By PINO Studio
These days, if you want to grow a business and remain competitive, one of the essential things that set your brand apart from a crowded digital space is having an efficient and engaging website. Having one has been proven to bring benefits to your business: it builds your company credibility, solidifies your brand, positively impacts your sales, and increases your customer base. With the pandemic steering most, if not all, brand engagements into easily accessible online platforms, you definitely donโt want to miss out on the party. With that said, hereโs a round-up of key elements that turn good websites into great ones.
1. Show them who you are.
Stay consistently on-brand throughout your website design. Before getting your website off the ground, consider that you have all the following elements of your brand established: logo, typography, color palette, illustrations, and other visual cues.
When you have these elements together, make sure that every website page reflects your unique visual identity as a brand. The more clear and consistent your branding is, the more visually appealing and memorable your website will be.
2. Know who youโre talking to.
Your website design should align with your target audiencesโ needs! The first step is to determine who those people are and why they are coming to your website. The simpler you can make the journey, the better the user experience you create.
For example, if youโre crafting a website that promotes skincare products to both men and women of all ages and skin types, they would have unique backgrounds and pain points as consumers who purchase online. A 20-year-old will most likely have a different user journey than a 40-year-old will. The former is more tech-savvy, while the latter might struggle when made to navigate a less straightforward and experimental design. Both will appreciate a more personalized and curated experience on the website.
3. Itโs best to overshare, intentionally.
If youโre a small business, one of your top priorities should be providing as much information about your business and the value you offer to your customers from the get-go. Though, keep in mind: donโt bombard your audience with all the essential information right away. Instead, think about creating a content hierarchy where you have a strategic arrangement of information on a given page.
You can do this by emphasizing the most important content by placing it at the top of the page and the lesser ones towards the bottom. Another strategy is by using font size, spacing, bold, italics, and color to highlight important information on the page.
On the other hand, invest in high-quality website copy that is unique to your company and products so you get to showcase your brandโs personality and allow a richer level of engagement with your audience. Try to think about it from your customerโs point of view. What information would be helpful to them and what would they need to be explained in more detail? Thinking of your content through that lens will help customers become more engaged in your website for longer and will more likely create a long-term relationship with them that results in a sale.
4. Elevate your product imagery.
When it comes to product photos, make sure they give your customers a sense of texture, size, scale, detail, context, and brand personality because this is where they make their immediate value judgment about your products. With clear, crisp, and creative product imagery, you are able to build your credibility and create a good first impression.
Etsy, a global marketplace for unique and creative goods, found that the quality of images was the most important factor in an online sale for 90% of its users! In other words, whether you sell on Etsy or your own website, investing in great product photography is critical to your brandโs success. The converse is also true: a bad photo could discourage your customers from making a purchase, no matter how great your product is.
5. Make sure itโs seamless.
Make your website easy to navigate so your customers canโt help but add items to their carts and check out! Some sections that help with usability are the navigation menu, headings and labels, a search bar, and call-to-action buttons.
Experts advise keeping the top-level navigation menu to five clearly labeled tabs, with related pages organized under them. You should also offer a clear way to return to the homepage no matter where your readers land, with every page containing at least one call-to-action.
6. Last but not least, be mobile-friendly.
According to a Perficient study, more than half of all digital traffic originates from mobile devices and mobile apps. Websites optimized for mobile devices are straightforward to browse and visually appealing overall. Consumers gravitate toward whatโs convenient, so having an efficient mobile website provides your customers with multiple avenues to make that purchase!
It can be a lot to consider especially if youโre a small business owner with back-end work to juggle. But ultimately, the value of great web design comes from having more insight into customer behavior and the factors that influence them to support your brand. This valuable knowledge is what sets your business up for more growth and success in the long run.
Got more questions and concerns about everything and anything web design? Send us your thoughts at hello@pino.ph!
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