How to Make a Living As A UI/UX Designer
Designers are creative thinkers making design their part of life.
What a designer do? Just Creative Thinking
The art of creative thinking today needs no introduction. Creative thinking plays a very significant not only in Profession life but in Personal too. For a creative designer, you have to have a piece of complete knowledge about what you are making, the characteristic which makes it different from others.
There is a proverb “We humans cannot make anything from nothing”. You will be more creative when you start thinking about and viewing different ideas.
To become a designer you have to make designing a part of your life and think in a creative way. It is just an introduction carry on and you can learn everything.
Getting Started
Passionate about Designing, Want to be a UI/UX Designer? Then read on. Building a website or app without designing makes no sense.
The Tech Industry is booming nowadays, and many people are diving into it to get the most out of it. Before a decade, there is no responsiveness, animation, UI (User Interface)/UX(User Experience) designing for Website and Apps.
But today, the industries are focusing on designing rather than coding. Due to this, many platforms such as Webflow, WordPress, Supernova is rapidly growing. Similarly, Figma, Behance, is at its peak.
Who is UI/UX designer?
UI/UX designers is a person or group of persons who is responsible for designing a Website/Web pages or Application(Apps) without any code.
They are booming right now.
From top companies to small are hiring designers from all over the world. Many career options, high wages, and many more.
Step 1: Make an Environment Suitable for Designing.
To succeed in your job or business, you must be genuinely interested in other people, their interests. Learn from different designers their designing skills. View their design on a popular platform like Dribbble.
Reach out to them and ask for at least half an hour for an interview, if possible. When you are done, reach out to other famous designers to know about their designing skills, ask them about all of the doubts that are running on your mind, the experiences, the difficulties they have faced. Be well prepared before interviewing a top designer.
To become a UI/UX designer, you have to think as a designer does, practice every single day, learn various techniques, love to implement them. “No one can become great in a single day” the same thing applies to it, first surround yourself with the designing environment.
Starting reading books, news, latest blogs, watch videos, articles, subscribe to top designers channel, or maybe platforms to get the latest updates and to surround yourself with this.
Step 2: Platform to Explore
One of the great platform to explore where designers gain inspiration, feedback, community, and jobs. Learn from top designers, their designs, and connect with designers worldwide.
It is used for professional designers to showcase their skills. Better design with animation is mainly seen in Dribbble.
2. Behance
According to Wikipedia, Behance is a social media platform owned by Adobe which aims “to showcase and discover creative work. There are various categories other than design for designers such as Graphic design, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and many more such unique types. Learn from top designers, their systems, and connect with designers worldwide.
3. Awwwards
Too much to learn from a single platform. Various cool designs, eBooks, and many more. To encourage designers, there is multiple competition as well, and after the winners are chosen among the Awwwards community and an international jury panel consists of designers. The best daily designs are also published in Awwwards year-end books.
There is another platform as well, but after studying a little bit, this platform is highly recommended by most designers.
And after suggesting various platforms, a beginner always has some doubts about What to start with? Where to learn first? I highly recommend exploring a single skill, “Only to get most out of a single box,” and then jump to others. I want to assure you that I only write about what I do or have done.
Step 3: Planning
Now that you know the environment, you can start planning. Create a to-do list to be performed in a day or even in a month. Be strict with what you have planned.
It’s always become easy for people to be creative through their daily practices. The designer should always focus on change. For that, they have to creative, productive.
No designer can be creative from the start, they have to grow the tree to eat fruits i.e. Designers have to practice being creative and productive. Aiming for success requires more than just planning.
After this, you have a guide about the designing process. Now after understanding various designs from the various designing platforms, you have an idea about it. So now get started to practice it.
Step 4: Practice With Available Tools
One of the important aspects to be successful is “Always love to practice what you have learned.” According to a study, a person can only remember 10% from reading and 90% from practicing it. So to learn quickly, one of the easiest ways is by practicing it. So let's started to practice.
There are lots of tools to start practicing with, so it’s up to you which one to choose and explore. But according to the popularity and by recommendation below means are best.
Designing Tools:
a) Sketch (Only For Apple/ Mac Users)
b) Figma (Best and free designing tool to work with)
Here you can take an idea from other designer’s designs but not steal. It is not about stealing but to copy everything from other designers is not likely to perform, instead of stealing it, leave designing and explore others which you like.
Step 5: Implementation
After getting an Idea, practicing it, building something from that, the next step is to showcase your skill. But Where? Only to dribble, Behance, Awwwards. Yeah, you read it right. Any designer can showcase their skills on this platform.
So this is the primary journey to which many designers learn straightforwardly and quickly. After it joins Design Communities to get something better. The most popular communities are Behance and dribbble other than that, Designer Hangout and Hexagon are also very popular.
Step 6: Start Earning
Take part in Challenges, Contest where you can earn money. Behance Daily Design Challenges is one of the challenges that you can participate in. Start your brand, Start a startup, Expand your business. Work as a freelancer in Freelancer, Fiverr, or Upwork.
According to Glassdoor, the average salary for only a Web Designer is 354k per year, and this goes on exponentially. Work as a Website designer in top MNC’s. There are various sources to earn money; just get started.
Books to refer
- The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman
- Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
- Universal Principles of Design
- Lean UX: Applying Lean Principles to Improve User Experience
Conclusion
For a successful designer, you have to keep learning because the industry is changing, and if you are stuck at a certain point, you would be lost. After performing the above steps, you have to think about the various designs and implement them on any Designing tools like Figma.
Be strict with what you have learned; practice it. Plan your time; keep connected with other designers. Start with small, dream big, and implement it.
After this, you have to gain more knowledge about the related topics and other trending topics. In this era, Information is a must, and you have to keep grasping it to be part of technology.
