Quick- think of your favorite website that you use regularly. Is it fast? Attractive? User-friendly? Easy to access the information you need? User experience, or UX, is the umbrella term for how a consumer feels about a website, and it can make all the difference for your business’s level of success.

Website Design

In website design, UX is the process of enhancing satisfaction among users by making the website fast, efficient and accessible. The more comfortable a person feels using a website, the more likely he or she is to keep coming back to that site. On the other hand, a website that is cluttered with hard-to-access information, superfluous features that create lag time when loading pages, and a lot of dead ends can turn consumers off and cause them to seek products and services elsewhere, from less complicated sites. Employing basic UX principles in your business’s website design can ensure the user-friendliness and popularity of your company’s website, which can really give you the edge over your competitors.

When it comes to website design, user experience is just as important, if not more, than visual appeal. You can have the most awesome-looking website ever designed, with impressive visual effects and engaging color schemes and graphics- if users don’t feel that they can access information on the site, or if the impressive graphic design makes transitions take forever to load, none of that is going to matter. When a consumer feels alienated by a website, they in turn will feel alienated by your brand or product and look to the competition to meet their needs.

Make Your Website User Friendly

So how do you keep your website easy to use and understand, without sacrificing the amount of info you include in it? Simple: when designing your website, make sure it employs the basic UX principles:

• Digestibility- Is your website easy to understand for users of all levels of online experience?
• Clarity- Are the details associated with your product (pricing, features, etc.) clearly outlined and highly visible?
• Trust- Do your consumers feel comfortable giving your company their personal payment information?
• Familiarity- Are users familiar with the layout and styles employed in your web design?
• Delight- Does your website give users a sense of joy when they buy what you are selling?

UX is key when it comes to building a small business, because it is your customers’ first impression of your company. Make sure it’s a favorable one and you can build brand loyalty and win customers for life.

Contact us for help with your small business Internet Marketing & Web Design!