8 Best Tips To Design Websites Like A Professional
In 21st century, e-commerce is dominating the business world. With online selling overtaking traditional methods of trading, the need for websites has increased remarkably and so has the demand for website designers.
A web designer must be both creative as well as technically skilled and should use both the attributes to build and design websites. It is the role of a web designer to make sure that a site looks attractive and is highly functional at the same time.
With digital media occupying a significant place in our lives, a web designer has a vital role to play in this new wake of digitalisation. Think about this – from Google to WhatsApp, from Amazon to Facebook – a good interface is quintessential nowadays.
While the job of designing web pages can seem to be quite an easy task, it definitely is not. Ask any web designer around you, and he or she will tell you how many things must be considered while designing a website. To make it look its aesthetic best, it is crucial that you select the appropriate colour palette, font, and layout and images for the website.
It does not end here! While keeping it visually attractive is essential, a website should also be user-friendly. As a web designer, it is your responsibility to create the appropriate look while ensuring that the site is easy to access.
If you are wondering how to design a webpage that is aesthetic and at the same time easy to use, here are 10 tips for you. Use these to create web designs that look like they have been designed by professionals.
8 Tips and Tricks for Website Designing
If you are a novice when it comes to designing a website, then these tips are sure to be helpful for you.
- Design off-screen first
Rather than creating code and designs on the screen first, try designing on paper so that you can save the time that is wasted in editing and cleaning unwanted things later. Putting the layout that you have in mind on a whiteboard will help you figure things more easily and get you a clear idea of the site first. Use a paper to jot down the specific elements that you want on the webpage and decide their positions by drawing them out.
- Soothing Colour Palette
Every good website designer draws on a grayscale first and then adds colour to the elements within the layout gradually. While designing a website for the first time, you must remember this too. Opt for a layout and a colour scheme that is unique and visually aesthetic. Try to keep it as simple as possible.
- Easy-to-use Navigation
Remember: the simpler the navigation, the better it is. A website that has many layers is usually complicated to use which in turn brings less traffic to the site. According to a survey, web pages, which take 2.4 seconds to load, experience great mobile conversation rate of 1.9%. Hence, you must use more straightforward layouts for the website that have minimal navigation. Make it a point to use as few drop-down menus as possible. Keep in mind that the menu links on the website page should include the vital items that the visitors mostly want to see – the About Us page, the Home page and the Contact page.
- A Clean Layout
A lucid and straightforward layout is crucial for a good website. So go for a design that does not look too crowded. You should also avoid using too many search boxes or buttons. And yes! Flashy banners and complicated graphics are a strict no-no, and you should not use sliding carousels either.
- Easy-to-understand Font
40% of people will switch to a different search result if the first one is not mobile friendly. Make sure that the size is not too small so that the viewer does not have to zoom in to read what is written. Use fonts that are prominent for the headings so that, it grabs the viewer’s attention. Some of the fonts that you can consider using on a web layout are Calibri, Arial, Cambria and Times New Roman.
- Using Phase out sliders
Be it sidebars or the sliders – if you are using them, make sure you phase them out in the webpage so that the number of distractions on your site is minimum. This way it will be easier for users to navigate through the website. For the home page, it is better if you opt for a large header space. Use a unique and well-crafted design to define the brand. Make sure that you choose an icon that can be considered static.
- Minimal Content
Good content is the essence of a good website. Hence, you make sure that the content is aligned perfectly so that the website does not end up looking too clumsy. Keep in mind that a site that has a lot of material on it does not receive traffic. Hence, be minimal and opt for graphics instead to show content.
- Use the space
A cluttered webpage can be quite distracting to the users and so you recommend you to use more space in the layout. Rather than trying to include multiple elements on a webpage, opt for a layout that leaves empty places within the site. This will help the viewer to focus on what is important. Although known as whitespace, it is not necessary that you keep the space white. Use subtle colours that are not too eye-catching to make the readers more focused on important things.
Best Web Designing Trends for 2018
In the year 2017, we saw mobile usage overtaking desktop browsing. Keeping that in mind, let us see what 2018 has in store for web designers.
1. Drop shadows and depth
Shadows are in this year, and web designers are using grids and parallel layouts to play with shadows more to create depth and an illusion.
2. Vibrant, saturated colour schemes
2018 is the year for a colour splash online. More and more designers are breaking stereotypes and going for vibrant shades in the headers. Use contrasting colours to attract visitors’ attention.
3. Mobile first
Mobile browsing has surpassed desktop, and that is precisely why you must make a website keeping mobile in mind first. So let go of the images and opt for icons to save space.
4. Custom illustrations
Illustrations being considered the next big thing by many famous website designers and therefore try to use them to create images that are vibrant and playful. This helps you mellow down the formal tone of a website and makes it friendlier in approach.
- Integrated animations
2018 is the year for better integrated animations and, therefore, you must get rid of static images and start using animations to make a website more engaging. Use integrated animations and GIF files to make the site more fun.
6. Dynamic gradients
Over the last few years, we have seen the website designers use dynamic gradients to make the website look as vibrant as possible. Now in 2018, once again the designers are choosing dimensional colours over flat designs thus marking the comeback of gradients in this year.
With e-commerce looming large over the traditional business practices, website designing has a lot of scopes and earning opportunities. Easy as it may sound, website designing needs a blend of creativity as well as technical skills. However, the above tips are sure to be of great help to the beginners to design a website like a pro.
Author Bio: Gracie Anderson is a celebrated web designer who has several brilliant websites to her name. She is an active blogger and a marketing strategist heading one of the biggest web solutions agencies in the Singapore. She is also associated with myassignmenthelp.com/sg and extends essay help to students pursuing web designing.
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