With 90% of online users being undecided about a brand before researching them online, web design has never been so important. As the face of your online brand, you have approximately 50 milliseconds to make a positive first impression. Otherwise, users may exit your page and visit another competitor.
Design, functionality and navigation are just a few of many factors in developing a user-friendly website. Everything in web design should be planned and trialled to ensure a quality service is being presented to online users. Even the smallest of coding errors can provide an exit door for those who were once promising leads.
Join us in our exploration of the importance of web design and keeping online users engaged.
Branding
Consistent branding should be implemented across all of your platforms. Your logo, slogans, dedicated fonts and colours are all what sparks the memory of your brand in customers. Therefore, helping you to build a recognisable brand for effective brand awareness and uniformity.
Branding can provide a more inviting and recognisable welcome for visitors who have found your brand elsewhere online. In addition to creating a professional and therefore trustworthy image for your business.
Design
There are two sides to great web design. First, you have everything that makes your website visually appealing, from the colour palette to layout, to fonts. This is what will initially engage online users and set the tone of your brand. For your design, you should take inspiration from your logo, to create a consistent design.
Then you have responsive web design, which makes your website compatible across all platforms and devices. This is important for providing a user-friendly experience, which could benefit your website performance.
Navigation
Think of your website as a store. Customers will be entering with a rough idea on what they are looking for and a budget in mind. They don’t want to spend hours browsing each aisle to find what they need with no customer service in sight to help.
Therefore, organising your website navigation is one of the biggest influences on online conversions. Add clear page names across your top navigation, with relevant dropdown menus and additional links in your website footer. Clear channels of communication are also important. Consider adding links to your social media or a live customer service chat in the corner of your web design.
SEO
However, making your website visually appealing isn’t enough. Having an SEO optimised website is what will get you moving higher in search results, for improved online visibility. As your first steps, consider how you can incorporate the following into your web design:
- Keyword-rich content
- Headings
- ALT tags on images
- Internal linking
- Meta descriptions and title tags
- SSL certificate
These are just baby steps into SEO but are still essential.
Content
Adding content to your website is not just about posting regularly. Quality, informative and relevant content is essential for user engagement. Repurposing your content to use across different channels is also a great tactic for encouraging user interaction all around.
For example, if you had recent success with a project, post about it. Add photos to your social media channels and shoutout your team members for their work on LinkedIn. You could even write a case study for your blog to showcase your work to website visitors. Doing this is also beneficial for SEO by providing backlinks to your website.
Upgrading Your Web Design
The requirements for a functional and engaging website have changed dramatically over recent years. With an increased demand for ease of usability, high security and responsive design, you cannot afford to lose to your competitors.
Besides offering SEO and content marketing services, we also deliver comprehensive web design services to small businesses in Birmingham and all over the UK. To find out more, call SEO it Right on 0121 308 0219.
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