An effective web design ought to fulfill its predetermined function by revealing its specific message and at the same time engaging the visitor. Various factors such as colors, consistency, typography, simplicity, functionality and imagery all contribute to an awesome web design.
When designing your site, there are quite a lot of factors to consider which also plays an important role on how your website will be perceived. It’s good to note that a website that is well designed can aid to build trust as well as lead the web users to take action. Creating an awesome user experience includes ensuring that your website design is appropriately optimized for functionality and usability.
Below are some of the guidelines to follow that will assist you to make the right decisions for your next web project:
WEBSITE PURPOSE
For your website to serve its purpose, it needs to correspond to the needs of the visitors. Having a clear and understandable on every page of your website will assist the user to understand what you have to offer. Of what benefit is your website? Are you imparting any sort of knowledge like a ‘How to guide’? Is the website for entertainment like sports coverage or do you sell products to your visitors? There are various purposes that a website can possess but we have the significant purposes which are quite common to almost all websites and they are:
- Developing Your Reputation
- Sales and After Care
- Generating Leads
- Describing Expertise
SIMPLICITY
Simplicity is one of the best ways to go when you want to consider the usability of your website and the user experience. Below are the possible ways to achieve simplicity through web design:
Color
Color has the ability to convey messages and stimulate emotional responses. Getting to find a color palette that suits your brand identity will enable you to affect your client’s behavior towards your brand. Ensure to keep the color selection delimited to less than five colors. Complementary colors also work great. The right color combinations maximize clients’ engagement on your website and make them feel relaxed.
TYPE
Typography plays a vital role on your website. It brings about attention and also works as the visional interpretation of the brand. Typefaces should be easy to read and can only use at most three separate fonts on the site.
IMAGERY
Imagery is all visual elements used within communications. They comprise illustration, video and all forms of graphics, still photography. All imagery should be revelatory and capture the spirit of the firm as well as act as the representation of their brand identity. When we visit a website, the first information we consume there is visual and as an initial impression it is vital that pictures of high quality are utilized to form an impression of credibility and professionalism in the mind of the users.
NAVIGATION
Website navigation is a way finding process utilized on sites where users interact and try to locate what they are seeking for. Website navigation is an essential factor to retaining web users. Hamburger menu CSS is the latest trend in mobile and desktop design. If the sites navigation is incomprehensible; your website visitors might probably give up and look for what they need somewhere else. Making web navigation straightforward, consistent and intuitive on every page is vital.
F-SHAPED PATTERN READING
The F- based pattern is the most prevalent way visitors can be able to scan wordings on a website. Eye tracking studies have recently shown that a lot of what people see is in the upper and left part of the screen. The F’ shaped pattern imitates our normal style of reading in the West. A website design the right way will work with a peruser’s normal pattern of reading the page.
VISUAL HIERARCHY
Visual hierarchy is the organization of elements depending on their order of significance. This is accomplished either by color, size, contrast, imagery, typographically, whitespace, style and texture. One of the most essential responsibilities of visual hierarchy is to create a focal point; this enables visitors to know where the most key information is located.
CONTENT
Just like the popular saying “content is king”. For a website design to be effective, it has to possess both outstanding design and also a topnotch content. With the use of fascinating language, awesome content can influence and also draw the attention of visitors by converting them into possible clients.
GRID BASED LAYOUT
Grids aid to organize your web design as well as keep your contents arranged. The grid based layout also helps to coordinate different elements on the webpage and keep them in an orderly manner. The grid arranges web content into a clear rigid grid structure with sections and column that stays in an orderly manner, try to feel balanced and set result and orders in a good looking website.
LOAD TIME
Websites with a high loading time are a pain in the ass. Waiting for a site for more than 10 seconds to load will make you lose a good number of visitors. Almost all web visitors expects a website to load in five seconds or less and will probably leave the site if it fails to load within three seconds. To solve this problem, try to work on the size of the image, it will help your website load much faster than before.
MOBILE FRIENDLY
Mobile phones are gradually taking over the world. In recent times, more individuals are using their mobile phones or other similar devices to surf the net. It is very essential to consider creating your site with a mobile friendly layout so more people can be able to visit your website. If your site is not mobile friendly, all you have to do is to either redesign it with a responsive layout (this implies that your website can easily conform to various screen widths) or you can also create a dedicated mobile website (This means a website specially optimized particularly for mobile users so it can be easy for them to visit the site).
