The Do’s and Don’ts if you are a Web Designer
If you design websites, you should take responsibility in creating designs which are useful and enjoyable. It will be a difficult task for anyone who just recently started creating websites, so for newbies or even someone who needs further knowledge on web designs, Redot Global created a simple list of do’s and don’ts to follow when designing your next web design project.
First, the do’s
1. Keep your interface consistent
One of the most important features of good UX is to keep the interface consistent throughout the entire design. The overall look and sense of your website should be consistent across all of your site’s pages. Uniform layout, typography, and other aspects will improve the usability of your website.
2. Design easy-to-use navigation
Navigation is the heart of usability. That is the most used feature in a website. Having seamless navigation on your site is crucial for making your website useful and usable. Users will have a hard time searching for what they want if your navigation design is not up to the mark.
3. Change the color of visited links
Links play a vital role in your site. When the unvisited links and the vistited ones appear to the not different, users could unintentionally revisit the same pages repeatedly which is frustrating when they are searching for something. Knowing your past and present locations makes it easier to navigate through your website.
4. Make it easy to scan your pages
When users visit your site visitors are more likely to quickly skip through the page rather than read everything on it in detail. For example, when visitors want to find specific content or looking for a specific part of your blog, they will scan a website’s pages until they find what they are looking for. And your design could help them with that.
5. Content is important.
No matter how user-friendly the design is, your website would be useless without quality content. Users visit a website for the information it provides. So provide your visitors with rich content to fulfill their needs.
6. Limit the number of choices.
The higher the number of choices you provide the more decisions a visitor has to make. This could be overwhelming and could reduce the number of visitors. Limit the number of choices so that they could decide easily.
7. Make your website responsive
Today with rising of mobile platforms it is vital that you make your website render correctly no matter what device your visitor is using. If your website is not responsive your audience would become thinner and thinner.
Now let’s dive into Don’ts
1. DO NOT make visitors wait.
No one likes to wait. Especially when it comes to website loading. Users are more likely to bounce off from your website if your website takes longer to load. Make it less time-consuming for your visitor.
2. Do not use too many typefaces
When you start building a site, you are eager to use a lot of different typefaces. But it’s better to hold that temptation back. Too many variations in font types could be distracting, confusing, and even annoying. Remember it is a website, not a graffiti!
3. Don’t use too many colors on your website
Similar to typefaces, it’s a good idea to avoid using too many colors on your website. The more colors you use, the harder it is to achieve balance. Using too many colors in design is like trying to play many music tracks at once, which could confuse the person viewing your design and it has a huge affect on user-friendliness.
4. Do not show automatic pop-ups too early.
Pop-ups could be frustrating especially when the visitor is bombarded with them from the beginning. You need to attract the visitor first and make the proposals later.
5. Don’t play background music or auto-play videos with music
Let visitors choose whether they want to play the video or play the music. If you start media tracks automatically when the page is loaded it will be a distraction for the visitor. Unexpected music could even be dangerous for your website. Let the visitors handle that.
6. Don’t sacrifice usability for the sake of beauty
No matter how beautiful your website is, it is pointless if it is less user-friendly and hard to navigate in. User experience comes first. Your website should not be a puzzle, it should be an attractive piece of work.
Conclusion
When people interact with your website, they expect an excellent user experience. You are a designer who satisfies that need. Always see from the user’s point of view so that your design and efforts do not go in vain.
