The ATA Chronicle - January/February 2017 - 28

BUSINESS PRACTICES

BY MATT LINDLEY

6 Handy Web Design Tools for Small Businesses
THE NOUN PROJECT
https://thenounproject.com
Icons are great for communicating ideas
and explaining things in a visual way. The
Noun Project is a repository of icons made
by creators around the world that anyone
can use on their web design projects for
free. All you have to do is attribute the
creator, or you can pay a small fee for
royalty-free use.

TYPOSAURUS
http://www.typosaur.us
Nothing says "don't do business with
me" like a glaring typo on your website.
Typosaurus is a web app that makes it
possible to check your copy for spelling
mistakes once it has gone live. You can
paste in up to 100 URLs and Typosaurus
will flag any errors within seconds. A
Chrome extension makes the tool even
easier to use.

TINYPNG

ith so much business being done
online, a slick and well functioning
website should be key to your
online presence. In recent years, many free
web tools have launched that make it easier
than ever to build a professional website
very cheaply. All you have to do is know
where to find them. Here are six of my
favorites. There's no excuse for having a
terrible website anymore!

UNSPLASH
https://unsplash.com
Still using generic stock images? Unsplash
is a great source of "anti-stock" photos
that will bring authenticity and character
to your website. Ten new photos are
added every 10 days, all of which can be
used for web design projects royalty free.
It's great for crafting a professional web
presence on a tight budget.

https://tinypng.com

COOLORS
https://coolors.co
A jarring or unsuitable color scheme can
send the wrong message to potential clients
and stop them from wanting to work with
you. The Coolors web app is a great way
to come up with color scheme ideas for a
new project quickly. It's really easy to use:
just hit the space bar to generate new color
schemes and lock colors you like in place
with the padlock icon.

Large file sizes can take a long time to
load and put off users. TinyPNG will
compress PNG images while preserving
transparency, with virtually no loss
in image quality. This will make your
website load faster and provide a better
experience for customers and clients.
TinyPNG can also now compress JPEG
files, and there's a free extension available
for Magento and WordPress.

www.flipsnack.com

So, if you're ready to add some oomph
to your website, any of these applications
will do the trick. Have fun! 

Business assets, like brochures and
catalogues, never look as good in PDF
as in print. FlipSnack changes all that by
converting standard PDF files into stylish
online magazines. These "flip books" are
fully embeddable on your website and
enable users to turn the pages as they
would a real magazine. You can also add
sound and video to increase engagement.

Matt Lindley is a senior
outreach executive at Verve
Search in London. He is
also a writer and creator of
visual content. He speaks one
foreign language (Polish) and
would love to learn another (Spanish). Contact:
mattelindley@gmail.com

FLIPSNACK

"Business Practices" will alternate in this space with "The Entrepreneurial Linguist." This column is not intended to constitute legal, financial, or other business advice. Each individual or company should make
its own independent business decisions and consult its own legal, financial, or other advisors as appropriate. The views expressed here are not necessarily those of ATA or its Board of Directors.

The ATA Chronicle | January/February 2017

www.atanet.org

https://www.thenounproject.com http://www.typosaur.us https://www.tinypng.com https://www.coolors.co https://unsplash.com http://www.flipsnack.com http://www.atanet.org

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The ATA Chronicle - January/February 2017