January 16, 2020 — November 9th, 2017 – What good is your website if you have no conversions? Let’s discuss how to design your site to be a conversion machine. We will look at common design trends that convert well and even talk about ways to determine what is the best design for your audience. We will cover homepage design, subpages, landing pages and conversion funnels/paths.

August 6, 2019 — How to design websites for both search engines and for your customers.

Takeaways:
We will cover the importance of wireframing, site speed, mobile-first design, branding, clarity of marketing messages and CTAs, ADA compliance, competitor research (and using analytics), user personas, journey mapping and earning trust thru specific guidelines to improve your UX.

Graphics Expertise: the design, exportation, and use of scalable vector graphics (also .png .jpgs) files, for both retina display and faster load times. Learn about .svg codes – displaying logos with nothing but code!

Presentation Slides »

March 18, 2019 — This topic will be an overview to the leg work to do before you jump into the design and development stage of building a website. Whether you are designing your own site, are a designer working on a client site, or you are looking to work with an agency to build your site, doing some planning will help ensure a smooth process and great site. We will cover the basics of site maps, user personas, content guides, and other questions to consider about your websites functionality before you start designing or developing your site.

Presentation Slides »

August 17, 2018 — The WordPress REST API is often perceived by designers as something developers talk about in chat groups filled with lines of code. This talk aims to help designers familiarize themselves with the API and grow our computational design skills with its help. We’ll cover what an API is, what it’s used for, and how we can innovate with it.

Presentation Slides »

May 8, 2018 — This talk shows how the application of simple principles of Gestalt psychology can greatly enhance the design of WordPress websites. Most of us probably use some of those principles intuitively already. However, consciously adopting a Gestalt-driven approach helps us hugely towards creating a more meaningful, efficient and improved experience of our websites for our end users. And by the way: it’s not necessary to be an expert to use these principles. The talk covers a selection of the Gestalt principles that have a real, practical role in the designing of web pages. Plenty of examples of real-world applications will be provided.

Presentation Slides »

December 12, 2017 — eCommerce websites have been evolving since the first online shop opened in 1995. You would think that, by now, businesses would have perfected their customer journey and user experience? Yet, many online retailers are still buying or commissioning one-size-fits-all themes under the assumption that these will automatically rake in the millions.

Each and every functionality and feature on your website’s money pages has a purpose – to arouse curiosity, generate interest, tingle desire, provide social proof and create a sense of urgency. That’s how you will convert your visitors into paying customers.
During my talk, I will walk you through proven product, cart and checkout frameworks, that you can take away to design the customer journey that fits your business model and product offerings. I will draw on examples from my own professional experience and other successful eCommerce websites.

You will pick up some inspiration to turn your own website into a high-converting eCommerce machine.

December 12, 2017 — The accessibility of a website is significantly affected by the underlying HTML, CSS and javascript that developers use to create it. But it is also possible to impact upon the accessibility of a site at the design stage – both the visual design, and the interactive design or UX. And it’s not just about colour schemes either.

In this presentation I will outline a few key points to keep in mind when you are designing your next beautiful website or theme. I will illustrate the points with some good (and bad) examples.

Good design and web accessibility can go hand in hand – come and find out how.

I have previously presented this talk at WordCamp London 2017 and WordCamp Bristol 2017, WordCamp Edinburgh and a couple of WP meetup groups.

December 12, 2017 — In this short talk, we’ll cover the best practices for creating website navigation and what to keep in mind when creating a theme or building a website for a client. When to use multi-level vs. single-level menus or sticky vs. non-sticky vs. mixed type menus. What accessibility challenges you can face and how to tackle them. Hamburger pros and cons. What to include in the menu and what to keep away. Buckle up, we have only 10 minutes!

Presentation Slides »

December 12, 2017 — Bob will introduce you to the principles of this exciting new CSS Module, show demos of uniquely designed layouts and code examples of how they can be created for WordPress

June 5, 2017 — Have you ever wanted to change how your WordPress site looks or works, but aren’t sure if you can make the changes on your own? Do you wonder what kind of help you even need: a designer or a programmer? Both? And what do those folks even do? If you do hire someone, how much should you spend?

This talk will go over examples of some things you can DIY and when you might consider calling a professional. It will also review the different skill sets that go into working on a WordPress site to help you understand what kind of help you need. Finally, it will cover what costs to expect and give you some tips on getting professional help.