The design and layout of the website is one of the most powerful tools for marketers to use to access, inform and convert browsers to buyers. While this fundamental may sound flatly basic and whilst it is widely known in business, this prime sales tool is not always prioritised.
Ease of User Experience (UX)
Why is my website UX important?
Internet World Stats cites that more than 64% of the population is online. There are more than 5 billion internet users today and as technology becomes cheaper and more accessible, the number of internet users is set to increase rapidly. This presents businesses with an invaluable opportunity to reach an enormous number of potential customers.
Not only is a website a showcase of your brand, it is also one of the strongest tools in the digital marketing toolbox. The internet is on 24/7 and this means that customers can engage with your content whenever and wherever they want to but this is assuming that they stay on your website.
Designed for Attention
How do I make sure that visitors do not leave my site and interact with it?
The most effective way to reduce the bounce rate and increase engagement on your website is to serve relevant, high quality content, with an optimised user experience.
To illustrate how important these factors are, WebFX analysed some usage statistics and found that 94% of first impressions are based on the design of the website, with 75% of users assessing credibility based on the overall design of the site. In this study, thirty eight percent of the visitors that said they left specific sites attributed their moves to poor web design and unattractive layout, and 88% said they would not return to a website if they had a bad experience.
It is worth recognising that not all visitors to a website are going to convert into leads for the business. Many of these visitors may just be browsing but to lose a user due to poor design, layout and user experience, is a travesty because these visitors’ experience on the website contributes to Google’s PageRank algorithm.
Their UX could benefit your business through positive word of mouth coverage.
Three Seconds Rule
What makes a good website?
Serving relevant and high-quality content to your customers in a well-designed and appealing layout is the most important factor. But what happens if they bounce before the page has even loaded?
If visitors are leaving your website before the page they clicked on has even loaded, it’s a clear and urgent signal that your pages are loading too slowly. Unbounce reported that in 2019, the average loading time for a webpage was 15 seconds. Compare this figure with the top-ranking pages on Google, which had an average loading time of three seconds.
Google also reports that most users bounce after waiting three seconds for the page to load. The speed at which a page loads directly influences the probability of a user making a purchase, according to Google.
Clearly, the standard for effective websites is high, and much of the industry is lagging far behind in this aspect. Considering that top-ranking websites have an existing headstart, as well as the incentive to remain at the top of Google’s search rankings, businesses which overlook their websites should take notice and consider optimising or even redesigning this sales asset.
Maximise the impact of your website
Ranking near the top of Google’s search results is naturally the number one priority for digital marketers because this provides the highest amount of exposure to potential customers.
Although this is primarily a Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) responsibility, the website should be designed with full coordination between content creators, web developers and SEO experts. By doing this, each page on the website can be designed for a specific audience and purpose to ensure that there are no competing keywords and topics within the website.
Google needs to serve the right page to the right person. If the team developing the website cooperates with the same goal in mind, the website will achieve more favourable rankings on the search results page.
Improving your load time, page design and layout, and the quality of content on your website, is critical to ensure that users find and stay on your website.
Making a strong first impression, within the first few seconds, is vital when trying to capture the user’s attention. If the user does not find what they are looking for immediately they need to be able to find it quickly, either via the search bar or from links in your content and the sidebar.
But this is not the end of the story. To gain a conversion, users need to be landing on the right page with the right content – with the ultimate aim being to generate a sale or interaction with the business.