6 Steps to Choose fonts - 12 AI Tools for faster workflow- Ep 253

80 percentage of the users are mobile users when it comes to accessing the Internet. Also, gartner says that 15% of the global population already has some form of a disability in terms of accessing the font at their end, which is making even more crucial. Niels and Norman Group found that fonts with higher legibility can improve your speed reading rate up to 20 percentage. So what does this say? Readability, legibility and clarity towards what we are presenting should be very very very presentable. That's where the term comes like choice of typeface, using the font rightly, using the spacing rightly, using the ligatures rightly, using the kerning and leading and tracking rightly is what is important for a designer. In this podcast we are going to know why it is important to really choose right typeface and what are the process to do it. A lot of people don't know how to choose it in a very structured way. You're going to see some statistics and case studies as well as we are going to see amazing AI tools which can help to help you do it little faster. Okay, let's ju welcome guys. Welcome to Design for Change. Thank you for staying tuning in this podcast. So very important topic. One of my student has really asked and also many many people have asked me over the span of my two years of particularly coaching and mentoring. In my experience people don't know how to use font, they just use randomly with whatever is available in the online whatever is available from the portfolio, what they are seeing it in online or maybe in Pinterest or Behance or anything they just copy pasting it not even knowing the significance, importance, why it is. Let me give you four important factors readability and legibility. A font should be significantly improving the user experience only when the functional aspect is met. If you are creating something very useless, it's not even readable. There is no point in creating the typeface at all. Second is brand personality. A brand first of all should align with the requirement of the personality of that particular typeface, whatever it's projecting or else there is huge mismatch in the connection between audience and the brand. Let's say if it's a children's app, let's say if it's a financial app, let's say if it is any kind of app which is leading to sports, fitness, anything, it should be relevant. Third, accessibility. It should be more accessible to all the different type of users with visual impairments, with disabilities, with reading disabilities, with hearing disabilities. So how they can able to bring down these parameters to make it accessibility and inclusive in design. Fourth is consistency, how you're able to seamlessly create a responsive design in mobile. Tab web makes the brand cohesive. Okay, so these 4 meters, these 4 parameters defines the choice of your font. Guys, you need to know why the fonts are choiced and why the process is coming into the picture in order to ensure these four parameters. Readability, legibility, brand personality, accessibility and inclusiveness and consistency. Okay, Jagdish, so having learned this, how do I really choose it? Okay, the reason is clear, but how do we do it? How is a big question, right? There are seven steps which you can easily do it guys. First define your target market. Try to understand what is their preference, what is the geography, what are their basic interest and try to understand practically where are they using? Are they using any short forms, any long form text, or are they using any call to action buttons? Who's your audience? That is where all the factors comes in. Don't think like you'll just drag and drop in some typeface design and then you will pull it out from Google Font and go and understand your target market before coming into all the differences what you're trying to make or else you will not create a significant impact. Is that what I can conclude this? Second, consider the context of use. Like let's say are they using it in mobile, are they using it for the transaction purpose or reading purpose or watching a videos purpose or entertainment purpose or productivity purpose, what is that and are they using in mobile and tablet the font size differs. So choose the typeface. When it comes to mobile, when it comes to web app, when it comes to tablet, differently and also based on the resolution of the screen, which is making it even more simple. Okay, so consider the context of use. That's the second thing. Third important thing is font characteristic. Whether you use serif or sans serif. Serif is very conventional, guys. It's like very what you call traditional way of putting like let's say Times New Roman, you have a small what you call comma or a character in the bottom and the top, right? It's actually a serif. Sans serif is something modern. Like what you can say is like let's say Arial Helvetica. All these things are very modern font. So choice between these two matters a lot. Whether you wanted to do a timeless design, classical design or a trendy design.

Okay.

And also make sure how it is readable in various devices. Make sure you give some reading practice for your testing audiences or also do do it from a Long distance and ask like let's say hey, how do you is it readable for you? What did you understand from reading this? So ask your target market or maybe to test it with a small group to understand it. Once it is confirmed then you ensure that font is also having a scalability feature in all the platforms like let's say Android qt different, different development platforms then and only this particular characteristic. What you choose makes sense. Okay, Font characteristic is the third important thing. Accessibility consideration. Make sure it has a good contrast and also think whether it is an open type feature. Like let's say look for very very good open fonts which is like alternative characters and more. Because sometimes it will be helpful to make sure it is accessible for everyone. Also choicing the font is based on the WCAG guidelines, which is website content accessibility guidelines. This actually recommends you a lot of content guys. You can able to find out distinguishing characters from it. Okay, so accessibility and inclusivity is very important. Fifth important thing is testing and feedback. No matter what you do, unless you test it, you will never know what works, what not works. Okay, so AB split testing is a very good way to perform one font over the other and to ensure how the readability is happening or the engagement is created. Okay, you need to get it and then I will say this is most most important which is case study based understanding. You have to benchmark certain competitors also in your line, how they have created. Once if you're able to follow the six methods guys, you will be able to create more impactful choice of typeface. First is defining your purpose and target audience. Second is considering the context of use. Third is font scale, font characteristic and readability and accessibility and testing and feedback and then using it with the benchmark data from your competitors. Okay, so now I'm going to tell you some resources. Use Google Font, use Font Squirrel, use Adobe Fonts. These are all like direct open source font guys. You can able to bring a lot of fonts from here. Adobe may be little premium, but you can use Google Fonts which is free of cost.

Okay?

And particularly Font Squirrel provides high quality free fonts. I'll paste you this link in the below description. Don't worry about this in the podcast you can able to find it. But recently BBC has developed this custom font guys called BBC Write. Actually it is improved to make readability in all the devices happen. And you know what? It is a very clear legible design in mobile as well as large web interfaces, everything. Because BBC wants to ensure that. Okay, so an Airbnb they Have switched to a custom font called serial in 2018 only they did this guys. And also they're very unique and it's very consistent across all of their platforms. In mobile, in tablet, in everything. It is designed only to make sure legibility is taken care and it provides approachability because Airbnb is a service based industry, right? So the approachability and how warmth it is conveying for the user is most most important.

Okay?

So understand this. That's the reason we are able to do this. Let me give one activity, guys. Take variety of fonts, test them which is readable according to you and your target market in your earlier project, okay? With various screen sizes and all use two different type of font to use AB split testing.

Okay?

Use one sample group for one typeface, another sample group for another compare which is good readability, good user engagement happening. And then choose the option A or B and make sure it follows all the WCAG guidelines. And you can use a tool called Wave or Axe Axe. If you insert your font, it will tell you what are the errors, what are the accessibility guidelines which you're missing out. So these tools will help you out to cut short your time to development in more faster way. Okay, so to close this entire thing, it's all good so far now. But unless until you are not using the AI properly, you won't be able to use typeface in a more better way. Because right now type pairing, type kerning, spacing, everything needs to be automated in a greater way, guys. Or else what happens is manually. If you do it takes huge time. You can use a font called Font Joy. It it accessory. It actually uses the machine learning to generate these pairings with you.

Okay?

It will generate that font fairing and it makes visually appealing design. In the recent video also in YouTube I've recorded about this font Joy type case study. You can able to watch it.

Okay.

Second is type IO Typ IO actually it analyzes popular website and suggests you what font pairing works, what doesn't work. It provides you real time example. You can use Adobe fonts which is actually called TypeKit formally.

Okay.

It uses AI tools to recommend your typeface context and it provides a vast library, guys, you know Adobe huge.

Okay.

Fourth is what the font. You can use AI to identify font from images. It quickly help you to find out the similar fonts that you like. And the next is fontsmith font pairing tool. It uses machine learning algorithm to suggest you what is harmoniously working in the font pairing and which matches for your context. Okay, so these are all some of the AI tools guys. You can able to try it out on your own and you can even create a seamless workflow without any big effort putting into it.

Okay.

And you can use some of the tools like, let's say WCAG guidelines reader. And you can use Axe Accessibility. You can use Wave Tool, which is Wave Tool. And also you can use Star. You can use Readability Analyzer, you can use Google Lighthouse. These performs accessibility also and readability and inclusiveness. How your typeface has successfully performed.

Okay.

And then you will find out huge meaning and connection. Don't worry, all of the resources are pasted in the podcast. You can able to read it.

Okay.

And then there are AI tools for split testing also you can use Optimizely. It's actually one of the famous tools for split testing in a B with AI optimized traditional experience. It helps you improve your engagement of the user in a greater way. Google Optimize Hard Jar Usability Hub particularly Usability Hub is a great software guys. You can able to find remote testing also with different user and find out which font worked which doesn't work and also whether you're able to meet the requirement. You're able to explore the typeface, you're able to make it readable and accessible. Are you conducting a good testing method to find out which works for you and gather the feedback and reiterate it. So these are all the methods, how you can choose the typeface. These are all the AI tools which you can use. And let me know in this podcast how you're able to implement and get through it. And make sure I gave you the activity. Choose one variety of font and test it out to the small group and split test it and see how it is really working good and which method work for you. Then and only you will also go ahead and keep on improving and iterating the process. Listening to this podcast will not change anything. Taking action will. Okay, thank you. We'll see in another episode. Take care guys. Bye bye.