10 Facts About Website Design You Might Not Know

Did you know that if you go to your favorite search engine and type in “website design Dallas” you will get different results than if you type in another city? However, if you simply type in “website design” you are likely to get results from websites that are anchored to areas all over the world. Try it out and see for yourself. 

Although this is something that you might already be aware of, there are many other facts about the world wide web that many people don’t know, but if they did know…things could be much different for them when it comes to the success of their website.

We have compiled a list of facts that will make an impact on your site and the way that people interact with it. If you understand these key factors, you have a good chance of having an effective website.

1 Your Hosting Structure Matters

One of the biggest mistakes a web developer can make is to host a busy website on a platform that can not handle the heat. The place that you host your site is the foundation that it will stand upon as it presents itself and your business to the world. If that foundation is weak, the website will crumble and the entire effort will have to be restarted and rebuilt.

Instead of wasting the energy and time that it takes to house the website on a cheap hosting platform, do your research and discover the right kind of hosting solution for the needs of your website.

2 You Have Approximately 5 Seconds to Make an Impact

Most people that are looking for something on the internet are in the mindset that they have millions of places to look through in order to find exactly what they want. They are in a rush and do not want to waste time looking at a site that does not offer anything to them.

When a person lands on a website for the first time, they are presented with whatever the web designer provides them. If what they see does not appeal to them, or engage them, they will bounce to another website just as quickly as they entered it.

By placing engaging content “above the fold” of the landing page you automatically give the user a reason to stay and learn more about what you have to offer. 

The immediate content can be:

• Images
• Headings
• Text
• Action Buttons
• Videos
• Forms

The way that the first glimpse of the web page appears to the user can make all of the difference in the world when it comes to gaining conversions.

3 Colors Make a Difference

Some people love lots of bright colors. Some, on the other hand, do not. It is difficult to predict who will like what colors when they come to your website, but it is important to use colors that do not repel people.

One of the best ways to determine the colors that will best suit your site is to understand your target audience and build on what might be appealing to them.

Although there are neutral colors such as light tones and greys, you don’t want to make your content appear boring to your specific audience. 

If you build your site with a bold, red font in all caps you will most likely scare people off as soon as they land on the pages…however…if your target audience prefers bright reds in all caps, you might get more conversions.

Understand your target audience and choose colors that will keep them on your site.

4 Large Images Inhibit Load Time

OK, you might already know that the larger images that you use, the more time it takes to load pages. If not…now you do… However, this is a double-edged sword when it comes to retaining visitors or scaring them off.

You want compelling images that suit your target audience, but yet, you want your website pages to load into their browsers without boring them to death as they wait. 

Formatting images to load quicker is a skill that only advanced web developers understand. The thing is that if a person stumbles onto a website for the first time and the load time lags they are very likely to simply bounce to another site before the page has time to load.

The problem with this is that some devices will load images faster…or slower…than others. When you use large images that have to be resized by the browser it still takes a bit of memory and power to load those images.

The key is to use images that are sized in a way that works best for the page…and don’t overdo them. Although sliding hero images at the top of the page may look awesome, they use a lot of resources to render properly. Consider cutting down the size of images and using them in a way that keeps the balance of the site and helps to reduce load times.

5 The Way you Structure Your Content Matters

Content on a website is a big deal. It has to be built correctly, otherwise, it goes to waste. For example, if you put your important text in small font that matches the rest of the text on your site, you might not get the attention of your users when you want it.

Does this make sense?

If all of the components of the content are wrapped into a mass of text, there will be no way for your visitors to see what they are looking for unless they read all of the text. 

Most people do not want to do that.

• People like headings
• People like numbered lists
• People like bulleted lists
• People like images

Apart from the technical side of content structure and the aspect of SEO, it is best to break up content on pages under main headings, subheadings, and paragraphs that are small and easy to read.

It is important to express what might be relevant to your target audience when they visit your pages by bolding text or putting it into smaller subheadings that stand out from the rest of the text on the pages.

6 Readable Fonts Produce Conversions

How many times have you been to a website where you could not read the content because of a weird font? If it has not happened to you yet, believe it or not, it happens to people all of the time.

Some companies, or people for that matter, are stuck on a particular font that they believe looks cool. However, just because it may look cool or whatever does not mean that it is effective as a way to engage an audience.

If your site is equipped with a readable font that makes it easy for the user to read and navigate the site, you are much more apt to get a higher conversion rate than if you use a font that is hard to read. If people can’t read your content, they will go somewhere else that they can.

7 You Don’t Get Results by Stuffing Keywords

One of the biggest mistakes a web developer can make is to assume that if they create content that is forged with pillar keywords and that every paragraph is equipped with a variant of those keywords the site will appear at the top of the rankings of search results.

If it were that easy everybody would be doing it and the search results would be an absolute mess. Believe it or not, search engines are a lot smarter than most people give them credit for. It is best to create meaningful content that is helpful to people that are searching for answers regarding it.

8 Alt Image Descriptions Are For People with Disabilities

Another huge mistake is that people make it a point to use keywords in the alt text of images as opposed to providing clear descriptions regarding the content of the images. Although it is helpful to put keyword descriptions into the images if they describe the images, merely slapping keywords in an image for the purpose of SEO is a huge mistake. Not only does it not work for SEO, but it causes confusion for people that can’t see that want to understand what is on the pages of the site.

9 Your Meta Description Does Not Impact Your Search Results

Try as you might, your meta descriptions do not have an impact on search results. However, it is important to understand that your meta description is what will show up in search results under the title of your page.

If you include your keywords in your meta descriptions you can help people identify what they are looking for and they will be more likely to click on your link as opposed to other links that do not include the keywords.

Meta descriptions are more for conversion rates and click-through rates than anything else. It is also important to understand that search results truncate the meta description at between 120 and 160 characters depending on the size of the screen.

10 Links Are Very Important

Although sometimes the importance is overlooked, links are a big deal. The only way people can find pages on a site is if they have links to them. While backlinks from other sites can build the domain authority of your website, inbound links are important for the structure of your site.

In addition to clearly labeled menus at the header and footer of the site, it is important to link to pages within the site by anchoring text to pages via hyperlinks.

The more structured your site is with proper links, the stronger it is and easier it is for users to navigate.

Conclusion

The more you know about how websites work and how they interact with the internet the better off you are when it comes to creating an effective web environment for your users. The best way to get the most out of your website is to hire a professional web developer to help you get things exactly the way they are supposed to be.