Website design in Colorado and development go hand-in-hand. A great-looking website can’t be expected to convert site visitors into clients and customers if the links don’t work. Likewise, no one will want to look at a poorly-designed website that has fast, intuitive functionality. Customers expect easy navigation of your website and they expect it to look not only professional but like a site that matches your brand’s look and feel. The most successful online businesses these days combine functionality with design.
So how exactly does website design affect your Colorado business? There are many aspects of web design to consider, as well as metrics related to design you should pay attention to as you develop and expand your site.
First, let’s examine a few elements of your website’s design that are affecting your bottom line positively or negatively right now:
Website Design in Colorado and Your Business
The most important design concept for any website you expect visitors to use to buy your products and services from is simplicity. Knowing your target audience and what they want from your brand, you should put the products, services, and information you know most visitors want first “above the fold.” This newspaper concept simply means putting the most important information at the top of the page, so that users don’t have to scroll down to get what they want. This is easier said than done if your products or services require education of your audience, but the more you can prioritize certain pieces of information and links by keeping them above the fold, the better off your user experience will be. (For more elements of web design style, click here).
Play with Color
Color is an important yet underrated part of any website’s design. Simply changing your call-to-action button on your homepage from one color to another can increase conversions. Think about the emotional impact of certain colors and your target audience. If your ideal customer is a woman, for example, blues, purples, and greens are generally more effective.
Use Video
A picture is worth a thousand words, and studies by researchers the world over are finding that a video is almost worth a thousand pictures. Some research (such as this study by Digital Commerce 360) has shown that product videos have increased sales and conversions by as much as 144%. As a rule of thumb, a video showing your product’s differentiating factors or of company leaders explaining their mission statements make customers feel more comfortable with your brand and retain more of the information you’re trying to provide to them.
Clear Unique Value Proposition and Call-to-Action
This is the bread and butter of your website. It’s the button customers click on to sign up or order. It’s the reason why they should sign up or order. Writing effective Unique Value Propositions (UVP) and Calls-to-Action (CTA) is difficult enough. Don’t hide that carefully crafted copy in an inconvenient area of your website, put these crucial sentences where they deliver the clearest message to the casual visitor who may need to be convinced of your brand’s positivity.
Metrics to Watch
Any website design company in Colorado will set you up with ways to measure the effectiveness of your design choices. The problem with many business owners is that they focus on the wrong metrics and make the wrong changes. Here are a few metrics you should pay attention to that indicate successes and flaws in your design (see more here):
Mobile Visitors and Engagement
These days, if your website doesn’t translate well to mobile devices, you’re missing out on huge swaths of potential customers visiting your site. Customers don’t have time to turn their phones to the side and squint at tiny copy not optimized for their small phone screens. If you notice the vast majority of your site’s visitors are on desktops, you need to take a look at your mobile site optimization because you could be missing out on sales and conversions.
Load Time
Do large swathes of users visit your site and leave within a minute? It could be because of load time. Customers expect websites to load in the snap of their fingers. Even a slight delay in load time causes many to lose interest and/or navigate away from your site to a competitor’s.
One factor that increases load time is the web hosting service you’re using, but overloading your webpage with too much content, especially pictures and videos, will slow load time as well.
Bounce Rate
Bounce rate is a common metric examined by web developers and designers and often obsessed over by business owners. The bounce rate shows how many visitors come to your site, see the first page they land on, then, without clicking on another link on your website, leave, usually without spending more than a minute interacting with your page. If your bounce rate is high, customers are experiencing something either functionality- or design-related that is turning them away from your brand.
Make sure your website design expert in Colorado can maximize your website’s potential.