To be more accurate though, the term isn’t so much a job title as it is a lifestyle choice that refers specifically to the way in which someone works. A digital nomad can in fact do any job as long as it’s online and as long as it’s ‘remote’. A digital nomad is someone who doesn’t need an office then and who is ‘untethered’ from any one physical location. As long as they have a laptop and an internet connection, they can work from pretty much anywhere in the world.

These then are people who upload photos to Facebook of themselves sitting on a deckchair with a beer alongside the caption “another busy day in the office!”. In other words, they’re the people who everyone else loathes… and definitely envies.

Why Become a Digital Nomad?

These days, an increasing number of jobs don’t require any physical presence. If you work mostly on a computer, then chances are that you can do your job just as well from the Maldives as you can from your office. These jobs include writers, accountants, consultants, lawyers, proofreaders, editors – even managers in some circumstances. Being self-employed makes this even easier but you don’t have to be self-employed by any means as long as the organization you work for is forward thinking and happy to have a ‘decentralized’ approach. WordPress is a famous example of a company with an entirely decentralized employment, with team members in almost every country.

Often, becoming a digital nomad will require you to make a few changes to your routine and your workflow. Once you’ve done that though, it’s surprisingly easy to adapt and the rewards are huge.

The most obvious reward of course is the simple fact that you don’t have to work in an office. This means no suit/uniform, no boss breathing over your shoulder, no grey cubicles and no commute. Commuting to work can sometimes take up 1-2 hours of your day. Hours where you’re certainly not relaxing or having fun but you’re not being paid either! The same goes for your lunch break.

Simply by working from home you would save yourself 2-3 hours a day which you could use to pursue hobbies, go to the gym and generally be happier and freer. But the fact that you can be anywhere you want to while you’re working means that you can be much more ambitious than that. You can work when you want and where you want, so why not work in the New York bar in Tokyo while watching the locals come and go? Why not sit on a beach in Croatia and watch the turtles pass you by? Then, in the evening, you can go and sample amazing food, explore the surroundings and generally live a life of adventure.

Being a digital nomad is essentially a lifestyle choice that brings you as close as possible to being completely free. This then lets you see the world and meet amazing people and generally means an escape from the rat race.

The Challenges

That isn’t to say that being a digital nomad is easy however. And neither is it for everyone – not by a long shot. In fact, being a digital nomad can be incredibly hard at times and you will definitely get out of it what you put in.

To help prepare you for the potential rigors of this lifestyle, let’s take a look at some of the challenges that come from being a digital nomad. We’ll split these into ‘work challenges’ and ‘lifestyle challenges’.

Work Challenges

One of the biggest challenges for digital nomads is the struggle of balancing their work life and their free time. If you’re travelling then you will have high outgoings, so to afford that you need to make sure you’re generating a big profit.

In some cases, this can result in a situation where you’re sitting in a café at 12am still typing while the night life is thriving all around you. Being in a foreign country is only an amazing experience if you can actually spend some time looking around. The other scenario is that you spend too much time exploring and struggle to make enough profit. This can result in being stuck in a foreign country sans funding. As you can imagine, this is also less than ideal. If you are going to succeed as a digital nomad then, you need to make sure you have a working business model first that is reliably generating income without taking up all of your free time. Passive income is preferable, though not necessarily required.

Another reason that passive income is preferable when possible, is the time difference. This is another challenge you’ll face as a digital nomad and especially if you are working for an employer. Time differences when travelling abroad mean that you can struggle to arrange online meetings with your clients and business partners and they can mean you end up working late hours. If part of your job is taking calls, then you can have your work number forwarded to your mobile phone but this can still mean answering business calls at 3am.

Of course one of the biggest challenges with working online while travelling though is the quest for WiFi. And not just WiFi but power sockets as well. It’s not unusual as a digital nomad to find yourself desperately searching around for a place to plug in your laptop or for a café that offers free WiFi. Some areas are great for this but others are less so. And sometimes it’s the places without the WiFi that you would really rather be…

Lifestyle Challenges

The other kinds of challenges you’ll face as a digital nomad are the lifestyle challenges. These are all the things you would normally face when on holiday only much worse because you’ll be out there for months or even years. These include things like loneliness – which is a real problem when travelling all on your own – missing your creature comforts, fitting your whole life into a single bag, trying to find places to wash your clothes, being unable to save any money and being trapped in a foreign country unable to speak the language when you get ill or have your bag stolen.

This isn’t to put you off of the idea of being a digital nomad – rather it’s just to make sure that you are completely aware of the challenges going in. Bloggers will often post pictures of them typing on their computers with huge waterfalls behind them. Rarely do they post pictures of themselves lugging huge backpacks around rough neighborhoods in the middle of the night trying to find a coffee and some WiFi…

Is it For You?

So is being a digital nomad for you? That all depends on your general disposition. If you’re someone who is happy spending time on their own, who wants to see the world and who is okay being away from their creature comforts, then this is one of the most rewarding experiences you can possibly have. And now is the only time in the history of mankind that it’s possible. That’s pretty amazing.

What also helps is to already have a successful online business model and to generally be a disciplined ‘self-starter’ who can work without a rigid structure to guide them.

You might also choose to be a digital nomad if you consider yourself someone who is ‘psychologically unemployable’. In other words, if the idea of coming to the same office every single day for the rest of your life is enough to drive you completely mad, then you should definitely think about breaking free and travelling the world.

Remember though: if you do try being a digital nomad and you find that it’s too much of a challenge, then you can always just come home. That’s the great thing about this, you’re free to do whatever you want!

How to Become a Digital Nomad

If you’ve made it this far and you’re still excited at the prospect of working online while travelling the world, then it sounds like you’ve got what it takes. The next question is: how do you become a digital nomad?

The first step is to decide how you’re going to keep earning. You can ask your current boss whether it’s possible for you to work entirely remotely if you like where you’re working currently and if that doesn’t work then you can always try applying to more flexible jobs. If you find that your employers are resistant at first, then you can try gradually warming them up to the idea by taking longer and longer breaks and working while you’re away.

More often though, being a digital nomad means working for yourself and ‘unjobbing’. This means having money without having a job. Sounds good doesn’t it?

So what are your unjobbing options? Here are some ways you can earn money entirely online that are suitable for remote working:

• Being a copywriter for websites and online businesses
• Being a digital marketer
• Being an affiliate marketer
• Running a monetized blog
• Monetizing a YouTube account
• Selling a digital product such as an eBook or an app
• Offering consultation
• Day trading
• Professional online gambling
• Web design
• Graphic design
• Photography

There are many more besides these but of course you don’t have to limit yourself to just one. Often it’s possible to combine multiple revenue streams and thus to become far more resilient to losing clients etc.

The best forms of income for the digital nomad are passive forms. These are the kinds that generate money while you’re asleep – such as selling digital products or running a website. While you still need to put time in, these are great because they don’t involve ‘trading’ your time for money. You can find plenty of information on all these topics by just browsing the web. Decide which business model appeals to you most and then start reading up.

If you’re currently employed and you want to gain your financial independence, then you can start out by earning money in the evenings or at the weekends. You only need to leave your job once you start making enough money to support yourself. By using this process to wean yourself off, you remove the risk and fear of simply handing in your notice and praying you figure out a way to earn money.

What You’ll Need

If you do decide to embrace the digital nomad lifestyle and you successfully ditch your day job, there are a few things that can help to make your transition that much easier. Here are just a few:

• A microfiber towel – These are towels that fold flat and dry almost instantly. They’re perfect for travelling and are an absolute must.
• A small laptop – Great options include Windows 8.1 tablets (with a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse) or perhaps a MacBook Air or ChromeBook.
• A dongle – Various dongles can help you to get online from any remote location. Often they’re free but with the caveat that you have to watch ads etc.
• The 4 Hour Workweek – This is the book that practically invented lifestyle design and it’s an absolute must-read if you’re at all interested in this subject. You should also read Vagabonding.
• Skype – And Vonage for making international calls.
• Google Docs – The cloud becomes a serious asset for remote workers and Google Docs is one of the best implementations of that.
• Google Drive/OneDrive/DropBox – Likewise, some kind of cloud storage is also a must.
• iTranslate – Rarely will a translation app ever be so vital to your lifestyle.
• Eyemask and earbuds – Just trust me on this one!

The Third Way

If you don’t feel ready to commit to the digital nomad lifestyle but still want your freedom, if you love hot baths too much but can’t stand another day in the office, then there is a third option.

Being a digital nomad is only one example of ‘lifestyle design’. Lifestyle design simply means using modern tools and resources in order to create the lifestyle you want. For some people that means a life of travel and adventure – for others it means staying in bed and eating pop-tarts. The point is that it’s up to you. You are not beholden to anyone and life was meant to be lived.

If you don’t feel like spending weeks abroad then why not work from a local coffee shop instead? Or why not work from different scenic spots in your home town? You could meet your friends on their lunch breaks and when you felt like it you could visit other countries for a few days or a few weeks without having to ask anyone for permission. Or maybe you’d just choose to stay at home with your kids a little more? You could wear what you want, work out as much as you need and generally live whatever kind of life you want.

Being a digital nomad is certainly not for everyone. But lifestyle design truly is and when you discover it, everything changes.

The post Becoming a Digital Nomad – What to Expect and How to Make the Leap appeared first on TextBoss.

Would you like a job with practically limitless earning potential? And that will allow you to run your own business and get a real sense of pride seeing your work being enjoyed by millions of readers?

Then you should consider being a freelance writer.

Being a freelance writer provides you with all those amazing benefits and more. And there has never been a better time to become a freelance writer thanks to the number of businesses that are migrating to the web. Digital marketers say that ‘content is king’ and that means that writers are king.

To become a freelance writer, all you need is a computer and the ability to write good English. Anyone can do it and there is ample work available. The only problem is that a lot of people have no idea where to start. Here then we will take an in-depth look at what it takes to become a freelance writer. This will be a comprehensive guide that will provide you with all the tools, tips, advice and more that you could possibly need to be highly successful.

If you’re at all interested in being a freelance writer, then read on. This will act as your comprehensive crash course that will prepare you for the big wide world.

Skills and Traits You Will Need to Succeed

Before we jump into specific tools and tips, it’s a good idea to start with the basic skills you’ll need to thrive as a freelance writer. What service are you providing and what skills will you need in order to offer that service to a good quality?

Writing

Of course the most important skill for any freelance writer is to have good writing skills. In other words, you need to be able to write well in strong English (or whatever language you’re working in). At the same time, you also need to be able to write in a number of different styles from persuasive writing to entertaining and ‘colloquial’ blog posts etc.

The most important thing you need to be a good writer is to have the ‘voice’ that readers and publishers are looking for. Having ‘the voice’ means that your writing should read as though you were talking to someone. They should thus be able to easily follow what you’re writing and to pick up on the correct tone and meaning from everything you say. The voice is also largely what makes your writing engaging.

This is something you can improve with practice but to a large extent it’s innate; you either have it or you don’t. Ask a friend to read over some of your writing and to honestly appraise it. If you don’t have the voice then you may want to think about different careers.

What’s also important in terms of writing ability is that you have good grammar and good punctuation. This means knowing where to put your commas and how to use parentheses correctly. This is something that you can learn, so it’s worth swatting up on proper editing and grammar before you start putting yourself out there. Note though that some issues, such as the ‘Oxford comma’, are contentious and don’t have a right or wrong answer. This is where your discretion comes in.

Speed

If you become a great freelance writer then you might be able to land big clients with huge websites or even magazines with large circulation. However, there’s a good chance you’re not going to be working for those big clients to start with and that means you’re going to have to offer your services cheaply. This is especially true if you are looking at finding clients on the web who run websites or if you will work through an intermediary such as a writing agency.

This means you might have to work for anything from $1 per 100 words to $2 per 100 words. That might not sound like very much but that’s where speed comes in. If you can write 10,000 words a day, then you can earn $200 potentially which is no small amount of money. Some writers will manage 20,000 or more a day! What’s more, there’s nothing to stop you doing a little extra work at the weekends if you have an expensive week coming up.

Just make sure that when you go this fast, you aren’t compromising quality. Of course mistakes are inevitable when you’re writing at this speed and for that rate – and good clients will recognize this and may even hire an editor. Still though, you need to make sure that even at high quantities, your work is still largely error free and this means you need to be focused on what you’re doing. A good keyboard helps a lot here, which we will look at later.

Quality

While working fast, you still need to stay committed to the quality of the work and that means focusing on what it is the client wants to achieve with their content. If they’re selling a product then you need to make writing that is highly persuasive. If they want to inform their audience on a subject, then your content needs to be informative and better than the competition.

You need to have the right attitude in order to succeed as a writer and that means caring about your clients. If you don’t, then they won’t come back to you for future work. Every time you send a piece of writing to a client, you should feel a little sad that you aren’t going to be keeping it for your own website. That’s when you know you’re really delivering quality.

SEO Knowledge

SEO is ‘Search Engine Optimization’ and this means the creation of websites and marketing strategies designed specifically to perform well on Google and to get to the top of the search engine results pages (SERPs). Usually this involves the subtle use of keywords as well as the creation of content that is highly sharable and clickable.

There is some overlap between SEO and writing services seeing as ‘content marketing’ is a big part of promoting a website online. While you don’t necessarily need to be an SEO expert, it certainly helps to have a grasp of this subject. Thankfully, there is plenty of information available online and even on this very blog.

Research

Being a good writer also means being a good researcher. Sometimes you will be asked to write on topics you know nothing about. Actually, this is one of the fun things about being a freelance writer as you’ll find you end up with all kinds of knowledge on a wealth of subjects. To cope though, you will need to be able to quickly understand the crux of a new subject and then bring that to your content in a way that makes you sound like an expert.

Self-Starter

Being a self-employed writer means that you’ll have no boss and no one looking over your shoulder. It’s down to you to meet the deadlines you’re set, to exceed expectations daily and to keep looking for more clients when you don’t have enough work. This takes immense mental discipline. If you’re the kind of person who starts a new training program every year and doesn’t see it through, then you might not have the kind of drive necessary to be a freelance writer.

What You Will Need

Now you know the skills you’ll need, you should have a basic idea of whether or not you can realistically cut it as a freelance writer and you may or may not still be interested in going ahead with this career choice.

If you have decided that freelance writing is for you, then the next step is to look into some of the tools of your trade in terms of software and hardware that can be very useful. Here we will look at some things that every freelance writer needs to succeed:

A Small Laptop

Having some kind of portable laptop or computer is a very important tool for a writer. One of the very best benefits of being a freelance writer is that you will be able to work remotely and to travel as you do. If you invest in a small laptop that can slip into a bag, then you can work while on the beach or while sitting in your garden. Look for something with a long battery life, a light profile and a good keyboard.

A Great Keyboard

Speaking of which, you may want to invest in an additional keyboard that will be comfortable and that will provide you with the best accuracy even at high speeds. A great choice here is to get a ‘mechanical keyboard’. If you get a Windows tablet then you can use a bluetooth keyboard like this without sacrificing portability.

Word Processor

Your word processor is the software you will use to write with. The most famous example of this is Microsoft Word, which comes as part of Office360. Getting a subscription to Office360 is pretty much a no-brainer for writers and will mean you’re able to take advantage of a lot of fancy features. If you write ebooks for clients for instance, Word will let you instantly add a table of contents. If you are asked to proofread work by another writer meanwhile, you’ll be able to use Word’s comments feature. This is a must-have tool then for any serious freelance writer.

If you can’t afford Word to begin with though, you can choose free options such as TextEdit for Mac, OpenOffice or Google Docs. Google Docs saves to the cloud so is especially useful if you find yourself moving from computer to computer a lot. It does require an internet connection though.

While Word is required for more advanced projects, you can easily ‘make do’ with Google Docs and then get Office360 once you start profiting.

A Website

Having your own website will give you a great place to promote your services and to make yourself look good. The best thing about a website is that you can promote it with other means (such as PPC advertising) and you won’t be competing with anyone else on there. Having a website makes you look more professional and this in turn means you can charge a little more for your services.

Skype

When you start working with many new clients, they will often request to have a Skype meeting first. This way they can ensure that you understand the project they are going to give you and they can see that you care about their project and that you are cognizant and capable.

Samples

When you first hear from a new client, often the first thing they will ask for is some samples that they can see. Likewise, if you want to promote yourself on your own website, then having samples online will help you to stand out and to inspire trust in potential customers. Spend some time then creating examples of your very best work and be ready to show those to people who ask for proof of your writing prowess. Note too that these samples should cover a broad range of types of articles, styles and topics. This way you can always show a sample that is relevant to the kind of work that a client wants you to do for them.

PayPal

PayPal is the main payment method that you will use as an online freelance writer. While PayPal does charge a fee, it’s also fast, convenient and secure. If you develop a long-term relationship with a client then you might be able to organize wire transfer. Otherwise though, PayPal will be your best bet and with the amount you’re going to be transferring you will need a premium or business account linked to a real bank account.

Copyscape

Copyscape is another paid tool, this time for checking that content is ‘original’ and hasn’t been directly lifted from another source online. This is important for your clients as they need original content in order to ‘rank’ highly in the SERPs (Google doesn’t like duplicate writing) and because there are copyright issues when you lift work (you also cannot sell the same work to multiple clients). ‘Copyscape passed content’ has become a synonym for ‘100% unique content’ which ensures your clients that it’s not stolen.

That said, you don’t actually need Copyscape as long as you know you are writing in your own voice and using sources only for research – not for copying. It can be useful for checking sometimes though and some clients may specifically request that you test your writing with it.

VAS

A ‘VAS’ is a ‘Virtual Assistant Service’. In no way is this a necessity but it can certainly help in some cases. Basically a VAS is an individual or team who provide a wide range of services that can be carried out online, normally at a very low price. As a writer, you can use them to research topics for you, to gather useful links or even to help you find work!

Finding Clients

Before you can begin writing you need something to write and that means you need clients!

So how do you find writing clients online? Usually the answer is through a site for freelance work, through a content mill, or through a forum for webmasters/digital marketers.

Some of your best options include: Elance, PeoplePerHour and oDesk (for all kinds of jobs), Freelancer.com (for writing specifically), Fiverr (for work starting at $5), WarriorForum (a forum for digital marketers) or DigitalPointForums (a forum for webmasters).

In my personal experience, sites like Elance and oDesk involve a little too much competition, ultimately driving your price lower than you would probably want to go. WarriorForum, PeoplePerHour and DigitalPoint all however are great for finding steady, ongoing work in a slightly less saturated market – you do have to pay to place an ad on WarriorForum though.

Of course there are many other places you can find work too if you’re willing to explore. One strategy is to simply find blogs that look like they might accept freelance work (or advertise that they do) and to contact them. Another option is to try contacting print magazines to write for, or to read a magazine that lists markets for writers. I actually used to work for a magazine called ‘Writers’ News’ which would list other magazines, websites, competitions and more that were all looking for people who could write!

How it Works

Now you have the tools and the skills and you’ve found your first clients. What does working as a freelance writer actually entail?

When someone contacts you, they may be ready to give you an order right away, or they might want a quick chat on Skype first. Either way, you’ll eventually get set some work which will normally involve a word count and potentially a due date (otherwise your turn around time should be no more than 48 hours for medium-sized projects). Generally an order can be anywhere in the rage of 500 to 10,000 words though sometimes you’ll get huge week-long projects.

If you have multiple long-term clients then you need to be able to juggle the work you do for them so that they are all consistently getting prompt delivery. Turning down work when you’ve got too much will often mean going some days with nothing – so it’s worth cramming in an extra few hours to keep your clients sweet.

Make sure to pay careful attention to the description for the work and to include any keywords they ask, to follow the recommended tone and style and to help them meet their goals with what you ultimately produce. If you need more clarification, just ask.

Once you’re finished, you can then send the work as an e-mail attachment and request payment. Alternatively, you may wish to ask for payment upfront. What you do is up to you but a general advice to follow is to ask for payment in arears for small projects (500-10,000 words) but ask for 50% or 100% up-front if it will take more than a day.

Hopefully you’ll get some regular clients who want repeat work and you’ll learn quickly who you can trust and who you can’t. If you find anyone has a habit of paying late (or not at all) then inform them that you can only work with them if they are willing to pay up-front in future.

If someone completely fails to pay, then you can sell the work elsewhere (as long as they haven’t published it) or make money from it in other ways – such as putting it into an ebook.

Final Tips

Those are the basics of being a freelance writer. Ultimately it comes down to getting a computer and word processing software, placing an ad offering to write for $1 to $2 per 100 words and then delivering the work promptly with a PayPal invoice. It’s a beautifully simple business model and while it isn’t infinitely scalable, it’s certainly versatile to suit your specific requirements.

While it’s a simple system though, that doesn’t always mean easy. Follow these tips if you want to survive and thrive!

Commit to Quality – We touched on this briefly but once again: make sure you are delivering high quality work at all times. The best thing you can do as a writer is to get repeat and ongoing work from a satisfied client and for there to be any chance of that happening, you need to provide reliably high quality content every time.

Don’t Work From Home – Working from home doesn’t have to be taken literally. If you work from your house all the time you’ll find it’s easy to get distracted and that you go stir crazy from not leaving your four walls. Buy a couple of cappuccinos and work in a coffee shop instead.

Limit Communication Overhead – Unfortunately, you will find that some clients are more effort than they’re worth. In the nicest possible way, if someone is sending you 20 e-mails a day and only paying for a few articles a month then they are costing you more than they’re earning you. Keep e-mails brief, avoid Skype meetings if possible and drop clients who keep pestering.

But Don’t be Afraid to ‘Kiss-Ass’ – That said, a rude client or confused client who pays for regular work is worth keeping. Sometimes you will have to say ‘sorry’ even when it’s not your fault. While it can be a little frustrating, it’s not worth arguing with someone which wastes time, loses you business and may result in a bad review. Be the bigger man or woman and swallow your pride from time to time. I once had a prospective client contact me who was a little blunt and I almost told them to jog on. 7 years later I’m still working for them and wouldn’t have gotten to where I am now without them – I’m very glad I didn’t send that angry e-mail!

Have Limits – When you’re a self-employed writer you can always be earning more money. As long as the work is there, you can work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. My advice? Don’t. There comes a point where you are living to work rather than working to live and in order to provide a good service and to enjoy your job you need that ‘me’ time to recharge. Set clear limits as to when you work and when you don’t and stick to them. The book ‘The Four Hour Workweek‘ is a great read that provides lots of tips of that nature.

Run a Blog – Writing for others is fun and rewarding to a point but if you never get to see your name on anything you write it can eventually get a little disheartening. Run your own blog then and that way you can still enjoy writing for the love of writing sometimes!

So there you have it, everything you need to know to start killing it as a writer on the web. There’s much more of course and you will always be learning until the day you put down the keyboard. The rest though, you’ll learn on the job. Good luck!

The post How to Become a Freelance Writer appeared first on TextBoss.

But wait a minute! Before you hit that ‘publish’ button, have you thought about the typography you’re going to use? Have you thought about it for your website in general? Because even the best content in the world can live or die based on your choice of typeface. This is a highly detailed subject that can have a huge impact on the look and feel of your web design as well as the flow and impact of your posts and articles. Unfortunately, it’s also a subject that a lot of webmasters and bloggers simply overlook – and it costs them dearly.

When it comes to web design the devil is very much in the detail. While you might not find yourself thinking much about typeface as you brose the web, the fact of the matter is that it has an unconscious impact on readers that speaks to the tone of the article and the quality of the business. The right typeface can make you stay longer on a page or it can encourage you to click on another link. And when you get it perfect, it will bring together the whole design of the site and the message of the content into a cohesive whole.

To help you get better acquainted with this subject then, let’s go over the basics of typography. By the end you should be a veritable typophile…

What is a Typeface?

This seems like a pretty good place to start: what even is a typeface? A typeface is of course style of text you choose to write in but did you know there’s a difference between a font and a typeface? Specifically, the term ‘font’ refers to a precise choice of style – such as Arial Bold or Arial Narrow, whereas a typeface refers to the broader category – i.e. Arial.

That said, the terms ‘font’ and ‘typeface’ are often used interchangeably, as they will be for the rest of this article.

In either case, the objective of a typeface or font choice is to make your text look clear and easy to read while at the same time being consistent and reflecting the tone and subject of the text or publication (website in your case).

Typefaces were originally invented when analog printing first came to be. Originally, printing involved laying out letters that acted like stamps onto frames, rolling them in ink and then pressing them onto paper. This is where the term ‘printing press’ comes from. The typeface would dictate the shapes of these letters.

Today, typefaces serve pretty much the same role. Your aim in picking the right font is to make sure that your readers can easily see what’s on your page without undermining the message of your brand. What looks good on a screen though is somewhat different from what looked good using a printing press and so typography has had to evolve with the times. When the web was first introduced, resolution was an issue that needed to be considered when designing a typeface. Today that’s not such an issue but responsive web design is. In Google’s latest ‘mobile friendliness’ update, they mandated that sites must use text that is easy to read on a mobile device or suffer potential penalizations in mobile search results.

Aspects of Typeface

Size isn’t everything when it comes to typeface though. What’s just as important is making sure that your font is easy to read and that it’s fitting for the type of content you’re posting. If you run an online news site then you’ll probably want a serif font for instance. Let’s take a look at some of the different factors influencing the feel of a font.

Serif

One of the biggest distinctions that can be made between typefaces is whether or not they are ‘serif’ or ‘sans serif’. A serif font is basically any font that has feet and legs – like Times New Roman. These types of fonts were used very commonly in the creation of newspapers and look particularly good when printed on paper. The idea of the feet is to help draw attention to various strokes and thus make it easier to differentiate between letters. An ‘l’ (L) and an ‘I’ (i) look different for instance when you use a serif font.

For digital media however, serif fonts can actually end up having the opposite effect and make a page look a little unnecessarily cluttered. This is particularly true on mobiles with small screens. Recent design trends have moved very much in the direction of minimalism too and so sans serif typefaces tend to evoke more of a feeling of modernity and of the digital age.

If you run a news blog, then choosing a serif font might lend you prestige through association with print publications. If you run a hip design blog, then a sans serif font shows you know what you’re doing and you’re ‘current’.

Stroke Width and Weight

The stroke of a font refers to individual lines. In many modern fonts these remain a consistent width all the way through, whereas in some gothic styles and script styles (see below) the width can vary at different points.

The weight meanwhile refers to how thick the letters are overall. When you make a font bold you are increasing the overall weight. When you make a font with variable stroke widths bold though, all the different areas of the letter will increase proportionately.

Kerning

Kerning refers to the space between individual letters. A well designed font will consider this carefully, as well as the ‘border’ around the font which prevents the tail of the ‘g’ from overlapping the line underneath it for instance.

Kerning is a little more complicated than it might sound because the ideal space between different letters varies depending on the weight of that letter on each side etc. The objective of kerning is to make a page of text appear to be a roughly even distribution of black and white rather than having obvious patches of heavy text and areas of ‘light’ text.

One of the reasons that the Comic Sans typeface gets so much flack is that it lacks proper kerning. Or at least it is believed to – in fact the font was designed for lower resolution displays where the kerning made a lot more sense the way it is.

Kerning is just one example of why it’s so difficult to create your own unique font – and why it pays to get a professional in.

Slope

The slope of any given text refers to how slanted it is. While you can make most fonts italic, others are italic by nature.

Originally italics was invented as a way to fit more text onto a page without making it harder to read! Today it is used more often for emphasis.

Width

The width of typeface of course refers to its relative width compared to its height. This is important in graphic design because wider fonts often look better when used as long headers etc. Narrow fonts make more sense in side bars on websites.

Era and Style

Fonts vary in their style and can be grouped together in rough categories, often dictated by their era. Gothic fonts for instance are old-style fonts that wouldn’t look out of place in a horror film, whereas script fonts are fonts that look hand written (and often have a sharp slope). Modern fonts are those newspaper-style fonts with straight lines and serifs, decorative fonts are ‘over the top’ fonts that look like blood or fur and monotype fonts are fonts with uniform kerning (used for programmers).

When choosing your font you need to ensure that the era and style reflect your business. As mentioned earlier, sans serif fonts look the most modern and so are a good pick for online businesses. Meanwhile, script fonts are great for greeting cards and monospace fonts can unconsciously communicate that your site is about programming (if it is). Other font styles include old styles and transitional styles. Sometimes these categories are described as ‘flavors’.

How to Get Your Font Choice Right

So far you know that your font needs to be legible on all devices and that it needs to match the style and tone of your business. Remember the design maxim ‘communicate, don’t decorate’. In other words, a good font choice should say something about your business. At the same time, you shouldn’t sacrifice function for form.

For an appealing design you want to use more than one font but you shouldn’t use more than three. This might mean having one font for your text, one for your header and one for your subheader. The fonts you choose to combine need to work with one another. That means that they should be from a similar era and style. For example then you don’t want to choose a script font for your headers and then use a monotype for your text… it will just look bizarre.

That said though, you also need to avoid combining fonts that are too similar. You need to make sure that it’s clear you’ve purposefully chosen to use two different fonts otherwise it can look a little jarring.

Once you’ve made your decision on which fonts to use, you next need to carefully consider your size and color. These factors will have a big impact on the overall legibility and how readable and enjoyable your font is for your visitors.

To start finding fonts to use, check out ‘FontSquirrel.com’. That’s a great repository with a ton of free fonts you can use. Once you start playing with them, you’ll quickly see the difference it makes and you won’t look back!

The post A Comprehensive Introduction to the World of Typography – The Devil is in the Details appeared first on TextBoss.