Web designing is more than just aesthetics. A website should seek to accomplish something meaningful such as lead generation, brand awareness and so on and so forth. Thus, that you should be less concerned with how it looks and more with what it can do for you.
There are a billion websites all over the world. The trick is to make yours stand out. How do you achieve that? By working on the site’s usability (the ease of access) and user experience (how fun it is to interact with your site). So what are those guidelines? Read below to find out.
Simplicity
While visitors get attracted with overall appeal of the website but their intent is to complete an action when they visit your site or are on the lookout for a particular piece of information. An addition of any unnecessary design elements that serves no functional value will bring nothing.
For improving usability and UX, do not delve into experimenting with a lot of colors. Stick to some. Typefaces must be clear to read and again, the colors should not be many. Use a maximum of three different typefaces, not more than that. Graphics should only be added so they enable the user to complete a certain action. Avoid not for nothing graphics.
Visual Hierarchy
By visual hierarchy, it simply means that the certain arrangements on your website are such that they automatically take the visitor to the important bits first. In order to improve usability and UX, the hierarchy must appear as something which is both natural and fun for the user.
You can play around with position, color, and size of the elements therein so that the structure lures the user into exploring or clicking the most crucial bits on your website first. Example of Spotify is a classic one in this case. The “Get Spotify Free” CTA sits above the visual hierarchy.
Consistency
Consistency in life is important, let alone a website. With a consistent website, the overall look and feel of your website do not change when the visitor views different pages on your site. This includes all your backgrounds, color patterns, typefaces etc. Consistency yields a positive impact on usability and UX of your site.
The above does not mean that there shouldn’t be separate layouts for different pages of your website. Although they should be different, but the layouts should be employed consistently so as to not confuse the visitor and he finds it convenient seeking the information on any given page.
Conventionality
Web design has been subject to certain conventions over time such as the main navigation is usually found at the top or left side of the page and that upon clicking the logo of your business brings the visitor back to the website’s homepage and the likes thereof.
I am all for uniqueness, but controlled uniqueness is often helpful. You can throw out all the conventions that have taken root out of the window. Rather use the conventionality to your advantage by making navigation easier for your visitors.
Author Bio:
John Dixon is a digital marketer by profession and works in a leading web development company UAE. He loves to write on topics such as web design, content marketing etc. Follow him for updates via his Twitter handle.