How to Elevate Your Website’s User Experience?

• By Zubair Hassan
• 05-09-2020
• Web Design

Any software product meant for consumers will succeed if it has an impeccable user experience. I think this fact has been established by now and is common knowledge. With this said, user experience isn’t the sole factor on which the success of your product depends. However, it is one of the crucial ones that should not be taken lightly.

It is safe to say that technology of 2020 is more UX-centric than ever. The same can be applied to websites, which are our focal point of today.

It takes less than 5 seconds for visitors to decide whether they will be sticking to your website longer or not. This is why it is imperative to make the design not just eye-catching but super-engaging as well so the users convert eventually bringing in the sales or whatever that your website aims to achieve.

So, what are those factors that can really elevate your website’s game not just with the users but within the market place as well? Let’s count them below and discuss them in detail.

1) Optimize Your Website for Loading Speed
Your page loading speed is of utmost importance. Consider yourself as the user and answer when was the last time you stayed on a website that took ages to load. By ages, we mean a couple of seconds.

Users expect the load time to be within 2 seconds. If it takes longer than that, they immediately opt out and look for other faster options. So, before they can even interact, your website needs to load first.

This is why optimizing websites for speed is always pressed as it affects your Google ranking as well. According to Google, if the page loading time extends to more than 3 seconds, then the probability of the bounce rate increases by 32%. Similarly, if the page loading time exceeds to 6 seconds, then the bounce rate increases to 106% - which is bad bad.

In a time of 5G networks and speedy technology, the patience to endure slow loading web pages have run thin. This is why, you need to make sure to perform an in-depth audit and identify the areas that are performing slow in term of loading.
However, here’s a small checklist you can consider.
• Compress images and anything that can be compressed.
• Check server response time and upgrade your hosting services if needed.
• Optimize your code and remove unnecessary indentation and characters.
• Leverage browser caching.
• Minimize CSS, JavaScript, and HTML.
• Reduce redirects.

2) Add the Right Call To Actions (CTAs)
If your website is missing CTAs, then your sales are as good as ‘null’. Why? Because the clients wouldn’t know where to go and what to do with your website. This is why, designing a website that has great navigation and visible CTAs is what will teach your clients/customers how to engage with your website and convert.

Here’s what you need to consider when designing your CTAs.
• Size: The bigger the better but not obnoxiously big.
• Color and shape: Keep the aesthetics right and in-line with the rest of the theme. However, the CTA button should stand out.
• Placement within the page: The placement is important especially if your website is mobile-responsive. You might want to research about the right placement styles and pick the ones that suits your website the best.
• Written copy: The copy for the CTA button needs to be clear, to the point, and concise – it usually goes like “Buy Now” and “Learn More” or “Download for Free”.

3) Incorporate Mobile-Responsive Design
A well-designed website of 2020 is adaptive to all device screens without compromising the quality or loading time. Since mobile screens are smaller than the desktops screens, you need to make sure your important comouponents like the CTAs are optimized accordingly.
Mobile-responsiveness is more crucial for the eCommerce sites that aim to drive maximum sales and revenue. It is important that their online-store is optimized for all screen-sizes. Because if potential customers are finding your website through their smartphones and are forced to open it on their laptops – then that defeats the purpose and neither will they make the hassle.

4) Keep Your SEO techniques Top-Notch
You simply cannot skimp on your website’s SEO. One of the main purpose of having a website is ranking it on search engines for maximum visibility, traffic, and conversions.

For instance, if you are running a software development company in Houston and selling website development services, then you may be trying to rank at the top on a certain search query. Like, website development services in Houston could be your target keyword that you may be trying to rank first on.

Of course, in order for your website to rank, there is a whole part of ‘technical SEO’ that you need to understand. But if we have to explain you in the simplest of ways, then:

Technical SEO involves optimizing your site using the best SEO techniques so search engine crawlers can index your website and rank you better. There is much that goes into your website’s SEO and in order to rank your site better, it is advised to hire an SEO expert to do this job to perfection.

5) Keep that Navigation Simple
A great website has a greater navigation that adds richness to the overall user experience. When visitors can easily navigate through your entire website and find what they are looking for without having to frantically find for it, is a winner website.

So, keep your navigation clean, simple and self-explanatory. Here’s three things that make navigation a lovely affair.

• Minimal: Simple and user-friendly.
• Design: As much as your design needs to translate your brand and its guidelines the best way possible; it also needs to be aesthetically pleasing and familiar.
• Structure: Last but most important, the structure. It needs to be sharp and easily understandable.

Wrapping Up
As much as the functionality of your website is important, the experience it provides is of equal if not more, valuable. This is why your UI/UX designers and mobile application development companies need to be on top of their game with their constant upgrading and updating of your website.