We have enjoyed sharing our knowledge with you and hope to continue doing so. However, we’ve also realized that it is just as important to let others share their knowledge and experience with everyone as well.

Be part of the UI Patterns family

We are always on the lookout for great guest writers. Are you an expert in your field? Do you want to write for UI Patterns? Then we’d love to invite you to contribute to the community with us.

Who can contribute?

Anyone! You do not need to be an established blogger to write for us, but merely have experience working in the industry, know what you’re talking about, and have something interesting to say. If you love web design, that means you!

We take great effort in assuring quality content and are glad to provide feedback on how you can better your writing in order to communicate your story better and be more spot-on with our readers.

What’s in it for you

UI-Patterns.com is constantly growing and getting even more recognized. We can offer you a small token of our appreciation and exposure for yourself.

• Each guest writer is acknowledged as the author in the top and bottom of a post with a short and detailed biography, and links to official website and twitter account.
• Get your work published to over 2.000 daily readers.
• Listed on the contributing authors section.
• Great exposure to constantly growing traffic.
• Enjoy our Google PageRank.
• Contribute to the community!

Guidelines and expectations

It is important for us to keep up our standards of quality. One of the core principles behind content on UI-patterns.com is that everything should be immediately useful for the user. A pattern or blog post should be suggestive and guiding rather than reflective and abstract (not that the two pairs are counterparts).

Besides that…

• Posts must be original pieces written for UI-Patterns.com.
• Guest posts cannot be republished.
• Posts must be non-promotional.
• Guest posts are unpaid.

What kind of posts are we looking for?

The average UI Patterns reader include both software developers, web designers, and business developers. This is why all posts should be of some interest to all of these three groups. Posts should never be so technical that example code is necessary and never be so high-level that the average web developer falls asleep. We welcome

• New and exciting perspectives on user interface design, process, and the web design business.
• Inspiration. Success stories, case studies, excellent sources and resourceful lists for high quality goodies.
• Design considerations. Did you just relaunch your site or do interesting work for a client? Tell us about the process and result – and how it was unique.
• Explained showcases of how both established and pending patterns are applied in the real world of web design.
• Persuasive design – how can psychological principles be applied to increase conversion, engagement, and general happiness of your users?
• Emerging design patterns – cool things spotted around the web that could possibly become an established pattern.
• Product reviews – if it’s relevant to usability or web design in general
• Tips – Tips on how to get better. How to learn to sketch prototypes or what books would be helpful.

Before you submit

You need at least to:

• Have something really interesting to tell that delivers value for the UI-Patterns.com reader.
• Be concise and get to the point.
• Have somebody else read it through before you send it.

One last thing

Articles may be edited. Please don’t be offended if we suggest changes, fix grammar, add links etc. However, no major changes will be made without your approval. It’s still your post.

I’m convinced! Now what?

The idea for your post is everything. Take some time to think of something that will fit the site perfectly, and then email us at info (at) ui-patterns (dot) com with your idea. Even better, email a few ideas and we’ll work on the best one!

Make sure you give an overview of what each post would be about – then it’s much easier for us to let you know if your post will work for the site or not.

Formatting

• All posts need a descriptive title picture and a short teasing summary.
• Get to the point! The most important thing we judge a potential guest post by is a lack of rambling around a topic. Get the message out there in the simplest way possible.
• Images will be presented 380 pixels wide. There are no limits on height, but try to keep it below 500 pixels in height.
• Add as many useful links as you like. You can either disperse them throughout the post, or make a “Resources” or “Sources” section at the end of your post.
• We like an easy-to-read, conversational tone, but some level of formality does help – e.g. no smilies in the posts!