Three Tips to Website Design
It’s the year 2020, and we all know in this digital age that it is essential for every business to have a website, regardless of the products or services they offer. We also know that web design isn’t effortless. It takes a ton of practice, and even experts slip up sometimes. Here are some essential features to consider when designing your website to avoid making mistakes:
1. Don’t Pick Just Any Theme
When designing a website, there are many essential features to include in your design. Without these essential features, your user ability will lack, and users will be less likely to enjoy visiting your site. It’s essential to have a mobile-friendly website or a site that provides an excellent mobile experience. These days we have many resources available to us, wordpress.com and wordpress.org both offer many free website templates that are designed to be mobile-friendly. You can also download other website templates from outside sources such as themeforest.net or Envatomarket.com. Both of these sites provide many template options that vary in price but include details on features they have and make the website design process much more manageable than starting from scratch. Make sure to do an ample amount of research on themes before picking one. You need to ensure that the theme will work the way you need it to. Will it be responsive to the plugins you need? Was the theme built within the last year? Read the comments and reviews, are they generally good or bad?
2. Design with Speed in Mind
The website theme leads me to my next tip, loading speed. Build your website with loading speed as your main priority. A slow loading speed will cause visitors to leave your site without getting what they came for. In one of my blog posts from a few weeks ago, “Three ways Google’s Mobile-First Indexing Impacts Mobile SEO,” we talked about how the website speed affects the way Google index’s your website. If you haven’t done so already, check it out here to find out why your loading speed is so important. As you design your website, you can check your loading speed periodically using Google’s PageSpeed Insight Tool. After obtaining your results, you can optimize your site until it reaches your loading speed goals.
3. Perfect Your Header
You only get one chance to make a first impression. So, make sure your header, which is located at the very top of your website, is user-friendly, engaging, easy to read, and recognizable. By recognizable, I mean that the user is able to recognize your brand. Make sure your logo is present, the verbiage Is visible, your phone number is there, and your conversion tactic is obvious. Navigation is the most essential part of your website. If it is not easy to navigate and user friendly, users will leave your site, and we definitely don’t want that! Does your site require a login section? Include it here. Does your website have a shopping cart? Include it here. Does your site require a search feature? Include it here. Most importantly, make sure it is visible at all times; otherwise, users will stray away because it’s not easily navigable or user-friendly. Navigation is the most important part of your website layout and design; users want it to be clear and easy. Prior to designing all of your pages, focus on your header to ensure that your website will flow properly.
The design and layout of your website are the most important part of building your website. So, don’t jump into committing to just any theme; take your time to ensure it will meet your needs. Otherwise, functionality, user ability, navigation, and other factors will lack the features they need to give you the successful website you desire. If you would like to learn more about building a website, or are interested in developing a successful website with a responsive design, contact us for a consultation. We would be more than happy to take this task off your hands.
