Freelance UX Design, E-Strategy, Templating

Curriculum Vitae - Frederik Van Zande

My book collection:

  1. Programming
    background
  2. User Experience
    Design
  3. E-marketing
  4. HTML
    & CSS
  5. Design
    background

Currently working full-time for Belfius

last update:

About me

Freelance UX designer,
e-strategist & templater

Generalist & specialist

I'm a generalist with a diverse knowledge of UX disciplines and a specialist in multiple areas. My design and programming background allows me to create realistic concepts and to follow up on the implementations and quality control. I combine my UX with e-marketing knowledge to create website strategies and to optimize conversions. 

I create templates with high-end semantics, SEO and extensive responsive optimizations. My template work shows most to advantage for high traffic websites.

UX focus on content & UI

I have been doing UX for 9 years and e-marketing for 8 years. My experience with content makes me stand out most. What to communicate, how to structure it, how to make it work best, how to optimize it for all media and how to maintain it.

My user experience design disciplines include information architecture, content strategy, information design, findability, usability, interaction + interface design.

Semantic & responsive templates

I have 12 years' template experience. I can wireframe and prototype in HTML & CSS, reducing the overall development & design time significantly. I love to play with interfaces and to transform designs for responsive websites.

I stand out with my semantic and rich metadata skills and my UX knowledge allows me to make better decisions on the fly. I work with a mobile first approach, keep an eye on performance, and simplify interfaces while keeping all their functionalities.

Employability

For UX work I can be deployed in a bigger UX team or as the only UX designer for big and small projects. I work mostly as the middleman between the client and the design + development team.

For templating work I prefer projects where semantics, SEO and clean code matter or websites that need extensive responsive optimizations. My template work shows most to advantage for high traffic websites.

Frederik Van Zande

User experience designer, internet strategist, HTML & CSS expert

Gender: male

Age: 35 years old

Date of birth: , Leuven

Nationality: Belgian

Residence: Vielsalm, Belgium - Google Maps

Driver license: A, B

Languages (CEFR guideline)

  • Dutch: C2 - mother tongue
  • English: C1 - effective operational proficiency
  • French: B1 - Independent user - intermediate

Mobile: +32 495 60 94 50

Skype: fre_entity

be.linkedin.com/in/frederikvanzande

Skills

UX design

skill level advanced

10 years of experience

I'm most experienced in content related UX disciplines: information architecture, content strategy, information design and accessibility. I've improved websites with extended content plans, done countless of CMS implementations, conceptualized and designed the interface of 2 specialized content management systems.

My other UX skills include usability, interaction design, interface design, design patterns. I specialized 3 years in mobile & tablet UX, and have extended experience with e-commerce, corporate websites, press and investors, online reporting and more complex UI interface projects.

I have wireframe and prototype experience with many software and directly in HTML & CSS as well.

  • Information architecture

    skill level advanced

    10 years of experience

    I have in-depth technical knowledge regarding underlying application structures for many systems, and can understand new ones easily with my technical background. This allows me to optimize my IA work for the specific systems within their limitations.

    I have experience with:

    • implementing tag systems,ontologies, thesauri, taxonomies and the semantic web
    • navigation from in-page to faceted
    • site structures for simple websites to macro IA (mutliple sites)
    • multi language and multiple country websites (one project had 24 country versions, each in 27 languages)
    • tweaking and implementing search systems and improving search result pages
    • content strategies for specific CMS implementations
    Favorite resources: Peter Morville, Jim Kalbach

  • Usability

    skill level advanced

    10 years of experience

    "Prioritizing Web Usability" of Jakob Nielsen was my first step into UX design, and many books followed after that one. I have extensive knowledge of usability heuristics and basic user tests.

    I have experience with:

    • e-commerce and product / service pages
    • corporate websites, about us sections, press sections
    • investor relations, financial sections
    • online reports
    • mobile and tablet
    Favorite resources: Jakob NIelsen, Steve Krug, Nielsen Norman Group, Susan Weinschenk

  • UI & interaction design

    skill level Expert

    9 years of experience

    I know most limitations and possibilities of HTML, CSS and JavaScript and this gives me an advantage in wireframing interactions and interfaces.

    I have experience with designing:

    • web forms & optimizations
    • productivity apps
    • CMS interfaces and modules
    • social networks
    • mobile and tablet optimized interfaces
    • product comparisons
    Favorite resources: Luke Wroblewski, Bill Moggridge, Matthew Linderman, Robert Hoekman, Alan Cooper

  • Findability

    skill level Expert

    11 years of experience

    Most of my projects have lots of content. Making that content easy to find on search engines and on the website itself is always a primary goal. I have experience in Search Engine Optimization, on-site and on-page findability.

    My most used techniques include:

    • optimizing websites and pages for external search engines: website structure and navigation, page content and HTML
    • implementing and fine-tuning tag & meta data systems for better internal search results
    • optimizing information scent
    • optimizing content structure on page level
    • optimizing content for skimming, scanning and reading
    Favorite resources: Peter Morville, Dan Thies, MOZ.com

  • Information design

    skill level advanced

    9 years of experience

    I love content. It is one of the main pillars next to user centered design in my design approach. I've always been fascinated by presenting information in an effective way to make it easier for the visitor to understand.

    I have lots of experience with:

    • data visualizations with charts
    • creating infographics briefings
    • creating image materials to simplify scientific concepts
    • selecting communicating photos
    Favorite resources: Edward Tufte

  • Content strategy

    skill level advanced

    8 years of experience

    I'm not a hero with words, far from it, but I do like to work with content, just in a different way, with content strategies. I plan what information should be communicated, how & where it should be communicated, and how we can manage that content in a CMS.

    Regular tasks:

    • analyzing interviews to make a content plan
    • mapping content on a website structure and structuring it on page level
    • linking content
    • creating copywriter briefings and content guidelines
    • mapping content on semantic models, taxonomies & metadata
    • structuring and building content management systems
    Favorite resources: Sara Wachter-Boettcher, Margot Bloomstein, Kristina Halvorson, Ann Rockley

Templating

skill level Expert

15 years of experience

Well-written HTML & CSS is crucial for a good user experience. It involves front-end performance, findability, accessibility and manageability in the CMS. My semantic HTML techniques include SEO, progressive enhancement, accessbility and rich metadata. (microformats, microdata, RDFa).

I write/use my own CSS frameworks with a transcending CSS, SMACSS and mobile first approach. I have experience with LESS & Sass but work mostly with my own Sass based language and compiler that compiles faster and outputs more efficient mobile first CSS.

  • HTML

    skill level Expert

    15 years of experience

    HTML is easy, but writing great HTML is not. I found pleasure in writing HTML when I learned about semantics and continuously improved my skills.

    • Semantic HTML

      skill level Expert

      11 years of experience

      An SEO book got me started with semantics, accessibility and progressive enhancement made me focus more on it. I start every page with just writing HTML (with CSS classes) and I will rarely change it when I write the CSS.

      Click here to see this page without CSS / with only the semantic HTML.

    • Rich metadata

      skill level Expert

      9 years of experience

      I'm using microformats since 2006, did many schema.org implementations with microdata since 2014 and switched last year to RDFa.

      Click here to see the Mio Product porfolio page in Google Structured data test tool.

    • Non semantic HTML

      skill level Expert

      15 years of experience

      I learned HTML when table layouts were still the norm. Most of the habit of writing non semantic HTML is gone. I only use it occasionally to write HTML emails.

  • CSS

    skill level Expert

    15 years of experience

    I'm an expert in transforming interfaces with CSS and I like to optimize interfaces for each responsive breakpoint. I also have in-depth understandings how the browsers interpret and render CSS.

    • Stylesheet languages

      skill level Expert

      3 years of experience

      I worked with LESS and Sass for 3 years, but I don't like how many extra media queries they render in complex stylesheets.

      We created our own Sass based language and compiler. It has some limitations vs Sass but it is much faster and intuitive to write responsive websites. Our compiler renders the same files up to 40x faster then Sass and has a much shorter and more efficient mobile first CSS output.

    • CSS Frameworks

      skill level Intermediate

      6 years of experience

      I have tried different frameworks like bootstrap and others. While they make it easy for the novice to style a website, they add styling classes to the content and connect the content with the design. I prefer making my own framework and link it to pure semantic CSS classes in a CSS compiler. I don't like most CSS frameworks, but I can work with them when required.

  • Templating methods

    skill level Expert

    11 years of experience

    The thinking and techniques behind HTML and CSS is what kept it so interesting for me over the years.

    The challenge to create code that follows all the rules, to improve it, to make it work on more devices & for more people.

    • Responsive webdesign

      skill level Expert

      6 years of experience

      I make websites a lot more responsive then the average coder and love to code challenging interfaces and transformations. My responsive webdesign work is not just limited to CSS. I also created concepts and briefings for JavaScript enhancements.

    • Progressive enhancement

      skill level Expert

      11 years of experience

      Once you realize how hard it can be to improve a conversion rate with 3%, you will understand why supporting older browsers still makes sense. All my work is fully functional without JavaScript, and I still coded modern looking but still IE6 compatible interfaces for pharma software in 2014.

    • Transcending CSS

      skill level Expert

      10 years of experience

      Not really a skill or official name, but Andy Clarke's book was for me the best foundation to bridge the gap between CSS, semantic HTML and progressive enhancement. I still code my CSS based upon his way of looking at it.

    • SMACSS

      skill level advanced

      3 years of experience

      Scalable and Modular Architecture for CSS. I don't fully follow the namespacing, but I follow the principles by heart.

    • Front-end performance

      skill level advanced

      9 years of experience

      From download speed, to perceived speed, server and client side, I've been involved in all. I incorporate this as well in my mobile first approach.

    • Accessibility

      skill level advanced

      11 years of experience

      All of my template work gets high accessibility scores. I haven't had a client in ages that required me to code to the full accessibility standards, but I've done this during my 5 first coding years and I can do it again if required.

E-marketing

skill level Intermediate

9 years of experience

  • Conversion & persuasion

    skill level advanced

    9 years of experience

    I combine UX with e-marketing techniques for landing page and website optimizations. Almost every product or service related page I've done involves knowledge of conversion optimizations and persuasion techniques.

  • Social media marketing

    skill level Intermediate

    6 years of experience

    I developed successful website strategies that involved intensive use of social media to connect with their customer base and potential customers.

  • Web analytics

    skill level Intermediate

    11 years of experience

    My interest in web analytics started with tracking and optimizing website conversions. I implement custom analytic events, create custom reports and can analyze website data to see what's really going on, and what can be improved.

Design

skill level advanced

13 years of experience

  • Web design

    skill level advanced

    13 years of experience

    I studied design before I got involved with website design. I've designed many websites, but I never considered myself to be great in 'emotional' design compared to others. I can produce professional looking websites and I can work fluently with all the tools, but it takes me more time and effort then a full-time designer. The past 7 years I just made designer briefings and followed up on them, except for this website and a few others.

  • Graphic design

    skill level Intermediate

    13 years of experience

    I used to be very good at 3D, but switched completely to web design 11 years ago. I've made brochures, flyers, video's, animations, artwork etc ... for clients, but I don't do this professionally anymore. I now use my this knowledge and skill for design briefings or for my own projects..

Work history

  1. UX designer, information architect - freelance

    - present

    Belfius, Brussels

  2. UX designer, e-strategist, templater - self-employed, freelance

    - present

    Experience Matters, Vielsalm

    I built a CMS for high-end responsive and semantic websites and worked as freelancer on bigger UX and templating projects.

    We created our own CMS "Contend" to built fully responsive and semantic websites. I also worked as freelance UX designer and/or templater on bigger projects like pharmaceutical software interface designs and a social network.

    Featured projects

    1. Janssen Pharmaceutica - Report to the community 2013

      The first project with our Contend CMS: a huge CSR report made with 2 persons in just 201 hours. That includes everything from templating, project management, optimizations, tablet scaling, programming to filling in content and choosing photos.

      A huge report made in just 216 hours
      with our brand-new CMS

      Visit the project page

    2. Meplis - Health collaboration platform

      I helped the Meplis team as a freelancer with UX consultancy on their new social network system, translated HC pro - patient interactions into modules that can easily be reused / extended, and implemented a custom template framework for easy and fast restyling.

    3. Fruit At Work website

      I started with a website strategy, translated it to a content plan and templated the new website. This project is a showcase of responsive webdesign in our Contend CMS.

      A new responsive & SEO optimized
      website that highlights the UVPs

      Visit the project page

    4. Contend CMS

      We created our own CMS based upon Information Architecture principles that has a separate content database containing all the content relations and types. From the content system you can build websites, reports, apps etc ...

      It has a structure that runs further inside the page (controlled nested templates), semantic templates (HTML5, microdata & rdfa), built-in responsive tools and grid system, template switcher and compiles its own CSS based upon what is used in the templates. We have one base installation that we regularly update and improve, and can push new functionalities and updates of modules to other installations with just a few clicks.

  3. UX designer, templater, webteam lead - freelance

    -

    Comfi, Anderlecht

    I lead and managed the development team, helped selling projects and did all the UX and templating work.

    I led and managed the development team, created productivity tools, helped selling the projects, did all the UX, wireframing, prototyping and templating.

    We started with a 2 persons and ended with a 5 person development team making huge websites. From event sites to full corporate websites and annual or CSR reports for the pharma industry, real estate companies, financial institutions, BEL 20, European & national federations, ...

    Under the Bemore brand I translated corporate storytelling into content plans and web strategies.

    Featured projects

    1. Nyrstar - Annual report 2011 & 2012

      In 2011 we transformed a huge annual report of 600 A4 pages into a annual report website in just 5 weeks. In 2012 we did the same, but this time it became the main publication and we made it tablet compatible. The PDF renders of the facts and figures were used as the required printed version, which was a big cost saving.

      A huge annual report with magazine
      styled pages made in 5 weeks

      Visit the project page

    2. FEDNOT - Notarius Magazine

      We connected a Comfi CMS implementation with an iPad app.It allowed the communication team to produce good looking interactive digital magazines for the iPad and the website, with no external help needed.

    3. Comfi CMS

      We made our own CMS, based upon IA principles. It has a flexible information architecture, makes it easy to wireframe and prototype with real content, and optimize that content in a next step with better templates and styling. The CMS makes it easy to translate fast, and other tools like a table mapper, note system, PDF render, etc ... allowed us to make huge reports with a small team in a very short time span.

  4. Web designer, UX designer, designer - self-employed

    -

    Entity webdesign, Leuven

    I created 4 years part-time websites and print work followed by 2 years as a full-time UX designer and templater.

    During my Creative Media studies and my job at Mio I made part-time websites and magazines for clients. After Mio I became full-time self-employed and focused on UX and e-marketing. I studied 25% of my time and applied the new knowledge on client projects.

    Featured projects

    1. Sip-well website

      I received a "carte blanche" from Sip-Well to apply my new knowledge about landing page optimization, e-marketing and UX design. I made a comprehensive website strategy, wireframes, a prototype, content briefings and the website design and code.

      The conversion rates of all goals showed a strong increase, with the highlight a conversion rate increase of +1800% for visitors with a search query that didn't contain Sip-Well.

      A comprehensive website strategy
      resulting in superb conversion rates

      Visit the project page

    2. Mio Technology website - design & templating

      I translated the wireframes into designs and templated the HTML and CSS with a focus on SEO, accessibility, progressive enhancement, and a full separation of content and style. The templates were documented and built for easy redesigns without changing the HTML.

      A website redesign with a focus on 
      usability, SEO & easy maintenance

      Visit the project page

  5. Web designer, templater

    -

    Mio Technology, Asse

    I redesigned and templated the Mio Website completely. Our website grew from +200.000 to +1.500.000 unique visitors per month and had many no.1 results on Google.

    I redesigned the Mio Website completely, defined and follow up on the "best practices" for HTML, CSS, SEO, accessibility, progressive enhancement, etc ... for a worldwide implementation of the Reddot CMS. SEO optimizations resulted in many number 1 results on Google for the most important keywords. Our websites grew from +200.000 to +1.500.000 unique visitors per month.

    Started as a web designer and gradually became a UX designer. It was here that my passion for user centered design started as I could see the direct impact of my work: reduced workload and better results for colleagues (support, marketing and sales). In this fast growing team I redesigned and restructured every part of the website.

    Featured projects

    1. Mio Technology website - research, wireframes & prototype

      Redesign of all the product pages, press section and "about us" section:

      • research, content strategy, information architecture, UX improvements, wireframing
      • quickly choose (and buy) the right GPS device
      • harmonization of all product pages and features, with minimal extra content costs, also for older devices
      • connecting product related content to the product pages (support, accessories and updates, quick tips and tricks, ...)
      • improve press relations (implementation of all the recommendations of the NN/g group)

      These wireframes were used later as a base for all Mio websites worldwide.

      A website redesign with a focus on 
      usability, SEO & easy maintenance

      Visit the project page

    2. Redesign Mio Support section

      Redesign of the existing support system:

      • new templates with SEO optimalisation
      • optimal usage of tagging and metadata leading to improved internal search results
      • optimalization of the search result pages
      • content design optimalization of the articles

      This led to a serious reduction of phone support and general support costs.

    3. Creation Mio Club + newsletter

      Design of a "fun" section with navigation tips and tricks, speedcam locations, map updates, coupled to a monthly newsletter. This section got +260.000 visitors each month after a year.

Education history

  1. UX, e-marketing, templating, webdesign - Self study

    - present

    I became a passionate learner since my Creative Media studies: from reading books after work hours, to several months of full-time studying. I studied UX design disciplines, e-marketing, website optimizations, semantic HTML + CSS and sector specializations. 

    I became a passionate learner since my Creative Media studies: from reading books after work hours, to several months of full-time studying.

    • UX design disciplines: usability, IA, content strategy and design, interaction and interface design, findability, ...
    • e-marketing and website optimizations: call to actions, social media, analytics, conversions and persuasions, ....
    • semantic HTML and CSS: microdata, rdfa, mobile first and responsive webdesign, template systems, SEO, performance, accessibility, ....
    • sector specializations: finance, press, investors, corporate websites, e-commerce

    1. - Ongoing: UX strategy

    2. - : Rapid prototyping techniques (HTML & JavaScript),
      performance optimizations (CSS, JavaScript, GPU), 
      Progressive Web Apps

    3. - : axure RP 8 (refresh)

      job related

    4. - : Workflow automation refresh (node.js, Gulp, ...),
      performance optimizations

      job related

    5. - : Agile user experience design,
      user story mapping

      job related

    6. - : CMS architecture, CSS compilers, 
      design patterns for social media networks.

      job related

    7. - : Content strategy, content work flows, mobile usability, 
      CSS compilers, SMACSS, microdata, RDFa.

      full-time

    8. - : HTML5, responsive CSS, website performance,
      mobile and tablet usabilty, e-marketing, UX design.

      job related

    9. - : Corporate websites, press and investor relations,
      annual reports. CSR reports,
      information design, usability, social media marketing.

      job related

    10. - : Information design, information architecture,  
      analytics, email marketing.

      job related

    11. - : UX design, interaction design, interface design, usability, 
      e-commerce, conversion and persuasion, 
      microformats, accessibility.

      full-time

    12. - : Usability, UX design, information architecture, 
      interaction design, findability..

      job related

    13. - : SEO, XML, progressive enhancement,
      web design.

      job related

    14. - : Web design, semantic HTML, SEO, CSS,
      JavaScript, PHP.

      full-time

    15. - : 3D modelling, texturing and lighting, 
      rigging, animation, particles.

      full-time

    16. - : Design techniques and software: 
      Photoshop, Illustrator, HTML, After Effects, Premiere, Cinema 4D.

      school related

  2. Creative media

    SAE Rotterdam

    -

    Webdesign, 3D, DTP, motion graphics

  3. Applied informatics

    Katholieke Hogeschool Leuven

    -

  4. Computer sciences

    Katholieke Universiteit Leuven

    -

  5. Economics-mathematics

    Heilig Hartcollege Tervuren

    -

Employability

For UX work I can be deployed in a bigger UX team or as the only UX designer for big and small projects. I have worked mostly as the middleman between the client and the design + development team. I briefed them and followed up on their results.

For templating work I prefer projects where semantics, SEO and clean code matter. Or websites that need extensive responsive optimizations. I put time and effort into optimized templates and they are shown most to advantage for high traffic websites.

I take project and time based jobs, long and short freelance assignments: Heuristic evaluations of a few hours, huge projects from a few months to years, in-house as a consultant or as part of the team.

Availability

Currently working full-time for Belfius and on some personal projects.
Only available for smaller jobs without a tight deadline. 

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