When designing your website, what is your end goal? Do you want users to read your content? Purchase? Sign up? This should be your first question, as knowing what you want your website to be used for allows you to provide foundations for design to be based upon.
If conversions (like most websites) is your goal – design can play a pretty big part in converting leads. Research from Stanford University suggests that 46.1% of people say a website’s design is the top criteria for deciding if a company is credible or not. Making it more important than ever to consider not only the design but user ability when designing your site. A poorly designed site combined with poor content is sure to leave you with one thing, a poor bounce rate.
With 42.3% of the world’s population now on the web, now is the time to sit down and think about how you can incorporate web design techniques through a host of innovative tools to set you apart from your competitors. After all, your website acts as your storefront – It’s your customer’s first impression, so make a good one.
We recently sat down to chat with our Website Development Partner, Martyn Paddon, Director at Rubix Software, to find out his opinion on designing your website to convert the most leads:-
How important is the user experience on my website?
User experience is the number 1 priority for any business. I would liken it to your shop window in a long row of the same service providers showing their shop windows. Customers will get an instant impression of your business simply by their experience when visiting your site. If your site takes too long to load or does not respond properly to the device they are accessing it on it will immediately put the visitor off and the likelihood is that they will simply press the back key and visit your competitor. When the visitor is on your site they will want to know succinctly what you are providing; how you can help them and how they can contact you. You will be surprised at the number of sites that may be very well designed but the visitor cannot get this information fast and they simply leave your site.
Should my website be responsive?
With more visitors accessing a website through a mobile/tablet device than a desktop; building a website that responds automatically to the size of the screen or type of device being used is no longer an option but a must. A responsive website must ensure that the user experience is seamless.
Should I outsource my website build?
My advice would be that if you are building a website for personal or limited use or for a club then often a DIY website creation tool will be more than adequate for your needs. However, if you are using a website to provide information to prospective customers then having this professionally designed and constructed can make all the difference. The site will be optimised for speed; responsiveness and react properly to how people access your site. Website professionals will use tools to ensure that speed is enhanced; technologies such as Javascript can be used to provide real professional touches to your site. In addition to the use of Content Management Systems, you can update the pages yourself as required
How can I create an effective contact page to ensure conversions?
Contact pages should be easily accessible from anywhere on your website; people will not want to spend the time navigating through your site to determine how they contact you. Once on your contact page; this should contain an easy to complete form; contact details about your business including phone and email addresses. In addition, a map is great so that visitors know where you are located.
What are your top tips when designing a website?
Great design; make the site stand out from your competitors; easy to navigate whatever the device being used. Visitors tend to land on a site and want to know three things, what you provide; how you provide it and how they can get in touch, make sure this is provided.
FireTap can design a website that incorporates robust features and creative, visually stunning design. We offer a variety of website design services created to ensure your website grows with you. Our robust websites are built with user experience in mind while keeping in line with your branding and following the latest trends to ensure your website is able to run at its maximum performance and is easy to navigate while keeping the user engaged.
Find out more about our website design services.
