How to Design the Perfect Website
The perfect website can improve your brand recognition and brand loyalty, increase sales revenue, and attract customer feedback for better products. However, it is extremely important to find a balance between every element and create a perfect website that both the site owner and the user like. This can be achieved by checking whether your idea has all of the necessary characteristics of a good website, and implementing it just as meticulously.
The easiest way to start designing the perfect website is to find a match between user and designer expectations. Spend a long meeting asking questions about the site’s requirements and your budget. Pay particular attention to the preferred colors, desired functionality, site content, estimated traffic and possible future upgrades. After that, go online and research competitor websites, to find out what the dominant techniques of the industry are, and whether these are the best possible for your site. Users usually complain in the forums if they consider something unpleasant or too difficult to use, so pay special attention to forum comments. Finally, prepare a report on where there are differences between your idea and the common industry practices, and think of ways to improve on every single point. Sometimes related industries offer better suggestions.
Here is what your report should include:
– Appearance
The first thing the user sees is the website layout, so the overall theme should reflect your type of business. For example, nature-related companies opt for green and blue, as these colors reflect purity and calmness. As a general rule, images and backgrounds are a strict NOas these distract or are simply unpleasant to look at1. Perfect websites make good use of white as a natural continuation of their color theme. The layout should be intuitive so that users quickly get accustomed to your site and know where to look for a specific function. Drop-down menus are a fantastic addition as these save a lot of space. The home page should be streamlined and fitted with beautiful visuals as well as spaced links for the best first impression. Embedded videos and animations can quickly present your business, but be aware that these slow down the loading process.
– Functionality
Functions can quickly gobble up your budget, so removing unnecessary ones can really save money. It is vital to know what users expect of the website, and they are provided with it. Keep in mind that there is no best package for every website. For example, web stores are not appropriate for locally based merchants where it is more convenient to simply go and purchase the item. Nevertheless, most businesses benefit from a newsletter sign-up form, as this lets them keep in touch with previous and potential customers.
– Content
Users will mainly visit your page to access fantastic content, so you must meet their expectations2. Content can be in the form of informative and innovative articles, descriptive infographics, engaging videos, animations, charts, graphs, raw data, etc. Whatever the medium, these must be prepared with the customer in mind, as in, they must use niche-specific keywords, they must offer new or controversial ideas, and they should be credible. If you present your products, services and site as flawless, and subjectively rate your competitors, customers will not trust your advice and abandon your website.
– Customer feedback
Effective Internet branding is about two-way communication between companies and customers. Therefore, a contact form or question and answer forum is vital to a successful online business as this allows clients to openly ask questions, look at others’ solutions and propose improvements to the products. Not only will this function increase customer satisfaction, but it will also give you access to specific advice and recommendations.
References: