Tag Archive for: web design

How to Make Your Website More Accessible

Close-up Photography of Magnifying Glass

The best component that you can add to your site is easy navigation.

  • Nobody wants to encounter a website with excessive number of difficulties. You have to assess the level of proficiency of majority of your users with regards to computer literacy, and most of them only know the basics.
  • It would be such a torment if your customers would always rely on Google to divert them to the links that identify with your site. The first step toward keeping your visitors engaged is to set up a navigation bar with a definitive page names, and if your website is filled with tons of information, adding an on-site search feature can be really helpful.

THE PROS OF FILTERING YOUR SEARCH

  • Today, you can literally search for everything with the help of search engines. Just type in a few words or a whole sentence, press enter and that is about it. After a while, you can have your desired results. Occasionally though, seeing a sea of results posted on the internet can be very overwhelming.
  • A very helpful way to avoid the overwhelming feeling is to filter your search. You can do this by narrowing the search box according to different classifications chosen by your users. Doing such will give your clients the most relevant results with regards to their desired topic.

OPEN-ENDED SEARCHES

  • Constrained search is very convenient but nowadays, most websites would opt to use open-ended search strategy. Open-ended search method is still widely used because constrained search can also be too restricting. If you’re planning to use this type of search, make sure that the results that will come up are relevant and accurate to what your customers are looking for because it would be frustrating to only look up for one particular word and be overrun by a million other articles that are not associated with the topic.
  • Your on-site search must be set up to look for the exact phrase first. Set up your on-site search to look for the exact phrase first. Despite the occurrence of irrelevant articles showing up, they should be filtered to show the most relevant results. The same process is important for pages that sell products online.

CONSIDER DIRECT SEARCHING TO SPECIFIC PAGES

  • The choice between using constrained or open-ended search is in your hands, just consider what is more suited for your website or you can opt to skip the search page if you like. Make sure that your choice can easily link all of the direct pages to your article and with just one click of the mouse, it can automatically direct the clients to the essential points of your business.

    THE BOTTOM LINE: Whatever option you decided to use, the most important thing is that an on-site search feature should be present on your website. If you search something and a lot of unrelated search results will come up, adjust it until you get the search feature to work appropriately. It is preferable to provide more specific results because that is what most people want when they are searching on a website.

12 Tips to Perfect Web Forms

Person Touching Macbook Pro

In designing web forms, the saying: never judge a book by its cover really does not apply. If you want to create a website that people will constantly have to visit, visuals are everything. The web forms that they have to fill need to be clear, understandable, and unambiguous. Yes, content is important, but poor presentation of web forms can affect your website. The web form design is important especially if you are selling a product online. The data they need to input in these forms need to be accurate. An effective web form ensures a pleasant shopping experience for all your customers.

Follow the below to help you design effective web forms:

  • POST-ITS FOR CONTACT FORMS

    Just to add a little something to a regular contact form.

  • EASY REPEAT PURCHASES ON MOBILE

    Store customer data if they permit you to do so in order that their next transactions would not be as much of a hassle as their first go.

  • NICE DESIGN

    Provide nice web form design to please the eyes of your customers.

  • ALIGNING FORM LABELS VERTICALLY ON MOBILE

    Line up labels especially on mobile sites to make it less squeezed in and compressed.

  • ADDRESS QUESTIONS THAT ARE USUALLY ASKED

    Provide additional information on why your customers need to answer these questions because they naturally would want to know why it is necessary for them to take up these steps.

  • CLEAR DELIVERY OPTIONS IN CHECKOUT

    Provide a clear list of modes of delivery that a customer may choose from.

  • PROVIDE AN EASY TOOL TO GAUGE CONTACT URGENCY

    This is like providing a meter for your customers’ queries. This will determine how eager they are for your reply. This allows you to know if the message is just a mere message or a message that is need in of immediate response.

  • TAILOR INPUT STYLE TO FORM FIELDS

    Use input style that caters to the form fields that your customer is going to fill in. For example if they are about to fill in their numbers, of course it will be more convenient for them to input number keys directly.

  • MIX OF DATA ENTRY STYLES

    Make it more fun and interesting by mixing at matching different styles to your contact forms.

  • CHECKOUT ENTRY PAGE

    Give them the option of guest check out to avoid turning them off by compulsory registration. This means giving them the discretion of checking your site as a guest and not forcing them to immediately sign up. Also, if you want to encourage them to sign up without being a little too aggressive, you can always flash all the benefits and advantages of creating their own accounts.

  • LIVE CHAT IN CHECKOUT

    Providing a live chat session for guest customers and even customers themselves will allow you to entertain questions as they fire up.

  • MOBILE CHECKOUT

    Creating a mobile version of the site’s check out is also a great idea. This should make it convenient for your on-the-go customers. This should be designed to fit the mobile screens. It should clear, readable and straightforward.

Web Design Changes to Help You Increase Ad Revenues

ads, beverage, black coffee

There has been reports of the decrease of use of advertising.

But is it really dead because of the emergence of all these other promotional methods? Well, the answer is not really. It is not totally the end of the advertising industry.

HERE IS THE STATISTICAL RESULT  WHEN YOU SEARCH ABOUT THE DECLINE:

  • The number of advertisements increase (resulting in more ads competing for user attention) and attention spans decrease (people just won’t bother responding to ads!)
  • Most experts began to declare advertising dead, yet FACEBOOK reported a massive $8.6 billion in advertising revenue in the fourth quarter of 2016 alone. This number was an improvement from the their figures in 2015.

There is hope for the decreasing ad revenues because here are a few tips to help you to get back in the game:

  • CONSIDER REDESIGNING YOUR ADS

    One of the reasons why banner ads fail is because of a phenomenon called BANNER BLINDNESS. It happens when website visitors ignore banner-like information. While website advertisements have evolved through the years, banner blindness is still rampant. Now why do people ignore banners? Our attention span is limited. If we need to take into consideration everything we see and hear, we would go crazy from all the information we encounter. As web designers, you need to create ads that attract people. Of course, visitors won’t notice poorly designed ads. People won’t click and waste their time on something dull and uninteresting.

  • SENSORY ADAPTATION

    Aside from banner blindness, another phenomenon you should take note is SENSORY ADAPTATION. This another hindrance that keeps your website viewers away from seeing your banner ads. What is SENSORY ADAPTATION then? It is a phenomenon where people get used to things. Our bodies adapt well to the surroundings. Any stimuli that trigger our senses will eventually will not bother us. Our bodies get used to the annoying ads that we just ignore it. This could be the reason why website visitors won’t respond to any ads displayed. For example, when you browse a website that has a dominant BLUE color scheme, any ads with a similar code will just be ignored. The ad will blend well to the website’s color scheme. At first, of course, you will notice it but eventually, like a chameleon, it go unnoticed and invisible at first glance. Sensory adaptation can be other things too and not just limited to the color of your ads or your website. The point here is that there hindrances so you need to design ads that will definitely standout. Consider the overall design of your website and the number of ads you will publish on your website.

  • OPTIMIZE YOUR MOBILE ADS

    It’s impossible for someone NOT to have a mobile phone. It’s basically the most important essential in every person’s bag. People won’t go anywhere without their phone which is why it is imperative that you should focus on optimizing your mobile ads. Ads should automatically adjust to whatever phone model your website visitors are using.

You see, if you pay more attention to details, it is impossible to fail. It’s in the little things! All you have to do is follow these guidelines to bring your ad revenue to the top.

6 B2B Guidelines To Help Boost Your Website

Two Person in Formal Attire Doing Shakehands

What is B2B?

It’s a type of transaction, which means business to business. If your website caters to other businesses, the tips below will come in handy. Whether you are a web design agency or marketing agency, knowing these valuable tips will help you stand out from your competitors.

  • DO NOT IGNORE YOUR STATS

    Always keep track of your performance. Every good host should be able to provide you with important statistics. You should have a variety of identifiers to gauge how your website is doing, to measure what are the bestselling products, to know when people visiting your website. Don’t neglect these data provide to know the overall performance of your website. You will know to plan what’s best for your online business. At the end of the day, these stats should be able to boost online transactions and give you answers on what are the most-viewed products. “What are the products that generate profit?” “What are the products that aren’t doing well?” Your stats should be able to help you answer some of these questions.

  • DO NOT FORGET TO FREQUENTLY BLOG

    Blogging greatly in boosting your website. Because you are publishing new content from time to time, your website will have more chances appearing in different search engine results.  Thus, you have a greater reach and you will be more  to the world. Don’t ignore the power of constant updates because timely and relevant posts could help boost your online presence. Not only that, blogging will also improve customer relations. Through your posts, they get to know you more, making them trust in you more.

  • ALWAYS MAXIMIZE YOUR VISUAL CONTENTS

    This is related to blogging. Don’t just fill your lengthy post with words. People will process information better if we see visuals. Pictures help us comprehend better. It’s already been proven that marketing and other promotional posts that contain images tend to attract more customers than those with plain text. Always make sure to add pictures to your blog posts. Better yet provide infographics and instructional videos to your marketing campaigns.

  • DO NOT JUST AIMLESSLY PROMOTE

    Promoting your business is good, but try to be personal. Don’t just flood your social media pages with generic updates. Your followers will find it annoying. Build your business’ credibility by interacting with your followers. Ask them questions, talk to them, or give them product recommendations. Your audiences don’t want to your know more about business’ history,  they are interested more on your products will help them. Instead of driving away them by your detached and emotionless marketing campaigns, use a customer-focused approach. Interact and answer queries.

  • DO NOT IGNORE EMAIL MARKETING

    Of course, new customers will NOT avail your products and services right away. It is important to pay attention in building trust and confidence. Email marketing will help in bridging this gap. Formulate on ways to connect with your prospective and existing clients through email. This method can help you earn the highest return of investment.

  • DO NOT IGNORE SOCIAL MEDIA

    Social media has the power to make magic. The best part is that it’s absolutely FREE. Having multiple social media accounts will open countless of doors for your online business. It will help you to become more visible to the world and even to people aren’t even in your circle. Almost everyone has at least one social media account. It’s counterproductive to not take advantage of this!

How to Create Efficient CTA Buttons

apple, business, computer

First of all, for those of us who are not well-versed in the website terminologies, what is a call-to-action button? A call-to-action button or CTA button is created to induce website visitors to take action and check out your website. If CTA buttons are designed properly, they can be an effective marketing tool.

SOME TIPS THAT YOU SHOULD KEEP IN MIND:

  • For a CTA button to be effective, consider your website’s overall design.
  • CTA buttons should be related to your business. For example, if you in the hospitality industry and you have a HOTEL business, a BOOK NOW button is more appropriate than a SHOP NOW button.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR CUSTOMERS CLICK THOSE CTA BUTTONS?

  • CHOOSE THE RIGHT WORDS FOR YOUR CTA BUTTONS

    When dealing with CTA buttons, do NOT be vague! You need to your word choices clear so he/she will know where that particular CTA button will redirect. No need to choose flowery words. Be concise and direct by telling them to “SHOP NOW” because items are on sale. If you want them to explore, use words like “SEE MORE” to view the bargain bin items. Another tip is to keep short. You do not have design a sentence long button. Limit you CTA buttons to 2 words at most. Using CTA buttons will greatly help in conversion. Approximately, a CTA button is 2.5 times better than mere text alone.

  • CHOOSE A SUITABLE A COLOR

    Different strokes for different folks. Of course, there’s no perfect color that will appeal to everyone. But you consider the design of your website. If your website is dominantly red, then, avoid making your CTA buttons red, orange, or yellow. It will be like a chameleon and it will NOT stand out. Your customers won’t easily spot a BUY NOW button. A darker shade will be ideal to contrast the bright red color.

  • CHOOSE THE PERFECT LOCATION FOR YOUR CTA BUTTONS

    Usually, in a web page, there’s at least two CTA buttons visible. One is used to tell the customers to LEARN MORE about the product or to SEE MORE detailed product description. The other button is to urge them to avail a product. It can either an ADD TO CART or BUY NOW button. This is an important button to successfully buy a product so you have to make sure the customers do not have to browse to the bottom of the page to click the purchase button. Conveniently place them on the top most part of a web page.

  • ANIMATE YOUR CTA BUTTONS

    If you have not learned about the HOVER EFFECT, then, it’s time you should! A hover effect occurs when a mouse over command is applied and your CTA button’s color will change. This helps in drawing more attention to that SHOP NOW button to encourage website visitors to click on them directing them to a particular product page.  A blinking button can be an eyesore and annoying at times so it is preferred to just highlight those buttons when a mouse hovers over them.

ON USING CTA BUTTONS

It is one of the many ways one can attract more customers and satisfy existing ones. This does not only does that for you but it also gives a little more convenience to your customers. If you want to do CTA buttons the right and effective way, follow these full proof tips and watch your business soar.

12 Free Web Fonts and Where to Get Them!

Premium designs do not need to be expensive!

Letter, Fonts,

Yes, they are indeed free fonts!

Believe it or not there’s a corcunopia of free web fonts . You just need to take time to dig from the limitless options. Fortunately for you, I made a list of the exceptional fonts you can freely download online.

Of course, you can still get web fonts from paid subcription services, but if you have a limited budget, you don’t need to compromise quality. These web fonts are totally free and they look great. There should be something that fits your web projects. Just click on the specific names to download them for free.

Below are the list of extensive free fonts:

  • Archivo Narrow

    Archivo Narrow typeface is designed by Héctor Gatti. This family has four fonts. It is made to look great both in print media & digital platforms. If you prefer a bolder and heavier typeface, Archivo Black is available for emphasizing those headlines.

  • Palanquin

    This is optimized for the digital age. Palanquin is a very flexible font family with seven text weights. If you want a heavier option, the Palanquin Dark won’t disappoint you.

  • Ostrich Sans

    Ostrich Sans is designed to showcase its modern flair. It’s a sans-serif typeface that has a variety of styles and weights. The font family consists of a variety of style whether  you prefer light, black, or normal.

  • PT Sans

    It was made for the Public Types of Russian Federation and was created by designed by Alexandra Korolkova, Olga Umpeleva and Vladimir Yefimov.  Released in 2009, this font family offers a distinctive contemporary look.

  • Fira Sans

    This is made by the designer Erik Spiekermann to blend perfectly with Mozilla FirefoxOS. The Fira has a wide range of styles to suit different screen sizes.

  • Montserrat

    Julieta Ulanovsky made this font family with Buenos Aires in mind. She created Montserrat to  conserve the street signs she show in Montserrat, Buenos Aires. As the area changed, the signages slowly faded away so she decided to secure it by creating the Montserrat family.

  • Abril Fatface

    If you need a font family that is perfect for headlines, Abril Fatface establishes a strong presence! This font family contains 18 styles to cater different purposes.

  • Playfair Display

    Your website has tight spaces? Playfair Display is created to insert into small, narrow spaces. Best font family to make striking headlines when space is limited. (Pro tip: Perfect when paired with Georgia!)

  • GT Walsheim

    Do you have a pretty design blog? This font family has been a famous choice!  A variety of design blogs prefers GT Walsheim offers a symmetrical sans-serif stylish appearance. The full version of GT Walsheim is for sale, BUT you can try it first and avail the free trial.

  • Merriweather

    If you frequently publish lengthy blog posts, Merriweather is a great choice for extended screen time. It is a top pick if readability is your number one priority. Merriweather is constantly updated so you better check out the  designer Eben Sorkin’s blog from time to time.

  • Gravitas One

    This font family is another ideal choice for headers and tabs! Gravitas One is created by Riccardo De Franceschi and it will definitely look wonderful when making eye-catching titles and headers.

  • Jura

    Jura is a jack of all trades because it is suitable anywhere! Whether you like light, medium, or demibold weights, Jura has something for you.

Chatbots on Your Website?

Photography of Woman Using Laptop

We depend on the wonders of technology.

If we want if it’s going to rain or not, we use our phone to know the latest weather forecast.  If we want to ride a cab, we use an app. Everything that we do now is basically dependent on the internet and technology. One of the beneficial effects of technology is being able to communicate despite the geographic differences.

Today, there are limitless options when you browse for communication apps on the Google Play Store / AppStore. These mobile apps have made our lives easier.

So, how is this relevant to your online business? How will it help websites?

You can communicate to your customers using chatbots! What’s a chatbot? A chatbot, according to Google, serves as an interactive agent that is programmed to do specific tasks for you. It can help you to communicate by telling it what to do. You may use it to give specific instructions for products that needs to be assembled, care and storage for fragile products, and anything really that you want to say.

What is its relevance to your website?

Competition is getting out of hand. There are a lot of businesses out there that offer various services and they even have tricks up into their sleeves because the competition is tight. Using chatbots to provide better customer support, to make specific instructions more accessible, and so on.

HOW IS THAT EXACTLY?

You can use chatbots as an extension to your website. Use this to your advantage and the most perfect way to put this is to use it as your internet personality or your social voice. You need to be able to answer questions like, “How should we get this across our customers?”, “What tone should we set for them?”, “Should be even bother use emoticons?”, “How are we going to communicate this to our clients?”.

This will also increase productivity. A chatbot will help all websites in reducing typo errors. It greatly helps businesses to improve customer satisfaction and boost profitability. You don’t need to hire additional customer service representatives to compose emails and answer phone calls. Adding a chatbot on your website will help you in disseminating important information.

HOW TO GET STARTED?

  • STUDY

  • You need to think things carefully. Learn what chatbots are about and how it can help websites in terms of dealing with customers. So, you can strategize on how to prevent any possible problems in the future.
  • GROUP TOGETHER

  • If you have decided that chatbots are help your website in answering inquiries and other customer related concerns, it is best research on the available chatbots that you can install in your website or if you need to have one customized.
  • GET TO PITCHING

  • Last but not the least, thoroughly scan your existing client list and ask yourself if your clients will benefit if you decide to automate parts of your website using a chatbot. Will it be helpful? Will it be able to help you get the message across? If it’s a yes, then, you better start researching on chatbots.

Serverless Technology and Websites

blur, computer, connection

complicated wires on a server

Technology may seem easy and convenient, but rather, it’s something more complicated than expected. The process went from tedious manual computing to fast and smooth online transactions. It does not end there though, technology continues to change. Now, computers are connected with wires.

Most companies now utilize cloud computing services. The generally known serverless computing platform Amazon Web Services’ AWS Lambda.

So what does this mean?

It is not easy to implement new ways to companies that have stuck to the traditional computing methods they have been accustomed to. This is why serverless technology can raise some eyebrows, but you should know that serverless technology has greatly increased through the years. There are three remarkable reasons being this huge leap: DECREASES EXPENSES, SPEEDY DEPLOYMENT, and EFFORTLESS SCALING.

Why is it important?

Other than it is the prevalent technology now, the main reason why serverless technology is ideal is because it will minimizes possible loss . Because it is serverless, it is cheaper than the typical wired hosting. You can search for testimonials about how online about how serverless technology helped many companies to cut down costs.

HOW WILL THIS WORK FOR YOUR BUSINESS?

  • CMS

    A content management system (CMS) manages the creation and modification of digital content. It typically supports multiple users in a collaborative environment. For the first step, use a caching system to create static pages from the CMS to be served by a cloud service provider. CMS different extensively. You have different options to use but if you want it to be convenient and affordable, use something similar to Amazon Eslasticache.

  • CATALOG

    Often times when your website features a lot of products and variations, it can cause a major obstacle to the browsing speed. You need to find a way to minimize this setback. The best proven way is using micro-services so that every interaction that the user can have with the website can be grouped into smaller pieces.

  • CARTS

    Carts might just be carts but they occupy a lot of space. In your traditional web store, MySQL bottlenecks will eventually go downhill from there. To prevent this unfortunate event from occurring, you can use something like AWS Lamba or Dynamo DB.  You can do your own thorough research on how this greatly aids your carts, especially for those people who place bulk orders. Typically, it is very easy to set up, it will not break your bank account, and it is what you need to productively use serverless technology.

Why are they not following the suit?

Yes, it may be cheap, relevant, and effective. The truth is that the serverless community is still relatively new in the market. People find it risky to just jump and change ships in a snap. It would require time and effort to completely revamp your business’ websites. It is totally understandable if people would still have second thoughts in switching to a new system. It is difficult to learn and test the waters especially when your entire business is at stake. Remember, technology is continuously changing and it is getting more advanced every year. We need to catch up ASAP!

Helpful Typography Tips

Close-up of Hand over White Background

Yes, it is important to create a website that appealing and compelling to your target audience, but the main purpose of typography in web design is to communicate effectively to your website visitors. The design you will choose for your website is a one-of-a-kind aspect of your brand.

In this article, you will learn tips to help improve the readability and appearance of your website and to communicate well to your readers. Read on the important tips below:

  1. LIMIT THE NUMBER OF FONTS

    While style is an important factor in designing, and while it is very tempting to use as much styles as you can, it to use multiple fonts. Sticking to one or two is enough Two is already a lot! The aim here is to make the website clean and to retain a certain structure. Remember that LESS IS ALWAYS MORE.

  2. CHOOSE STANDARD AND SIMPLER FONTS

    Choosing standard fonts guarantees better readability. Readers used to seeing system fonts such as Arial, Garamond, Calibri, Verdana etc. Not unless if your website requires a specific typeface, it is best to stick with fonts that people will easily identify.

  3. REDUCE YOUR LINE LENGTH

    The key to a perfect website is readability and legibility. Your line length shouldn’t be too narrow, nor too wide, it just has to be the right length. The suggested length by The Baymard Institute is approximately 60 characters each line

  4. CHOOSE A TYPEFACE THAT’S READABLE DESPITE THE SIZE

    Your website viewers will use different gadgets so there’s isn’t a single uniform resolution or screen sizes. Just make sure that you would apply a typeface that will work well on a tiny screen or a huge desktop.

  5. CHOOSE A TYPEFACE THAT MAKE EVERY LETTER DISTINCT

    To be more specific, the chosen typeface should be distinct. The ‘i’ should not be mistaken for the “l” and vice versa. It happens in a LOT of typefaces so avoid confusing ones. Convenience of your readers should be your priority.

  6. AVOID USING ALL CAPITAL LETTERS

    Capitalizing letters should only be used to emphasize a point! You should NOT capitalize the whole blog post or web page.

  7. THERE SHOULD BE ENOUGH SPACE BETWEEN LINES

    This refers to a typography term called leading. If you increase the lead, you are increasing or widening the white space in between lines of the text. By doing so, you are also increasing the readability of the text. Don’t decrease the leading because that would be very hard to read.

  8. MAKE SURE YOUR COLOR CONTRAST IS SPOT ON

    Colors also play a vital role in typography or in web design. The most important thing is to consider the readability of your text. It is pretty much USELESS to use the same font color and the same background color. The W3C recommends that small text should have a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 against its background. Large text should have a contrast ratio of at least 3:1 against its background.

  9. AVOID TEXTS IN RED OR GREEN

    Color blindness is a common among men (8% of men are color blind!)

    It is recommended to use other color shades and avoid using red or green because these are the common colors that affect those that are color blind.

  10. DO NOT USE BLINKING TEXTS

    Flashing or blinking texts may cause seizures to some people, while others find it annoying and distracting. It is best to avoid anything that blinks!

Understanding the Elements of Typography

Words Text Scrabble Blocks

Typography is  the art and technique of arranging to make any language readable and understandable when displayed on screen. It may appear simple… what’s the problem in choosing stylish fonts? We just have to go with the best looking one, right? Nope, it is not just about choosing the right font. There are a lot more things in typography than you think.

Typography is not just drawing and making art, but there are a bunch of terms related to typography. This article is focused on web design typography.  These frequently used typography terms will help you learn the basics.

THE KEY ELEMENTS OF TYPOGRAPHY

  • Typeface

    This refers to the font family. It is a set of fonts with different patterns and characteristics. Concrete examples of typefaces are: Arial Narrow, Baskerville Old Face, Garamond, Segoe Script, Tahoma, Comic Sans, and so on.

  • Font

    Font refers to a set characters with the same style and size. Contrary to popular belief, font is not the typeface. A correct example of font is 12-point Lucida Handwriting in bold or 23-point Bookman Old Style in italic.

    Generally, it is calculated in points (pt). Points dictate the height of the lettering. There are approximately 72 (72.272) points in one inch or 2.54 cm. An example would be the font size 72 would be about one inch tall, and 36 would be about a half of an inch. This would be the size, particularly the height element of typography.

  • Weight

    In typography, weight is defined as any particular styles used to make the characters appear heavier lighter. This affects the size element of typography.

    For example, if you want the text to be extra thin, you have the option to use the weight ‘thin 100’or if you want your text to appear bolder than usual, you may opt to apply the weight ‘extra bold 800’. It depends on how thick or thin you want your text to appear.

  • Kerning

    It is simply defined as the process of adjusting the spacing between characters of in a proportional font. This does not only improve legibility or readability, this is also to make it look more appealing and pleasing to look at. However, you do need a separate editing software to use this function.

  • Tracking

    Refers to the letter-spacing. It’s the degree of increase (or sometimes decrease) of space between letters to affect visual density in a line or in a series of text. This is not to be confused with kerning because kerning refers to is used to the density issues in reading texts.

  • Leading

    If tracking is all about letter-spacing, leading is about the line-spacing. It is the distance between two baselines of lines of type. Leading is so named because conventional print shops put strips of lead between lines of type to increase vertical space.

So, these terms are elements of typography. There are a lot of typography terms you will encounter in the future, but these terms will cover the basics. It will ensure your texts to be legible, readable, and appealing to your website visitors.