Surprisingly, many business owners and marketers fail to take into account why their audiences are choosing to visit their websites and how they like to interact once they’re on the website. If someone is on your website, they are likely searching for an answer to their question. With this in mind, your first goal when designing your website should be to help your visitors get the information they need as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Warby Parker, an online retailer of designer eyeglasses, is a company that implemented this strategy well when designing its website. With eyewear being somewhat technical and highly taste specific, Warby Parker’s simplified website design makes it extremely easy for visitors to find the right products for them. The company understands its customers well and knows that they want to be able to use the website to make comparisons and find similar frames based on their previous views. Customers even have the ability to use the website to request up to 5 pairs of eyeglasses for free for a 5 day trial period.
2. Develop clear buyer personas.
Too many businesses make the mistake of designing the website first and then incorporating buyer personas later. Taking into account your various buyer personas and how they make decisions will help you to most effectively design your website and define a voice for your brand that resonates with your audience.
An example of a website that speaks to several buyer personas is Fox Valley Technical College. Upon arriving at the website’s homepage, the visitor has the choice to explore 4 discernible areas. Each area is catered to a specific buyer persona and allows the visitor to dig deeper into the content to find specific answers to questions.
3. Optimize for mobile.
It’s no secret that smartphone and tablet users are on the rise. In fact, approximately 60 percent of digital media is done from smartphones and tablets. If you aren’t currently optimizing your website to be mobile friendly, your website is going to suffer. Your audience should be able to view your website just as easily from their mobile devices as from their desktop computers. While in the past, businesses typically had to build an entirely separate website for mobile users, current technology makes responsive web design much easier to achieve.
If you’re looking for some good examples of responsive web design, AWWWARDS put together a list of websites that look good on all browsers, desktops, tablets, and smartphones. Or, open our website up on a mobile phone, tablet, and desktop to see how the content on our website scales according to the device size making for a unified experience.
Of course, there are many additional factors that go into great website design, but prioritizing these 3 ingredients will get you results. When you put your customers first and incorporate how you can solve their problems into your website’s design, your company will benefit.
