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Original Source: https://ecommerce-platforms.com/articles/start-a-phone-case-business

Phone cases are everywhere. And the demand for phone cases is constantly rising because of new phone version releases, old phones, broken cases, an increase in population, and new customers getting into the market (like teenagers with their first phones). If you’re interested in learning how to start a phone case business, now is the right time. In fact, there has never really been a bad time to sell phone cases. So, for those phone case entrepreneurs out there, we encourage you to bookmark this page, read it through step-by-step, and use each step to guide you on your way to success with a phone case business.

Keep reading to learn how to start a phone case business with no prior experience!

Advantages of Starting a Phone Case Business

Selling something like a phone case has several unique benefits because of its very nature. They’re complementary products that work to protect phones, make them prettier, and allow for additional features like credit card storage. We understand that launching any business comes with questions and concerns about the product’s viability. But outside of the usual day-to-day obstacles, phone case businesses don’t encounter many significant hurdles, especially when it comes to penetrating the market.

To encourage you to keep exploring how to start a phone case business, here are some advantages of selling phone cases as your main product:

Phone case lifecycles get attached to the lifecycles of phones. New iPhones and Androids come out every year, so you not only get a new wave of potential customers on a regular basis, but the large phone companies are often marketing for you. Phones and phone cases break. This introduces an additional flock of buyers who replace their cases or upgrade to a new phone (and therefore need a new case) every few years. This also opens up the potential for repeat sales not long after a customer made a purchase (maybe they broke their phone a few days after buying it). If you learn how to start a phone case business, it’s tough to run out of potential customers. You can source from high-quality, print-on-demand dropshipping services like Printful. These services offer design tools, printing services, packaging, and direct shipping to your ecommerce customers. There’s no reason to store or print anything from your own home or office. The upfront cost is low, and so is the initial risk. Printing phones on demand requires a tiny upfront investment. Most of the small fees get covered as you make sales. It’s possible to sell online, through marketplaces, and in-person. You can run an online store, list on places like Amazon/eBay/Etsy/social media, and visit trade shows or craft fairs. All of these are opportunities to make more sales. It’s also common to run an outdoor or indoor mall kiosk to sell your phone case designs. The profit margins are higher than other types of dropshippable products. Some items like home goods, decor, and even some apparel items have slim margins. That’s not the case for phone cases. Phone cases have simpler designs that you can make on your own or by using online templates. You can hire a designer, buy templates, or use online marketplaces for premium designs. Learning how to start a phone case business also involves learning a bit about design. It’s easier to target one niche with mobile devices. Think dog owners, bowling afficionados, cooking hobbyists, travelers, or even just targeting a certain location, like phone cases dedicated to neighborhoods in Chicago. These are the target markets that tend to sell. It’s easier to hold some inventory, process returns, and absorb sunk costs. Some startups struggle with bulky, expensive items, but phone cases are relatively cheap, and they’re super small. It’s a great market for custom designs. You can offer custom phone cases in your business model, allowing customers to print their names or special dates on the phones.

Initial Things to Think About Before Learning How To Start a Phone Case Business

Before developing a marketing strategy, building an online store, and conquering the phone case market, it’s important to understand the market and walk through some initial questions.

Is It Profitable to Start a Phone Case Business?

That depends on your approach, marketing efforts, and the appeal of your designs; but it’s definitely easier to achieve profitability with phone cases than other types of products.

One metric that shows continuing market growth is the interest in phone cases from online searches. There’s a wide variety of terms we could search to figure out these trends, but we’ll stick to the basic “phone case” keyword.

According to Google Trends, online search interest in the keyword “phone case” has risen steadily over the past ten years. You’ll notice that interest has peaks and valleys because of the holidays, new phone releases, and customer demand, but the average interest in this market continues to grow.

Another way to analyze the popularity and growth of the phone case industry is by looking at relevant keywords, and not only taking into account their search volume but also the competition required to successfully advertise for those keywords.

And there’s no doubt that hundreds of phone case keywords have far too high of competition. However, there are still thousands of relevant keywords with low and medium competition levels, allowing new companies to target those keywords and see results.

Not to mention, those keywords also have impressive monthly search volume, starting at 100 searches per month and going up to 100k, For instance, the “iphone 8 case” keyword looks promising (many of the older but still available phones have low competition), as does the “leather mobile phone cases” keyword.

We can also look at potential profitability based on recommended phone case margins from Printful. Most phone cases on Printful cost anywhere from $10.95 to $12.28. That’s a little high, but you minimize your risk with dropshipping through Printful (instead of purchasing and storing thousands of cases and hoping you sell them).

Printful suggests sellers start at a retail price of $15.50 per phone case, rendering up to $4.55 in profit for each sale. That’s not bad!

And just a slight increase in the retail price makes for an incredible boost in profit margins. Many cell phone cases sell for $20 or $30 per case (some go to $100 if they’re really heavy duty). At a $20 retail price, your profit margin sits at 36% per sale, producing up to $9.05 in profit per phone.

Finally, the growth of your business generally means that you can afford to purchase in bulk, shifting away from the dropshipping model or at least running some sort of hybrid. Buying wholesale makes for even stronger profit margins. There are plenty of suppliers for bulk phone cases, but Printful drops the price to $8.21 per case when you buy 200 items. That’s more than an extra $2 per sale added to your margins. So, we think it’s safe to say that learning how to start a phone case business is rather profitable if done right.

Types of Phone Cases and Phone Models to Consider

The first choice you must make is to decide to sell:

iPhone cases or…Samsung cases

Or sell them both!

Phone cases are rather simple products, but there are so many device types and versions, potentially requiring you to sell dozens of case variations with the same design. Luckily, this doesn’t take much work with Printful. Yet, you should still know the phone case options available.

Let’s start with iPhones. As of this article, Printful offers printing and shipping for 17 different iPhone case sizes, from the iPhone 7 to the iPhone 13 Pro Max. You can choose to just sell some of them, but we recommend listing them all as product variants. Printful is doing the sourcing and fulfillment for you, so multiple variants don’t cost you anything extra.

Printful provides a large collection of Samsung Galaxy phone cases as well, with options like the S10, S20 FE, and the S21 Ultra. As of right now, you can pick from 10 different Samsung Galaxy phone cases in Printful.

Some regional sellers have the option to list biodegradable iPhone cases in their ecommerce shops. You should check to see if your region has a Printful location nearby, but we just wanted to also mention this as an option.

Additionally, the phone case market is more than just iPhone and Samsung Galaxy cases. You could explore outside of Printful to source cases for:

Google Pixel phonesMicrosoft phonesSony phonesOppo phonesHonor phonesXiaomi phonesNokia phonesDoro phonesEmporia phonesAlcatel phonesAcer phonesAsus phonesBlackview phonesCubot phonesTablet devicesMany more!

There also comes to decision on what type of phone cases to list in your store. Phone case manufacturers have grown creative over the years, so we’re starting to see improved durability, styles, materials, and storage features.

Printful offers classic BPA-free hybrid Thermoplastic Polyurethane and Polycarbonate (PC) material phone cases that offer a sleek design, durable build, and grippy finish.

Here are the main phone types to consider when learning how to start a phone case business:

Polycarbonate/polyurethane shell cases (a happy medium with decent durability, increased style, and excellent comfort)Rubber bumper cases that protect the sides of the phoneWallet or purse phone cases with storage for keys, cash, and cardsExtra durable cases (the kind OtterBox sells—meant for extreme environments) Battery cases (stores an extra hidden battery pack within the case)Silicone/gel cases (inexpensive, flexible, and stylish, but usually the lowest amount of protection)

All of these options leave much to think about when learning how to start a phone case business. But it’s best to start with the classic polycarbonate cases since they’re readily available for dropshipping/printing through Printful, and they offer an affordable, durable, stylish solution. After that, you can explore sources like AliExpress and Oberlo to locate unique phone cases for extremely low prices.

How to Start a Phone Case Business

It all starts with an idea, but every step has its purpose. In this section, we’ll outline the actions you should take to find success when learning how to start a phone case business.

We cover:

Finding a gap in the marketCreating a business planFiguring out your target marketDesigning the phone casesFinding a supplier, printer, and shipperCreating an online storeAdding pricing, mockups, and product detailsAccepting phone case orders and marketing your business

Find a Gap in the Market

You’ve already decided to sell phone cases, but do you have to get any more specific than that? We discussed that you should know all about the different phone case models, versions, and sizes, but there’s also the next step is figuring out a niche within the phone case market.

Can you find success by just designing hundreds of random iPhone and Samsung cases? Sure, but it’s significantly harder to grab market share, and you’re far less likely to establish a memorable brand name. A business that sells phone cases with outdoorsy designs, sporting designs, movie designs, and quotes from books isn’t likely to end up in the minds of anyone. It’s too broad.

Luckily, there are plenty of gaps in the custom phone case market; you simply have to complete some research to figure out which ones have enough demand, while also showing less competition.

You can read our guide on how to find a niche business here. We also have thoughts to consider as you go through potential niches:

Is there a hobby or interest that people would love to show off on their phones? Think bikers, athletes, pet owners, book worms, gardeners, or anything else people consume their time with. What about professions? Doctors, lawyers, writers, actors, teachers, and every profession has their own inside jokes, quirks, and designs that you could highlight on phone cases. Think about locational designs such as countries, neighborhoods, cities, and landmarks that represent all of these. Humor is a great category that fits in with just about every niche. Consider quotes from classic movies, books, TV shows, or songs. Nostalgia is a powerful emotion, so think about aspects of pop culture that may make people jump for the Buy button when seeing your phones. With movies, books, pop culture, and sports, you always have to look into licensing and copyright law. Don’t sell a design for Star Wars or the New York Yankees if you haven’t gained licensing rights. Can you establish a niche that isn’t focused on the design content but rather where the phone cases come from? Like a phone case market made solely by local, independent artists; or an eco-friendly phone case company; or phones with nifty features like secret storage or extreme durability. Is there a way to incorporate custom phone designs where the niche focuses on events, moments, or people from their lives? Options include weddings, anniversaries, birthdays, graduations, or job advancement.

Create a Business Plan

Too many entrepreneurs try to launch their dreams without a business plan. There’s a misguided perception that business plans are only used as some way to visualize what you want to achieve. That’s partially true, but it’s really a written contract with yourself and stakeholders, along with a real plan to guide you to your goals. Not to mention, if you ever need partners, investors, or employees, those people often want to see a business plan.

It’s one of the smartest decisions you can make when constructing a business from scratch, and the lack of a business plan is taking one step towards failure.

Read our guide on how to write a business plan and use its tips to formulate the plan around a phone case company. Our guide shows you how to outline the following in your business plan:

Market researchMarketingFinancial planningSales channelsYour business model

Figure Out the Target Audience for Your Phone Case Business Idea

Lacking a true understanding of your target audience, or not having a target audience at all, eliminates your ability to craft products, make marketing materials, and communicate properly with your customers. It’s as simple as sending en email marketing message that caters to men, but not realizing that the majority of your target market is women. Another example is creating phone cases for RV owners, but not understanding that 20% of your target market is people who don’t own RVs (yet they dream of owning).

You can collect this target market information before you launch and while you run the business, using tools like:

Surveys and questionarresGoogle AnalyticsFacebook Audience InsightsJust about any insights program on social mediaSEO toolsCompetitor analysis software

With a target audience in mind, you then have the ability to generate a customer persona, or an outline of your average customer. A customer persona usually includes details like:

GenderOccupationAgeSpending habitsHobbiesLifestyle choicesLife habitsInternet browsing habits

After that, weigh the benefits and downsides of targeting specific sections of your customer base. You may find that some 30 to 45-year-olds are far more likely to purchase phone cases, so you shouldn’t put as much effort into marketing to younger people with less money. That’s just an example, but it’s absolutely something you could discover during your market research.

Design the Phone Cases

It’s easier to design phone cases when compared to items like clothing or pillows. Why? Because a phone case only needs a small, simple design that goes on a flat surface. You don’t have to worry about strange garment materials, embroidery, or making sure your design has a super high resolution to fit across a large object.

But how should you design your phone cases in the first place? There are several methods to consider:

Design the phone cases yourself. Use tools like Photoshop, Procreate, or Photopea if you have experience with professional design software. Many of them, like Canva or Pixlr, work well for less experienced designers. You can also use the Printful design tools, which are fairly basic, but get the job done for simple designs. Purchase pre-made designs online. There are subscription sites like Vexels, or sites like Vecteezy to purchase completed vector art. Buytshirtdesigns.net and Thefancydeal.com sell pre-made shirt designs that work on phones as well. Another option is to buy from designers on Etsy, Fiverr, or Guru.com. Hire a designer to make all the phone case designs. Search for quality designers on sites like Dribbble, DeviantArt, and 99Designs. These marketplaces allow artists to display their work, after which you reach out to them based on what you like. Some may end up too expensive, but there’s a plethora of designers out there willing to work for varying budgets.

Find a Phone Case Supplier, Printer, and Shipper (There’s a Service That Provides All of These)

Establishing a phone case business requires you to figure out:

SourcingPrintingStorageFulfillment

You could start with a wholesale manufacture partnership for the widest profit margin. For that, we recommend going to Alibaba to source from a Chinese manufacturer. However, that leaves you to store all the inventory and fulfill orders with packaging and shipping.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with fulfilling your own orders, but the lowest risk fulfillment method for phone cases is through a supplier/printer/fulfillment company like Printful.

Printful powers a significant portion of the printing business, as it provides access to hundreds of blank products that merchants can use to print, package, and ship to customers. Another benefit is that Printful acts as a dropshipper, storing all of your items in their own warehouses, and only pulling and printing products when a customer makes a purchase from your website.

Now, that means your profit margins end up smaller, but that’s an incredible trade off considering you take on minimal risk as a startup.

To get started, go to the Printful website and create an account. Search through the product collection and learn all about the types of phone cases offered by the supplier. You can even make product designs prior to having an online store.

Create an account using your email or social login information. Walk through the steps to make an account, like filling in business information and requirements.

Go to the Printful product library and open the Phone Cases section.

Here, you get a taste of what’s available, and you can even start designing a phone case for testing purposes.

Create an Online Store to Sell Your Phone Cases

Creating an online store requires a few things:

A business nameProducts to sellA platform to add ecommerce functionality

We already have the products. And we encourage you to spend a significant amount of time developing a quality business name.

But what about actually finding an ecommerce platform, a system for making a website, listing products, and processing transactions? That’s where Shopify comes into the picture.

Not only does Shopify provide a simple, affordable website builder, but it includes features for SEO, product listing, payment processing, integrated paid advertising, and more.

To get started, go to the Shopify website and click one of the Start Free Trial buttons.

Walk through the steps to launch an account (like adding your store name and business information). There’s no need to type in any credit card information. You receive a 14-day free trial, allowing you to test features, build a complete online store, and even display products prior to signing up for a paid account. Learn about Shopify pricing to give you an idea of which premium plans you should consider in the future.

Once you have a Shopify account, it sends you to the Shopify dashboard where you create your ecommerce shop. The left side menu offers options to manage orders, products, customers, finances, and marketing, while the Get Started guide in the center of the dashboard shares steps to take to launch your store the most efficient way.

We recommend customizing the look of your store first. This way, you can upload a logo, change around the design of the homepage, and add categories to organize the phone cases you plan on selling.

To customize the store (or swap out the default theme for a new one), go to Sales Channels > Online Store > Themes > Customize.

The Shopify Customizer provides a visual look at your current theme and overall website. The left side panel offers settings to adjust what appears on the website. For instance, you can remove the announcement bar, add a header image, and rearrange the building blocks to ensure you have the cleanest possible homepage. Most themes already have a homepage product showcase, but make sure that’s included just in case; this way, your phone cases appear on the homepage when you add them to the Homepage category from Printful.

Next up, you need to integrate Printful with Shopify to create products and sync them with your online store. Go to the Printful dashboard and click on the Stores menu item.

Scroll down to locate the section to “Choose your store’s platform.” Click Choose Platform.

Select the Connect button under Shopify. There are also many other platforms you can use, like WooCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, and Bigcommerce. Read our comparison between the top ecommerce platforms to help guide your decision.

This sends you back to Shopify where it asks you to install the Printful app. Click the Add App button to proceed.

Shopify has a large App Store, and Printful is one of the apps in that store. So, it provides a seemless integration with the click of a button. This is all done in Shopify, where you can read through the information about the integration.

Scroll to the bottom of the page to click the Install App button.

You’ve successfully integrated Printful and Shopify, allowing you to add phone case designs to Printful and sync the product pages with Shopify. The end result should send you to Printful, where you can add your first product.

Add Your Design, Pricing, Mockups, and Details to Your Product Pages

It’s possible to add products in Shopify, but it makes the most sense to create products in Printful when selling phone cases. This way, you’re able to sync the products to Shopify, while still getting the benefits of automated product fulfillment from Printful.

Click on the Add Product button to get started.

Browse through the product options and go to Accessories > Phone Cases. Choose iPhone Case, Samsung Case, or Biodegradable iPhone Case based on what you plan on selling. You can always go back to add multiple styles of cases. It’s best to create separate product pages if you plan on selling both iPhone and Samsung cases.

This sends you to the Printful product designer. Mark the check boxes for each phone case model you plan on selling; these get added to your store as product variants for the customer to choose. Click the Drop Your Design Here button to upload a design from your computer or other storage service.

After uploading, the design appears in the mockup preview. It’s also possible to change the Print Area Background to incorporate a unique color background if that’s not already included in your design file.

That’s the main way to add a design to a Printful product, but we encourage you to test the entire editor just in case something else allows you to get more creative with your designs. For instance, the Printful designer has options to:

Choose filesAdd textAdd clipartAdd a quick designChoose from premium imagesPosition your imageAdd patternsAdjust the sizing or transform the image

When you’re done designing, click on the Proceed To Media button.

Note: Printful always displays the current cost of the product in the bottom right corner. There’s no extra fee to add one design to a phone case, but some products get more expensive as you print on multiple parts of the item.

The next section prompts you to select a mockup style for your product pages. This is one of the wonderful parts about Printful, since you don’t have to pay for product photos or take them yourself. Printful puts your design on several default and lifestyle product photos that you can use for free.

For this example, we’ll go with a creative lifestyle product photo for every variant.

Click on the Proceed To Details button.

This section asks you to fill in information that appears on the product page in Shopify. As with all ecommerce products, you should create a catchy (and SEO-friendly) Product Title and Description. Printful inserts default information from the manufacturer; we recommend using some of this for product specifications, but it’s wise to rewrite it all for SEO purposes.

Also, feel free to add Tags and Product Collections. We suggest using a Homepage collection so you can instantly place items for purchase on the homepage. It’s also important to mark the checkbox for Product Visibility; otherwise, it won’t show up in your store.

Select the Proceed to Pricing button.

The Product Pricing page has options to set a percentage or dollar-based revenue increase. View the Printful Price (your cost per phone case), the Revenue (your profit per phone case sale), and the Retail Price (how much your customers spend on each phone case) to make the perfect profit margin for your store. Printful already recommends pricing, but you should adjust the pricing based on what your customers are willing to pay.

When you’re all done, click on the Submit To Store button.

Within a few seconds, Printful adds the item to your dashboard, where you can view the synced variants and click to View In Shopify or Edit In Shopify.

Note: Make sure you complete most edits in Printful, since they’re the ones making and fulfilling your phone case.

Going over to Shopify, we can now see that the product successfully synced from Printful.

And we recommend going to the frontend view of your Shopify store to see if everything looks right. As you can see, our product appears in the Homepage category showcase.

It’s also a good idea to look at the actual product page. Check that you have all the right product variants, pricing, descriptions, and images. Feel free to use the Shopify Customizer to adjust the overall layout of all product pages.

Accept Mobile Phone Case Orders and Market Your New Business

Now it’s time to start selling your phone cases!

There are many ways to market your products in Shopify, most of which are stored under the Marketing menu item. You can click on the Create Campaign button to see marketing options and launch a campaign.

Options for marketing in Shopify include:

Shopify Email marketingFacebooks AdsPinterest AdsSnapchat AdsYahoo AdsMicrosoft Smart ShoppingSMS Test marketing

When it comes to selling custom phone cases, we find that a few forms of marketing work best:

Social advertising: You can do this on Facebook, Snapchat, and Pinterest through the Shopify dashboard. Other social networks offer advertising tools as well. Search engine advertising: Google has its own advertising panel (so you must do this outside of Shopify). Otherwise, Shopify has advertising features through Microsoft. Email marketing: Use Shopify Email or one of the many integrations like Mailchimp or Constant Contact. Influencer marketing: This is one of the most powerful marketing strategies when dropshipping custom designs. Shopify doesn’t have a feature for this, but you can easily reach out to relevant social influencers and bloggers and create an agreement for them to market your phone case. Think Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Snapchat.

Summary on How to Start a Phone Case Business

All online business owners want to start with low costs, minimal storage requirements, and decreased risk. In reality, that’s not always possible, unless you consider a small business like one that sells cell phone cases. These phone accessories allow for an incredible amount of flexibility; you can sell from a physical storefront, at a kiosk, or learn how to start a phone case business with an online store.

With a little market research on demographics, some of your own designs, and an efficient fulfillment system through Shopify and Printful, we believe that any dedicated business person has the potential to make a considerable amount of money with a custom phone case business. Simply pair all of that with some Facebook Ads and influencer marketing and you’re well on your way to finding your place in the world of iPhone cases and Android cases.

If you have any questions about how to start a phone case business with a Shopify ecommerce website and Printful, let us know in the comments section below. Also, share your tips if you’ve already found success with a phone case ecommerce business!

The post How to Start a Phone Case Business (With No Prior Experience) appeared first on Ecommerce Platforms.

Original Source: https://designrfix.com/design/top-7-tshirt-design-tool-providers-printing-industry

Customized t-shirts are liked by the youngsters a lot. They often wear t-shirts with witty one-liners, logos of football teams and many other things. With the T-shirt business becoming more and more user-centric, it is imperative that customers have a design tool that can be used for creating designs on t-shirts with ease. Unlike complex…

The post Top 7 T-shirt Design Tool Providers For the Printing Industry appeared first on DesignrFix.

Original Source: https://smashingmagazine.com/2022/02/benchmark-improve-web-vitals-real-user-metrics/

How would you measure performance? Sometimes it’s the amount of time an application takes from initial request to fully rendered. Other times it’s about how fast a task is performed. It may also be how long it takes for the user to get feedback on an action. Rest assured, all these definitions (and others) would be correct, provided the right context.

Unfortunately, there is no silver bullet for measuring performance. Different products will have different benchmarks and two apps may perform differently against the same metrics, but still rank quite similarly to our subjective “good” and “bad” verdicts.

In an effort to streamline language and to promote collaboration and standardization, our industry has come up with widespread concepts. This way developers are capable of sharing solutions, defining priorities, and focusing on getting work done effectively.

Performance vs Perceived Performance

Take this snippet as an example:

const sum = new Array(1000)
.fill(0)
.map((el, idx) => el + idx)
.reduce((sum, el) => sum + el, 0)
console.log(sum)

The purpose of this is unimportant, and it doesn’t really do anything except take a considerable amount of time to output a number to the console. Facing this code, one would (rightfully) say it does not perform well. It’s not fast code to run, and it could be optimized with different kinds of loops, or perform those tasks in a single loop.

Another important thing is that it has the potential to block the rendering of a web page. It freezes (or maybe even crashes) your browser tab. So in this case, the performance perceived by the user is hand in hand with the performance of the task itself.

However, we can execute this task in a web worker. By preventing render block, our task will not perform any faster— so one could say performance is still the same — but the user will still be able to interact with our app, and be provided with proper feedback. That impacts how fast our end-user will perceive our application. It is not faster, but it has better Perceived Performance.

Note: Feel free to explore my react-web-workers proof-of-concept on GitHub if you want to know more about Web-Workers and React.

Web Vitals

Web performance is a broad topic with thousands of metrics that you could potentially monitor and improve. Web Vitals are Google’s answer to standardizing web performance. This standardization empowers developers to focus on the metrics that have the greatest impact on the end-user experience.

First Contentful Paint (FCP)
The time from when loading starts to when content is rendered on the screen.
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)
The render time of the largest image or text block is visible within the viewport. A good score is under 2.5s for 75% of page loads.
First Input Delay (FID)
The time from when the user interacts with the page to the time the browser is able to process the request.
A good score is under 100ms for 75% of page loads.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)
The total sum of all individual layout shifts for every unexpected shift that occurs in the page’s lifespan. A good score is 0.1 on 75% of page loads.
Time to Interactive (TTI)
The time from when the page starts loading to when its main sub-resources have loaded.
Total Blocking Time (TBT)
The time between First Contentful Paint and Time to Interactive where the main thread was blocked (no responsiveness to user input).

Which one of these is the most important?

Core Web Vitals are the subset of Web Vitals that Google has identified as having the greatest impact on the end-user experience. As of 2022, there are three Core Web Vitals — Largest Contentful Paint (speed), Cumulative Layout Shift (stability) and First Input Delay (interactivity).

Recommended Reading: The Developer’s Guide to Core Web Vitals

Chrome User Experience Report vs Real User Metrics

There are multiple ways of testing Web Vitals on your application. The easiest one is to open your Chrome Devtools, go to the Lighthouse tab, check your preferences, and generate a report. This is called a Chrome User Experience Report (CrUX), and it is based on a 28-day average of samples from Chrome users who meet certain requirements:

browsing history sync;
no Sync passphrase setup;
usage statistic reporting enabled.

But it’s quite hard to define how representative of your own users the Chrome UX Report is. The report serves as a ballpark range and can offer a good indicator of things to improve on an ad-hoc basis. This is why it’s a very good idea to use a Real User Monitoring (RUM) tool, like Raygun. This will report on people actually interacting with your app, across all browsers, within an allocated timeframe.

Monitoring real user metrics yourself is not a simple task though. There are a plethora of hurdles to be aware of. However, it doesn’t have to be complicated. It’s easy to get set up with getting RUM metrics with performance monitoring tools. One of the options worth considering is Raygun — it can be set up in a few quick steps and is GDPR-friendly. In addition, you also get plenty of error reporting features.

Application Monitoring

Developers often treat observability and performance monitoring as an after-thought. However, monitoring is a crucial aspect of the development lifecycle which helps software teams move faster, prioritize efforts, and avoid serious issues down the road.

Setting up monitoring can be straightforward, and building features that account for observability will help the team do basic maintenance and code hygiene to avoid those dreadful refactoring sprints. Application monitoring can help you sleep peacefully at night and guides your team towards crafting better user experiences.

Monitor Trends And Avoid Regressions

In the same way, we have tests running on our Continuous Integration pipeline (ideally) to avoid feature regressions and bugs, we ought to have a way to identify performance regressions for our users immediately after a new deployment. Raygun can help developers automate this work with their Deployment Tracking feature.

Adhering to the performance budget becomes more sustainable. With this information, your team can quickly spot performance regressions (or improvements) across all Web Vitals, identify problematic deployments, and zero in on impacted users.

Drill In And Take Action

When using RUM, it is possible to narrow down results on a per-user basis. For example, in Raygun, it is possible to click on a score or bar on the histogram to see a list of impacted users. This makes it possible to start drilling further into sessions on an individual basis, with instance-level information. This helps taking action directly targeted to the issue instead of simply trusting general best practices. And later on, to diagnose the repercussions of the change.

Wrapping Up

To summarize, Web Vitals are the new gold standard in performance due to their direct correlation with the user’s experience. Development teams who are actively monitoring and optimizing their Web Vitals based on real user insights will deliver faster and more resilient digital experiences.

We’ve only just scratched the surface of what monitoring can do and solutions to sustain performance maintenance while scaling your app. Let me know in the comments how you employ a Performance Budget, better observability, or other solutions to have a relaxed night of sleep!

Original Source: https://ecommerce-platforms.com/website-builders/web-com-review

In this Web.com review, we’ll be examining just how effective Web.com is as a website builder. The solution promises a convenient and easy-to-use method of building your digital presence. However, there has been some controversy around this store recently, as many people argue it’s not as reliable, or feature-rich as you might think.

Web.com is a website building service offering a combination of both managed solutions for websites, with hosting and domains, or do-it-yourself options. You can register your domain with web.com if you already have another site builder you want to use, and access hosting with a 99.9% uptime guarantee.

There’s also access to a range of other tools like ecommerce stores, website templates, email marketing solutions, SEO support, and integrations with tools for PPC and social media marketing. Let’s take a closer look at what we.com can do.

What is Web.com?

At first glance, Web.com seems like an excellent choice for any entrepreneur in search of a site-building solution suitable for beginners. You’ll have access to everything from stock photos and templates to custom domain names, for prices starting as low as $1.95.

Web.com promises to make building your website quick and simple, with affordable prices, excellent tools, and a guaranteed uptime for peace of mind. Unfortunately, while this product will definitely be appealing to smaller businesses, it has some limitations too.

Like many of the most affordable website building tools on the market, Web.com seems to compromise a little on functionality, in exchange for affordability.

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Web.com Review: Pros and Cons

Overall, Web.com promises a lot of the same things as most web hosting services, and site building tools. There’s access to first month low prices, and standalone hosting solutions, like you’d expect from competitors like GoDaddy. You also get a money-back guarantee, but it can be a little difficult to find the refunds team in Jacksonville.

If you’re looking for advanced web hosting services, VPS access, and excellent tools for your new website, you might struggle with Web.com.

Pros ?
Cons ?

Pros ?

Cheap intro offer: You can start an online presence with very little initial expense. However, the offer will only last a month, and you’ll struggle to stand out online.
Publish your site quickly: It’s easy to get online. Web.com doesn’t really require any coding knowledge. You can use a template to create your website and jump in.
Decent web hosting services: The web hosting services are pretty good, but they don’t quite compare with some other market leaders like Bluehost.
Support: you can get 24/7 support via phone call, which isn’t an option for every website builder. This can be very useful when you’re making sure someone can answer your questions.
Range of features: Web.com has a decent range of features, even if it does struggle to keep up with some other providers.

Cons ?

No free trial: The functionality you get doesn’t always match the pricing. There’s no free plan or free trial, just a money-back guarantee.
Messy customization options: It’s difficult to do anything beyond a few basic tweaks without having to deal with complex tools.
Confusing backend: It can be difficult to find certain things.

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Web.com Review: Website Building

Web.com is an all-in-one website building tool, offering a range of different features.

The website-building service is the central aspect of the Web.com portfolio. There are various ways to design and publish your website with Web.com, starting with the custom website building technology. The website builder on Web.com is a drag-and-drop solution, intended to be as simple as possible for beginners and experts alike.

The website builder promises a flexible design space, loaded with features like pre-designed content blocks, stock photos and social media integrations. You can also choose to sell online with ecommerce features added into your store.

Unfortunately, the website builder also happens to be one of the biggest points of contention for Web.com users, who claim the technology is clunky and difficult to use. We’ll come back to that in a moment, for now, let’s look at the other website building options you’ll have from web.com:

Custom website design: If you get tired of trying to make your own website with Web.com, you can have a professional do most of the work for you. There’s a customized website design and copy feature, a friendly in-house design team with SEO content support, and access to ecommerce support if you want an online store.Professional email account: You’ll have complete access to your own professional email account, which matches your domain name. This also includes access to a business calendar, contact list, and tasks and notifications.WordPress site building: Web.com offers simplified WordPress site building options specifically for people who want to make the most out of the WordPress ecosystem. You can power your WordPress site with Web.com hosting, and there’s also a professional web design service available if you want the team to make your website for you too.Online stores: The drag-and-drop store builder is very similar to the standard website builder on Web.com. you can use this tech to sell up to 500 products, accept credit cards, and manage/track your orders easily. You’ll have access to a range of payment providers, like Stripe and PayPal, real-time shipping rate calculations, social selling, and data tracking. You can also integrate Google analytics into your store, track your inventory, and more.Expert services: The expert services offering from Web.com essentially aims to take all of the stress of actually building your online store off your shoulders. You can create custom websites and ecommerce stores with the help of a professional. Your website is automatically optimized, and ready to integrate with SEO and PPC campaigns. You can even get dedicated marketing services to guide you through the basics of advertising.Domain hosting: Website hosting from Web.com promises 99.9% uptime for quick and simple hosting experiences among small businesses. You can access a quick and seamless installation, hassle-free hosting technology, and award-winning customer service. There’s also a range of hosting options to choose from depending on how much space you need.Domain names: Web.com allows customers to purchase their own domain name too. This is a relatively quick and easy process, designed to ensure you can claim the right identity for your online store or website.

The wide range of website building options may make it seem like Web.com is an extremely valuable tool, for an impressively low price. But let’s take a look at ease of use.

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Web.com Review: Building Your Website

If, like most people, you decide to skip the professional services option for building your website, and decide to start creating something yourself, you’ll need to use the Web.com website builder. Unfortunately, the web.com website builder can be quite complex to use.

The Web.com website builder uses the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) strategy for designing your website. This means you can see exactly what you’re going to get from your website as you’re editing. The initial set-up process is drawn-out and complicated. You’ll need to choose your domain name to begin with and create a web.com account – all before you’ve seen the prices of your package. Then, you need to choose and pay for your plan, and say what kind of business you’re in before you begin to see templates.

Web.com promises hundreds of templates, but when you choose an industry, you’ll really only have a handful of options to choose from. Many people consider these templates to be basic at best. Many look outdated and simplistic. The only way to see alternative designs, if you don’t like the ones you’re given, is to go back through the set-up process and choose another industry.

On the plus side, you can make basic changes to your site in a small amount of time, changing text with a click and swapping photos. There’s also a large library of stock photos and videos you can use for free on your website, which is a nice touch.

As an added bonus, you get a mobile preview mode to check exactly what your store is going to look like on smaller devices, which helps to ensure you’re creating an effective, responsive website.

Further reading ?

The Best Website Builder On the Market in 2022 (Top Solutions Reviewed and Compared)

The Best Cheapest Website Builders Available Online in 2022

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Web.com Review: Customer Support

Customer support is often an important part of searching for the right website building tool. You’ll need plenty of guidance to help you understand everything from online marketing to search engine optimization with your new site building tool.

Web.com offers a handful of ways for companies to reach out if they have questions about web hosting, site building, and so on. You can get direct phone support from the 24/7 phone line which is free with all plans, but you may need to wait a while on busy days.

A live chat tool is also available, but the support you get might not be particularly in-depth through this medium. You can also raise a support ticket, but it often takes a while to get any kind of feedback this way. Web.com does have some social media pages for contact too.

You can find a handful of useful videos from Web.com on YouTube if you need help figuring out how to access your free domain name, or which of the web hosting packages are right for you.

Generally, however, you get the best all-around response from the direct phone line.

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Web.com Review: Pricing

The pricing for Web.com depends on what you want. Free domain name access is available with all plans if you’re looking for a website builder, or you can access web hosting separately. Websites come with access to SSL certificate access, stock images, webpage building support, and so on.

The website builder starts at $22.95 per month, while website building and online marketing will cost business owners around $29.95. There’s also website, marketing and store functionality for business owners who want to develop a DIY store, and this starts at $39.95.

All three plans come with a drag-and-drop website builder, a free domain name for a year, and a library of stock photos and videos. There’s also access to hosting, and a 99% uptime guarantee. You’ll need to be on a higher paid plan for things like SSL certification to encrypt your site data.

You also need extra to access site submission to Google and the option to sell online, or access domain name renewal. These features come with most webpage and website builders automatically elsewhere. For instance, Wix automatically submits your site to Google, and provides SSL certification for free. Weebly also includes SSL with its premium plans.

The only way to sell through web.com layouts is to access the highest website plan, which will give you access to around 500 products to sell.

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Web.com Review: Ease of Use and Experience

Web.com isn’t quite as advanced as many other website builders and hosting company solutions when it comes to getting you started online. You don’t automatically get listed with directories, Bing and Google, and although you get access to domain registration, the hosting plans are pretty limited.

The Web.com team promises an industry standard uptime of around 99.9%. However, the reality is you may get a lot less than this. If you do, your only option is to seek out technical support for user-friendly network solutions you can add to your web development process.

As either a web.com site builder or web development system, web.com is pretty lacking in terms of overall experience. While aspects of the website solution are user-friendly, the number of issues you can encounter without full web.com support makes life very difficult.

Web.com Review: Verdict

Ultimately, when it comes to building your online presence across Google, Yahoo, and more, there are much more advanced options out there. With basic knowledgebase access, and a handful of simplistic tools and features which barely keep up with the tools you get from other, lower-priced tools.

The post Your Comprehensive Web.com Review & Guide appeared first on Ecommerce Platforms.

Original Source: https://1stwebdesigner.com/this-week-in-web-design-january-21-2022/

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