You have created a website, then. For whatever causes, and using whatever tools. Congratulations! To make sure everything is in order in terms of good design aspects, you might want to pause before releasing it into the big global internet domain.
Since many people believe that design is subjective, you are allowed to use any colours you like on your website. But in actuality, it’s never about aesthetics or beauty. A well-Service Design website must achieve your business goals and guarantee that visitors you anticipate will stay are not turned away.
Section #1. The Main Page
Your website’s main page serves as both the cover and title, and just like books, websites are evaluated by both. Today’s Internet consumers visit too many websites to give each one individual attention, so if yours doesn’t grab their attention immediately away, it will most surely fall behind. The following are the most important requirements that your main page must meet:
correct message In five seconds or less, the visitor can tell what your site is about.
obvious next move The primary page must make it clear to the visitor where to go.
a strong hero image. The visitor’s attention is drawn to the main page’s core visual, which may be a picture, an animation, or a video.
calling for action. Place as many calls as there are viable actions if your website chases more than one form of action.
Bring forth the feeling. As if it were your first time, enter your website. Does it give off the vibe you want your guest to have?
Section #2. Structure & Navigation
Websites with decent design are set up so that each visitor may reach their destination as quickly as possible. You are aware of the goals of your visitors when you start your website: to publish, subscribe, purchase, sell, search specific information, etc. The website’s layout and navigation show how easily a user can access its intended usage. Critically assess the design of your website. Here are some guidelines to see if everything is okay in this regard:
basic road map All of your information should be organised into numerous unique categories on your main menu. Good websites only include five to six top-level categories at most, and research suggests that the average user can only retain four things in their short-term memory. Therefore, the general rule of thumb in this case would be: the less, the better.
Please, only a few levels. Nobody enjoys discovering that a folder has ten subfolders, each of which has one hundred more, when they open the folder. Avoid going too deep in your navigation. Consider using an extended drop-down menu, as seen in the image above, if you have numerous categories that are difficult to combine.
Show the location as it is. Display to your users their actual location and route across your website. Using breadcrumbs is an effective approach to do this.
Page consistency. Maintain a consistent header, footer, and logo position across all of your pages. Only if you want your main page to serve as a cover may you make an exception.
My people should look. No matter how clear and straightforward your navigation is, some customers prefer to just enter in the search terms they are looking for on your website. Provide them with that option by integrating a search box.
Section #3. User Experience
There is a proverb that is well-known among experts in user experience: “Good design is as little design as possible.” UX guidelines and patterns are purely scientific and the result of extensive research; they allow for very little to no creativity. Throughout the history of web design, billions of users have put these sound web design principles to the test. Check the following to see if they have been correctly applied on your website:
Differentiate between links and buttons. Your website has buttons that signify actions. Your site’s users must understand immediately what they would do after clicking a button when they see one. In contrast, links make the assumption that they will direct the user to a specific area of the text. A good link gives an indication as to what is beyond it. Visitors to websites that conflate these two are also puzzled as a result.
Arrange the forms. The majority of contemporary websites assume the presence of user registration or subscription options, and we bet yours does too. Forms are the tools used by your visitors to enter their data. Fields, boxes, buttons, and drop-down menus are all components of forms that must be placed correctly.
Here is a useful list of dos and don’ts for managing forms. Compare your method of form implementation to the accepted practises!
Use the radio boxes and checks correctly. To the consumers’ disappointment, these two aspects are commonly mistaken. Checking a box implies a yes-or-no response. It is a yes if it is checked. It’s a no if it’s not. And there isn’t a neutral position. A radio box offers the chance to choose from options, typically more than two. Whenever possible, use both items; never separate them with the equality sign.
Instead of employing it just once, repeat your main action. When you want a visitor to your website to do an action,
Don’t give them just one option to complete the task. Put a quick link on the side and a button at the bottom. Making the main action available from different pages is a good approach.
