Glossary

Welcome to the Tiller Glossary, your inside track to understanding concepts and jargon related to branding, design, development, marketing, and more.

Term of the day

Customer Experience

Customer experience is the sum of all interactions a customer has with your brand throughout the customer journey, both direct and indirect.

Featured Terms

All topics

3-Click Rule

The 3-click rule is an official and unsubstantiated design rule that states that a user should always be able to find their desired information within three clicks or less.

5-Second Test

A 5-second test is a form of usability testing that tests how effectively a message is communicated through design.

Annotated Wireframes

Annotations are comments or notes of explanation. Wireframe annotations add context around design elements, functionality, user flow, rationale, and more.

API Integrations

An application programming interface (API) connects the flow of data between two or more computers or software applications. In other words, API integrations allow your programs and devices to talk to each other.

Application Development

Mobile and web application development is the process of creating software that helps the end-user perform specific tasks.

Backlinks

Backlinks are links from one website to another. Backlinking is an important factor for SEO that can help improve domain authority and search ranking.

Bounce Rate

A bounce rate is the percentage of website visitors who land on a web page and leave the page without taking any action.

Brand Development

Brand development is the continuous process of defining, refining, and testing your overall brand strategy.

Brand Equity

Brand equity is the value a company gains from a consumer’s positive perception of their brand compared to a generic equivalent.

Brand Guidelines

Brand guidelines outline the tools, defined rules, and standards for communicating your brand.

Brand Identity

Brand identity guides the visual elements that distinguish your brand in a sea of competitors.

Branding

Branding is the process of creating a uniquely identifiable company or product and promoting it via marketing and advertising. It includes the name, logo, and overall design.

Content Marketing

Content marketing is a form of online marketing that includes infographics, web pages, educational articles, podcasts, webinars, videos, and e-books.

Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO)

Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the exercise of increasing the number of website or mobile app users who perform a desired action.

Customer Experience

Customer experience is the sum of all interactions a customer has with your brand throughout the customer journey, both direct and indirect.

F-Shaped Pattern

The F-shaped pattern is a common left to right, top to bottom pattern of eye-movement that readers use when reading or scanning a web page.

Gestalt Principles

The Gestalt Principles are based on the concept that the human eye perceives the whole shape of something differently than each part of the shape. They help explain how our brains make sense of design.

Graphic Design

Graphic designers manage the visual identity of a brand from the logo to the colour palette to the illustrations. Graphic design is often used in a wide range of marketing materials.

Graphical User Interface (GUI)

A graphical user interface (GUI) is an interface through which a user interacts with visual elements like icons or buttons on the screen of an electronic device using a pointer, keyboard, or touch screen.

Information Architecture (IA)

Information architecture is the structure and organization of content in a digital experience (e.g. software, website, or mobile app).

Interaction Design

Interaction design is the design of interactions between a user and a digital product or website. It plays a critical role in the overall user experience design.

Lean UX

Lean UX is a highly collaborative, iterative, design technique that focuses on solving specific user experience problems within the constraints of development sprints.

Logo Design

Logos imbue your brand’s overarching messaging, feeling, or story within one graphic or glyph.

Low-Fidelity Prototypes

Low-fidelity prototyping is a fundamental phase in the web design process. Ideas and concepts are presented using simple lines and shapes without concern for aesthetics or detailed content.

Meta Description

In a Search Engine Results Page (SERP), the short descriptions found below the page titles and URLs are referred to as meta descriptions.

Minimum Viable Product

A minimum viable product (MVP) is an early version of a product that is launched into the market with just enough features to attract early customers and begin collecting valuable information.

Mobile App Mockups

A mobile app mockup is an in-between stage between a wireframe and a developed prototype. Mockups present finished design - including colour palette, typography, imagery, layout, button styles, etc.

Mobile Wireframes

Mobile wireframes are low-fidelity blueprints for a mobile application.

Mockups

Mockups are mid to high-fidelity static visual designs that demonstrate the basic content layout, color schemes, typography, white spacing, and user navigation of a web design.

Off-Page SEO

Off-page SEO is a search optimization strategy that happens outside of your website. Factors include link building, social media shares, Google reviews, and more.

On-Page SEO

On-page SEO is the practice of optimizing web page content and HTML to improve organic search traffic and boost search engine rankings.

Prototyping

Prototyping is a crucial phase of any design project that uses an interactive, navigable version of wireframes to simulate how the final product will work.

Responsive Web Design

Responsive web design is a method that uses coding strategies to optimize a website’s layout for viewing on various devices (desktop, tablet, and mobile).

Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the practice of optimizing your website to increase the quantity and quality of your traffic via organic search engine results.

Sitemap

A sitemap (HTML or XML) is a file that contains a list of pages on your website.

Sketching

UI sketching is the process of drawing out your user interface ideas before diving deeper into the design process. It can be done with pen and paper or with a variety of online tools.

System UI

Any display elements that can be customized and that are independent of apps on the device, are referred to as System UI.

Title Tags

A title tag is the clickable title of a webpage that appears on the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) and in a browser tab.

Usability

Usability is the degree of ease a user has when using your website or product. The more effective, efficient, and user-friendly a website is, the more satisfied the users will be.

Usability Engineering

Usability engineering is a professional discipline focused on optimizing the interactions between people and interactive systems.

Usability Heuristics

A heuristic is a practical approach to problem-solving. Usability heuristics help assess the usability of user interface (UI) design and inform improvements.

Usability Testing

Usability testing is a product testing method where users are asked to perform specific tasks while someone observes and gathers results that will inform product revisions.

User Experience (UX) Design

User experience (UX) design is the process of creating user-friendly products that provide end-users with an easy-to-navigate and relevant digital experience.

User Interface (UI) Design

User interface (UI) design encompasses the visual elements a user sees and how they interact with them. Great UI makes for a visually stunning website that is accessible and easy to use.

User-Centered Design

User-centered design ensures that every touchpoint a user has with your product or website is meaningful.

Web Design

Web design is the process of strategizing and creating an online user experience that will connect with your target audience.

Website Footer

A website footer is a content band located at the very bottom of each page on your website that contains helpful information for web users.

Whiteboarding

Whiteboarding is the process of brainstorming and visually collaborating on ideas in a shared space. It can be done using a physical whiteboard and dry-erase markers, or with digital whiteboard software.

Wireframing

Wireframing is an efficient and low-cost way to visually represent the structure and layout of a product or website before progressing further into design and development.