In this digital age, it has become essential for companies to maintain a website. A website is not just about sales, but it’s also about providing your customers an enjoyable experience. Your website is the center of all your digital activities. If a prospective customer, employee, business partner, wants to know about you, they will visit your website first.
If you are building a website, there are plenty of things that you should look into. Here are five features of a successful and effective website:
Feature 1: Clear, User-Friendly Navigation
An intuitive and easy-to-navigate website allows visitors to find information quickly. There should be a clear hierarchical structure with every category and clickable sub-categories in the navigation menus. With this, a user doesn’t have to go through several pages to find the relevant information. For instance, if your website deals in clothing goods, you should have pages in categories like t-shirts, jeans, shirts, and hoodies. The navigation also boosts your search engine rankings.
Feature 2: Simplicity
A great website is simple, elegant, and functional. Here are three essential features when it comes to simplicity:
Color: Use a color scheme that fits well with the image of your brand. Keep the color selection limited to less than five colors. Pleasing color combinations allow customers to spend more time on your website.
Typography: Typography is the technique of arranging text. Good typography makes it easy to read the text and enhances a customer’s experience. Keep a maximum of 3 different fonts; otherwise, it will wreck the layout.
Imagery: By using beautiful graphics, a website can immediately grab a user’s attention and promote the brand’s identity. If done right, it can also boost your search engine ranking.
Feature 3: Adopt SEO Strategy
Build your website with Search Engine Optimization (SEO) in mind. Important factors that contribute to SEO rankings include quality content, keywords, relevant links, and usability. For better ranking, it is essential that Google crawlers easily find your content. To achieve this, create a flat structure that will keep pages no deeper than four clicks from the homepage. Try to map the content strategy at this point to chart out a map about the content format you’ll use. Remember to use a logical URL structure with page hierarchies to improve the user experience.
Feature 4: Very Little Load Time
Visitors and search engines love fast-loading websites. However, if a website takes more than three seconds to load, users will shift to the competitor’s website. When designing your website, use these tips to boost the speed:
- Use animation and high-resolution images to a minimum as they increase the loading time
- Lessen the number of HTTP requests you have on each page
- Shrink any JavaScript and CSS elements you use
- Keep external scripts to a minimum
Feature 5: Mobile-Friendly Design
Developing a mobile-friendly website has become a necessity for businesses as a sizeable chunk of the population is now using smartphones to access websites. Mobile-optimized websites let you instantly engage users with mobile-specific features such as click-to-call and mapping functions. A mobile website also gives you a competitive edge against your competitors and creates a brand identity for your organization. Mobile-friendly websites are specifically designed for faster load time, which results in more people returning to your site.
There are many ways we can assist you with your website maintenance. Feel free to explore our Website Care Packages or schedule a call with Nicole and explore how we can support you.
