Which is the Best Influencer Marketing Platform for Your Business?

Original Source: https://ecommerce-platforms.com/articles/best-influencer-marketing-platform

Are you dreaming of becoming a social media influencer and unsure of where to begin? Or maybe you’re already a social media superstar looking for new and innovative ways to increase your influence? Alternatively, you may be a company considering hiring influencers for the first time and looking to learn more about influencer marketing platforms.

Well, either way, you’ve come to the right place! Here we’re exploring the big wide world of influencer marketing platforms! So let’s jump right in! #influencer #worlddomination

What’s Influencer Marketing?

Since the dawn of the internet and social networks, people have capitalized on online advertising and eCommerce. In fact, as far back as 2006, influencers established themselves as the ‘head-honchos’ of digital marketing. 

The idea, while simple, is a genius one: Pay influencers and celebrities to inspire consumers to buy your product or service.

When it comes to marketing KPIs, the most crucial is ‘return on investment’ (ROI). Fortunately, when done well, influencer marketing can generate as much as 11 times the ROI than traditional marketing methods!

With all that said, what are the best influencer marketing platforms?

First up on this list, social media…

Social Media Platforms

At first glance, with so many social media platforms out there, social media marketing can seem daunting – to say the least! 

But, fear not, they’re not as scary as they seem. 

Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, and many more have taken the world by storm, connecting A-lister stars with adoring fans across the globe. Needless to say, social media has undoubtedly opened the world up to new opportunities, adventures, and influences.

But, for our purposes, the key platforms for influencer marketing are:

InstagramFacebookYoutubeTikTokSnapchat

That said, let’s take a closer look at our first social media platform: Instagram.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Instagram

Instagram is the place for anyone wishing to share aspects of their life or business. Whether your account is for private use, connecting with family and friends only, or business, Instagram connects people and brands. 

When it comes to influencer marketing, you can promote your brand on Instagram by sharing posts, stories, reels, lives, and more with your followers. As you may already know, influencers have a significant impact on Instagram, whether they’re selling a product, movement, or their own brand- it’s an excellent platform for boosting brand awareness. In fact, as many as 89% of marketers say Instagram’s the most important channel for influencer marketing. 

In 2019, Instagram began testing Facebook’s Brands Collabs Manager with a select group of influencers. It’s a tool that allows chosen content creators to source partnerships, deals, and share campaign data. This is an excellent place for influencers to get even more exposure and likewise an ideal platform for business owners looking to find fruitful partnerships.

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

Instagrammers Like to Shop

When you consider that 70% of shopping enthusiasts turn to Instagram to find products, adding Instagram influencers to your marketing budget will help you attract some of that cohort. Not least because 37% of Instagram users interact with influencers. 

Extend Your Reach

Instagram is famous for its global reach, with as many as one billion active users enjoying the platform every month! With so many potential followers to be had, why wouldn’t you use this valuable asset to promote your brand and get the word out there? 

It Can Be Inexpensive and Efficient

As for cost, there’s no set template here. Influencers are paid by their reach, and this is based on the number of followers and/or subscribers they have. Influencers are broadly put into five categories: 

Nano-influencers: 1,000–10,000 followersMicro-influencers: 10,000–50,000 followersMid-tier influencers: 50,000–500,000 followersMacro-influencers: 500,000–1,000,000 followersMega-influencers: 1,000,000+ followers

Costs vary and aren’t set in stone. Interestingly, the latest research suggests that a mid-tier influencer with around 100,000 followers would earn about $500 per Instagram post. In contrast, a Nano-influencer will be paid anywhere between $10-100 per post. 

Cons

The Wrong Influencers = Bad Business

There’s an element of risk with anything, and with Instagram influencers, hiring the right one can make or break your business. 

For example, when mega influencer Kim Kardashian promoted an anti-morning sickness drug on Instagram and failed to disclose its potential side effects, the FDA pressured her to remove the post. 

Then there was beauty and fashion influencer Chriselle Lim, who was hired by Volvo to promote their cars. Unfortunately, her followers weren’t too happy because they felt the ad wasn’t authentic to her style. 

These are just a few of many examples where companies have likely spent sizable sums to secure such prestigious influencers, only for the results to have flopped. 

Who’s Instagram Best for?

Whether you’re an influencer or looking to hire an influencer, Instagram has to be the right fit for your brand. Instagram is a platform that encourages and thrives on engagement, particularly visual content that’s attractive to its audience, which is primarily younger. Most Instagram users are under 30, with 31% aged 18-24 and 31.2% aged 25-34. So if that’s your demo and you think Instagram would work for your line of business, it’s worth checking out!

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Facebook

When someone mentions social media, the first thing that comes into most people’s heads is Facebook. It’s the ultimate platform for connecting with friends, family, and colleagues. With 2.38 billion monthly users and 65 million small business owners using Facebook Pages to promote themselves, it’s no wonder 83% of marketers include Facebook in their marketing strategy.

Facebook has its own platform called: Brand Collabs Manager. Here, influencers can sign up and create a profile. Then, on the flip side of the coin, businesses interested in hiring influencers can browse the profiles and hopefully find an influencer that complements their ethos and business needs.

Best Influencer Marketing Platform

Pros

Reach New Demographics

As we’ve already said, when we talk about influencer marketing, Facebook’s child-platform Instagram tends to be more relevant for young audiences. However, Facebook’s still a great way to reach new audiences thanks to its billions of registered users. In fact, it’s especially advantageous if you’re targeting a slightly older demographic, as 49.2% of Facebook’s users are aged 25-44.

Building Community

Facebook groups are fantastic for building an online community and nurturing a sense of togetherness. Namely, because it’s easier for influencers to engage directly with their target audience’s discussions, posts, queries, etc. 

Facebook Live

Like Instagram, Facebook also comes with a live video function. This allows you to live stream an event or performance for viewers to watch via their phones, TVs, or computers. Engagement comes via comments, shares, or likes. Influencers typically benefit from Facebook live if, for instance, they want to do a live demo of themselves testing a product. 

Cons

Less Organic Reach

Facebook’s algorithm makes it difficult to attract much in the way of organic views or engagement. For example, at the end of 2020, the average reach of an organic post was 5.2%, while the engagement rate for an organic post was 0.25% in the same period. 

Who’s Facebook Best for?

Facebook is great for all kinds of businesses and influencers – especially those looking to target demographics aged between 25 and 44. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: YouTube

YouTube rapidly established itself as a platform for uploading video content for entertainment, education, product reviews, etc., – you name it, it’s probably on YouTube! An astonishing one billion hours of YouTube video content are viewed on the platform daily, with 500+ hours of content uploaded every minute. 

YouTube enables users to watch, like, comment, and share videos as well as subscribe to their favorite YouTube channels. Given that the platform supports longer-form videos, it’s ideal for anyone offering more in-depth content. 

Pros:

You Can Post Longform Content

As we’ve already mentioned, YouTube lets influencers post longer videos. This makes it much easier to review products in-depth, tell a story, and give viewers greater insight into their lives. In addition, YouTube’s algorithm favors videos longer than 10 minutes because it keeps viewers on the platform in one place, making it easier to show them ads.

 Few other platforms give influencers the same opportunity to post this kind of long-form video content. For example, TikTok videos started out as 15-second clips, then 30 seconds, and, at the time of writing, it was 3 minutes. 

It Excels at Video

It’s no secret that YouTube’s still one of the top video content platforms with 2 billion active users as of 2020. This is good to know because video marketing is on the up and up. In fact,  64% of customers are more likely to buy a product after seeing a video featuring it. 

Fortunately, YouTube comes with a range of helpful video features, like the ability to embed links, add subtitles and captions, showcase an enticing thumbnail, and more. Each video also gets its own comment section which is a great place to encourage viewer engagement.

Monetization

YouTube has its own monetization scheme to pay successful influencers. In the first instance, a video can generate income through advertising if it has a lot of viewers. 

In addition, influencers can charge for sponsorship deals. The amount of which typically depends on their reach, just as we discussed in the Instagram section. 

Content Takes Longer to Create

Because high-ranking Youtube videos tend to be longer and the quality of video content is so high on this platform, creating competitive content can take much longer than other social media platforms.  

You Need More Skills

It takes various skills to make a YouTube video look good, engaging the proper lighting, audio, camera work, editing, etc. 

Who’s YouTube Best for?

YouTube is a platform where creativity and skill are crucial for standing out. It’s an entertainment channel, first and foremost, rather than a lifestyle platform like Instagram. As a result, YouTube is great for businesses and influencers wanting to tell a story and invest in every piece of content they create. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: TikTok

TikTok is a video-sharing app that enables users to create and post short 15-second videos. Thanks to its fun snippets of entertainment, TikTok has stormed Gen Z. 

In fact, 50% of TikTok users are aged under 34, and 41% are aged 16-24 out of over 130 million active TikTok users. Many of whom visit the app as often as eight times a day.

The conclusion? TikTok is part of young people’s daily routine, making it the perfect place for influencers and business owners wanting to attract a more youthful audience. 

TikTok is well-renowned for its challenges and trends. For example, the ‘Tell Me Without Telling Me’ challenge where TikTok users challenge each other to “tell” them something without actually using the words. Elsewhere, there’s ‘Zoom Meeting Mishaps,’ where TikTok users post about awkward Zoom meeting incidents. 

These are just two of many popular trends, but you get the gist!

Celebrities have also embraced TikTok, including Reese Witherspoon, Gordon Ramsay, Will Smith, and Selena Gomez.

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

Capture a Young Audience with Huge Spending Power

As many as 60% of TikTok users are aged between 16 and 24, who have a spending power of $140+ billion, accounting for 40%+ of global consumers this year. Needless to say, this makes TikTok ideal if you’re looking to market yourself to this demographic. 

Fun and Relatable

TikTok is all about short, fun, engaging, and relatable video content. As a result, it’s an excellent platform for brands and influencers with a good sense of humor looking to showcase their authenticity.

Great for Engagement

High-quality influencer content is easily shareable and has a good chance of reaching a massive audience organically. For example, a funny or creative video can spread on its own, allowing you to expand your audience and easily attract like-minded followers. An example of this is Elf Cosmetic’s hashtag challenge #eyeslipsface, resulting in 4 billion+ views and 5 million video contributions. Ad Week even called it the most successful TikTok marketing campaign. 

Cons

It’s The Wrong Place for a Sales Pitch

Audiences come to TikTok to have a good time. As such, it’s not the right platform for sales pitches or formal analysis of a product’s features and benefits. TikTok videos need something fun and snappy to succeed, which, of course, doesn’t suit all brands and products.

TikTok Isn’t Right for Everyone.

Building on what we’ve just said, TikTok has a very niche audience. It’s primarily a younger, female crowd and those looking for fun, shareable content that takes seconds to consume. Consequently, TikTok isn’t suitable for brands trying to reach more mature audiences or those wanting to strike a more serious tone.

Who’s TikTok Best for?

TikTok is best for lifestyle-focused brands and influencers that are high-energy, youthful, innovative, and fun. Rather than focusing on conversions and sales, TikTok is an excellent place to establish and improve upon your brand perception.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Snapchat

Compared to other influencer marketing platforms like Instagram and TikTok, Snapchat is often forgotten about. But that doesn’t mean Snapchat, with its 293 million daily users, isn’t a worthy contender for your influencer marketing strategy.

The platform hinges on the concept of FOMO (the fear of missing out). Here, users, influencers, and celebrities can post images or videos that can only be viewed within a set time before they disappear. Then, once a user has seen the content, they can’t view it again.

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

You Can Use Snapchat to Reward VIP Customers

Snapchat’s disappearing content makes it the ideal platform for influencers to reward loyal followers with one-off additional content.

A Moment in the Life of…

Authentic brands and influencers can benefit from the one-on-one feeling and authenticity that Snapchat provides. It’s excellent for:

Shooting behind-the-scenes-style contentLifestyle updatesLittle memories and stories

…and anything else that helps you establish a deeper, more personal connection with your audience.

Cons

Organic Growth is Practically Impossible

Because you need to actively follow or befriend someone on Snapchat to see their content, most people won’t follow an influencer unless they’ve already seen them elsewhere. In light of that, Snapchat’s rarely an influencer’s primary platform because it’s nearly impossible to grow organically. Put simply, you need an established audience before you can make waves on this channel.

Nothing Lasts

While Snapchat’s great for that FOMO feeling and provides sneak peeks into an influencer’s life, content isn’t available to view for long. As such, it’s not a great fit for brands looking to create permanent or evergreen content.

Who’s Snapchat Best for?

Snapchat is best for influencers that already have a dedicated following who want to engage with their most loyal fans more personally.

As for marketers, if they want to reach teens, Snapchat is potentially a good choice, with 34% of US teens favoring it over other platforms, followed by TikTok and Instagram. That said, a 2020 study found that only 11% of marketers were using Snapchat as a video channel. 

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Influencer Marketing Platforms

As we’ve just established, influencers can nurture a presence on any and all of the social platforms mentioned above. But how do you find sponsors to pay you to promote products and create content? And in turn, how do businesses get in touch with influencers looking for collaboration opportunities?

This is where influencer marketing platforms are worth their weight in gold.

In short, these are networking platforms where businesses and influencers can get in touch to arrange sponsorships or other deals. On some platforms, influencers can browse through available opportunities and pitch themselves. Likewise, other networks provide companies with directories full of influencers to peruse through. 

That said, let’s discuss some of the best influencer marketing platforms available today:

Best Influencer Marketing Platform: #paid

#paid is a leading all-in-one influencer marketing software that enables you to hire influencers and launch influencer marketing campaigns from the convenience of one place.

Using #paid’s Handraise™ feature, the platform will match your brief with the best creator for your specific needs. Working with Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat, #paid provides a simple and effective marketing solution for brands looking to expand their business.

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

If you’re looking to hire an influencer, you’ll be pleased to hear that content creators have to pre-qualify before entering the pool and are only chosen if their following marries with your target market. Influencers then compete by pitching their ideas and campaign concepts for businesses to review. 

On the flip side, if you’re an influencer, you benefit from an established relationship with #paid. When it comes to finding new collaboration opportunities, this platform does most of the work for you. They’ll match you with brands who want you to be the face of their campaigns that also suit the audience you want to interact with -win-win! 

#paid also comes with a centralized messaging system that enables clients to communicate clearly with creators to ensure maximum efficiency. Finally, previews are also available so that clients can double-check everything’s up to scratch before the campaign goes live.

Cons

There are limited numbers of influencers to choose from, so you may end up picking someone that isn’t the perfect fit for your brand. 

Who’s #paid Best for?

#paid is best for influencers with followings over 5,000 and an active engagement rate (at least 2%). This is essential for the sign-up process – applicants that don’t meet these criteria won’t be successful.

Also, businesses looking to hire relevant influencers or creators quickly (who are a good fit for their brand) and want a one-stop-shop method of doing so have lots to gain from #paid. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Upfluence

Upfluence is an all-in-one influencer database platform. It provides end-to-end campaign management, influencer search software, and marketing campaign creation, all from the safety of the cloud. 

The platform makes it easy to:

Influencer discovery for campaignsKeep on top of influencer relationship management Streamline automated campaignsHandle influencer paymentsTrack ROI and salesIntegrate with your existing marketing stack. 

Put simply, Upfluence provides companies with all the info they need to find the right influencer for the right job – or even a whole team of influencers! 

For influencers wanting to appear on Upfluence’s database, they’ll need to go through a screening process to ensure they’re legitimate, have high engagement, and have an extensive reach. That way, companies can trust who they’re hiring.

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

Upfluence’s main advantage is that it’s truly a holistic influencer marketing platform that provides businesses with real-time data about specific influencers. This goes a long way to helping brands make the best possible collaboration decisions for their business. In addition, the user-friendly interface makes the platform easy to use and quick to navigate. 

Influencers get to potentially work with big-name brands such as Amazon, Universal, Farfetch, Asics, and Zappos.com. Not to mention, they receive secure and convenient payment via the platform. 

Cons

There are no prices available on its website (at the time of writing). Instead, interested parties have to contact Upfluence to receive quotes. The database is also much smaller than other platforms, so there’s a higher chance that you won’t stumble across the ‘perfect fit.’ In addition, a few Upfluence users have complained about lousy customer support. 

Who’s Upfluence Best for?

Upfluence has four price plans, and although prices are not visible, they are aimed in sequence at small, growing, or enterprise organizations. Upfluence doesn’t limit itself to specific niches. In fact, its website tells clients that it has all types of influencers around the world – from nano content creators with a few hundred followers to celebrities who attract millions of fans. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Pixlee

Pixlee is a content management tool, as well as an influencer marketing platform. It enables brands to collect and curate content posted by their customers, including product reviews or mentions. 

Through Pixlee, brands can contact those influencers and ask permission to share their content on their own pages. Thus building a content strategy based on social proof and user engagement.

So, in short, Pixlee empowers brands to find and manage social influencers and potential brand advocates via their social listening features. Once the brand has identified opportunities for collaboration, they can then engage those influencers in 1:1 conversations to plan their content strategy and negotiate compensation.

Pixlee also helps you visualize the ROI generated from your influencers and content across your social channels from one centralized dashboard. That way, you can keep on top of exactly what’s leading to impressions and conversions.

Influencers can also sign up to Pixlee to feature as certified influencers and get matched with potentially interesting brands. This part of the platform is called Pixlee for Creators and acts as a communication channel between influencers and clients. Here, influencers and brands can share contracts, manage content approval, share campaign status updates, and more. 

Influencers just create an account by registering via Facebook. However, influencers are also strongly encouraged to link their Instagram accounts too. If brands are interested in working with an influencer, having seen their read-only profile, they’ll send a campaign invitation via email.  

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

Pixlee’s main advantage is that it streamlines the curation of user-generated content. Namely, by making it incredibly easy for brands to engage with influencers who already love your products.

For influencers, it’s quick and easy to sign up via Facebook. On top of that, the platform’s incredibly intuitive, with users saying they especially like the chat portal that enables them to communicate with the businesses they’ve been retained by.

Cons

Not all businesses- especially companies who are just starting out will have customers talking about them. If that’s the situation you’re in, Pixlee probably isn’t the right platform for you. On top of this, Pixlee doesn’t provide a clear pricing scheme – you have to get in touch for a quote.

Who’s Pixlee Best for?

Pixlee’s website states that it’s ideal for innovative brands with an active customer base that wants to inject more social proof into their content.

As far as influencers are concerned, Pixlee is best for those wanting to contact the brands that use Pixlee that suit their profile. Brands listed on the Pixlee website include Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants, Fairmont Hotels and Resorts, Morphe, MadisonReed, Kenneth Cole, and Alterra Mountain Company.  

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: NeoReach

NeoReach prides itself in creating top influencer campaigns for enterprises and Fortune 500 companies. The platform offers the services of its full-fledged influencer marketing agency that handles everything from sourcing influencers to reporting on their performance and everything in between.

With this approach, brands can take their hands off the wheel and leave NeoReach to take care of their influencer marketing strategy.

But suppose you want a little more control over your campaign? In that case, the platform also enables you to search for your ideal influencer using 40 different filters, including keywords, social platforms, profile performance, and more. You can even search for the perfect influencers by audience demographic.

The entire collaboration with your chosen influencer(s) is automated to help efficiently plan campaigns and seamlessly execute them. This involves managing contracts, tracking payment history, reviewing posts, and coordinating influencer relationships.

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

NeoReach provides a complete end-to-end influencer marketing solution, including sourcing, contract negotiation, campaign strategy, detailed reports, brief creative development, and much more. It also has powerful search features to find the influencers you’d like to work with and the audiences they appeal to.

For influencers, NeoReach works with Fortune 500 brands, so it’s an opportunity to potentially work with big names. 

Cons

As NeoReach targets fortune 500 companies, unsurprisingly, it’s not a budget-friendly solution for smaller brands. 

Also, as NeoReach manages every aspect of the influencer marketing campaign, it places less focus on the personal relationship with influencers.

Who’s NeoReach Best for?

NeoReach is best for big brands, agencies, and enterprises wanting an end-to-end solution to achieve significant results. 

As for influencers, NeoReach is probably best for influencers keen to work with larger brands. In which case, it’s likely those brands will be more interested in influencers with an extensive reach. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Fourstarzz

Fourstarzz is one of the leading influencer marketing platforms for small and medium-sized businesses. For clients looking for influencers, it comes at a monthly cost of $59 per month, which unlocks access to over 800,000 creators. This includes niche nano- and micro-influencers alongside famous celebrities and athletes.

You can filter for influencers based on demographics, location, languages, engagement, interest, post value, and more. Then, you’re free to negotiate and communicate directly with your influencers. In addition, you can create a list of influencers for different campaigns and analyze their performance using Fourstarzz’’s predictive ROI tool.

Fourstarzz also provides a fully managed agency service, which is great if you don’t want to plan your own campaign.

As for influencers, the Fourstarzz website has a dedicated influencer area, and it’s free to sign up. Influencers are responsible for negotiating pricing and campaigns directly with brands. In addition, influencers have free access to the Fourstarzz Okanjo affiliate marketing section. Here you learn how to direct followers to products, and each time they buy, you earn a portion of every sale. 

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

With its simple pricing plan, Fourstarzz unleashes the power of influencer marketing and makes it accessible for small businesses. You can create as many influencer lists, conduct unlimited searches, and build as many campaigns as you want. Not to mention, you can cancel your subscription anytime.

For influencers, Fourstarzz’s free sign-up process is simple to understand, and access to its affiliate marketing program is also a bonus. 

Cons

There’s no free trial, and influencer contact details are only provided if you sign up for an annual plan (which does, however, lower the monthly cost to $44.25). Fourstarzz also falls short when it comes to post-campaign analytics. While it provides plenty of information about influencers upfront, it doesn’t measure how well their campaigns go once you’ve started to collaborate.

For influencers, Fourstarzz largely works with smaller and medium-sized brands, so if your eye is on a bigger prize, it may not be the platform for you. 

Who’s Fourstarzz Best for?

Fourstarzz is a high-value, low-cost solution for small businesses looking to make influencer marketing part of their marketing strategy. That said, firms with a higher budget might prefer a platform with more campaign tracking functionality. 

Where influencers are concerned, Fourstarzz is perhaps best suited to those keen to work with startup brands while earning some added income through affiliate marketing. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: MightyScout

One major way MightyScout differs from other influencer marketing platforms is that it works with digital marketing agencies to improve their return on investment. It focuses on Instagram and TikTok influencer tracking and provides analytics and reporting to boot. As a result, the platform helps agencies get more work done for their clients without hiring additional staff. 

Rather than focusing on finding new influencers, MightyScout enables agencies to analyze their current influencer campaign performance using the platform’s profit and engagement calculator.

The agencies it works with represent a wide client base, including big names like Mastercard, L’Oreal, Disney, Walmart, Lancome, Nestle, Mercedes Benz, etc. 

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

MightyScout dramatically reduces the time it takes agencies to track and monitor their influencer programs, significantly cutting labor costs. In addition, it comes with powerful reporting features across Instagram and TikTok and allows agencies to set hashtag and brand mention targets.

It’s an attractive proposition for influencers who are keen to work with agencies representing household name brands. 

Cons

MightyScout doesn’t help you run or start influencer marketing campaigns or find new influencers. Instead, it aims to help agencies get a quicker and better grasp of their ongoing campaigns.

Another drawback is that the platform works only for TikTok and Instagram and no other social channels.

Who’s MightyScout Best for?

MightyScout is best for digital marketing agencies with a focus on influencer marketing. For example, suppose you’re spending vast amounts of time tracking your campaigns and analyzing the results. In that case, this platform can help you streamline workflows significantly.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Tribe Dynamics

Tribe Dynamics is another influencer marketing analytics platform. Like Mightyscout, its focus is to provide businesses with better visibility into their influencer campaigns so that you get a firmer grasp of how they’re performing. You’re better positioned to optimize your campaigns and compare which influencers earn you the most conversions with this info to hand.

Tribe Dynamics also allows you to create custom feeds for subsets of your influencer community. That way, you can keep track of content and the impact of your influencer’s initiatives in real-time.

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

Tribe Dynamics offers some of the most powerful influencer marketing analytics on the market and a wide range of insights, including:

Relationship managementPosting historyCustom feedsBrand mention monitoring

Cons

Pricing is only available on request. However, even the micro plan provides tools for managing up to 750 influencers, indicating the kind of scale the tool operates at. 

Tribe Dynamics also doesn’t provide tools to find and nurture new influencer relationships.

Who’s Tribe Dynamics Best for?

Tribe Dynamics is for larger data-driven brands and agencies that manage large influencer marketing campaigns consisting of hundreds of influencers.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Brandbassador

Brandbassador is a referral and influencer marketing platform that aims to help brands and marketing departments attract customers with a brand affinity to your business. It’s more like an affiliate marketing software program that works for different-sized brands, including B2B companies. 

Brandbassador calls itself a referral platform that helps enterprises and startups grow their profits by fostering relationships with brand ambassadors. The platform’s software allows you to identify and enroll customers, affiliates, influencers, partners, and employees into your advocate programs and create personalized referral campaigns. You can then track and monitor your ambassadors and automatically reward your best partners with cash, points, credits, or gift cards.

Brandbassador integrates with a suite of other marketing tools, as well as many ecommerce platforms.

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

Brandbassador provides a fully branded and white-labeled affiliate marketing portal for all your brand ambassadors. Via this platform, it’s easy to engage with influencers and set up reward programs for referral schemes. Ambassador also lets you A/B test your decisions, create custom reports, and monitor conversion rates.

Cons

With a greater focus on affiliate marketing, Brandbassador isn’t specifically designed for influencer marketing. 

Who’s Ambassador Best for?

It’s best suited to business owners who want to pay influencers through affiliate commissions.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Intellifluence

With Intellifluence, we return to the more traditional influencer networks. This site puts you in touch with trusted influencers who post their rates upfront so that you know precisely what you’ll pay from the get-go. 

Each influencer provides specific services, such as video reviews on TikTok, and comes with a star rating from other customers and an indication of their follower reach. Not to mention, payment and messaging tools are also built into the platform.

Clients can create pitches and send them to influencers of their choice. These pitches include a campaign goal, the free product value and cash reward offered, and a description of the work required.

With over 100,000 creators, Intellifluence isn’t the largest influencer marketing platform. Still, its simple system makes finding influencers transparent, simple, and affordable.

Influencers interested in working with Intellifluence receive free products or cash for reviews. It’s free to sign up and use the platform, which doesn’t take any portion of your earnings. You sign up through the Intellifluence platform, enter your details, complete a profile so brands can find you based on your experience and interests. Then, if a brand reaches out to you to try their products, you’ll be rewarded in cash or get to keep the product once you’ve shared an honest review with your followers. 

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

With upfront pricing per job, small businesses and brands can easily budget their influencer marketing efforts. Clients can also post public offers for qualified influencers to apply to, making it easier for brands to find influencers and grow their audience.

It’s free for influencers to sign up, and they don’t have to give Intellifluence any of their earnings. 

Cons

Intellifluence is better suited to one-off influencer posts rather than full-fledged campaigns. It doesn’t provide many analytics tools to predict or monitor the ROI of the collaboration. While this might not be a huge problem for those new to influencer marketing, the platform’s less suitable for established pros and larger companies.

Who’s Intellifluence Best for?

Intellifluence is best suited to small, unique businesses that are just getting started with influencer marketing. You can use Intellifluence to find your first affordable influencers or supplement existing campaigns.

From an influencer perspective, it’s ideal for anyone with a social media following who wants to capitalize on that by posting honest reviews of products.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Webfluential

Webfluential is another platform that empowers businesses to connect with influencers and helps them to shape campaigns that generate a high ROI. 

They offer various services for different budgets, including self-service software that enables brands to search through thousands of accredited influencers. From there, businesses and influencers can work together to co-create branded content. 

Clients can also set up smart contracts to pay influencers when the client is satisfied. Influencers can also send pitches to proactively find work for themselves. In addition, they receive a professional media kit from Webfluential. This shows them how to host their stats, create rate cards for their offerings, and showcase their best work using public URLs. Influencers also get access to insights to track the growth and performance of their content.

Aside from this, Webfluential also offers a managed service where a team of experts will help you with your influencer marketing campaigns from start to finish.

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

Webfluence has influencers covering many social channels and gives them a way to proactively seek opportunities with the brands they love. 

Not to mention, this affordable and straightforward system helps small businesses quickly access influencers in their niche and compare rates.

The platform also partners with IBM’s AI tool Watson, which can analyze whether the tone of your brand on Twitter matches the tone of the influencer you want to work with. Another pro for clients is that influencers have to apply to join, so not just anyone will pitch for your briefs.

Cons

The site design is clunky at times – especially its influencer search functionality. Plus, on top of the monthly cost for the software service, clients also have to pay a 10% fee on all content deals. 

Who’s Webfluential Best for?

Webfluential is suitable for any size brand that wants to find new influencers and know what they’ll pay ahead of time. 

For influencers, it’s a great platform for seeking extra work and starting new relationships with brands.

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Klear

Klear is another influencer marketing platform alternative that combines an influencer search function, communications, analytics, and payments all into one. Klear lets you browse influencers by category, with more advanced filters like location, age, audience demographics, brand mentions, and more. You can also choose between vetted influencers and newer members that haven’t yet been certified.

Influencers/creators sign up through the Klear website and receive a media kit that helps you demonstrate to brands why you’d be a perfect fit. Here, you can demonstrate your:

Audience insightsPrevious workMetrics such as numbers of social likesA demographic breakdown of where your audience is and its average age

Best Influencer Marketing Platforms

Pros

Klear’s AI studies your brand to propose better influencer matches. The reporting features are great for tracking campaign success, and Klear also enables you to handle all things influencer marketing from one place. As such. It’s a great platform if you’re looking to streamline your influencer marketing efforts.

On top of that, Klear also provides monitoring features that allow you to research competitors and see how they perform for mentions and engagement.

On paper, Klear looks like a good fit for influencers who want to partner with known and emerging brands. Big names include Estee Lauder, Uber, H&M, Nike, and Adidas.  

Cons

Klear doesn’t report on TikTok, which is a significant drawback for brands hoping to focus on this channel. Also, pricing is only available on request.

Who’s Klear Best for?

Small and large brands alike can use Klear to find new influencers and manage their campaigns from the convenience of one platform. 

It’s also an interesting proposition for influencers aiming high and wanting to work with well-known brands. 

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Best Influencer Marketing Platform: Heepsy

Heepsy acts as an influencer search engine that provides access to over 11 million influencer profiles across Instagram, YouTube, Tiktok, and Twitch. This also includes micro-influencers with more than 1k followers on TikTok and Youtube, as well as Instagram influencers with over 5k followers.

You can use Heepsy’s advanced search filters to help you identify the right influencers across niche industries. You can also search by location, category, contact info, and performance metrics.

In addition, this influencer marketplace provides stats to help you compare these influencer profiles so that clients can see at a glance an influencer’s:

Authenticity ratingEngagement rateLanguages they can speak

…and more. Needless to say, this info goes a long way to speeding up your vetting process.

From there, you can create your own influencer lists before reaching out to start a conversation.

best influencer marketing platform

Pros

You can try Heepsy’s search feature for free with limited search results. Or you can pay an affordable $49 per month to access all 11 million influencers and create lists.

For influencers, it’s an opportunity to potentially work with small and larger brands such as Walmart, RollsRoyce, IKEA, and New Balance. 

Cons

Heepsy doesn’t provide any further assistance than helping you find influencer profiles and calculate cost estimations. But reaching out and negotiating actual rates is down to you and the influencer. Contact information and advanced data like audience insights and authenticity audits are also only included with Heepsy’s most expensive pricing plan.

Who’s Heepsy Best for?

Heepsy is excellent for companies that want to use data to identify the best influencer profiles across multiple social media networks. However, you’ll need to be comfortable managing your own influencer relationships and contracts, as this is left completely down to you. 

Heepsy is best suited to influencers with 5,000+ followers on YouTube and Instagram.  

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Which is the Best Influencer Marketing Platform for You?

Traditional advertising strategies don’t carry the same weight anymore. Instead, online word-of-mouth marketing, referrals, and social proof are what drives conversions. To succeed in this new paradigm, influencer marketing is the best way to gain an edge!

Most of the action work happens on social platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. But, as an influencer, you can boost your income and start proactively building connections with brands by joining one or more of the influencer marketing platforms on this list.

For clients looking to hire influencers, we recommend using the advanced search tools available with these platforms. This is the easiest way to find the right influencers for you. From there, you can start managing your campaigns and tracking the performance of branded content.

We hope this list has helped you identify where the best influencer marketing opportunities can be found. Let us know in the comments which platform is your favorite for connecting with brands and influencers. Perhaps it’s even one we haven’t mentioned like traackr, hypr, tapinfluence, revfluence, famebit, izea, or aspireiq. Either way, we want to hear about it!

The post Which is the Best Influencer Marketing Platform for Your Business? appeared first on Ecommerce Platforms.

The Best Printify Alternatives for Print on Demand in 2022

Original Source: https://ecommerce-platforms.com/print-on-demand/best-printify-alternatives

In this article, we’re going to be exploring the best Printify alternatives, for those who want an alternate solution for POD selling. For Print on Demand, there are some names which often stand out more than others. Printify is one of the better-known companies in the POD landscape.

However, it’s not the only option. Like dropshipping, print on demand has emerged as an extremely popular business model in the current market. This has led to an influx of reputable POD resources appearing worldwide.

Alternatives like Printful give companies a range of options for where they can source their products, ideal for situations where Printify might not have the items you’re looking for, or the quality of service you need.

Let’s take a look at some of the top Printify alternatives on the market today.

1. Printful

printful - best printify alternatives

Printful is possibly the most popular print on demand company in a lot of countries today. Known for it’s wide selection of products, excellent shipping times, and handy mock-up generator, Printful has a lot to offer. Printful offers a host of ways to make your brand stand out when you’re producing POD products too, with solutions like cut and sew, sublimation printing and embroidery.

Part of what makes Printful so attractive is a commitment to helping companies dive into the POD world as quickly and easily as possible. Everything is simple and straightforward, from the moment you sign up, you’ll be guided through the process of finding the products you need. There’s even a handy mock-up generator, where you can add your designs to the products you want to sell.

You’ll be able to integrate Printify with your online stores, to help with speedily listing products. You can even add things like branded labels and unique packaging inserts into the mix, to help ensure you make the right impact with your brand image. Overall, it’s an excellent alternative to Printify.

Printful also promises excellent customer service, so if anything does go wrong with your shipping or printing process, you can reach out and get answers as quickly as possible. This is crucial in a POD landscape where your customers are reliant on you to deal with problems.

Pricing ?

There’s no monthly or setup fees included when you start using Printful. Similar to Printify, the amount you spend will depend on the kind of products you want to order for your customers, the branding options you choose, and the speed and destination of shipping. There are various calculators on Printful to help you estimate costs.

Pros:

Lots of branding and customization
Fulfillment centers around the world
Great customer service and support
Huge range of products
Mock-up builder helps with designing products
Sample order discounts
Integrations with leading website building tools

Cons:

Can be difficult to establish shipping settings
Profit margins are a little low

Who is it Best For? ✅

Widely considered one of the top print on demand products available, Printful offers a huge range of products and excellent customer service for companies from all backgrounds. There’s even a mock-up generator for creating your designs.

? Read our Printful review.

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2. Print Aura

One of the leading printing services on the market for simple but effective apparel printing, Print Aura offers an affordable and easy way to start your online store. There are tons of items to get started with building your product selection, with options like aprons, hats, masks, and mugs. You can even create phone cases, children’s clothing, and pillows.

Print Aura is also wonderfully efficient. The average turnaround time is usually around 3-to-5 days, which is excellent if you’re trying to deliver the best possible experience to your target audience. There’s also a wide range of customization options, to ensure your brand stands out.

While Print Aura may seem a little basic at first glance, compared to other market leaders like Printify, it’s an excellent pick for many business leaders. There are no minimum orders, and the printing quality is always excellent. You also get the added benefit of global and US shipping.

Print Aura also gives you a number of assets to help with starting your sales online. Alongside a design tool for mock-ups, you’ll also get a range of how-to guides, amazing customer support, and plenty of tips. The Print Aura Guarantee ensures every print is high quality.

Pricing ?

Print Aura’s pricing will depend on the kind of items you’re going to be purchasing and shipping to your customers. Keep in mind you’ll spend a lot less if you’re choosing simple items with simple branding options. Sweatshirts, for instance, will cost around $8.50 on average, while pillows are around $11.50. Though some of the items are pricey, you do get an excellent shipping calculator, and high-quality products.

Pros:

Lots of branding options to make your products stand out
No setup or subscription fees
Mockup generator to help with your designs
Track customer items whenever they ship
No minimum order requirements
High quality products

Cons:

Customer service responses can be slow
Some shipping costs are expensive

Who is it Best For? ✅

If you’re looking for a wide range of excellent products and decent delivery speeds, Print Aura is a great choice. There’s also the added peace of mind which comes with a product guarantee to ensure you’re getting good quality.

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3. Gooten

Gooten is one of the better-known names in the Print on Demand market. Known for offering a wide variety of easy-to-use services, Gooten makes sure you can get your designs on the web and selling as quickly as possible. This fantastic product ensures you can sell your own designs with speed. There’s also the option to purchase designs of other artists too.

Once you sign up for an account with Gooten, it’s simple to start selling. There’s plenty of tools like a mockup generator for checking out what your product is going to look like. There’s also an automated system for delivery and order tracking.

Gooten has more than 150 product options, and integrates with leading website creation tools like Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, and Etsy. There’s also excellent speed of service with Gooten. Not only can you send products to more than 70 global routing locations, but you’ll have access to 2.8-day average production, and 3.9 day average shipping.

Gooten has earned a lot of recognition over the years for its excellent service and fantastic selection of high-quality items. You can even print products you might not find elsewhere, like yoga mats and gym bags.

Pricing ?

Pricing for Gooten will depend on what you want to sell. There aren’t any set-up or monthly fees. You simply calculate the product costs, add in your shipping costs, and determine how much you’re going to spend on branding.

Pros:

Excellent broad product selection
Easy to use with lots of great tools
Integration with top website builders
Global shipping and fast shipping feeds
Fast production times
Automated order tracking

Cons:

Prices can be somewhat high
Not a lot of marketing tools available

Who is it Best For? ✅

If you want to transform your existing website with POD technology, Gooten integrates with a huge selection of website builders, to help bring your dream to life. The company also offers some of the fastest shipping and production times.

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4. Teespring

Another fantastic Printify alternative, Teespring offers a wide range of beautiful print-on-demand items, for affordable prices. There are plenty of famous brands and influencers already selling their merchandise on Teespring, so you know it’s trustworthy. While the company started out selling only custom T-shirts, today’s entrepreneurs can sell everything from mugs and stickers to artwork.

Similar to most POD companies, TeeSpring simplifies the process of building your ideal business. You can use the mock-up generator to estimate what your items are going to look like before they reach your online store. There’s also plenty of room for experimentation with branding options to make your products stand out.

You’ll be able to cross-sell your products across a range of channels, download images of your mockup products, and even donate your profits to charity if you like. There’s even the option to add multiple people to a Teespring account, which is ideal if you’re running a business with a handful of employees all working together.

The Boosted network offered by TeeSpring is fantastic if you need extra help reaching potential buyers too. This allows you to highlight your items to customers on places like Amazon and Etsy.

Pricing ?

Similar to may POD solutions, you’ll be able to start selling on TeeSpring for free, paying just the costs of making and shipping your items. You will have access to options like “rush shipping” in some cases, which can cost more.

Pros:

Lots of products to choose from
Plenty of marketing help with the boosted network
Straightforward fulfilment and ordering
Easy-to-use mockup generator
Rush shipping options
High-quality products

Cons:

Can be a little tricky to get used to at first
Limitations on customization

Who is it Best For? ✅

If you’re looking for a print on demand company to help you start making an impact online, Teespring could be the ideal choice. The boosted network is great when you need help drawing attention to your products as a new brand.

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5. Spreadshirt

A beautifully straightforward solution for print on demand, Spreadshirt is a German company with a host of fantastic products on offer. There are more than 200 items to explore, and you can sell in up to 12 different languages. The range of customization options on Spreadshirt is great too, with step-by-step guidance to ensure you make your products look amazing.

Spreadshirt stands out as one of the more appealing solutions on the market due to its versatility. If you don’t have any ideas for a product yourself, you can simply use one of the designs made by the artists in Spreadshirt’s community. There’s also a number of eco-friendly production processes in play, to ensure you’re not having a negative impact on the environment.

Spreadshirt simplifies the process of selling gifts, clothes, apparel, and more. It’s also one of the few print-on-demand companies with transparent manufacturing methods. With items from photos and t-shirts, to Christmas gifts, you’ll have no problem finding things to sell. Plus, you can boost your chances of getting a sale with the Spreadshirt marketplace.

Pricing ?

The price you pay when selling on Spreadshirt will depend on which items you want to ship to customers, and how you’re going to customize them. You’ll also need to pay for the storage and shipping costs associated with creating your products.

Pros:

Excellent for finding existing customers
Lots of ways to customize your items
PayPal payments are available
Artists to give you extra design options
Easy-to-use environment

Cons:

You’ll deal with most of the marketing yourself
Some products can get quite pricey

Who is it Best For? ✅

If you’re looking for an easy way to start selling online, even if you don’t have your own designs already available, Spreadshirt is a great choice. Thanks to the available artists on the platform, you should have no trouble building a product portfolio.

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6. Modalyst

modalyst - best printify alternatives

Another great option for building your e-commerce business via print on demand, Modalyst connects your existing website to drop shippers all around Canada, Europe and the US. You can build an ecommerce business quickly and easily with Modalst, creating custom products from scratch, without compromising on quality.

The vast supplier network from Modalyst allows you to add a range of products to your ecommerce platforms, such as bags, t-shirts, hoodies and more. You can experiment with custom printing options, and get samples sent to your home so you can test the quality of everything you make.

One of the best things about this Print on Demand service, is Modalyst only ever connects you with high-quality suppliers, so you never have to worry about a low-quality print provider ruining your business reputation.

Pricing ?

Modalyst has a selection of pricing plans, all available on Monthly and Yearly plans. The first option is “Hobby” for $0, then there’s “Start-up” at $35 per month, and “Pro” for $90 per month. The different packages give you more access to a higher range of trending products from top t-shirt printing companies and creative providers.

A higher priced package can also help you to reach your customer base across the USA and Europe faster, as the dropshippers offer faster delivery times.

Pros:

Very reliable dropshipping services
Great for finding and selling trending products
Fulfillment centers around the world
Merch, leggings, home decor, and many other options to choose from
Rapid order fulfillment

Cons:

Can be expensive to access some unique products
Hefty transaction fee on a variety of products

Who is it Best For? ✅

If you’re looking for a dropshipping solution that can offer a wide range of product designs upfront with no compromise on quality, Modalyst is a great choice. The solution will give you access to leading luxurious brands – but you will need to be willing to pay the price.

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Choosing Your Printify Alternatives

There are no shortage of Printify alternatives to choose from in the current dropshipping markets. Each solution comes with its own benefits, from templates for your designs to reduce the hassle of creation, to extensive integration functionality for your existing Wix or Shopify store.

The right Printify alternative for you will offer more than just competitive prices for your dropshipping products. You’ll also need to find something you can trust to deliver excellent, high-quality items to your customers as quickly as possible.

Beginners will need a service that’s convenient and easy to use, while developers and tech-savvy business owners may want more advanced features like API access and connections to platforms like eBay and Amazon. Good luck finding the service that works best for you.

The post The Best Printify Alternatives for Print on Demand in 2022 appeared first on Ecommerce Platforms.

15 Best New Fonts, December 2021

Original Source: https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2021/12/15-best-new-fonts-december-2021/

Are you tired of using the same old Google fonts from website to website? You’re in luck!

In this month’s roundup of the best new fonts, we’re showcasing the latest and greatest fonts from independent type foundries and designers worldwide.

Astronef Super

Astronef Super is a retro-futuristic font collection with seven styles that are meant to be mixed and matched. While the font is modular in design, there are wild variations in weight that you can have a lot of fun with.

Auguste

Auguste Serif and Auguste Sans Serif were originally drawn as a single stencil font that combined serif and sans serif styles. They ultimately became two separate fonts, with four weights apiece, that can be scaled up and down in size based on your needs.

Bartok

Bartok is an exciting font as it breaks with the concept of creating a family of unified styles. Instead, each of the four styles uses different structures and weights, meaning this font can be repurposed for a wide variety of brands and styles.

Cardone

Cardone is a type of serif known as Scotch Roman, designed for functionality and legibility. With its sturdy and brutal design, this serif is perfect for editorial content.

Champ

Champ is a fun and friendly font with nine weights. Because of its bold footprint, this serif performs best in branding and headlines.

Columba

Columba is modeled after old-style printing press typefaces. With its narrow, legible serif forms, Columba is most useful in text-heavy environments — both on the web as well as for printed brand materials.

Deia

Deia is a bracketed serif font with seven fonts. Thanks to the curved stroke transitions in Deia’s character set, this font is full of personality and would work great in product packaging and website branding.

Garton

Garton is a 19th century-inspired typewriter typeface that would look great on literary and editorial websites. This uniquely elegant font has three weights with italic companion sets for each.

Halisa

Halisa is an extensive font family with 60 styles, five widths, and six weights (plus italics). The designer drew inspiration from 19th-century factory signs to come up with this legible semi-constructed grotesque typeface.

Helvetica Now Variable

Helvetica Now Variable is an upgrade on Helvetica Now and the original 1957 Helvetica design. This one, however, adds over a million new Helvetica styles to the fold (all in one font file), which designers can use to create all kinds of digital and print content, including typographic animations.

Palast

Palast is a type system that consists of three sub-families: Palast Text, Palast Display, and Palast Poster. Designers can use this carefully crafted serif font family pretty much anywhere they want — from clients’ websites to promotional print graphics.

Parco

Parco is part of the new wave of humanistic typographic design. With Parco’s compact spacing and tall characters, this font will help designers craft eye-catching and highly legible headlines and branding.

Right Gothic

Right Gothic is a huge font family, containing 98 styles — seven weights, seven widths, 20-degree italics, and an adjustable contrast axis. While this contemporary font is a sans serif, it draws upon typical serif anatomy with its high contrast between thick and thin strokes.

Rund Text

Rund Text is a geometric sans serif that looks both stylish yet comfortable. It also has a companion Display family available to designers who want to bring the same type of functional design to larger headlines or branding.

Sculpin

Sculpin is another variable font to make this list of the best new fonts. This sans serif font was designed as if a chisel and brush had been used, giving it a structured, hand-crafted feel.

Source

p img {display:inline-block; margin-right:10px;}
.alignleft {float:left;}
p.showcase {clear:both;}
body#browserfriendly p, body#podcast p, div#emailbody p{margin:0;}

The post 15 Best New Fonts, December 2021 first appeared on Webdesigner Depot.

Designing Better Links For Websites And Emails: A Guideline

Original Source: https://smashingmagazine.com/2021/12/designing-better-links-websites-emails-guideline/

Why are “click here” and “by this link” poor choices? And is it acceptable to use “read more”? All these phrases have become so common that many people don’t see any problems with them.

How many times have you encountered or composed the following on websites, in emails, or intranets?

Fill in this form by the end of the day.
Check the equipment policy by the link.
You can find more information here, here, and here.

In this article, I’ll explain popular wording and formatting mistakes and will show more accessible and informative alternatives. Let’s go!

Meaningful Links
Exposing URLs
Download Links
Links vs. Buttons
Link-Rich Texts
Link Accessibility
Distinction
Color Contrast
Focus State
Optimization For Screen Readers
Duplicated Links

Meaningful Links

So what exactly is a hyperlink? It’s a combination of a web address (URL) and a clickable element (oftentimes a word or phrase, sometimes an image). While this is a vast topic, we’ll focus on text links, namely their usability and accessibility.

Thoughtfully composed links express respect to readers, whereas jumbled-up ones cause confusion and suspicion. When a link is presented as “here” or “this,” it’s harder to aim it with a cursor or finger. Also, it lacks transparency. What is hidden behind it: a page or file, an article or web form? One should re-read the whole sentence or paragraph to guess.

On the contrary, URLs attached to concise self-explanatory phrases inform people about the destination and are more convenient targets for clicking or tapping. Moreover, a well-composed link makes sense out of context and typically combines a topic (e.g. security, brand, marketing) and format (questionnaire, request form, guideline, policy, and so on).

Exposing URLs

If a web address is short and doesn’t look like M$c0P88%X4LHr&dxQ1A, then exposing it right away will work quite well, too, especially if the audience is supposed to copy it and paste it somewhere else.

And if you’ve got a long indecipherable chain of symbols, exposing it isn’t a great idea in most situations. In this case, consider embedding a URL into a succinct phrase or shortening the address in tools like Bitly or Cuttly.

However, these tools aren’t silver bullets: you do get a shorter link, but its meaningful parts will be replaced with random symbols, which are suspicious and not informative. Customizing shortened URLs is possible, but it’s typically a paid feature.

Compare the following examples:

bit.ly/30SjUa4y (suspicious and unreadable);
bit.ly/smashing-books (readable topic);
smash.ing/30SjUa4y (recognizable domain);
smash.ing/books (fully transparent).

Download Links

A link that guides to some downloadable resource needs a slightly different treatment. Besides embedding it into a meaningful phrase, you should also inform users about the file format and size:

The format gives clues to what you can do with this data (e.g. if the information is read-only or editable);
The file size is crucial for people with costly internet, slow connection, or limited local storage.

When you share a bunch of files (let’s say in different formats or versions), it’s not enough to design each link correctly. The whole series should be well-scannable and easy to use.

Links vs. Buttons

Not all links on a page or in an email are equally important. Authors often want their audience to click on the primary link, whereas other links can be skipped. If you’re going to draw people’s attention to the main action, think of presenting it as a button:

“Subscribe to the newsletter”
“Buy tickets”
“Get the white paper”
“Download the recording”

If you cannot create a button because of technical or time constraints, go for a quick-and-dirty solution: put that link in a separate line, make it bold, add spacing above and below, and so on.

Of course, button text should follow corresponding patterns so that you don’t cross the line between motivating readers and manipulating them:

Be concise (up to 4–5 words);
Ideally, start with a verb (e.g. “get”, “buy”, “download”, “apply for”, and so on);
Call the action honestly (i.e. avoid hushing up unpleasant steps like watching ads, registration or submitting personal data).

Compare “Download the report,” which assumes that downloading starts immediately after clicking, and “Get the report,” when a user downloads the file in exchange for their name and contact details.

Link-Rich Texts

Links enable the functioning of the Internet, however, vigorously pumping URLs into each sentence isn’t a good practice (of course, unless you contribute to a Wikipedia-like knowledge base that is cross-connected by nature).

Step zero is to make sure you really—really—need all the links. If you can edit something out, there won’t be a problem to solve. Otherwise, try to group the links: as a bulleted list, on the side of related paragraphs, or under a suitable title (e.g. “Recommended materials” or “Resources”).

Grouping the links helps a lot, but if the goal is to trigger action, the primary link should stand out. So, why not make it a button, then?

In the previous sections, we figured out how descriptive links increase usability and accessibility. At the same time, such links are longer, and consequently, can appear divided in a paragraph, when the first part of a link remains at the end of the previous line, and the second part jumps to the next line. It seems trivial compared to bigger flaws, but distorted links are a bit annoying in link-crowded texts.

If a paragraph width is fixed, compose text the way all links fit into lines, for example, try to start a paragraph with a link. However, browsers and devices render content differently, and links will still shift for some users. That’s why lists are a safer option for a set of links.

Link Accessibility

Accessible links are not only the ones that look tidy and clear; they should also be properly working. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), the world’s most famous digital accessibility standard, includes recommendations about hyperlinks, including some non-visual features.

Distinction

One of the WCAG requirements is not to rely on color only when you want to distinguish a button or link from the rest of the text. Painting links in blue or another color doesn’t suffice since it still might not be visible for people with color blindness. The most typical method is underlining links; they can also appear in bold font.

Color Contrast

Links are essential interactive elements and have to comply with contrast recommendations. WCAG has two levels of contrast compliance:

AA: medium, used by many websites for a mass audience;
AAA: high, primarily applied on governmental sites and by communities of people with disabilities.

For example, the AA level requires maintaining a contrast between a link and background of at least 4.5:1 for normal font size and 3:1 for large text.

Note: You can always check your colors with the help of the online Contrast Checker or Figma’s Contrast plugin.

Focus State

Like all interactive components, links should have a visible keyboard focus. All popular browsers have an embedded accessible focus by default (you might have seen this bold blue frame around input fields, dropdowns, buttons, and links in Google Chrome). Unfortunately, on some sites, focus gets manually removed or visually customized so that a focused link can look even less noticeable (e.g. faded out).

Optimization For Screen Readers

Blind users don’t see the web — they listen to it by means of “screen readers,” assistive programs that transform a written text into fast robotic speech. They navigate with a keyboard and remember dozens of handy shortcuts to jump between headings, buttons, or links instead of obediently listening to the entire content on a page.

So, when you remove wordiness for sighted people (for example, in the lists of different language versions or formats), it’s important to keep links clear for screen reader users, too. Otherwise, blind visitors will hear the following:

“Ukrainian — link, English — link, German — link”

The self-explanatory should be heard instead:

“Download project plan template in Ukrainian — link, download project plan template in English — link…”

And probably the most annoying thing on a news website is to hear this:

“Read more — link, read more — link, read more — link”

Sighted people can guess that “Read more…” relates to the nearest title, and blind people need individualized read-mores. Fortunately, the HTML attribute aria-label comes in handy here; it enables attaching explanatory text for screen reader users.

It’s often a designer’s responsibility to compose accessibility-related text and collaborate with a developer around optimal implementation, so here is a simplified code example:

<h4>News</h4>
<p>Eleks Design Team will participate in the Space Hackathon.
<a href=”aerospace-hackathon.html” aria-label=”Read more about Eleks participation in the Space Hackathon”>Read more…</a>
</p>
<p>Projector Tech and Creative Institute launches five courses on web accessibility this year.
<a href=”new-courses.html” aria-label=”Read more about new courses on accessibility by Projector Institute”>Read more…</a>
</p>

As you can see, each “Read more” has an extended explanation for screen readers. However, you won’t need to take care of article links with aria-label if each title is a link itself.

<h4>News</h4>
<h5><a href=”aerospace-hackathon.html”>Eleks Design Team will participate in the Space Hackathon</a>
</h5>
<h5><a href=”new-courses.html”>Projector Tech and Creative Institute launches five courses on web accessibility this year</a>
</h5>

Duplicated links

Multiple identical links are yet another widespread controversial practice. For example, on a web page, it means that the same web address is attached to an article title, hero image, and intro sentence. At first glance, nothing’s wrong: wherever you click — you get to the article. But for blind users, it means repeating the same information thrice, which extends the time they need to sift through content to what they are interested in.

An important note: We are now talking about identical destinations, but a card can include different ones, for instance, a link to the article, author’s profile, and tags. In this case, minor links can appear “wrapped” in the main one.

Now, emails. Let’s say we have an invitation to some online event, where a Zoom link repeats several times. In the event description, “what/when/where” section, and closing part. Not only will it create an impression of mess for sighted users, but also visually impaired users will be troubled with jumping between duplicated links.

Recommended Reading

In this article, I wanted to suggest options instead of showing the topic in black and white. There are multiple shades of good design, and you can find yours on the overlap of best practices and your particular case. Meanwhile, some additional reading on this topic:

“Using aria-label For Link Purpose,” Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)
“How To Make ‘Read More’ Links Accessible,” Vision Australia
“Writing Hyperlinks: Salient, Descriptive, Start With Keyword,” Marieke McCloskey, Nielsen Norman Group

15 Best Free VPN Providers

Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/free-virtual-private-networks/

According to Google, people are spending an average of 2 hours and 25 minutes a day on the internet. Browsing and accessing several sites, making them vulnerable to cyber thefts and hackers, and most…

Visit hongkiat.com for full content.

Grid Zoom Layout

Original Source: https://tympanus.net/codrops/2021/12/01/grid-zoom-layout/

Today I’d like to share a simple grid concept with you. The idea is to “zoom” or scale up a small grid image and show some more content (i.e. a project slideshow that is not implemented) and a small map that shows a miniature version of the whole image grid so that it becomes easy to navigate.

Combined with some text animations that we’ve previously explored in Layout with Reveal Animations and Content Preview, the whole design comes to life. We are using the same code as in the other demo.

The initially view looks as follows:

When clicking on a grid image, we animate it to the right side of the screen and scale it up.

And this is how it all comes together:

I hope you enjoy this little experiment and find it useful!

Thank you for checking by ?

The post Grid Zoom Layout appeared first on Codrops.

Sencha GRUI Delivers Rich and High Performance Grids For React Applications

Original Source: https://1stwebdesigner.com/sencha-grui-delivers-rich-and-high-performance-grids-for-react-applications/

Sencha GRUI is a perfect modern enterprise solution for React UI that comes with 100+ data grid features. With GRUI, Sencha has re-built the Ext JS grid from the ground up to use modern JavaScript, and a whole new architecture that will deliver all the same great features and even better performance in an easy to use React API.

Here is a quick overview of some of the features:

Ability to handle millions of records.
Large feature set (filtering, grouping, infinite scrolling, and more).
Full customization control.
Data Export capabilities (csv, tsv, html, pdf, xls).
Pre-tested across a wide range of platforms and browsers.
Easy UI component integration to the grid.

With incredibly fast data processing, massive amounts of data is never a problem. Utilizing client and server side buffered store, the Sencha Data Grid is able to load and manipulate large data sets within milliseconds!

Key Features

Virtual Columns

Virtual rendering of rows AND columns
Rendering of visible columns even when configuring an unlimited number of columns
Huge performance increase for large numbers of columns

Infinite Scrolling

Refreshes the viewed rows from the page cache as needed

Slider Paging Toolbar

The paging toolbar allows you to paginate forwards and backwards in the record sets with the slider buttons and input field

Column Drag and Drop

Reorder columns with the intuitive drag and drop interface

Column Editors

Each column can be edited, and you can create custom editors using React components

Sencha GRUI has robust documentation to help you get started quickly, and it is built with Sencha GRUI as an interactive demo so you can see how it works while you learn how to use it.

Pricing

The pricing for Sencha GRUI is simple and transparent, on a per developer basis. $499 per developer gives you a perpetual license, unlimited end users and products, and a year of updates and technical support. There is also a Free plan that offers all of the same features and benefits, but it requires an attribution watermark. However, you can sign up for a free 30-day trial to see if Sencha GRUI will work for you and your projects, so that makes it very easy to get to know the product and determine the route you will take.

Conclusion

Mission critical apps rely on the performance of their data grid components. With custom layouts and simple integration with React, GRUI by Sencha renders unparalleled performance to enterprise applications. The extensive documentation should make this easy to get acquainted with and utilize in your projects, and the pricing – especially the free trial – makes it a no-brainer to give it a try. We recommend you give Sencha GRUI a run and let us know what you think!

Top 10 Best Pocket Printer Reviews

Original Source: https://designrfix.com/reviews/best-pocket-printer

The best pocket printer can be used for printing out documents such as bills, receipts, invoices, etc. Also, they help you to print out pictures, photos, and other images that are stored on your computer or phone. What is a Pocket Printer? A pocket printer is a small device that fits into your pocket. It…

The post Top 10 Best Pocket Printer Reviews appeared first on DesignrFix.

How to Kickstart Your UX Career in 2022

Original Source: https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2021/12/how-to-kickstart-your-ux-career-in-2022/

As a UX designer, you get to work on creative, rewarding, even life-changing projects. It’s an industry with flexible working and countless opportunities. All this, and you get paid well too.

It doesn’t matter if you’re not a creative prodigy, or a tech grandmaster; you can learn to become a UX designer with the right mindset, a few tools you pick up along the way, and some committed learning.

By the time you’ve finished reading this post, you’ll be well on your way to designing your new career.

You can do this, let’s get started…

What is a Career in UX like?

Every career is different, but generally speaking, a UX designer works on making a user’s interaction with a product or service (normally websites) as intuitive as possible.

Just as a golf architect designs the layout of a golf course to flow through greens, tees, and holes, with buggy paths for access, and the odd bunker to add a challenge; so a UX designer creates the optimum experience for a site. A golf architect doesn’t need to reinvent the game of golf, and neither does a UX designer need to reinvent websites.

A golf architect will not design a course with a 360-degree sand bunker surrounding a tee (well, they might, but they really really shouldn’t), or a hole too small for a golf ball. In the same way as a UX designer, you’re not going to design an ecommerce site with a cart in the bottom left, a non-existent search feature, or hidden pricing.

The best thing about being a UX designer is that you don’t need to spend years in formal education to get qualified. The flipside is that if you want to be a great UX designer, it’s not a walk in the park.

Every designer is different, but some of the main traits of successful UX designers are: an enjoyment of problem-solving; good listening skills; curiosity; open-mindedness; attention to detail; creativity; communication skills; process-driven; and adaptability.

Before committing to this career path, check out a few podcasts, and read a few blog posts, to dip your toe in the water.

Still interested? Excellent, the next step is…

Getting Certified as a UX Designer

UX design is a practical skill. It’s all well and good knowing the theory, but without practice putting the theory into action no one will give you a chance to prove what you can do. So how do you get practical experience? You get certified, and there are three popular options: online, in-person training, or self-taught.

A good UX syllabus will include portfolio-building projects, tool mastery, networking opportunities, and even 1-2-1 mentorship. As well as learning the fundamentals of UX, you’ll cover user research and strategy, analysis, UI design, and more.

Option A: Online Course

Online courses tend to be much easier on the bank balance, as well as being flexible, which means you can fit them around your current job. You can work at your own pace, and in many cases choose modules that interest you, once you’ve completed the basic introduction.

There are many online course providers, including Coursera, Udemy, Skillshare, and Career Foundry.

Whatever option you choose, it is a good idea to get as broad a perspective as possible, so consider following more than one course — perhaps mix and match a paid course with a free one.

Option B: In-Person Training

This could be a university course, or a local boot camp where you physically sit in with an instructor and classmates.

This is more expensive, but it provides benefits that nothing else does. Firstly, you’ll have classmates you can bounce ideas off, collaborate with, keep motivated, inspired, and accountable. You can also get real-time, intensive coaching and advice from someone who’s been there, done that, bought the T-shirt (and redesigned it so it fits better).

Seach local boot camps and workshops, check out workshops at local conferences, and ask your local college what courses they offer.

Option C: Self-Taught

Being self-taught is the cheapest of all options. Work at your own pace, where, and when you want to. Watch YouTube videos, read blogs, garner information anywhere you can find it.

This option involves a lot of stumbling around in the dark. The biggest challenge is that you don’t know what it is that you don’t know. For this reason, it can pay to follow the syllabus of a local college course, even if you’re not enrolled and don’t attend lectures.

In reality, all education is self-taught to an extent, even the most prescribed courses need self-motivation.

Some of the most in-demand UX designers in the world are self-taught, so why not? Start exploring UX blogs like Nielsen Norman Group articles, Google Design,  UX Planet, and UX Matters.

Mastering UX Tools

Recruiters and hiring managers will seek your technical ability and your experience using popular tools from user research, to wireframing, to prototyping. When you get your first job in UX, the tools you use will be determined by your project manager, so it’s a good idea to have a passing familiarity with the most popular. These will include Maze, Userzoom, Sketch, XD, Figma, Marvel, and Hotjar.

If you’re following a guided course you should get an introduction to at least a couple of important tools. Once you understand one, you can probably pick the others up quite quickly… because, after all… they should be intuitive.

You do not need to know how to code, but understanding the roles, and restrictions of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript is very beneficial. When you get your first UX job, you’ll need to be able to talk about how technologies fit into the plan.

Building a UX Portfolio

Your portfolio is your résumé. The golden ticket. The silver bullet. Amassing a content-rich portfolio is paramount. You don’t need a real-world job to build your portfolio, and you should already have content to add from your course.

You need to demonstrate knowledge of UX tools and processes (what future employers will look for). Case studies that incorporate research, problem-solving, strategy, imagination, and (if possible) results are the best way to do this.

There are a variety of ways of building a portfolio, but the best is taking a real website, and redesigning it. Don’t worry if your first few projects aren’t the best; as long as you demonstrate improvement and growth, that counts for something. 

You can showcase your portfolio on sites such as Behance, Dribbble, or preferably create your website.

Landing Your First Job in UX

Start combing the job boards to see which companies are looking for UX designers. There’s a global shortage of qualified UX designers, so if you can’t find anything you’re looking in the wrong place! Make sure your whole network, from your Mom’s hairdresser to the barista at your favorite coffee place know that you’re looking; you never know where a good lead will come from.

Some companies are looking for UX skills as part of other roles. Others are looking for full-time UXers.

Don’t be disheartened if “Junior UX Designer” positions require 2 years of experience; HR just throws this in as a pre-filter. If you think you can do the job, apply anyway, if your portfolio’s good you might get an interview regardless, and if you get an interview they think you’re worth taking the time to meet.

If you don’t get the job, don’t be downhearted. Remember: every time someone else gets a job, that’s one less person you’re competing with for the next job.

Quick Prep on Some Common UX Interview Questions:

What’s your interpretation of a UX Designer?
What has inspired you to become a UX Designer?
How do you take constructive feedback and non-constructive feedback?
Who, or what companies, do you look up to in this industry, and why?
What’s your process with a new project?

Good Luck!

So, now you know what it takes to get into the field, it’s time to start applying yourself to this newfound and richly rewarding career. As the great writer Anton Chekov said, “Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice.” So get out there and practice, practice, practice. Add and add and add to your portfolio.

To become a UX Designer, enroll in a great course, build your portfolio, network, apply for roles, and always be learning. Always be open to new ideas and suggestions. There’s a lot of leg work, but the juice will be worth the squeeze. 

 

Featured image via Unsplash.

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