📝 Issue #435: The Good The Bad and The Ugly of A/B Testing, Exciting New Tools for Designers, Staying Relevant in Product Design, The Psychology of Design, and more…

There are numerous benefits of A/B testing, it’s a simple-to-implement, scientific approach to arriving at the best solution when facing a design question. But A/B testing is also deeply flawed, and can even be obstructive. Andy Budd looks into the good, the bad, and the ugly of A/B testing.

Building an online presence means attracting traffic to your site. The number one way of increasing traffic, and of boosting your SERPs, is through backlinks, but they are sometimes tough to get. Postaga is a superb, free, automated outreach tool designed to change the way you grow your sites’ traffic.

According to Nick Hahn, digital products are having their “assembly line” moment. In this in-depth article he explains how you can get ahead of the curve by embracing design systems, including some helpful tips on how to steer your team, and clients towards new methods of working.

Prepare for a range of dynamic communication roles in Northwestern University’s online master’s program in Information Design and Strategy. You’ll build the in-demand skills, such as UX, UI, and HCI, needed to drive user experiences. Choose from specializations in content strategy, data science and analytics, and learning design. Apply now - AD

Every month we roundup the best new tools and resources that we’ve found on the web in the previous four weeks. In May’s edition we’ve included some great free fonts, thousands of icons, free templates, a CSS library, some great new apps to trial, and some awesome utilities that will boost your workflow.

Show Layer is an awesome showcase of modern web apps. It allows you to spin up demos of showcased apps, then comment and like. It’s a brand new site, so there are currently relatively few apps, but in time Show Layer could be the Dribbble of product design. Sign up for free to submit your own app.

The Psychology of Design is a collection of cognitive biases and principles that affect UX. The rules are divided into information, meaning, time, and memory sections. There are currently 24 rules to learn, ranging from the well-known Hick’s Law, to the Zeigarnik Effect, with the authors aiming to add more.

Is there anything more annoying than clicking a link on a web page, only for a banner ad to appear and steal the click? Layout shifts are frustrating, and damaging to UX. Addy Osmani presents a guide on why layout shifts occur, and how to solve the issue, with a series of best practices for developers.

Blush is a fantastic free collection of illustrations that you can use, without attribution, in your site and app designs. Illustrations are provided by artists from around the world, and you can even sign-up and submit your own work. There’s currently a plugin for Figma, with Sketch and XD plugins on the way.

Throughout the Covid-19 lockdown, companies have attempted to respond with promotional ideas that have been more miss than hit. But trust Ikea to get the tone right. Ikea Russia has released a series of Ikea-style instructions for building the perfect homemade fort for children, or self-isolating designers.