It’s easy for you to believe that you know the elements that make a great website. More than you think is involved in creating a site that is able to meet the needs of users as well as business goals.
This article walks you through the six essential features of a good website and will show you what you need to think about before creating your own.
The six essential characteristics of a website that are successful
A well-designed website allows users to accomplish the tasks they’ve set out to accomplish and delivers a seamless effortless user experience (UX). Learn about what this means by following these guidelines for what constitutes a great website. Use our examples to guide your own designs.
1. A clear goal
If you don’t have a clear goal your website is likely to fail. When we refer to the word “purpose,” we’re discussing ‘user intent.’
Your site’s goal is to assist users to get their work done. be completed, so make certain you are aware of their requirements and what they are hoping to accomplish when they look for your site.
This is why it’s crucial to develop a variety of product personas along with ideal profile profiles for customers (ICPs) before you design your site. The ability to let users be the guide in the process of making decisions is crucial in ensuring the success of developing and optimizing your site.
Every web page must have a distinct function. Think about the reason the visitor coming to this specific page?’ and express the user’s intent through the layout of your page, it’s content, and calls to action (CTAs).
For instance, a clear value proposition, such as the one that Dropbox provides–helps you communicate the purpose of your service or product.
Slack is another example of a mission-driven website because it clearly explains what it can provide and how it can assist your company to work more effectively and efficiently. Slack also has a number of appealing CTAs including ‘talk with sales’, ‘try it for free, and sign-up with Google.
2. High-quality content
Your website can only be as good as the content it contains. The most effective websites provide user-centric content that is designed specifically for their users and not SEO.
However, SEO can and should play a significant role in the content you choose to publish If you know the search preferences of your customers and their needs, you can better comprehend the needs of your customers. Utilize pillar pages and topic clusters to study subjects that are interesting to your customers while also creating a structure for your content that increases authority and aids in getting ranked in search engines such as Google.
The posts referred to as a topic cluster focus on a specific element of a pillar webpage and usually target long-tail keywords (a more precise, longer phrase), and ‘pillar pages’ offer a comprehensive overview of the subject. The links between pages within a topic cluster must always link back to the pillar page that you have in depth.
3. Outstanding UX and UI
Excellent User Experience (UX) and user interface (UI) layout are some of the essential web design guidelines and principles. The best companies consider the user’s final experience right from the beginning of the web design process. Imagine UI as the content your users perceive and UX as the feelings and responses they experience when engaging with your website.
To create a stunning UI make sure that your design is simple and logical Don’t be afraid to utilize white space. Use engaging elements such as animations and videos however, be cautious not to overwhelm your users with too much visual stimulation.
Solid UX design is about creating a seamless user experience. Does your website have a well-organized layout? It’s easy to navigate? It is accessible for those with disabilities such as vision impairment? Think about your customer’s preferences for navigation, and then ask how you can design an experience that allows your customers to perform what they were born to do.
If you design with easy and intuitive navigation on your website within your mind, you’ll build an excellent product that will earn your customers to be loyal. To provide a great user experience, you’ll have to marry aesthetics with functionality.
Typeform‘s website is a stunning mix of UX and UI. Its menu bar at the top is easy to navigate, and it clearly displays all details that visitors may be seeking. When users visit their homepage it’s greeted with an animated video that shows how to utilize the tools.
4. Excellent performance
What happens in the background is as important as what the users are able to see. Therefore, focusing on performance is among the essential internet design principles to adhere to. Monitoring of websites is vital to good product performance. Therefore, often check for errors and broken links, and also make sure your site’s accessible to search engines.
Make sure you make sure you’re optimizing:
- Rapid loading speed: According to the research of Akamai the Akamai report, just a two-second delay in loading time for web pages boosts the bounce rate by 103% for eCommerce websites. 53 percent of mobile eCommerce website customers will leave a site that takes more than three minutes to open.
- SEO performance: Use strategies for optimizing your website such as eliminating duplicate content and improving website speed to aid search engines to find your site and make your site more noticeable to prospective customers.
5. Multi-device optimization
Mobile traffic now makes up over half of the total internet traffic. This is why your website has to be optimized across all devices that include desktop tablets, mobiles, and desktop displays.
Make sure that your navigation menus display correctly across various screen sizes Adjust the size of your images and their location and place CTAs so that they are clear for users, regardless of the device they’re using to visit your site.
6. High Security
The security of your visitors is an integral aspect of having an effective website. Website owners who are good at it prioritize the security of their users’ personal data with multi-factor authentication SSL certificates along with secure and safe hosting.
Security is particularly important to safeguard your credit card information on eCommerce websites and the users’ financial information on fintech websites.
Be sure that your visitors know that their information is secure so that they feel secure and are able to focus on having a positive experience on your site.
How do you design an effective website for clients and customers
Each website is individual, which is why there’s no standard solution to creating the best one. The most effective design for your website is the one that is suited to the specific requirements of your visitors.
To identify the requirements you should ask yourself some key questions prior to starting work on your site. Stephen Heffernan, the digital marketing and website consultant of The Connected Narrative offers a list of the most frequently asked questions companies should consider prior to creating their website:
- Who are my intended customers?
- What’s the point of my site?
- What kind of material should my site include?
- What can I do to get visitors be interacting with my site?
- What tone should I aim to establish in my web style?
- Do I need my site to be optimized for SEO?
If you ask yourself these types of questions it will be easier to identify the people you’re designing your website for and then optimize the design and content for users as well as search engines.
Create a site that your visitors will be delighted with
Your website is an effective way to increase loyal customers by promoting the word about your brand as well as increasing conversions and making users happy. Make sure you design your website by keeping our list of top features in mind to help your business grow and offer your visitors the experience they’ve always wanted.