Entries for the 2018 Automattic Design are due November 16 We were fortunate to have Nervous System computationally design, a-hem “grow,” the Automattic Design Award trophy. Nervous Systems’ website demonstrates their astounding experiments as artists, designers, and entrepreneurs. From a tree-like form to be used in a 4-dimensional zoetrope, to their online shop selling jewelry…

The WordPress.com design team (and friends) recently conducted extensive user research around small business owners and their experiences, as you may have already read elsewhere on this blog. The team spoke to 34 entrepreneurs, gaining insight into the stresses and joys of their day-to-day lives, with the goal of learning how we, as Automattic, can…

As an industry, we’ve been proclaiming the good news of mobile-first for years. Yet as much as we talk the talk, we don’t always walk the walk. It’s not a bad thing; things are just rarely black or white in real life and in our day-to-day work. Earlier this year, the Automattic design team conducted…

Automattic Design recently engaged in a “deep dive” customer research project to understand the psychology of small business owners. The underlying reason behind making this work happen has been our knowledge that roughly half the small businesses in the world don’t have a website. And since we’re a company that makes, among many things, website-making…

Recently, the WordPress.com design team spoke to 34 small business owners across the United States as part of a research project. The data gathered was vast, and incredibly insightful, but one thing has been sticking in my head after reading the results; Small business owners want partners more than vendors This goes to a fundamental part of…

For many small business owners, building a web presence is like trying to build a puzzle without knowing what the end result looks like. You can see how a few pieces fit together, but it’s not until you start filling in the edges — building on the work you’ve already done — that it starts…

As someone who spent several years squarely in the Engaged DIY-er camp working hard on my side hustle, I should know them. But I’m starting to realize something that never really fully clicked for me then. I’ll try my best to articulate. A Tricky Name. A Misleading Image.  The name “Engaged DIY” conjures up an…

As a former freelancer I would have been considered a small business owner at one point. I was managing all aspects of the business which operated under my name. There were definitely some areas that I neglected early on and the main one was marketing or “getting myself out there”. Producing the work itself was…