Top 10 Web Design Tips
When it comes to web design, Alchemy Interactive – a leading London
based web design agency – offers the following top ten tips:
1. Have a strong, clear brand message
Your web site should project the image you want the world to see –
and the great news is that through web design you can control that image
entirely. In terms of physical design this means positioning your logo
or key message in the top left hand corner – the part of the screen our
eyes are most naturally drawn to.
2. Provide a clear, concise navigation method
A good web designer will ensure that they use design techniques to
lead the user around the screen and site. Clearly differentiated
sub-sections and even a site map can ensure a concise, easy to follow
navigation route, while good use of position, colour, contrast and size
can all help focus the eye. Stick to one main navigation menu, remain
consistent throughout the site, use sub-navigation and keep it
uncluttered by avoiding drop down menus.
3. Make it intuitively easy to use
Visitors can be fickle and if a site is hard or slow to navigate
they’ll be off. Ensure navigation buttons are obvious and easily
identifiable – towards the top of the page is good – and have
appropriate links directly from page to page so the user can quickly
switch when something catches their interest. Finally, adhere to the
functionalities people have come to expect. For example, if text is
underlined your user will naturally expect it to be a link.
4. Keep it consistent
Users like to know where they are within a website and if the style
of a page changes dramatically or somehow feels different visitors will
become disengaged and can start to feel lost. Maintain consistency –
and a professional image – by ensuring everything matches, from heading
sizes and typefaces to design, colour and style of image.
5. Keep it simple
The whole draw of using a website is that it should be quick and easy to use. To this end simplicity is key.
Succinct, useful information should be available at the touch of a
button. Today’s surfers won’t hang around so make sure the page is
scannable. That means not being afraid to use (read: leave in) plenty of
white space. There is a theory behind this – our eyes do not naturally
work in a linear fashion. Given the chance they’ll take in more and then
zoom in to an area of interest from the bigger picture.
6. Ensure it’s easy to understand
Visitors coming to your website typically won’t want to spend much
time so ensure that every aspect is easy to understand; from the
navigation to the copy. There are design techniques that can help make
the information on a page easier to understand – think shorter
sentences, larger font, sections differentiated by contrast and colour
and, as previously mentioned, good use of white space. To this end,
there are some common rules of thumb: never use more than three
typefaces, or more than three different point sizes for a font and keep
lines of text to 18 words - 50-80 characters – max!
7. Degrade gracefully
Not everyone has the latest pc and the fastest broadband so make
sure your code is as simple as it can be without compromising on the
elements you need. HTML code needs to degrade gracefully and not slow
down or cause problems to lower spec computers. Cause an IT issue on
your visitors pc and you can be sure that customer won’t be back
again... or be recommending your site to anyone else!
8. Write it with your target audience in mind
When writing – or commissioning - the copy for your website, do
bear in mind your target audience. Tempting as it is to use the medium
to bombard the user with all the information you can, do keep it
succinct in style and use laymen’s terms if appropriate – or include a
glossary if technical terms are unavoidable. If you are hoping to
attract visitors through search engine optimisation (SEO) you’ll need to
consider the key words people will be using in their searches. Weave
these into the copy as often as is appropriate to help propel your site
up a search engines listings.
9. Consider usability
At the end of the day if your website isn’t usable visitors will be
off – as quick as a mouse. So, when working on the web design, consider
the end user’s experience of the site.
It can be a good idea to make a list of the things a user will want
to use your site for and then checking that these are easy to achieve
and if necessary are readily available from the homepage – e.g. Start
shopping, Current offers, Book an appointment etc. Then test early and
throughout the process test and test again. The only way to really check
that your site is as user friendly as it can be is to test it out on
people who know nothing about your business.
10. Make sure it’s compliant
A good website should adhere to certain guidelines. For example,
all web sites designed by Alchemy Interactive – a London based web
design agency – comply with the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). This
ensures their sites are suitable and accessible for people with
disabilities and cover aspects of web design such as screen flickering -
line with the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA).
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