Building and designing a website isn’t as easy as throwing some information on a template you found online and hoping for the best.
There is much more to it than that.
Well, you can take that approach but it is unlikely to have much success.
When designing a new site or redesigning an existing site, there are many things you need to take into consideration. We have 5 tips that you should keep in mind for your web design efforts.
No-one wants to go onto a website and have to read through a huge amount of text to find the info they want.
Away back in 1997 it was found that 79% of users don’t read webpages, they scan them. Do you know what? This still holds true today! Even over 20 years later internet users don’t want massive blocks of detailed information, they want what they need to know in bitesize chunks right there in front of them.
Less is often more and this is especially true in the web design world.
A simple approach to web design will keep your visitors happy and ensure that they can find the information they need right away. It also removes any clutter and even though our technological capabilities have improved massively since the internet became a ‘thing’, that doesn’t mean you need to cram many weird and wonderful design elements into one page.
Following on from the point above, too many aspects that are implemented into a website design means that it can be very distracting to the visitor.
If a user is on a page about what you can offer them whether it is a service or a product don’t divert their attention by having pop ups or large elements advertising your social media accounts or your blog. Yes, these are important to showcase to get more followers and more readers however their focus should be on that page and any relevant information that you link to on your site.
Web design isn’t just about making your site look pretty and attractive to visitors – it needs to be found as well.
Your site should be SEO friendly with all the different elements that this encompasses from keywords, meta descriptions, URLS and a mobile friendly design. This doesn’t come separate to your design because other parts of SEO such as page speed, usability and navigation all fall under the same banner so the two go hand in hand.
Finally, designing a new site or revamping an old one is all about planning.
Rome wasn’t built in a day and a website won’t be either. Find out some important points that you want from the process. What do you want the end goal to be? What do your visitors want? Have you asked them? How can you make your web design fit in with your overall communication and digital strategy?
These are all things you need to ask first. Don’t assume what people want – ask and then give them what works for them and this will ultimately lead to what works for your site.