelihood of capturing real, positive feedback. If you prompt a new customer to provide a quote testimonial three months post-purchase, they might not be interested in giving feedback anymore. By contacting them a couple of days after purchase, when the new product or service is fresh in their mind, you increase the chance of getting an enthusiastic and accurate review. 

Crafting credibility with Webflow

User testimonials empower your brand to reach your target audience via your existing customer base. Leveraging user feedback provides an organic way to grow your personal brand reputation and trust.

But having client testimonials isn’t enough. You need a great way to display them. That’s where Webflow comes in. Our powerful visual development platform helps you build impressive home pages, about us pages, and product pages so you can showcase user testimonials strategically throughout your site. Get started with Webflow Enterprise.

Apple’s “Shot on iPhone” billboards. Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke’” personalized bottles. IBM’s “Cognitive Studio” activation at SXSW. Netflix’s “Women Inmates: Why The Male Model Doesn’t Work” interactive spon-con in The New York Times. 

What do they have in common? All are smart, stunning brand campaigns businesses have devised to attract and connect with their target audiences. And all are examples of how visual communication can be extremely powerful . 

What is visual communication?

Print ads, billboards, catalogs, television commercials — brands have used these mediums to visually communicate with consumers for hundreds of years. Today, businesses deploy a wide range of media to reach an enormous audience (think Super Bowl ads) or a single individual (thanks to digital personalization). There’s a laundry list of visual communication options available to modern marketers and designers, including:

• Photography
• Illustration
• Microsites
• Video
• Infographics
• Charts and graphs
• Gifs
• Emoji
• Animation and motion graphics
• Presentations and slide decks
• AI-generated everything (for better or worse)

Each medium has its merits, but brands that stand out tend to find a way to rise above the noise of modern life and capture their audience’s attention. 

“I’ve always admired brands like Apple and Nike, but IBM’s historical significance truly stands out to me,” says Rese Wynn, Senior Brand Designer, here, at Webflow. “In the ‘90s, they pioneered the idea that enterprise brands don’t have to be dull. They crafted a unique visual language that spoke to their technical audience in a well-designed and engaging manner — prioritizing quality and good design. In my opinion, they laid the groundwork for the power of visuals in a company.”

The psychological benefits of visual communication

Pictures aren’t worth a thousand words because they’re aesthetically pleasing. They’re valuable because our brains are hard-wired for visual content. We’ve been absorbing and processing visual forms of communication since the days of Neandrathals and cave paintings — long before the written word came along. 

On an evolutionary basis, we’re much more adept at processing images over words, according to the Picture Superiority Effect.

Consider how the simplest visual cues, like colors or shapes, evoke instant responses. A red octagon prompts you to hit the brakes. A certain shade of robin’s-egg blue makes you think of Tiffany and Co’s fine jewelry. Even the direction and weight of a humble line can convey different concepts — with horizontal lines suggesting calmness while vertical lines convey strength. 

Our evolutionary disposition to visual communication means that brands can benefit from the power of visuals: capturing attention, improving retention, and enhancing clarity. 

Visual communication captures attention

“First impressions count, especially in business,” says Rese. “And visuals are the most impactful and easily understood tool.” 

Most people process images and visuals much faster than the written word — often with a simple glance. That means brands can make a meaningful experience out of a microsecond. 

“Across the marketing org at Webflow, we talk about ‘visually stunning’ work regularly,” says Pat Szot, Webflow’s Senior Brand Designer who specializes in video. “Using these two words to evaluate work is a litmus test for an asset. We ask ourselves, ‘Is this so beautiful that it will stun the viewer, cause a pause, encourage a moment of rest to let the eyes wander?’ When we pair it with ‘resonant content’, then we’re really set up for success when putting a message out into the world.” 

With good designs, brands have a chance to capture and capitalize on momentary attention. 

“I just ran into one of Zapier’s new ads on YouTube the other day and, decidedly, did not ‘skip ad’,” says Pat. “They’ve been launching some seriously stunning and fun work executing on their 2022 brand change. Their ability to visualize what ‘automation feels like’ is amazing.” 

Visual communication improves retention

When people study items as pictures versus only as words, they tend to retain and recall information better. One of the theories behind why this happens is that visual stimuli embed into our memory in two ways: as an image, and as a verbal code for what we’ve seen. Those two pathways, psychologists think, provide a “stickier” experience in our memory. 

“People are naturally visual,” says Pat. “So if businesses ignore the visual layer when presenting ideas, it does the work a disservice.”

By incorporating visuals into brand communications — internal, external, short or long-form — enterprises can count on making an impression that lasts.

Visual communication enhances clarity

Finally, research has shown that visual explanations help most of us understand complex messages more clearly — and approximately 65% of people identify as visual learners. 

“Because enterprises specifically address groups and audiences, we have to present our ideas intentionally,” Pat says. “Taking the time to craft the visual aspect of communication helps ensure that our ideas are interpreted as needed.”

This is why many brands and publications have refined the art of the infographic over the last several years. Infographics allow brands to tell a story and communicate more complex information through a combination of text, typography, charts, illustrations, or other visuals.

How enterprise orgs can create more meaningful and visual communicative experiences

Of course, not all corporate forms of visual communication are created equal. We all remember the ubiquitous stock photography of the 2000s. 

So our resident design experts, Rese and Pat, have a few recommendations for enterprise teams looking to create more impactful and visually communicative experiences — and a few examples of how visuals come to life here at Webflow.

Maintain visual consistency with brand guidelines

“Visual consistency is key,” says Rese. “Whether you’re selling to consumers or businesses, the visual message should be cohesive.”

Guidelines can help large teams stay on the same page and deliver cohesive visual experiences. As an added bonus, they help everyone work faster. 

“As a designer, reinventing the wheel is a painful and slow process,” says Pat. “Guidelines are huge timesavers in these cases because they help clear the way of decisions about the brand and asset that I don’t have to make.” 

Pair creative experiments with data-driven testing

However, following brand guidelines doesn’t mean eliminating all creative experimentation. Like any department within a business, designers need the space to innovate. 

“We’ve been getting into a rhythm of testing designs in the market,” says Pat. “We work closely with our performance and digital strategy teams to test different styles of design with data. When we have conversations about what’s been successful and what’s resonated with our market, we make adjustments accordingly.”

With this data-backed approach, the team can evolve their look and feel while staying tethered to the core of the brand. “We can experiment and try expressing new ideas in different ways,” Pat says. “As designs perform well, they get integrated in guidelines, and we move on to test different design variables. It’s been a great way to try new methods of interpreting the brand or the guidelines, while always feeling grounded in the core Webflow identity.”

Root your visuals in your company differentiator

“Start your visual design with an observation about the business,” says Pat. “Ask, what makes your business different or special? From there, iterate on ways to showcase that difference to the market.”

Here at Webflow, the creative team knows that the invested community is a huge part of what sets our business apart. “Sharing ideas, processes, and builds with users has been a core part of our identity,” says Pat. “Over the years, we’ve doubled down and then tripled down on how we showcase that aspect of the business. Today, it feeds a really creative cycle of work.”

For example, at Webflow Conf, our annual user conference, our team produces video testimonials from community members. Those interviews are conducted all at once, but are published, repurposed, and shared throughout the year. “But the point is, we started with the observation about the community,” says Pat. “And from that, we’ve built out a process that really works for our business.”

Find opportunities to introduce visuals in unexpected places

“Enterprises show up at industry events, conferences, and trade shows,” says Pat. “That’s a great opportunity to incorporate video into event presentations, booth displays, and virtual conferences because it can help attract attendees, increase engagement, and leave a longer-lasting impression.” 

Pat advises that organizations look to unexpected places to go beyond the written word, especially when clarity is paramount. “Recently, we’ve been polishing up our developer support channels for folks who build third-party apps to connect into Webflow,” he says. “We’re using video on our Documentation and FAQ pages to help explain specifications for developers — it’s a great way to eliminate friction.”

Get designers, writers, and marketers working in sync ASAP

Too often, designers and writers are running a relay — handing off copy without considering design — when they should be in a three-legged race.

“Designers are integral to a business’s public image,” says Rese. “They touch, read, and see everything, and recognizing their holistic understanding of the business is crucial for effective discussions. Designers do more than create appealing visuals — they shape how your business is perceived by the public. It’s essential for designers to be involved from beginning to end.”

Recently, Rese led the creative team that worked on our 2024 State of the Website ebook. Initially, the process followed a traditional approach of the marketing team providing copy, and the creative team creating layouts. But quickly, the team realized that method wasn’t ideal.

“We changed our approach by actively involving our creative content partners, instead of just taking their copy and running with it,” Rese said. “Together, we identified areas to highlight and addressed lengthy copy issues. Their collaboration helped us develop visuals that not only looked appealing, but also provided context and emphasis to the presented statistics and data.”

Stay inspired 

From everyday interactions to headline-worthy brand campaigns, the opportunities enterprises have to visually communicate with their audience are endless. And that can get quite overwhelming very quickly.

Stay inspired by seeing what the talented folks in the wider Webflow community are creating. Check out our more of our blog, follow us on Instagram, or subscribe to Webflow Inspo to get the latest in design, marketing, development, and more — delivered to your inbox every week. 

In the past, business leaders used intuition to make bold decisions about their companies with little research to support their ideas. With more data available today, teams are empowered to prioritize a data-driven approach. This surge in analytics-based decision-making has led to significant gains for organizations entering a new “big data” frontier.

Applying the data-driven decision-making (DDDM) model is crucial to your team’s success, but the framework is only as effective as your preparation, implementation, and maintenance. Learn how to use data to make decisions, the ins and outs of this model, and the proper steps to optimize your company’s data-based approach.

Why is data-driven decision-making important?

Data-driven decision-making is a business philosophy that uses data analytics above all else to inform decision-making. A business using DDDM opts to predicate its marketing tactics, business model, and even brand identity on improving specific key metrics. The goal is to remove intuition and guesswork from the equation, resulting in more predictable outcomes.

Here are a few benefits of DDDM:

• Increased transparency and accountability. Quantifiable metrics are easy to disseminate through your team, putting everyone squarely on the same page.
• Continuous improvement. Tracking key metrics and prioritizing their significance helps set solid goals and monitor progress.
• Increased consistency. When all members track results and progress using the same key metrics, communication is straightforward and the team’s overall output is cohesive.
• Cost savings. Guesswork involves significant trial and error, and each error involves wasteful spending. With a data-driven model, you’ll see more successful trials and avoid investing resources in the wrong initiatives.

Lufthansa, a German airline, is an incredible example of DDDM done right. When they moved to a unified analytics platform for their more than 500 subsidiary companies, their efficiency skyrocketed by over 30%. This could only occur when business leaders began to make consistent, data-driven decisions.

Data-driven vs. data-informed

A data-driven decision is based solely on metrics, while a data-informed decision involves other inputs like business objectives and brand identity. Both can result in a positive outcome, but a data-informed decision still relies partly on intuition. Teams using data-informed strategies may face analysis paralysis more than when considering data alone.

Usually more straightforward than data-informed decisions, a data-driven model is easier to automate. For example, Netflix uses customer viewing data to recommend shows they might enjoy. This is an automated, data-driven strategy that results in higher viewership. If Netflix used a data-informed model, it might gather the same data but rely on employees to make recommendations to specific customer groups.

Key components of data-driven decisions

DDDM relies on two primary components: accurate, relevant data and its correlations. Here’s how these aspects work in tandem for a successful model:

• Accurate, relevant data. If your analytics are inaccurate or irrelevant to tracking your goals, your decisions will suffer. Ensure you’ve validated all of your metrics before you use them to make decisions.
• Metric correlations. Correlations between metrics are a key component of data literacy because they guide teams in generating creative ideas for reaching goals. Encourage your team to ask why the metrics are the way they are. This way, they’ll understand data dependencies and be more confident in their approaches to manipulating the numbers.

How to make effective data-driven decisions: 6 steps

Proper DDDM requires setting highly specific goals and developing targeted solutions. It takes significant effort to craft a strong data-driven strategy and then track it closely. Luckily, the following six steps can simplify developing and maintaining your data-driven process.

1. Clarify business goals

Your first objective is to identify what gains you’d like to see. Begin with goals that are easy to measure, like increasing website traffic and reducing resource costs. You can use simple metrics to track these goals, and there are many ways to affect their outcomes.

After a few successful campaigns, apply your newfound expertise to more ambiguous targets, like improving employee retention or streamlining the customer experience. These goals are also measurable but require more creative analysis and complex metrics.

2. Poll your team for vital data sources

With clear goals in mind, you must identify the metrics you’ll use to track progress. Determining the correct measurements — and the tools you need to decipher and apply them — requires extensive data research. Consider bringing in qualified data researchers at this stage to help guide your efforts in the right direction.

Luckily, you can also rely on your team’s insights as a constant information source. Their expertise makes them suited to identify the best analysis tools and metrics for a given goal. And when it’s time to drive toward that goal, they’ll be prepared and motivated because they helped shape it.

3. Gather and organize essential data

Now, you’ll accumulate the relevant, accurate data that’s essential to DDDM’s effectiveness. Analysis tools track a wealth of metrics, so be selective and focus on those most closely related to your goals. Keep these data points orderly as you gather them — don’t let your metrics grow disorganized or fragmented into data silos.

The best data visualization and analytics tools have comprehensive dashboards, tables, and exportable spreadsheets. Optimize these resources and ensure everyone has access — the more informed your team is, the better their ideas will be.

4. Analyze and navigate data insights

At this point, you should have a mountain of metrics to sift through. Now, it’s time to unearth the most valuable gems from it. When you pinpoint the fundamental insights for informed decision-making, discuss them extensively with your team to reveal interesting aspects of your key findings.

Encourage your team to ask questions that help them better understand the data and how it all interconnects. Drawing accurate conclusions from a large data pool takes data literacy and expertise, so you may consult with expert researchers again to help guide the analysis process.

5. Use data to make decisions

With all your analytics in hand and a list of key insights, it’s time to act. Thankfully, a DDDM philosophy makes the right actions self-evident. The insights you analyzed should reveal the best course of action with little to no intuition.

For instance, if your goal is to cut costs, your metrics should show exactly where you can reduce spending. And if you aim to increase website traffic, you should easily see which strategies are working and which aren’t.

Sometimes, the insights you discover won’t easily translate into actions, which means you need more or different data. Make the best decision with the available information, but consider adjusting what you track going forward.

6. Monitor your decision’s impact by continuing to track metrics

After spending considerable time, money, and effort making a data-driven decision, it’s time to keep a sharp eye on how the choice plays out. Continue tracking your metrics to monitor whether your decision is achieving its goal. When you’ve gathered more insights, go back to the analysis step and seek opportunities for improvement.

Achieve your goals with Webflow

Transitioning to a DDDM model may seem like a complex shift in your business strategy, but the right tools and resources can streamline the process. Webflow Enterprise enables you to integrate many analytics and optimization tools into your website to help steer your data-driven decisions. With Webflow, you can create visually stunning, reliable websites that quickly expand to meet your company’s growing needs.

It’s often the first touchpoint for potential customers and an important source of information for returning visitors. In other words, your website is a prime opportunity to make a winning impression and frame users’ perception of your brand.

A key part of leaving a positive impact is a seamless and engaging user experience (UX). The more relevant, valuable, and navigable your site, the more likely users will stay and endorse it. Website optimization encompasses various content, design, and infrastructure strategies that help you build a user-friendly web platform that’s more likely to have customers coming back for more. Here’s how.

Why you need to optimize your website

Website optimization is an ongoing process that’s essential for maintaining the site’s relevance and effectiveness. To draw new visitors and maximize your return on investment (ROI), you must regularly refine your website to deliver an exceptional user experience. Optimizing your website also:

• Enhances the user experience. Regular updates ensure your website meets your users’ evolving preferences and expectations and provides a seamless and enjoyable online experience. This adaptability encourages visitors to stay longer and engage more deeply with your content.
• Increases visibility. As user engagement increases, search engine algorithms recognize your site as relevant and valuable, boost its ranking on the search engine results pages (SERPs), and make it more discoverable to potential customers. Higher rankings translate to more eyes on your site and broader reach for your brand.
• Drives higher traffic and conversions. Better visibility leads to increased organic traffic, and a well-optimized website converts more of this traffic into sales, improving your ROI and conversion rates. Optimized sites guide visitors smoothly through the sales funnel’s stages, capitalizing on every opportunity for conversion.
• Improves search engine optimization (SEO). Regular website optimization, which includes updating its keywords to align your platform with the evolving algorithms of search engines, keeps your site competitive and further increases its chances of ranking higher on the SERPs.

4 website optimization strategies

Website optimization involves a multifaceted approach that integrates content, design, SEO, and user experience. Let’s examine key strategies that boost your website’s performance, captivate your audience, and strengthen your online presence.

1. Create quality content

Valuable content draws new visitors to your site through search engines and backlinks. Aim to produce content that ranks well on SERPs and provides educational or entertaining value so it encourages visitors to return and share your site with their networks.

Google effectively identifies and favors high-quality content, focusing on:

• Relevance: Whether the content aligns with the search intent behind the keyword
• Authority: Your domain authority or credibility, influenced by factors like backlinks, user engagement, and overall popularity
• Stickiness: Whether your content genuinely engages visitors, reflected in longer dwell times and lower bounce rates on your site

To create content optimized for search engines and user satisfaction, consider the following steps:

Research and target keywords that match your audience’s search intent

Start your content strategy by conducting in-depth keyword research and identifying the terms and phrases closely aligning with what your target audience is searching for, or their search intent. Writing content that accurately reflects these keywords ensures you meet your audience’s needs more precisely. For example, if they search for “beginner yoga routines,” they expect content that introduces yoga practices, not advanced techniques.

By targeting the right keywords, you attract visitors more likely to engage with your content, stay on your site longer, and lower your bounce rate — and these user behaviors in turn elevate your search rankings.

Develop engaging and valuable content

Creating content that resonates with your audience involves more than just answering their questions — it requires providing them with a comprehensive resource. To achieve this, consider engaging subject matter experts to deepen your content’s authority, include relevant links for extended reading, and employ visuals like charts and infographics to clearly illustrate your points.

You should also structure your content to be user-friendly and substantial enough to serve as a standalone resource on the topic to reduce the chances of users bouncing to another site for more information. Studies — such as this study from SEO service providers Backlinko and Ahrefs — indicate that detailed articles over 1,400 words tend to secure higher rankings. By crafting detailed, in-depth content, you show search engines (and your audience) that your content is valuable, increasing your search rankings.

2. Audit and refresh your current content

Refreshing existing content can attract new readers and boost search engine rankings. Start with a content audit using SEO tools like Google Analytics and Google Search Console to examine web traffic and keyword standings. This data identifies content ripe for refinement. Then, follow these steps:

• Revise. Articles with high traffic but low engagement, such as low session durations and high bounce rates, signal that they’re not fulfilling visitor needs. Rectify this by reevaluating the search intent for your target keywords and reshaping the content accordingly. Enhancing your call to action (CTA) can also improve engagement.
• Refresh. Content that previously enjoyed high traffic but now experiences a lull requires an update. Replace outdated links, add updated statistics or insights, and enhance its visual appeal with new images or headers. This approach can reignite reader interest and breathe new life into your content.
• Delete. Remove old promotions, obsolete content, and underperforming articles that no longer attract readers. Implement 301 redirects for these pages to retain any backlink value and set up a custom 404 page to manage broken link navigation without negatively impacting the user experience. This cleanup streamlines your site and reinforces SEO by eliminating irrelevant pages that dilute your website’s offerings.

3. Improve on-page SEO

SEO isn’t just for your website as a whole — individual pages also matter. Ensure search engines can read, understand, and categorize your webpages. Even the most informative and relevant article will struggle to reach its intended audience if search engines can’t interpret its content. To assist search engines in effectively crawling and indexing your pages, consider optimizing the following elements:

Keyword placement

Include your primary keyword in the page URL, title tag (preferably at the beginning), meta description tag, and backlink anchor text. Feature it prominently in your H1 headers and subheadings (H2s, H3s) and the first 100 words of your content. Distribute the keyword and related terms throughout the article to reinforce the topic. This strategic keyword placement enhances your page’s relevance in search results, increasing its rankings.

Page structure

Develop a straightforward, navigable page structure to minimize user friction and encourage visitors to explore more of your site. A well-organized layout that incorporates elements like a clickable table of contents and clearly defined sections helps visitors navigate your site more effectively, leading to increased engagement and longer visit durations.

Links

Leverage outbound and internal link-building strategies to provide users with comprehensive information and improve your content’s authority. Outbound links to authoritative sources enhance your page’s credibility and help search engines understand your content’s context, which aids indexing. Internal linking is equally important because it keeps users engaged by navigating them to other relevant site content. It also distributes page authority throughout your platform, encouraging external sites to link back to your content.

Images

Properly optimized images can increase user engagement, assist with search engine indexing, and appear in image search results, driving additional traffic to your site. To optimize your images, follow image resolution best practices, such as adopting the WebP format and using descriptive file names. Assign alt text to all images to boost their search engine visibility and improve accessibility for users with screen readers.

XML sitemap

An incredibly simple but effective optimization that will help your site get better traffic is to build and submit an XML sitemap to Google. Your XML sitemap tells Google what the structure of your website is to help web crawlers index your site. This makes your content much more visible — even if it is new or has few internal links. Fortunately, creating a sitemap and submitting it through your Google Search Console account is a straightforward process.

4. Make sure your site is mobile-friendly

Since 2019, Google has been moving toward mobile-first indexing, making responsive design and effective mobile sites more critical than ever. More than half of web browsing is now on mobile, so you need mobile-friendly and responsive design to serve the majority of your potential audience. Responsive design is also accessible design, which you need to help people with accessibility needs interact with your website.

How to optimize your website: 4 tips

Now that we’ve reviewed some website optimization strategies, let’s explore four best practices to keep your efforts on track and guarantee their effectiveness.

1. Set clear objectives

Clearly define your website optimization goals, like improving user engagement, increasing conversion rates, or enhancing search engine visibility. Specific objectives will guide your overall plan and help you create a roadmap that breaks down your web optimization project into milestones, tasks, and dependencies. This turns your goal into actionable steps and boosts your team’s follow-through.

2. Conduct thorough research

Before making changes to your website, conduct comprehensive research. This includes looking into market trends, understanding your existing customers, evaluating your target user base, and accounting for technological innovations that may reshape the entire digital landscape, like artificial intelligence (AI). By understanding and tailoring your site to meet your target audience’s preferences, behavior, and pain points, you build a site that delivers an optimal user experience and sets you apart from your competitors.

3. Make technical improvements

Besides updating content and metadata, you’ll need to keep your site’s technical components updated. This is particularly important in the context of Core Web Vitals, a set of metrics that Google uses to assess a website’s user experience. Core Web Vitals focuses on loading performance, interactivity, and visual stability, all of which contribute to a smoother and more engaging user experience. By improving your site performance, you’ll also boost site security and optimize content delivery.

Optimizing the technical components of your site also improves page speeds. Faster-loading pages reduce user friction and keep site visitors engaged. You can boost site performance and page load times by refactoring your code and leveraging browser caching. Consider using analysis and monitoring solutions like GTmetrix for insights into your site’s performance and improvement opportunities.

If you’re operating on an outdated web system or platform, you should consider updating it or moving to a new one. Legacy systems often offer inadequate protection from modern cybersecurity threats, and a data breach can significantly erode user trust. Updating your platform ensures it meets current security standards, which is crucial for maintaining user confidence.

4. Measure the impact of your site optimization strategies

Part of optimizing your website is determining the metrics that measure its impact so you can make informed decisions about where to focus your continual optimization efforts. You’ll want to measure real-world user experiences for loading performance, interactivity, and the visual stability of your page. You can also evaluate your site traffic, keywords, and backlinks with Google Analytics to establish a baseline. Evaluate past performance to see what your audience needs are and monitor traffic as you develop your SEO strategy.

Several tools for SEO are available to help you understand your site traffic and how well you’re meeting the needs of your audience. For example, Clearscope helps with writing, Ahrefs provides information about SEO performance and helps with keyword research, and insights from Google’s PageSpeed Insights ensure your site is running at optimal performance.

Optimize your site with Webflow

If you’re ready to optimize your website, check out Webflow Enterprise. Our visual web development platform offers a robust framework for crafting and launching captivating content. With Webflow, harness the power of HTML or CSS visually with our intuitive design tools to customize your site for your audience. Take advantage of built-in tools to tailor your site while maintaining SEO, improving website performance, and boosting overall engagement.

Since then, we’ve been heartened to see what members of our community like Felix Lee, Ritesh Gupta, and Claudia Cafeo — among others —  have created and grown from this initiative.

And now, we’re excited to highlight the work of our new cohort of recipients Ayo Duyile, Melissa Mendez, Anatoly Popel, Alberto Sadde, and Chisom Adanna Igwe. 

Here’s their stories. 

Ayo Duyile

Co-Founder of Techsgiving

Washington, D.C. and Atlanta, Georgia

Describe your initiative.

The vision of Techsgiving is to become the largest community for diverse technologists of all ages through the vehicles of continuous skill development, global connectivity, and social good. Our corresponding mission is to provide the tools and resources for underrepresented professionals to excel in tech — while paying it forward for those who want to enter the tech world. 

How has the Webflow Community Grant assisted in supporting the goals for your initiative?

The Webflow Community Grant was strategically used for our flagship summit in December. It amassed 2,900 participants, 4,600 city wide participants, and a total economic impact of over $1.4 million on the local D.C. metropolitan area. On top of this, we were able to curate technical sessions on user experience and Webflow to provide more exposure to its tooling and teach people how they can leverage Webflow to grow their careers.

How can the community help your initiative?

Techsgiving is working on scaling its partnerships with municipalities like the City of Atlanta. The goal is to provide free residents with training for certifications to help them obtain Google certifications within 3 months and kickstart a path toward a successful career in a technical role. This rolled out in January,  and we plan to expand it across the country. 

Melissa Mendez

Founder of The Flow Party

Orlando, Florida

Describe your initiative. 

The Flow Party provides a secure, inclusive, and enjoyable environment for website developers and designers. We’re an energetic community that thrives on hard work but maintains a perpetual party atmosphere. Whether we’re immersed in coding marathons or taking a break to engage in lively conversations and share ideas, the fun never stops. 

Our weekly virtual events feature prominent creative guests, who generously share their expertise with our community. During these events, participants have the opportunity to ask questions, or simply hang out and network. 

Our overarching goal is to continue educating and supporting the community. This includes everything from organizing challenges and providing a platform for novices to enhance their skills, to providing seasoned professionals with an opportunity to showcase their work. 

How has the Webflow Community Grant assisted in supporting the goals of your initiative?

The Webflow Community Grant allows us to broaden our reach to individuals currently navigating their learning journey virtually. 

From the inception of The Flow Party, we’ve dedicated our personal time and resources to curate tutorials and support materials and to actively nurture our community. The grant empowers us to invest in our operational infrastructure, generate higher-quality content, diversify our offerings, and cultivate a more robust and interconnected community.

What are some new projects you’re building, or looking forward to building, with your initiative?

In 2024, we’re excited to introduce a premium offering tailored for individuals seeking more advanced learning opportunities. This initiative stems from the growth and progression of our initial members, who began their journey as beginners and have since evolved into professionals actively engaged with clients. This comprehensive plan is in response to their heightened needs for support, expanded knowledge, and mentorship from industry leaders. 

At the same time, we remain committed to delivering valuable content to the broader community through tutorials, live events, and ongoing support.

Anatoly Popel

CEO of CASES Media 

Kyiv, Ukraine

Describe your initiative.

Creative Practice is an online platform we created at CASES Media that’s dedicated to training professionals in creative industries. Our mission is to ensure that members of our community have the simplest and most effective path to their desired careers. Currently, we’ve brought together a community of over 115,000 participants and 1,750 organizations from Ukraine.

Thanks to us, tens of thousands of individuals have mastered relevant skills and are actively applying them in practice. Our collaboration with Webflow is incredibly valuable for us because of Webflow’s ability to enable professionals and teams to streamline the creation of web projects while delivering a high-quality and visually-appealing product. It’s a great fit for our community — by empowering folks to learn a new, incredibly beneficial skill, they can offer new and more robust services to their clients. 

How has the Webflow Community Grant assisted in supporting the goals for your initiative?

Before seeking grant support from the Webflow community, we were already engaged in training web designers and had developed our own course covering the basics of working with Webflow. We’ve always considered Webflow one of the leading tools for web designers. By mastering Webflow alongside fundamental web design skills, individuals can create basic web projects — landing pages and small websites.

However, we’re aware that a significant portion of designers within our community might not be fully aware of all the capabilities of Webflow. We wanted to show them that by harnessing the platform’s potential, they could tackle more complex and ambitious projects, and better leverage their knowledge and skills. The grant allowed us to expand our course offerings to three — one focusing on the platform’s basics, another on animations, and a third on the CMS.

What are some new projects you’re building, or looking forward to building, with your initiative?

In December 2023, our team launched our jobs platform. This was one of our key objectives — to make the transition from learning to a career as clear and straightforward as possible. 

For 2024, we’re planning on launching a freelance marketplace. This will empower our users to not only get job offers from employers but be able to take on freelance roles, as well. Beyond new functional capabilities, we’re also looking to release an English version in the second quarter of 2024. This will allow us to bring our initiative to users outside of Ukraine.

Alberto Sadde

CTO of Meaningful

Miami, Florida

Describe your initiative. 

Meaningful is a growth and Webflow agency that I founded with Orlando Osorio. It’s  become the go-to for big and custom Webflow projects in Latin America. Because of our work, over 40 top companies in the region use Webflow for all their website needs.

We wanted to find more Webflow talent in Latin America because of its potential. So we decided to take the matter into our own hands and teach Webflow to Spanish speakers  with the launch of Meaningful School. 

Meaningful School is an online community where Spanish-speakers across Latin America can learn, connect with Webflow devs, and find jobs at tech companies. We host different online and offline classes about Webflow, from how to build your first landing page to SEO, analytics, low-coding, conversion rate optimization, and more.

Last year, we introduced free introductory Webflow courses and events in Spanish. Since then, it’s reached over 500 people and introduced Webflow to more than 500,000 people across the region. 

How has the Webflow Community Grant assisted in supporting the goals for your initiative?

The Webflow Community Grant has played a crucial role in supporting our initiative at Meaningful School in several tangible and impactful ways:

• Increased dedication: The grant has enabled us to allocate more hours to the project, significantly enhancing our capacity to deliver high-quality education and support.
• Investment in marketing: We’ve invested part of the grant in marketing strategies, focusing on SEO and creating YouTube videos. This has been instrumental in growing our school’s reach and attracting more students.
• Boosting confidence and credibility: Receiving this grant has bolstered our confidence and credibility, allowing us to engage in more events and form valuable partnerships.
• Audiovisual equipment: As planned, we’ve invested in audiovisual equipment, improving the quality of our online content and the overall learning experience for our students.

How can the community help your initiative?

It’s easy to help us with our initiative at Meaningful School:

• Spread the word: Let people know about our Spanish Webflow courses! A quick shout-out on your social media or among your networks can help us reach more Spanish-speakers eager to learn Webflow.
• Join our community: Check out our online community. Your participation, insights, and experiences would be a valuable addition, enriching the learning journey for everyone.
• Mentor in Spanish: If you’re fluent in Spanish and have Webflow expertise, consider becoming a mentor. Your guidance can be a game-changer for our students, helping them master Webflow in a language they’re comfortable with.

To stay connected follow us on LinkedIn and be sure to contact us if you’d like to join our team or get involved with the school. 

What are some new projects you’re building, or looking forward to building, with your initiative?

Meaningful School is on a roll with our regular Webflow intro courses, new advanced offerings, increased Spanish YouTube content, and an upcoming job board to connect our growing community with real-world opportunities.

Our plan is to keep the momentum going by offering our Webflow intro course every three months. This course in particular has been a hit, and we’re committed to ensuring everyone gets a chance to dive into Webflow with us. We’re also developing more advanced Webflow courses to take our students deeper into the platform, unlocking new skills and creative possibilities.

Alongside this, we’re ramping up our YouTube content production in Spanish, focusing on Webflow-related materials to enrich our learning resources. This is crucial in helping our community level up their Webflow game.

Plus, we’re super focused on nurturing our online community. It’s not just about learning Webflow; it’s about creating connections, sharing experiences, and supporting each other.

Chisom Adanna Igwe

Founder and CEO of Sites for Creators, by Creators

Lisbon, Portugal 

Describe your initiative 

Sites for Creators, by Creators aims to integrate the vast creator economy with Webflow through the “Ultimate Webflow Creator Template.” This initiative addresses the needs of aspiring content creators and provides them with tailored tools and resources for Webflow. 

The template features various essential pages for creators, alongside a series of instructional YouTube tutorials. It’s designed to facilitate and enhance creators’ online presence. 

Leveraging my software engineering background and experiences at Meta and Reddit, this initiative seeks to empower creators while expanding Webflow’s reach in the digital content creation space.

How has the Webflow Community Grant assisted in supporting the goals for your initiative?

The Webflow Community Grant has been instrumental in supporting my initiative by providing the necessary funding to bring the “Ultimate Webflow Creator Template” to life. 

This grant has enabled me to dedicate time and resources towards developing a comprehensive and user-friendly template specifically designed for content creators. In addition, it has also allowed me to hire a skilled editor, ensuring the production of high-quality, informative YouTube tutorials to effectively guide creators to use the template.

Moreover, the grant has given my project credibility and visibility within the Webflow community and beyond. It serves as a validation of the initiative’s potential impact, and has helped attract further interest and support. 

What are some new projects you’re building, or looking forward to building with your initiative?

In my initiative’s next phase, I plan to develop advanced versions of the Webflow template with more customization options, create an online community platform for collaboration and feedback among creators, and organize educational workshops and webinars on digital content creation — allowing creators to leverage Webflow’s capabilities to its fullest.

Get involved with Webflow Community Grants

If you’re interested in applying for a Webflow Community Grant, or nominating a well-deserving initiative — be sure to check out the Webflow Community Grants page for more information. 

Digital UX/UI design requires a first draft, just like any other creative project. The first draft of any digital project should be a prototype, or mockup, of how a website, app, or other digital project will look and behave. Prototypes not only bring ideas to life successfully but also create cohesion across multiple teams and departments.

What are prototyping tools?

Prototyping tools are platforms designers use to create interactive mockups of digital products, such as websites, mobile apps, or software interfaces. These tools help designers visualize and demonstrate the functionality, layout, and user experience of their designs before they fully develop or implement them. 

Usually, these tools offer a range of features and functionalities, including drag-and-drop interfaces, pre-built UI components, interactive elements, animation capabilities, and collaboration tools.

In general, they serve several purposes in the prototyping process:

• Conceptualization: Prototyping tools help designers translate their ideas and concepts into tangible elements

• Communication: Prototypes serve as a visual communication tool that helps designers convey their design concepts and intentions to stakeholders, developers, and other team members more effectively than static wireframes or mockups

• Iterative design: Prototyping tools enable designers to quickly create, modify, and revise prototypes based on feedback and insights they gather during the design process

• User testing: Designers can employ prototypes in user testing sessions to evaluate the usability, functionality, and overall user experience of a design. User feedback collected from prototype testing informs design improvements and optimizations

What to look for in a prototyping tool

When it comes to prototyping tools, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. When considering which platform is best for your team, you’ll need to assess your needs, resources, and skill levels. 

No matter your specific circumstances, however, there are a few crucial things to keep in mind when looking for your next prototyping tool for yourself or for your team:

• Ease of use: Look for a tool with an intuitive interface and simple controls to simplify prototyping for everyone and speed up the workflow process  

• Functionality: Depending on your project requirements, you may need basic wireframing capabilities, interactive prototyping, animation tools, or advanced interactions
• Compatibility: Compatibility with design tools like Sketch, Figma, or Adobe XD can streamline your workflow and facilitate seamless collaboration between design and development teams

• Collaboration features: Look for features like commenting, sharing, and team-based editing

• Device preview: Check if the prototyping tool provides the ability to preview prototypes on various devices and screen sizes 

• Interactivity and animation: Evaluate the tool’s capabilities for creating interactive prototypes with animations, transitions, and gestures
• Sharing and presentation: Look for features such as link sharing, presentation mode, and export options to facilitate sharing and feedback gathering

• Support and documentation: Ensure that the prototyping tool offers comprehensive support resources, including tutorials, documentation, and community forums 

• Cost: Some tools offer free versions or trial periods, while others may require a subscription or one-time payment 

In this blog, we’ll cover the best prototyping tools for UI/UX designers to help you mockup, design, and launch your digital product.

17 prototyping tools for UI/UX designers

1. Figma

Figma is an all-in-one tool that makes collaboration and accessibility easy for UX designers, developers, and anyone else on a team with a browser-based, cloud-hosted platform. If you’ve worked with Sketch before, you’ll find that Figma has a similar feel that makes it easy to get started with.

Consistency is a priority in web design; you can use Figma’s flexible styles to control the appearance of text, grids, and other elements across a project. A variety of useful plugins enhance Figma’s functionality, like Autoflow for illustrating user flows, Figmotion for creating animations, and many others.

2. InVision Studio

Released in 2011, InVision is a trusted platform among designers for its easy-to-use functionality and up-to-date features — this intuitive platform is always coming out with new tools, which is perfect for designers who want to remain relevant in the industry.

InVision offers features like vector drawing, repeatable components that can be changed sitewide, and tools for creating animations and other dynamic visual effects.

Collaboration and communication are also strengths of InVision. Freehand lets team members draw, add notes, and offer feedback. Plus, InVision has a handy developer handoff feature that simplifies collaboration with dev team members.

3. Flinto 

Flinto is a prototyping tool known for its simplicity and ease of use — the perfect fit for beginners. 

Flinto’s seamless integration with design tools like Sketch and Figma simplifies the prototyping process, allowing users to create interactive prototypes effortlessly. The platform also allows users to incorporate animated transitions, sound effects, and video layers for more complex and detailed projects.

4. Webflow

Unlike other prototyping tools, Webflow allows users to create both functioning prototypes and live websites — complete with all of the HTML, CSS, and associated JavaScript. These features mean that users don’t just end up with a mockup — they have a fully functioning website, ready to launch.  

With an intuitive drag-and-drop interface, a powerful CMS, and the capability to create advanced animations, transitions, and micro-interactions, Webflow makes it possible to create any type of professional-level website.

A true visual development solution for both beginner designers and more seasoned ones, Webflow is an all-in-one solution for collaborating, prototyping, and launching your own website. 

For more in-depth tutorials on how to get started with prototyping, check out Webflow University.

5. Axure RP

Axure RP puts the power of wireframing and prototyping all in one package, helping companies improve their digital product design process. It allows designers to create low to high-resolution interactive prototypes of websites and apps, all without having to code.

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Along with what you need to build the visuals, interactivity, and organization, Axure RP also offers a comprehensive documentation tool, which makes keeping track of notes, tasks, and other important assets organized and accessible to those who need to see it.

Axure RP also facilitates a better handoff to developers by publishing prototypes on their cloud, with all of the code, specifications, and other assets they would need to build it.

Built for professionals with attention to all of the intricacies of building functional prototypes, Axure RP 9 is for those designers looking for the right prototyping tool for interactive design.

6. Origami Studio

Origami Studio, first created for Facebook designers out of necessity, has become a trusted, free prototyping tool for hundreds of people in the design community. 

For designers who need a more advanced system, Origami Studio offers powerful prototyping tools for websites and mobile apps. Central to Origami Studio is a Patch Editor that builds logic, behaviors, animations, and interactions. Each patch is like a building block for your prototype that helps you iterate quickly. The library includes a lot of prebuilt options, but you’ll only need 15-20 to get started. 

Origami Studio does have a bit of a learning curve, but the payoff of knowing how to use their prototyping tools and pulling off sophisticated prototypes makes it worth learning. This power, along with its compatibility in working with Sketch and Figma, makes Origami Studio an important tool for designers who want to go above and beyond standard low-fidelity prototyping.

7. Justinmind

Justinmind offers drag-and-drop functionality and the ability to create anything, from the simplest to most sophisticated of apps and web prototypes. Plus, the platform gives users plenty of support through videos and blogs and offers unlimited projects and pricing options, ranging from free to enterprise-level.

Justinmind comes with UI libraries and templates, as well as many other practical features. It lets you create the logic for conditional navigation, allows for user testing, and facilitates design team management. There’s also a number of integrations that let you use Justinmind with Sketch, Adobe Suite, Azure DevOps Server, and Jira in your workflow.

Its simple interface makes it a great starting point for a beginner UX designer but also offers features for more advanced designers.

8. Sketch

Many UX designers use Sketch as a part of their workflow, and for good reason. Unlike many other prototyping tools, Sketch doesn’t have much of a learning curve — you can jump right in and start creating. 

‍Uniformity and consistency drive much of Sketch’s functionality. You can use reusable elements sitewide with a smart layout feature that changes their dimensions depending on their content. Plus, it’s incredibly easy to use: along with a well-designed user interface, Sketch offers a host of shortcuts at your fingertips to speed up the design process and simplify developer handoff. 

Many consider Sketch an industry standard when it comes to wireframes and prototyping. Its feature-packed and user-friendly interface is just one reason why so many designers choose it.

9. Fluid UI

Fluid UI’s software is great for rapid prototyping thanks to its simple user interface. With ready-made libraries for material design that include more than 2,000 components, Fluid UI allows users to hit the ground running.

For users who want a bit more creative flexibility, you can also create personal libraries by uploading existing graphics. 

Fluid UI also has some great collaboration tools; it offers live video calling so teammates can chat and design at the same time. 

10. Overflow

Overflow is a user flow diagramming tool that allows designers to create interactive user flow prototypes in minutes.

Its simple interface, comprehensive features, automatic layout adjustments and easy sharing options are perfect for all levels of designers to create and present user flow prototypes effectively. Overflow also lets users create interactive self-guided presentations once they’re ready to share their prototyping. 

11. Marvel

If you need a rapid prototyping tool that will let you whip up apps, websites, and digital products quickly, Marvel is the answer. The intuitive, easy-to-use platform offers a complete suite of prototyping tools and integrations for simple and straightforward design. 

Unlike other platforms, Marvel takes you beyond static mockups and offers interactivity, dynamic transitions, and gestures to bring prototypes to life. Plus, this handoff tool is complete with all the code and assets developers need to dive in and create a live website.

Marvel takes care of teams that need some collaboration tools, too — users can add notes, make changes, and share ideas in real time.

12. Proto.io

Showtime, Amazon, and PayPal are just a few of the big names that have used Proto.io. With a comprehensive selection of components, this web-based tool makes creating interactive prototypes possible — no code required. 

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Proto.io gives you a variety of drag-and-drop UI web components, templates, icon libraries, digital assets, and audio/video integrations. You can also bring in anything you have created on your own in Photoshop or Sketch.

13. Principle

Principle for Mac creates dazzling interactions and eye-catching animations, bringing life to prototypes that go beyond dull static representations.

‍With multiple artboards, a timeline-based animation builder, and the ability to import Figma design files, Principle stands out because it pays special attention to motion — whether it be for interactions, quick animations, a multi-screen app flow, or whatever your imagination can think up. 

14. Balsamiq

Balsamiq is a low-fidelity wireframing tool. While it’s not necessarily designed specifically for ready prototypes like some of the tools mentioned above, it is a great place to create website wireframe mockups.

You can use Balsamiq for more than just websites. This tool is a great option for sketching product design, web apps, desktop software, mobile apps, and user interface wireframes.

15. MockFlow

MockFlow is a web-based prototyping tool that offers a simple and intuitive interface for creating wireframes and prototypes. 

Its drag-and-drop functionality and pre-built components make it easy for anyone to create mockups quickly. MockFlow also provides collaboration features, too, like text chatting, live presentations, and real time collaborative editing, allowing designers to share and gather feedback on their prototypes effortlessly.

16. ProtoPie

Massive organizations like Spotify, Amazon, and Microsoft use ProtoPie — a beloved prototyping tool. 

Its intuitive interface, powerful interactive capabilities, and seamless integration into design workflow simplifies the prototyping process, making it accessible even to beginners, while its advanced features cater to the needs of experienced designers. 

ProtoPie’s ability to create high-fidelity interactive prototypes with complex interactions, gestures, and animations sets it apart, allowing designers to simulate realistic user experiences effectively. And, its real-time preview feature enables instant feedback and iteration, facilitating a more efficient design process. 

17. Mockplus

If you need a quick and simple solution for prototyping, Mockplus is the answer. Its library of over 500+ web and app templates and 3000+ icons and components, plus its easy-to-use drag-and-drop functionality, makes it best for pressing projects and beginners that need help getting started.

Mockplus also offers features like real-time collaboration and interactive gestures so that entire design teams are on the same page. Plus, its seamless integration with other design tools streamlines the workflow, enabling designers to effortlessly import assets and maintain consistency across projects.

Take your prototyping to new heights

Prototyping is one of the most important steps in any design process — no matter if your design includes animation, sound, or something else entirely. For large organizations with multiple stakeholders at play — like product designers and developers — prototyping platforms can offer the seamless collaboration and presentation tools essential for making the process as smooth and simple as possible.

With Webflow, your team can go beyond static and clunky prototypes, and, instead, create fully responsive, interactive websites. From designing with real content to including production-ready code, Webflow offers a host of state-of-the-art design and prototyping tools for a simpler, sleeker, and better prototyping experience — for everyone.

From an immersive, experiential site for a Fortune 500 company all the way down to a stunning personal portfolio, this collection is just the tip of the iceberg of what Black creators have and are creating on the web and beyond. 

Now, let’s take a closer look. 

Erlen Masson 

Erlen Masson is a UK-based illustrator, art director, designer and developer who’s worked with iconic brands like Gucci, Burberry, Ray-Ban, Levis, Adidas, and more. His site “Welcome to Football,” is a site built in partnership with Freeda Media and Mastercard to encourage support and participation in women’s soccer leagues in the UK.

The focal points of the site are two maps of the UK — one for grassroutes leagues, and one for the Women’s Super League. Within each map, you can find the nearest women’s team to your location. Once you click on a specific team, you’ll be linked to their social accounts and website to learn more. 

The site is well designed — with bold colors and fun cartoon illustrations — but our favorite part of the site is the subtle parallax scrolling animations, and seamless zoom-in animations on the map pages.

Greg Washington 

With over 20 years of experience, and numerous awards, Greg Washington is a standout in the design and creative space. He’s been the force behind iconic microsites, apps, and sites for Jordan Brand, Nike, and Toyota.

For his site for Society and Space, an interdisciplinary journal and digital magazine covering social, political, economic and environmental issues — Greg took a more muted approach, but with no less impact.

As you enter the site, you’re immediately greeted by a stunning aerial shot of cars moving on a freeway. As you scroll, the different content and articles gently reveal themselves to you.

Different pages on the site replicate the same subtle but impactful design, and we love how Greg uses motion and animation to visually showcase the breadth of information, and impact of information covered in the magazine and site. 

Johnelle Smith 

Johnelle Smith is a Montreal-based designer and creative developer whose work draws inspiration from her Jamaican roots as well as the Black and Brown queer communities that have shaped her. Johnelle previously worked for Wiedan and Kennedy, Canadian Centre for Architecture, &Walsh, Sony Records and RCA Records.

This site, which was published in 2022, was built by Johnelle for the graphic design studio OTAMI which focuses specifically on multilingual typography.

Multilingualism is the primary focus of the site, with the main site headers as well as choice words in the text appearing as Cree, until you move your cursor over them to make them translate instantly to English.

We love how something so simple creates a full experience for the site visitor, and gives them a first hand look at the strengths and specialties of OTAMI as a graphic design studio, as well as their basis for all of their inspiration — Cree and Nêhiýaw traditions.

Melvin Mescudi 

Melvin Mescudi is not your average creative. The Brooklyn-based fullstack web developer is also a graphic designer, software engineer, full-time creative entrepreneur. With over a decade of experience, he describes his core mission as an ability to build “strong and provocative relationships between brands and customers.

The Lomein Collection is a New York City fashion brand, specializing in trendy streetwear, graphic tees, and hats. This site, built by Melvin Mescudi, features bold colors, Y2K-centric graphic design, and concise copy that communicates the brand’s offerings, history, and mission. 

While the bright colors and high-quality photography draw you in, it’s the small details that keep you engaged. We love the header slider experience that takes users through six unique hero images. We love how visuals feel like a cross between video game aesthetics and a fashion poster you’d see while walking down the street in Brooklyn, as well as the unique use of gradients behind high-quality product and model shots. 

Breeona Nechole 

Breeona Nechole is one of the many talented creative designers in the Webflow community. She specializes in uncovering the true essence of a brand in order to make websites with aesthetics and functionality that truly brings clients’ visions to life. 

Her sleek portfolio site is filled with delight. From the mix of serif and sans serif typography, to the toggle for darkmode and the unique custom cursor experience — no detail has been overlooked. 

We’re big fans of Breeona’s use of a soft color palette that she leverages to differentiate different sites pages, how she exposes her design process on her tactics page, and her unique hero slider that hides and exposes content about her expertise in branding, development, creative direction, and design. 

Alex Beige 

Freelance web developer and designer Alex Beige specializes in building accessible and innovative Webflow websites. His client roster spans across industries, from legal orgs and healthcare brands to design agencies and tech companies. 

The website for Brooklyn Editions is what he describes as his “proudest site” — and earned him an honorable mention from Awwwards in August 2023. Brooklyn Editions is the printmaking studio of master printer and accomplished photographer, Stephen Gross. 

Using client-provided designs — which feature a muted color palette, sharp lines, and high-quality photography — Alex built a stunning site that engages users using sleek scroll effects and stunning animations. 

Our favorite part of this site is the homepage slider that creates a suspension of depth effect by blurring the lines between the black background and the photography. It creates a hyper-immersive experience that really makes the printwork shine.

Explore the dynamic roster of talent in our community

The Webflow community is chock-full of incredible designers, web developers, and Webflow experts — plenty of which you’ve maybe never even heard of. We encourage anyone looking for talent to bring their latest web project to life to connect with any of the six designers we’ve highlighted here today, or to explore both our Experts program and Made in Webflow projects to discover talent from underrepresented communities doing incredible work.

With the rapid rise of digital connectivity, businesses have become borderless, allowing them to develop relationships with customers anywhere around the globe. It’s no wonder then that 66% of businesses are gearing up to expand globally within the next two years as part of their growth strategy. 

Not only does international expansion help companies reach an entirely new and diverse group of customers, it can also boost revenue. Other key benefits of going global include an increased competitive advantage, wider market reach, and more access to top talent around the world. 

However, expanding into new markets is no easy feat — it’s one that requires more than a one-size-fits-all approach. What works in your home country won’t always work in new locales due to the vast differences in language, beliefs, preferences, and cultural norms, which is why it’s so essential organizations take the time to develop a comprehensive localization strategy before expanding and scaling globally.

Whether you’re designing a website or kicking off a marketing campaign, connecting with new audiences on an emotional level is key. Not only does this mean communicating in their native language, but also developing authentic experiences designed around users’ expectations, needs, and wants.

Let’s take a closer look at why building an effective localization strategy is key to attracting and retaining customers, and strategies for how today’s businesses can expand their global footprint.

Localization builds trust and brand equity in new markets

Localization — the ability to adapt your digital content, visuals, and product information to suit specific regional markets — takes internationalization a step further, helping organizations deliver more relevant content to their customers, as well as provide hyper-personalized digital experiences.

This ability to meet or exceed customers’ expectations is critical to developing brand credibility, and in turn, a loyal customer base.

The first step toward gaining brand credibility and traction in new markets is developing marketing strategies that can earn your potential customers’ trust. Remember: in some cases, consumers in different parts of the world may know very little – or even nothing – about your brand. That means you’ll have to work even harder to connect with them. 

Start by analyzing each locale and unpacking its cultural norms and nuances, which extends far beyond just language differences. You can then use these insights to help design your customer experience (CX) for new markets.

Localization is vital to your customer acquisition strategy 

In today’s hyper-digital world, your website is the face and personality of your brand, making it your most valuable marketing asset. That’s why as a business begins to expand into new regions, website localization is no longer a nice-to-have – it’s mission critical. 

Research shows that people quickly navigate away from a site if it’s hard to use, difficult to understand, or not available in their native language. In fact, 40% of customers will not make an online purchase in a foreign language.

By localizing your website, you can eliminate any friction that might cause a consumer to abandon your site while also establishing a personal connection with them — which is key to your customer acquisition strategy. And while having several languages on your website is table stakes, translating language is just one part of localizing your website. 

Customizing your site for the different regions you serve should be applied to all elements of your website – from images and what content is displayed, down to the styles, layout, and colors on your site.

Website localization best practices

Localizing your website is one of the biggest drivers of customer satisfaction in new markets: 56% of online consumers say that having information in their own language on a site is even more important than price.

It also offers a low-investment, high-reward marketing strategy that your team can have full control over. By adjusting site content for different audiences, you can enhance the effectiveness of your messaging and targeting, too. Localization also increases site engagement, drives higher conversion rates, and improves customer loyalty. 

But in order to reap the benefits of website localization, teams need a foolproof localization strategy in place that helps them deliver on their goals. Below, let’s explore some best practices businesses can start to implement today to get localization right. 

Tailor your content and site design to different locales

When localizing your site for new audiences, it’s critical to consider every element – colors, layout, typography, and images. In other words, your site should “meet your visitors where they’re at” with a relevant experience that’s both cohesive and consistent. This is the most effective way to maximize engagement and build a connection with potential customers. Here’s how to get started: 

Spend time researching design trends and norms in your target markets

‍Before you begin planning your site design, it’s important to research design trends and do’s and don’ts when it comes to marketing in your target regions. For instance, Western countries trend towards sleek, minimalistic design with more scrolling to get through the content, while some East Asian countries (e.g., Japan and China) prefer more maximalist designs with tons of content packed into shorter pages.

As stated before, colors can also take on different cultural meanings. For example, red symbolizes luck in some countries, while it evokes danger and caution in others. Nuance is critical to localizing  experiences, so detailed research is key.

Customize your content

Tailor each content element on your site that’s relevant to the locale – from imagery and  marketing promotions to blogs and articles. For example, if you’re using a photo of a famous landmark, consider swapping it for a more recognizable and proximal landmark for a given locale.

Validate translations with native speakers

If your site is only available in one language, you’re leaving potential customers and business opportunities on the table. In fact, 60% of Webflow customers are outside of the U.S. and over 70% of sites built on Webflow get traffic from countries with different official languages. 

Language translation isn’t as simple as converting English words into a different language: tone, humor, cultural relevance and idioms must all be considered. Your punny marketing tagline can be completely unintelligible if directly translated to say, French, and even possibly offensive. 

While AI and machine-powered translation tools can deliver an excellent first pass, having a native speaker review your content before it goes live is essential. A native speaker can ensure linguistic accuracy and cultural appropriateness, and even offer suggestions to maximize the impact of your messaging.

Make sure your site is discoverable by your target audience

Even the best localized sites won’t perform if they’re not attracting the right audience. That’s why it’s critical to optimize your site for international SEO and drive traffic from your target markets. Let’s explore some key considerations that meaningfully impact your organic discoverability.

Choosing the right URL structure 

A subdirectory URL structure for localized sites (website.com/es for your Spanish site) enables you to maintain domain authority, thus yielding better results than a subdomain URL structure (es.website.com), which is on a separate domain from your primary site. That said, you may need your localized sites to sit on different domains for business reasons, e.g. if a business has a completely different brand in Japan. 

Generating a global sitemap

Having a properly organized sitemap with ‘hreflang’ tags included is essential for search engine crawlers to understand how your various localized pages are related to one another. 

Localizing your metadata 

Don’t forget: your metadata content should be localized across pages for each supported locale. Your metadata tells search engines how to read and display sites on search engine result pages (SERPs), so ensuring this content is optimized for different locales is critical to your international SEO strategy. This includes meta titles and descriptions. 

Reach new heights with a robust localization strategy

In today’s digital-first world, businesses must think beyond their home market to drive growth. Successful global expansion starts with localized experiences, and a great place to kick things off is with your website. For anyone looking to take their digital strategy to the next level, making your site visitors feel right at home – no matter where their home may be — is key, and implementing a localization strategy for your site is a critical determinant of your ability to do so. If you’re interested in learning more about localization and Webflow’s native solution, learn more today!

For marketing teams striving to stay ahead of the curve, the ability to adapt swiftly to change is paramount to growth and gaining a competitive advantage.

And this isn’t just speculation — a recent Gartner survey found that 90% of marketing leaders believe that the marketing function needs to be more adaptive to changes in customer needs.

That’s because teams who are more adaptable have stronger customer satisfaction and retention (CSAT). In fact, Gartner’s survey data also shows that for companies in the top quartile of adaptability, 87% of marketing leaders report a higher CSAT. 

Yet in a rapidly evolving business landscape, where the marketing playbook is being reinvented by tools like AI, it can be difficult for teams to know what to focus on, how to most effectively leverage new technology, and how to collaborate well across functions and locations.

With all of this in mind, we were excited to chat with Jasper’s Head of Marketing, Meghan Keaney Anderson, during a recent episode of our Boundless series.

In it, she shares her firsthand experience of how marketing teams can use AI to create not only faster outputs, but better outcomes. She also dives into how to foster a positive culture of teamwork and how to differentiate your brand and content in a crowded market. 

Here are some biggest tips for high-performing teams.

Be intentional with AI and emerging technologies

A McKinsey study of more than 400 use cases found that AI has the potential to contribute the most value to marketing compared to any other company function.

Given the technology’s enormous potential, it’s no wonder that marketing leaders are increasingly embracing the technology. Yet Meghan recommends that when getting started with AI, it’s important to proceed not with caution — but rather, intention.

“First, find the angle that matters most to your business — whether that’s AI for marketing, AI for ad copy, AI for ethics — and go deep on that rather than try to swell the whole ocean. ”

“In this relentless cycle of a new innovation or release coming out every week, be inquisitive, rather than reactionary. I would caution people to take a beat,” she adds. “Engage with it, ask questions, understand it deeper, don’t feel like you have to volley back immediately at every single breaking news.”

A few other tips Meghan shared for designing an AI marketing strategy:

1. Set standards: To create a strong AI foundation, it’s essential to start by creating company standards for each tool in regards to their security, use, and experimentation.
2. Play with purpose: Once standards are in place, Meghan says it’s time to “play with purpose. First, it’s important to understand what problem you’re trying to solve with the technology, then measure its effectiveness, and then decide to scale it up if it actually solves that problem.” 
3. Assess your risk: Understand the limitations and weaknesses of AI, so you can identify and address things as they crop up, such as biases and lack of representation. 

Remember: originality is the new currency

Every marketer is familiar with the pressure to churn out content quickly for the sake of search engine optimization, but with the advent of AI, Meghan says quality, rather than quantity, is no longer a nice-to-have, but a business necessity for marketing teams.

“In a world where anyone can create content super fast, information gets cheap,” Meghan says. “You need to put more emphasis into how to stand out to create something that is original and unique.”

Fortunately, Meghan says that while a lot of AI outputs are generic, using the right tools can help teams create customized content. For example, Jasper integrates companies’ brand and style guides to create content that’s on-brand and unique to that company.

Even still, she believes that now more than ever, marketing teams need story hunters, researchers, and journalists to create that deep-dive, valuable content. “People who think they can lay off their marketing team or writing team because they’ve got an AI tool now, are sorely mistaken,” says Meghan. She adds that it’s also important for teams to be strategic about reinvesting the time gained from automating content.

“Maybe it takes you less time to write a blog post, but you may want to take that time back and invest it into conducting original research, interviewing people or just doing more ideation to make that blog post higher quality. You may also want to spend more time thinking about how to distribute and repackage that content for different uses.”

In addition to content creation, Meghan says that the ways people discover content, products, and companies online is undergoing a major transformation as search engines begin using AI. For example, Google’s zero-click searches present users with the answer without them having to click on the website as a way to improve the user experience.

This will cause website traffic to decline in the coming year, so it’s important that marketing teams understand and optimize their content for zero-click SEO results and use other avenues to glean customers and achieve their goals. 

Create internal frameworks to foster collaboration

Jasper is an entirely remote company with a marketing team of about 15 people. Like many distributed workforces, teams struggled with feeling disjointed, siloed work, and broken communication. To mitigate this, Jasper adopted a model called SPADE (Setting, People, Alternatives, Decide, Explain) to help streamline the company’s decision-making process.

Meghan describes it as a “mechanism for talking about the situation analysis, which is the setting.” You then lay out the people that are needed, and follow that up with discussing trade offs and alternatives. Finally, you decide and justify that decision. She adds that it may seem like an obvious approach, but then you “realize you’re running a million miles an hour and stuff gets missed. ”

Jasper also created an operational framework to help communicate company-wide strategies and achieve goals. “By operating system, I don’t mean technology. [Instead] it’s a process of making plans on an annual and quarterly basis,” says Meghan.. “So, for example, heading into a quarter, we get together and talk about the strategy for that coming quarter. We do that at an executive level, and then we have a follow up team meeting to trickle everything down to the people who need to pull it off.”

She adds that having these universal frameworks in place has been instrumental in helping Jasper adapt quickly to market shifts, break down collaboration barriers, and scale. “It sounds like the boring stuff, but it is really what can make the difference between a team that is off-kilter and a team that is running well together.”

Keep marketers in the driver’s seat

Finally, Meghan reminds marketers to always “keep humans in the loop” and be careful about over-automating decisions based on technology.

“AI is great when it can surface to you insights that you wouldn’t have otherwise seen,” says Meghan. “But the marketer should still be in the driver’s seat and make the decisions.”

To hear more about how Meghan and Jasper maintain marketing velocity and to learn more insights from other business leaders in the world of tech, check out our Boundless webinar series.