By: Jeanette Stevens, iSimplyAssist LLC
“People ignore design that ignores people.” Frank Chimero
What makes a great UX design?
Great UX design is the sum total of: how the product looks and how the product works. When creating a website which will boost lead generation and garner a great user experience the website aesthetic is as important as the copy.
Imagine walking into a store with the desire to purchase a specific item. Immediately upon entering, it is difficult to find the product, the aisle names are confusing and hard to understand or worse grouped in generalized categories. Because you may have a little extra time and really need what you came to the store for, you find yourself walking every square inch to find what you are looking for and asking for help is even more confusing than just trying to figure it out on your own.
An experience like this on your website to a user would be an example of bad UX design and a crappy user experience overall.
Remember: To create a great user experience your website should not just look good and be easy to navigate, the information on it should also be relevant and valuable to your target user. “No matter how easy to use or beautiful a product is, it can’t deliver a great user experience if the customer doesn’t value the benefits the product provides.” (Source: The Lean Product Playbook, Dan Olsen)
- Place Your Most Important Content Near The Top
With much of the world reading from left to right, your most important information should start at the top of the page towards the left, since this is typically how people begin reading information on a page or a book. People will come to your website and start from the top, then if interest serves, continue to read through to the bottom of the page.
This is called visual hierarchy and it is an important design principle which helps to determine which elements and designs the user would consider the most important. Injecting a call – to- action or CTA in a prominent position on your website (line of sight top of the page), instead of somewhere in the middle or bottom of the page, could help boost your lead conversion rates. Some examples of how to optimize the top of your webpage for lead conversion would be: A CTA (Call to action) for example: how to set up a consultation, where to download a whitepaper or e-book, how to redeem a savings or coupon code.
- Eliminate Extra Words And Clutter From Content
On May 4th Google underwent another major (or core) algorithm update. The most important aspect of this update is how it will affect your search ranking and website traffic.
In Googles own words, here are a few things to consider:
Quality of content: “Beyond matching the words in your query with relevant documents on the web, Search algorithms also aim to prioritize the most reliable sources available. To do this, our systems are designed to identify signals that can help determine which pages demonstrate expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness on a given topic.” To read more click here.
This means that the websites which will rank the highest and win traffic are the ones that are most relevant to the user’s query. Saving one particular keywords phrase over and over through the website will no longer be enough to achieve decent ranking results. Instead knowing your audience and creating valuable content which speaks to the need of the user at time of query will result in more traffic and better bounce rates.
Your website should cater to the needs of your target customer, not just with how it looks but how it works. Photo Source: Unsplash
- Make Your Site Easy To Navigate
We have all gone to a website only to find it confusing to navigate. Pages within pages of content for example or navigation that does not follow a particular path resulting in feeling lost, then frustrated with the lost time and energy it takes to find information. Remember our initial point: Great UX is not just about how the product looks, but most importantly how it works.
A great way to test whether your site is easy to navigate and produces a good user experience is to show your designs to customers, get them involved in the process, survey them, ask what they like about the site and where you can make some adjustments. You can do this via email, include a simple checklist and feedback form.
In Googles own words, here are a few things to consider:
Usability of websites: “When ranking results, Google Search also evaluates whether webpages are easy to use. When we identify persistent user pain points, we develop algorithms to promote more usable pages over less usable ones, all other things being equal.” To read more click here.
Making sure that your site is optimized for mobile is very important. Photo Source: Unplash
In conclusion, I want to leave with one more important note on user experience or UX and this one is a biggie, especially for local businesses. Do not just stop at the design and general usability of your site, also make sure that your site is optimized for mobile usage.
Check out these mobile stats found on Quora Creative:
- 80% of users used a mobile device to search the internet in 2019
- 57% of consumers said: A business with a poorly designed mobile website is not likely to be recommended
- It takes less than a second for a mobile user to reach an opinion about your website.
If you are not seeing the kind of traffic and lead conversions that you are hoping to receive from your website not making sure that it is optimized for mobile could be part of the problem.
Impacted by COVID-19 and need to pivot? We can help you to revamp your website and implement a digital forward marketing strategy. Contact us: support@isimplyassistu.com and speak with someone from the team! Website: www.isimplyassistu.com