Neworld, Great relationships build great brands

1. Focus on content

Content is the most vital part of your website. Your content will win the attention of your customers, letting the other elements of your website (design, imagery, videos, etc.) provide a supporting role. Content is what will engage your audience and persuade them to take action. You will not achieve an effective and user-friendly website, if you have not considered your content first.

To succeed in this, put yourself in the shoes of your website visitors. Appreciating your visitors’ motivations will not only help you to present relevant content, but also help you to structure that content in a appropriate way.

2. Prioritise Page Speed

When it comes to how fast your website loads, patience is not a virtue that your site visitors posess. This is the age of instant gratification and people want to easily and immediately access what they’re looking for online.

Whether your site is an e-commerce site, a B2B site, or a site for sharing your news, opinions or tips, speed always matters. Also remember that as search engines continue to align their algorithms to match user’s needs, a slow site will rank badly in search engine results.

So that’s two good reasons to make sure your site is lightening fast and that loading time is treated with importance equivalent to other aspects of web design.

3. Keep it Simple

The designer Dieter Rams once explained his design approach in the phrase “Less, but better”.

This being said, simple design does not necessarily mean minimalist design or design that is simple to implement. Achieving simplicity in web design involves digging deep to fully understand a website visitor’s intentions so you can weed out the unnecessary to deliver a streamlined, easy-to-use experience. Navigating around a website should be effortless and obvious. Too much choice or variety can distract your visitors and make it impossible for them to reach their goals, leaving them frustrated.

Designing a user interface that recognises the user’s aims and presents the simplest means of achieving these goals, is the essence of skillful web design.

So, go forth and design! And if you pay heed to these 3 rules of web design you will be well on your way to achieving an exceptional website.

Caitriona Butler, Web Developer.
Caitriona can usually be found crafting robust and effective responsive web sites across a range of programming languages & technologies at Neworld, a branding, creative and web agency based in Dublin