Cleaning up: something many of us have had plenty of time for in 2020, often being confined to our homes week after week. However, you might not have realised how easily you can apply your decluttering efforts to your website, too – or at least, how you can do it.
Here are just a few rudimentary measures you could take to strip superfluous design elements out of your website – and consequently make it easier for visitors to navigate.
Remove the button to be… on the button
You may be tempted to stuff many links and buttons quite high up on your website interface if you fear that, otherwise, your visitors might too easily overlook them.
However, this web design practice dates from a time when people didn’t tend to scroll – because larger screens meant they didn’t have to.
As many of your site’s visitors probably see it on a smartphone rather than a desktop PC display these days, you should try to restrict the number of links or buttons in your top navigation panel, so that visitors don’t become quickly overwhelmed or disorientated.
Lower priority links, for example – like those to your social media pages – can probably be shifted to the site’s footer.
Display important messages as headings and bullet points
Naturally, in textual form, your brand should encapsulate what your organisation is about in just a few words. Hence, you should be careful where you place those words on your site – especially given Nielsen research findings that 79% of people opt to simply scan any new webpage they come across.
When people look over your content briefly rather than thoroughly, they are likelier to notice those crucial branding messages in your site’s headings and bullet points than those that might be buried away in larger blocks of text elsewhere on the page.
Move content to the blog or resources section
These sections basically act as your website’s filing cabinets: they might be tucked away compared to other areas of your site, but should be full of useful information easy for people to access when they need it. The word “when” there does, however, bear emphasis…
If certain content on your site attracts a steady flow of traffic from a nonetheless niche audience, it could be a good idea to reserve that content for your site’s blog or resources section. That way, the content can continue pulling in relevant visitors without diluting the impact of, say, your homepage or “About Us” page.
If you are uncertain exactly what ought to go where on your website, our web design company can overhaul your site’s structure to let you more easily organise what is placed within it. Feel free to get in touch with the PENNInk Productions team today by calling 020 8144 7931, or via our simple online contact form.
Edward Solomon has over 30 years’ experience in project management, technical education, computer networking, web design and development and is a Digital Business Consultant for PENNInk Productions Ltd.
