Today, having a website is of the utmost importance for individuals and businesses alike. If you want to operate in the online world, you need to have a website. But not just any website will do.
As a matter of fact, your website needs to be well-designed, properly optimized and highly functional in order for it to stand out from the crowd.
That being said, if someone wants to check out Bundesliga picks on your website, for example, they expect an intuitive design, efficient navigation and seamless browsing experience, among other things, of course. In other words, your website should provide a good user experience, and its content should answer what your users are looking for.
If your website isn’t able to deliver on visitors’ needs or expectations, those visitors will most likely bounce and search for another site that will meet their needs.
Therefore, if you want organic traffic and leads that are more likely to convert, then you need to make your website design a top priority. With that in mind, here are a few essential elements of a great website design.
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Mobile-friendliness And Responsiveness
Nowadays, there are a lot more mobile users than desktop users. That said, if your website isn’t mobile-friendly, you will not only lose a lot of traffic, but you’ll also lose online visibility as search engines like Google tend to penalize websites that aren’t mobile-friendly.
Even if you’re not interested in SEO (Search Engine Optimization) at the moment, you can still lose rankings and visibility due to the lack of mobile-friendliness.
Therefore, the simplest solution to this issue is to implement a responsive web design right from the start. In other words, a responsive design is like any other website design you may create.
The only difference is that a responsive design enables content on your website to adjust and adapt itself to any device and any screen size, thus making your website mobile-friendly.
This is undoubtedly a much more efficient and cost-effective approach than maintaining two versions of your website for both mobile and desktop users.
Website Speed And Page Loading Time
Most people think that website speed and page loading time are functionality aspects that have nothing to do with website design.
That’s, in fact, quite wrong because all of the flashy design elements you implement to impress website visitors need to load properly, and they take a lot of resources to do so.
The more complex web design is, i.e., many high-quality images, visuals, videos etc., the more time it takes to render everything and display it to the users.
That being said, you can have flashy stuff on your website and still manage to optimize overall speed and page loading time. Here are a few ways you can do that.
- Optimize and properly format images and other visuals.
- Minify the code.
- Use CDN (Content Delivery Network)
- Leverage browser caching.
- Minimize HTTP requests.
- Get rid of unnecessary plug-ins (for WordPress-powered websites)
- Use custom code for extensions.
Unique Visuals
The most crucial aspect of every website design is its visual representation. That includes website layout, overall design of web pages, color scheme, images and so on.
Your website must be visually appealing and stylish so that it can impress website visitors and encourage them to explore further.
If your website visuals are too flashy and overwhelming, as well as distasteful, your website visitors will most certainly bounce as soon s they land on your pages.
Therefore, too little or too many visuals are equally bad when it comes to website design, so find the right balance and keep in mind that your target audience has preferences of their own.
If you don’t meet their expectations when it comes to visuals, they won’t like your website, no matter how well-designed it may be.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
When it comes to website visibility, performance and functionality, SEO can be of great assistance. This marketing strategy can benefit your website design in more ways than one.
Needless to say, search engines like Google take numerous factors into consideration when ranking websites on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages).
These factors usually revolve around a website’s performance, speed, user and mobile-friendliness and so on.
So by optimizing your website for search engines, you’re basically improving your website’s performance and polishing design elements that may negatively affect your website speed, navigation, UI and so on. That’s just one aspect of SEO that matters. Here’s an example.
- Technical SEO – This SEO tactic helps you identify functionality issues that may negatively impact your rankings, such as slow page loading time, error pages, navigation issues, redirects, duplicate content and so on.
- On-page SEO – On-page audits help you optimize your website and individual pages for search engines. In other words, you help search engines understand both the content and the context of your pages so that they can index everything and match it with user intent accordingly.
That includes optimizing images, using keywords, optimizing title tags, URLs and meta descriptions, to name a few.
The Devil Is In The Detail
Paying attention to details is important for creating a great website design. Even small things like typography and white space can make a big difference when creating a unique website design.
More often than not, even small details like the tone of voice you use to write messages or content may significantly impact user experience. Therefore, make sure you pay attention to details as much as you can when crafting your website design.
Whatever you do, make sure you’re consistent with the visuals and details on your website. This is especially true if you have or you’re in the process of developing a brand.
Your users will notice any inconsistencies in website design. The same goes for website navigation, quality and quantity of content and overall user-friendliness. The more seamless and visually appealing the browsing experience is for users, the happier they become.
A great website design is more than just visuals. It’s about functionality, speed and great performance because all of these factors combined create a truly exceptional browsing experience.
And when it comes to browsing experience, consumer expectations, demands and needs are constantly growing. That’s why it’s of vital importance to have a great website design.
