Nowadays, a smart website design is almost a prerequisite if you want to build a lasting brand. It’s where your audience learns about your story and your offerings, and the goal is to keep them engaged for as long as possible.

That being said, the home to your brand should be more than an eye-candy. It has to be simple enough that they can explore without any hassle, and rich enough to ask for more. It’s a delicate balance. Anyone can create a website, but it takes careful planning come up with a good one.

Below are some of the key principles you should keep in mind when planning web design.

Purpose

Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful. – John Maeda

Why did you put up your website in the first place? What purpose does it fulfill for your target audience? How much do you know about them? Purpose comes down to individual pages, too: Each page should offer a certain type of information like entertainment, engagement, or transaction with your business. Creating a sales page? Keep the focus on your offering, and reinforce it as you go along. Creating an About page? Tell ’em about your company and the wonderful people behind it. You don’t need to put up a circus in a single page.

Navigation

People ignore designs that ignore people. – Frank Chimero

Dead ends are the end of engagement in your website. And as you already know, the goal is to keep them engaged until they’re ready to take the next step. Navigation is the framework containing all the touches happening within your website. It should feature a logical hierarchy; clear CTAs and clickable buttons; and the right information within 3 clicks. It’s a lot to keep track of, but creating a sitemap and constantly testing links and buttons will keep you on top of your game.

Mobile-friendly

The role of a designer is that of a good, thoughtful host anticipating the needs of his guests. – Charles Eames

As a consumer of information yourself, you know there are plenty of moments when you’d rather browse in your smartphone than get up and turn on your laptop to search something. Whether it be smartphone or tablet, people prefer the convenience of browsing on smaller screens now, especially when they’re on the go. In fact, there are varying stats everywhere but the most credible I can find is over 60% and climbing. So if your website is stuck on desktop view, you could be losing these viewers to your competition’s mobile-friendly layout. To fix this, you can either rebuild your site with multiple widths, or come up with a dedicated mobile site they can easily navigate on.

Communication

Get rid of anything that is not essential to making a point. – Christoph Niemann

Clear, well-organised information make a reader and SEO-friendly website. With tons of distractions on the internet, your viewers tend to want information quickly. They (We!) skim a lot, so placing meaningful headings, subheadings, and bullet points are more preferable than long, windy sentences.

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