A well-built website is the start of any successful online business. By well-built, we mean everything from having seamless navigation and functionality to boasting excellent coding integrity and appearance.
In this short guide, we explain the six essential features you must consider when designing a website that sells your business online and brings you results!
Quality web content
People desire information and want it delivered in the simplest and fastest way possible. A well-designed website should have plenty of quality information to entertain, educate, and convert readers into action takers.
While at it, don’t forget to add information that promotes your products and services. For example, if yours is a consulting firm, be sure to include testimonials from your happy clients. And if you’re in the retail business, consider adding high-quality pictures of your products.
User-friendly navigation
A well-designed website is one that has clear navigation to make it easy for readers to find the information they need. A site that is cryptic and confusing will hardly generate quality traffic as most readers will leave never to return.
User-friendly navigation enhances the functionality of your website by ensuring everything makes sense and flows logically. Place all important links and labels where readers will easily locate and click. Most importantly, make all your calls-to-action conspicuous enough. An excellent way to enhance your website’s user-friendliness is to plan out the content by site mapping it with a visual sitemap generator.
Strong color palette
Color schemes are an essential feature when designing a website. According to multiple studies, emotional responses such as happiness and frustration can be triggered by different colors.
Good web designers take a minimalist approach when using colors. Take your time to decide which colors bring out your content more clearly and triggers the right emotion among your readers. A few key factors to consider when selecting the appropriate color combination for your site include branding, business’s niche, and target audience.
Reliable hosting
There are no compromises when it comes to website hosting. Poor hosting can cost you in several ways. For starters, it slows down your website, which can be very frustrating and annoying to your visitors. It also negatively impacts your SERP traffic as loading speed is one of the primary factors for ranking on Google.
Speed optimization
People, and in particular web users, are generally impatient. They want to get what they’re looking for in the shortest possible time. A website that takes ages to load will not attract users. If your site cannot deliver information within less than five seconds, your content, no matter how good it is, might as well be rendered useless.
Some of the key factors that affect webpage loading speed include the number and weight of graphics, site hosting, traffic, and server speed and location.
Mobile-friendly design
There’s no doubt that tablets and smartphones drive quite a considerable amount of web traffic today, and this trend is not expected to slow down any time soon. With mobile devices becoming more accessible and cheaper, people are starting to depend on them to do virtually everything on the web.
When designing a website, consider using a responsive website design so that your website layout can adapt to the different screen sizes.
What else did we leave out? Feel free to share your web designing process and what you consider must-have when setting up a website.