Customers’ first impression of your brand matters. That’s why it’s important to focus on your company’s website design. If your target consumers have a bad experience with your brand online, you risk losing them to your competitors.
According to research, 94% of customers’ first impression of your business starts with your brand’s website design. Therefore, it’s imperative to create a company website that’s aesthetically appealing and is optimized for user experience. Customers want to purchase their goods from online brands that seem trustworthy and respectable.
For this reason, it’s advisable to invest your resources into creating an attractive, user-friendly, and fast website that reflects your business’s values and ethics. Below are ways you can do this to impress your customers:
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Plan
The first step to creating an appealing and user-friendly website is acknowledging that your site needs some improvements. Then, you can start working on the appropriate improvements by creating an actionable plan. A good plan gives you a map of how best to tackle your website’s issues.
When creating your plan, keep in mind the pages that are most loved by users, and what you will post on the pages. You should also consider what content and discounts are likely to convert them into buyers.
This will help you better design a website that will nurture your potential clients and help them through their purchasing journey. However, you do not need to make your site extremely graphic to attract customers. Sometimes, users appreciate a simple, yet beautiful and well-planned website.
Reduce Friction and Eliminate Distractions
Some brands include a lot of irrelevant and useless information that distracts users from their original message. For example, very long content, complex animations, and heavy images could distract and confuse your users.
Unfortunately, today’s users have a limited attention span of only a few seconds. Therefore, it’s imperative to ensure that your website design doesn’t distract them from the page they’re viewing and the message you’re looking to convey.
You can start by creating a strategy that consists of branding guidelines to help you. These guidelines should include details of your imagery, colors, logo usage, and font styles. Without guidelines, it’s very easy for businesses to struggle with the right website design.
Some businesses often make the mistake of using varying font sizes, styles, and arbitrary colors when redesigning their sites. This could easily distract your users and confuse the people you’re looking to convey to buyers.
Additionally, ensure you avoid using a lot of imagery, on-page interactions and animations. When your users are scrolling through your site, they are likely to be distracted if they see icons or animations throughout your page. Distractions also overwhelm the readers, removing their focus from the primary message.
Include Social Proof
Today, most consumers rely on product ratings and online reviews before making a purchase. Reviews and ratings increase a customer’s trust and reliability in the product and brand. The same concept applies to your brand and product sales.
Customers are more likely to purchase from you if you have good reviews and a higher rating. According to a study, prospectus customers are 58% more likely to purchase your products if they see impactful reviews and testimonials from your previous clients.
So how should the reviews and testimonials look to effectively impact your clients and create trust?
This is an important question to ask yourself. The first step is creating a strategy and deciding which format is best for your business; video or text testimonials. Historically, most customers prefer video testimonials to text, making them more effective.
That’s because video testimonials keep the user’s attention for a long time, and it builds a more resilient connection, because your customers can see the faces and hear the voices of real people. Another great option is using text testimonials. However, when not correctly incorporated and designed, they could hurt your business instead of helping you build trust.
If you want your text testimonials to help you build trust, ensure you include them on your site’s services or products pages, homepage, or a dedicated testimonial page. Remember to also include the testimonials on your site’s navigation
Don’t Forget to Include a Call-to-Action
After a user lands on your website, it’s essential to guide them to places on your site that will inspire and nature a conversation. Today, consumers are lazier than ever. Therefore, ensure you make it easier for them.
Use your content to point users in the right direction so that they do not struggle to find products or services on your site. A great way to impress your customers and improve your website’s design is by including a strategically placed call to action.
For example, you can include an icon for your clients to schedule an appointment with your business. This makes it easier for them to navigate to your contact page and make the appointment without struggling.
Another great way to improve your web design is to include a call to action on every web page across the entire website. However, be careful not to lose sight of your client’s buying journey.
Optimize Your Site for Mobile Use
Today, if your website isn’t optimized for mobile usage, you’re likely missing out on a massive chunk of the market.
Over 80% of people on Google use smartphones, and 61% of these users are less likely to return to a page they had trouble accessing. This means you’re losing your clients to competitors with mobile-optimized websites.
However, mobile optimization is more than just improved responsiveness. It’s essential for your web development team to tailor-make your website based on your client’s needs and wants. Before meeting with a website designer, ask yourself why your customers prefer using mobile devices to access your site.
What are your users looking for on your site? Do they get the experience they deserve when using their mobile phones? Answers to these questions will help you develop the best strategy to optimize your website for mobile usage. However, ensure that both mobile and desktop versions are similar.
If you want to optimize your website better, ensure you hire a digital marketing agency to help. They are better equipped to help you figure out what is wrong with your site and why your conversion rates are low.
Are You Ready to Redesign Your Company Website?
Your company website is the first point of contact between your brand and potential consumers. When redesigning your website, ensure that you create it based on your potential customers’ needs. Use the above design tips for guidance.
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