Your search for the best guide to best practices in website design is over. You’re in the right place if you want to learn more about website design, especially the best ways to make a good website. Here is a list of the best ways of website design, all of which will improve the user experience.
15 Best Practices for Website Design.
1. An Ease of Use and Navigation Website.
When it comes to best practices for website design, there is no way to stress enough how important website navigation is. You want people who visit your site to find it interesting, right?
The best way to do this is to reduce the number of decisions (clicks) users have to make to get where they want to go on the website. But you should think about how the links on your website look.
How to Act?
The menu and the navigation bar shouldn’t be hard to understand. People might not come to your business if it has too many options on the menu (more on decision fatigue later).
Every page should have a search bar and breadcrumbs for easy navigation. Because of this, the user only needs to click once to go back to any landing page they have already seen.
2. Call to Action That Is Clear and Direct (CTA).
One of the best things you can do when website design is to draw attention to your “call to action” sections because it works so well. Ideally, you want your website visitors to take action after they’ve visited. No matter if you’re a business, a brand, or a creative professional with a portfolio site.
How to act?
First and foremost, your calls to action should be easy to see in your website design as a whole. The text on the banner or button that tells them to do something should be more visually appealing and written in bigger letters to get people to click or read. Consider where you place your CTAs on your website.
• Is the button/banner on your page high enough?
• Is the button or banner grouped with the offer it goes with?
• How powerful A/B testing can be
• A/B testing is also an excellent way to check how well your CTAs work.
When you’re ready to send an email, you just need to split your email list in half and tell people to go to pages A and B. Allow yourself some time to see what happens.
You could make two landing pages for your email marketing campaign that was the same except where you place the “call to action (CTA)” button. You might be surprised by the difference between the overall engagement and conversion rates.
3. Trying to Keep Things the Same.
The best web designers don’t have to reinvent the wheel when it comes to web design standards. Most of the time, it is in your best interest to make sure that people understand how your website works. That’s because most visitors have grown used to certain rules of website design, and if you change them, your users will be confused.
How to act?
For example, it’s probably not in your best interest or that of your brand to add a brand-new navigation system to your website design because users might find it confusing and leave.
Most people won’t be able to figure out how to use your website well, so they’ll probably just close the tab and go somewhere else. So, you shouldn’t feel bad about using the standard navigation bars, hamburger menus, and social media icons.
4. SEO Optimization and Putting It First.
The term “SEO” in the business world stands for “Search Engine Optimization.” The process of changing your website’s content so that it gives the best possible answer to a search query that someone types into Google or another search engine.
You are currently working on your website, which will get free traffic from search engines if it has good content. It is a cost-free way to get more people to visit your website.
How to Act?
Pay attention to both on-page and off-page search engine optimization techniques if you want your website to be the best friend of search engines. Check that each of your pages answers a different search query as your top priority.
If you do this, search engines will be more likely to display your Website Design in results for relevant searches. This will put your site at the top of the search results. So, if you don’t already have a blog on your website, add one and start writing.
Don’t forget to format the content of your blog posts correctly by using the right heading styles and keywords during your website design. Make sure your images have alternative text and seek out inbound links (called backlinking in the world of SEO).
5. Leaving Blank Space.
When you first start learning about Website Design, best practices, and general design theory, it’s natural to want to try everything at once. But don’t get too excited—white space isn’t always a sign that you’re not meeting the standard for good Website Design.
How to Act?
First, using white space on your pages makes your calls to action stand out, making it more likely that people will do what you want them to do. When a company doesn’t keep adding more and more information to its web pages, the most important information stands out more.
Also, white space makes it easier for people to figure out what a website is all about. If you choose a simpler look for your website, it will load faster, which is a plus.
6. Page Loads Quickly.
When it comes to the best way for website design, you can’t say enough about how fast it needs to be. Both your visitors and search engines will become frustrated with your page if it takes too long to load.
And I’m not just talking about desktops. Even on mobile devices, your website should load quickly. In fact, Google has shown the industry that speed isn’t the only factor that needs to be taken into account by setting new standards.
Based on these numbers, it is clear as day that having a loading time of fewer than three seconds is by far the best way to keep people on your website and web pages.
How to Act?
But how do you make your website faster?
You can do some of the following:
• The pictures on your website are the best they can be.
• Maintain vigilance for broken links on your website.
• Make sure that every page you make has a responsive design.
Checking out the different web hosting companies to see what speed guarantees they offer is always a good idea. Even if the price of hosting for a whole year seems reasonable, you should still be on the lookout for warning signs.
If your hosting company only provides in one country, it’s possible that your site will take longer to load. This is because it will take longer for your browser to talk to the servers that hold your website.
7. Images.
Putting pictures of your products and other kinds of pictures on your website is an important part of making it. Many businesses and brands take advantage of the adage “a picture is worth a thousand words” by including visual content on their websites and social media pages.
Even if you don’t have an online store or aren’t a freelance photographer with a website portfolio, you probably will still have some kind of visual content on your site. Use images that show how your product is meant to be used to make sure the website design fits with your brand and business.
Or, if you’re offering a service or showcasing your abilities, photos that convey the nature of your business would be ideal.
How to Act?
Make sure to use high-quality photos that show the faces of the people in as much detail as possible. You should also optimize each of your images for search engine optimization (SEO).
This means that you should reduce the file sizes of your images so that they load faster. Also, make sure you don’t forget the alt text, which is extremely important. If your image doesn’t load for some reason, the alternative text will be shown instead. It should say what is going on in the picture.
8. Responsive Design.
Ensure that your site looks amazing on mobile devices and gives users the best experience you can. Most people who use the internet do so on mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. If your website is not optimized for devices with smaller screens, you could lose up to half of the traffic you could get.
People leave a website if the homepage takes more than three to five seconds to load. Because of this, you should use website elements that change size depending on how big the screen is. This will make sure that your site looks good no matter what device is being used.
How to Act?
Using a website builder can help you avoid common pitfalls in responsive web design if you’re new to the field of web design. Choose a builder that is up-to-date on all the best practices for website design.
In this way, you can avoid the constant stress of trying to meet the ever-shifting expectations for website design. There is probably no simpler way to guarantee that your site displays properly across all mobile browsers.
9. Consistent Branding Based on Stories.
When it comes to digital marketing, the websites that do the best are the ones that have a clear brand and a clean look. One important part of building a brand is telling the story of how your company came to be.
So, before you start making your website, you should think about what kind of story your brand is trying to tell. This means that all of your website’s pages should have the same design, making it clear what your business is all about.
How to Act?
Spend time brainstorming about what kind of brand you want to build, your company’s most important values, and its mission. Use these numbers to create a website logo and color scheme.
You need to make sure that the header, footer, and other parts of your page that appear more than once all say the same thing about your company and stay the same.
The menu bar is part of this. When making your website, you should think about the people you want to visit. At every step of the design process, your website should be made with the end user in mind. If you’re an eco-conscious person who wants to do their part to preserve the planet, a website with a flashy red logo may seem at odds with your values.
10. Don’t Offer Too Many Options.
When a consumer visits a site, they should be able to choose from a number of different things, like a number of different prices or a number of different products you sell. But don’t overdo it.
Have you ever visited the grocery shop and seen a child throwing a fit because there were too many candy options for them to choose from? According to Hick’s Law, a person is more likely to get “analysis paralysis” when they have too many choices. When there are too many choices, it takes more time to decide what to do.
How to Act?
In the world of e-commerce, this could mean that if there are too many products or deals to choose from, it will take site visitors longer to decide what they want. The longer they think about whether or not they need an extra pair of shoes, the more likely it is that they will have to talk to their partner, their sister, or their father about it.
Get ready for shopping carts to be left behind and the number of customers who buy to go down. Keeping things basic is a good rule of thumb for website design and one of the most important in digital marketing.
11. The Rule of Thirds can be a valuable tool for you.
This is probably one of the website design world’s worst-kept secrets. Using horizontal and vertical lines, the rule of thirds divides a picture or web page into nine equal sections.
When someone looks at the picture or visits the website, their eyes will immediately go to the point where these lines meet. Make sure that you follow the “golden rule of thirds” on both your website and your landing pages.
Why? This is a good way to get people’s attention because you can put the most important information on a web page where people already have their eyes drawn.
How to Act?
The easiest way to make sure that you follow the rule of thirds when designing a website is to use a grid. If this is important to you, keep reading. The best website builders have a grid editor that lets you put your content exactly where it needs to be without changing how the rest of the page looks.
Using this method, you can find where the different parts of a page meet after dividing it into nine equal parts. In this section, you have to write down the most important information. Then, look at the things that are already on your page. Where should you direct most of the user’s attention? It could be a button that tells people what to do, a form, or even just your company’s logo.
12. Put Special Touches On the End.
The most successful and long-lasting website designs often have that certain something. Even though you should try to keep your website’s overall design simple and easy to use, it’s a great idea to add a few small design elements and details to your website’s content.
Adding basic animations to load screens and user actions is an easy and quick way to accomplish this (think mouse clicks and animated buttons, to name a few). After all, you need your website to stand out and want everyone to remember it.
How to Act?
Think about how you can use different design elements and the kind of people you want to reach. When engineers confirm their email subscription, it’s likely they won’t care if a dancing unicorn shows up on the screen at some point. On the other hand, if you sell paper products or clothes for kids, you might do very well.
Also, not all unique parts have to be complicated animations that require the help of web designers. Changing the icons on your website and choosing a font that fits with your brand can give your pages a new look with very little extra work or cost.
Changing how you write your website can also greatly affect how customers think of your brand. Try to identify new and exciting ways to say phrases that most people use. Even if your 404 error page isn’t the most interesting page a visitor could land on, it doesn’t have to sound the same as every other 404 page.
13. Having Things in Common Helps You.
We, humans, are pretty simple, and we like it when things are the same or have the same shape. In fact, we tend to put similar things together so we can understand the world better.
And using a digital marketing company to design your website is definitely in your best interest by using similar colors and shapes for call-to-action and contact buttons. For example, you make it easy for the user to make connections between certain design elements on your site.
How to Act?
Start this website design practice off right by doing a quick design audit. Make a list of all the different parts of your website, along with their current shape, size, and color.
The next step is that you should start putting parts together that go well with each other. You could make all of your campaign buttons and sections the same color, or you could use circles of different sizes to frame your content. Either of these options is possible.
The next step is to find various alternatives about similar things that you can put on each page. You can link to a specific page, like a “landing page,” if you have one meant to get consumers to sign up for your newsletter. You might want to use the same set of colors for the copy section as you do for the email form.
14. Don’t Be Afraid of Landing Pages That Are Made Just for You.
Landing pages are arguably the most crucial component of any well-designed website, so be sure to pay close attention to this section. When making your landing pages, you should take the time to make separate pages for paid traffic and organic traffic.
Most of these problems you can fix with SEO. You need to use the right keywords if you want search engines to send people to your site for free. Make sure that your site’s content and the list of backlinks it has are both optimized.
If someone is looking for the “best car washing service in Chicago,” they probably aren’t ready to schedule a waxing just yet. They might still need some time to look into all of the service providers in the area before handing over their money.
If you pay for traffic, website visitors have already seen your ad. For example, you could give first-time customers a 50% discount on their first car wash.
If this is the case, someone who visits your website is probably already thinking about buying something, and they won’t need as much convincing as someone who is just looking around.
How to Act?
Look at the paid advertising campaigns you’re running for your website to find out how to improve your landing page in the best way. Think about the products or services they offer and where the user will go when they click on your advertisement.
Let’s say that when someone clicks on one of your ads in the present, they move to a page that basically says the same thing as the ad. You should think about making a new page that gives the user a list of products and then asks them to choose one from that list. Set up a meeting with the people on your sales team.
If someone clicks on a paid ad to get to your website, they are more likely to show interest in the prices you offer. Less information about your brand’s history and more about the offer that you advertise.
Also, make sure that people who find your website naturally (for example, through search engines) can find out a lot about your business and the products and services you offer.
15. Watch Out for Your Copy.
Have you carefully looked at how you use text in your website design as a whole? Thankfully, we reside in a world where people are capable of paying attention. The sad truth is that most people online won’t read everything on your website.
But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to get people to read what you have to say. Website copy best practices can vary depending on the type of website you have. It’s true that there are some universal principles that can be applied to virtually any area of study.
How to Act?
Although there should be as little text as possible on each page, those who have a lot going on in their lives may find it easier to read your website’s text by doing a few different things. You should be sure that the words you do use mean something.
So, make sure the sentences and paragraphs you write are short and easy to understand. Think of the words on your website as if they were an ad in a magazine. It is important to get the guest’s attention right away, or else it will be too late.
If you use bullet points and bold words, it will be easier for people to understand what you are trying to say. Use different and various font sizes to highlight the essential parts of your argument.
Conclusion.
If you’ve been looking for a comprehensive reference on modern website design standards, your quest may end here. Website design and, more specifically, the best practices for creating a successful site are the subject of this article. These are the best guiding points for website design.
