Anyone who’s looking to build a successful business cannot afford to overlook the importance of creating a good impression with a good quality “front door,” which is the website. People searching for products or services online usually look for the most promising offering, and make their decision based on what they see. If a business’ website is appealing enough, the business is most likely going to have many prospects knocking, after forming positive opinions about it.
So, what does a good website look like? How should one make it stand out? Here’s how:
Let the design have a visual hierarchy
It is important to display content clearly and effectively on a website through a proper use of visual hierarchy. This is because it guides the visitors to particular page elements in a structured way; in order of priority, beginning with the most important pieces.
Any wise business person would emphasize top visual assets like the logo and business name by making them bigger and more prominent.
Secondly, they would incorporate the perfect website layout to guide the prospects’ eyes accordingly, for instance, towards “more information.” A good example here would be a call-to-action button strategically located in the middle of the screen.
A good hierarchy for the business’ information helps prospects follow the breadcrumbs left for them unconsciously, especially if the data is well designed with color, proper spacing, accentuation elements and so forth. If you’re unsure about how to go about this, seek website design services.
Ensure the website content is simple to read
The more readable a site is, the more likely it is to attract users. Some of the rules a good business person can follow to achieve high readability include the following:
• Incorporating contrast. When there is enough contrast between the background color and text color, the text becomes more readable, and the website appears more accessible.
• Using large letters. There are more people struggling with smaller fonts than you can imagine, but fonts that are too large would be just as bad. A good rule of thumb is ensuring the body text remains at least 16pt. The number however depends on the kind of fonts being used for the website
• Using text themes. The website content has to have varied in terms of weight and size, ranging from larger titles, smaller subtitles to smaller body texts. This makes the website attractive and easier to scan.
Use the right images
Images are always a great idea when it comes to catching the attention of people, sending a message and giving them a good impression of a website within the shortest time possible. However, it is always unwise to plague a website with stock images, because they make the company appear less genuine. People like connecting with other people on the website just like in real life, so it’s important to offer them the closest thing to genuine, real life interaction. This is the reason why experts always recommend the use of real images that represent real people working at the company being represented by the website. Among other things, it evokes trust, which is critical to the success of any business. If it’s extremely necessary, real photographs can be combined with few, relevant and professional images portraying the brand, and products or services.
Make it fast
According to research, speed influences the most important elements of a website, including bounce rate, customer satisfaction and conversions. No one wants to hang around a slow website, no matter how promising it looks. It’s also important to consider that search engines use loading speed as one important factor while determining page rankings.
Make the website is simple to navigate
There are many ways to make a website stand out in terms of navigation. One of them is incorporating the scrolling feature to save your prospects the trouble of clicking endlessly on the website.
If a smart business owner wants to make their website neat, compressing information into accordions or sliders is not always the answer. Having all the information that is required in one long page always works, even if it includes all the information that gets hidden. This simple tip has been proven to increase conversions by 30 percent, perhaps because internet users generally prefer scrolling to clicking when scanning information.
Secondly, it is imperative to ensure the prospect can easily find anything they’re searching for by:
• Linking the logo to the homepage. This one alone saves the average visitor many precious clicks.
• Optimizing the footer. When a user scrolls through a page, one of the last things they see on the site is the footer, so it is a great idea to have all important links there. You can have your contact details there along with all the social media icons and a summary of your menu.
Optimize the website for mobile
It is well known that about 80 percent of internet users already own a smartphone, and about 61 percent of them are very unlikely to go back to a mobile site if they experienced problems using it. This is a huge demographic that cannot be ignored, and the best way to tap it is tailoring a website to meet the needs of regular, impatient internet users. If there are certain things users would make them want to access the site on their mobile phones, the business has to consider them while developing the site’s mobile version.
Ultimately, the business owner should have a big YES to the following questions:
• Can someone find what they’re looking for in seconds on my site via mobile?
• Does my website’s experience allow the average user to do anything on the site easily?
There are definitely many other ways of making your business website stand out, but these are by far the most important ones. Take your time to examine them, and implement them as necessary- even if it means seeking website design services to ensure your website is as efficient as possible.