How to Make a Good First Impression

With this in mind, it is essential to have a ‘user first’ mindset when thinking about your website. Here are some principles of good UX design that you can observe to make sure your site delivers a great experience for your customers.

1.User Interface (UI)

When it comes to the overall look and functionality of your site, clarity and simplicity are key. Make sure that when users arrive they can quickly understand what your site is about and how to find the information they need.

Keep your site navigation organised and make sure the menu copy is clear. Consider using a search feature if your site is content heavy.

It is also important to give users feedback where necessary when they are completing a task (e.g. including progress bars when a page is loading). Lastly, always anticipate that users might make mistakes and design for them!

2.Content

As we live in a world of information overload, it is a good idea to not overwhelm users and to only show them information when they need it. A top tip here is to keep the most important information you want to get across at the top of the page.

In addition, consider the readability of your copy by keeping line lengths to a minimum and using basic language. Almost every website that we complete research on, whether mobile or desktop, has 50% too much copy so as a rule halve what you write before launch.

3.Responsiveness

In 2017, 56% of web pages were visited from a mobile device. [source: https://blog.usejournal.com/5-trends-in-web-ux-design-2018-ee6b31168638 ]

Having a mobile responsive website is, of course, essential now but also consider a wide variety of screen shapes and sizes. Make any design changes from a mobile-first perspective.

Some main aspects to consider here are image sizes, navigation and text readability.

4.Accessibility

Accessibility means ensuring that your website is accessible to users with disabilities such as sight or cognitive difficulties.

To ensure that you do not exclude any users from your site think about areas such as typeface size, readability and colour usage. Improving accessibility also improves usability and so should not just be seen as something for people with disabilities, it will help with the overall experience of your site.

To learn more about accessibility guidelines visit the world content accessibility guidelines (WGAC) website.

To ensure that you have achieved a good website UX it is essential that you test your site with real users. If you would like to test your site or simply learn more contact us.