How to Improve the Quality of Your Website Design

If your business has no problem driving traffic to your website, your customers deserve a well-done, easy-to-navigate user interface design. The design of your website can influence the behavior of your visitors. Stanford’s Persuasion Technology Lab found that 46% of people believe website design determines credibility. That’s almost 1 in 2 people who visit your site. If your website doesn’t seem credible, your customers may look to your competitors to fulfill their needs.

Why Does Your Web Design Matter?

It’s the first impression.

It is likely that your website will be the first time a potential customer sees your brand and it only takes half a second for your web visitors to decide if they want to stay or leave. A great web design reveals a brand’s confidence. Having consistent colors, shapes and imagery determines whether its user interface is well thought out. A strong design will give off the impression that you care about your customers, you’re high-quality and you can be trusted.

It builds trust.

Poor design that may lead to mistrust can include flashing content, low-quality images, messy navigation and an outdated design. We’ve all seen it before, you click on a website and the background is all black with neon text. Or the websites where videos just pop up out of nowhere. Features like these are almost guaranteed to turn away site visitors instantly.

Make your website an inviting experience. We live in a world where even the people who don’t know anything about web design know which websites feels safe and which don’t.

It differentiates your brand from the competition.

When your website has a consistent and branded design, you stand a chance against your competition. Let’s say you owned a law firm and you wanted to bring more people to your website to gain clients. If your firm’s website has credible information, testimonials, appropriate colors, consistent fonts, representative graphics, etc., you have a higher chance of gaining more customers than a law firm whose website lacks these features. Differentiate yourself by having your own brand elements shown. Consistency in your brand and brand elements helps build your reputation and establishes a brand personality.

The Pampers website does a great job with differentiating itself with its competitors. It has a consistent font and blue color scheme that’s seen on their merchandise. If Pampers had decided it wanted its website to be purple instead because it looks more royal, this would be a bad idea. Luvs, their competitors, use the brand colors purple and green. This may confuse visitors when they visit the Pampers website. Own up to your brand and embrace your brand elements.

Here are a few basics of great website design:

It functions well on mobile. With over 200 million Americans with smartphones, it’s crucial to have a fully functioning website that’s responsive on both desktops and on mobile devices. If your website isn’t user-friendly on a mobile screen, your viewers will leave.

It has a solid navigation. Make it simple. Your website visitors need to be able to get around your site without confusion and your navigation can do this for them. Make buttons descriptive and easy to follow.

It’s high-speed. No one wants to wait for a website to load. Americans are on-the-go and that includes their search habits. According to Google, 53% of mobile users leave a website if it takes more than three seconds to load.

It’s consistent with brand elements. We know Nike because of their check mark symbol like we know Target for its red bullseye. These consistent elements, from fonts to imagery, are part of a brand and it should stay consistent within a website. When visitors come to your website, you want them to know they’re in the right place because it has the same elements of your brand in the real world.

It draws the visitor’s attention. This is where you can use your design to make a roadmap for your visitors. You want to have the right amount of copy and visuals to guide your audience through your website. Tell your customers what you want them to look at first. Make a visual hierarchy for your audience to follow and make it clear.

It has CTAs. Your call-to-action is one of the most important details of your website, thus making it prominent in your design is crucial for your visitors to click it. There are a number of ways to make your CTA stand out. One way is by using white space around your CTA, like Amazon. They have all this white space on their pages and the only color that really stands out is their yellow “Add to Cart” and orange “Buy Now” buttons, both CTAs.

Image Credit: Amazon

Are you ready to upgrade your website design? Appleton is an award-winning, full-service advertising agency that specializes in Orlando web design services. Appleton works with local, national and international clients to deliver powerful, responsive websites that are specifically designed to be seen first in search engines. Reach your target customers in the right places and establish highly-qualified leads with a dynamic and accessible website. Your web design and development goals are worth a conversation: contact us at 407-246-0092 or info@appletoncreative.com.