Web Design for Small Screens – User Experience at the Top

While many industry experts believe the rumour that Google only prefers responsive websites, this statement is partially true. Google gives greater credibility to websites that ensure good user experience – responsive or not. The success of your web design still hinges on the content that you offer on the site. However, to highlight that content and to make it presentable, navigation plays a crucial role.

Whether your target audience is accessing your website from a smartphone, mobile devices or the usual PCs, website navigation is something that shapes user experience. A well-thought out navigation compliments your content and enhances users’ understanding of what the website is all about. A few years back, mobile web was an uncharted territory and not many web designers were really looking forward to designing for the small screens. However, now times have changed and website design is more about being accessible to the target audience and conveying the message through impactful content, irrespective of the device they use.

So, what is it that you can do to make your website navigation adaptable to even the small screens on your smartphones? As per Google’s guidelines, responsive web design surely is the best practice for designing a flexible website that can adapt to any device, yet it may not be what the users want. Keeping user experience as the ultimate goal, Google says that webmasters can use different HTML to serve their content for small screen devices. This makes one thing very clear that Google doesn’t want everybody to go responsive; rather, it wants website designers to create sites that meet the users’ requirements.

Given below are few tips on designing websites that support smartphones and feature phones –

1.    Please the users, not the bots – Obsessing over responsive design may not pay off well if you are trying to reach users of feature mobile phones. It is important to identify user target audience and the type of phones they use. Designing your website as per the type of phones used by the targets would help in ensuring superior user experience.

2.    If not responsive, you can go for dynamic serving or separate URLs – When designing for feature phones, responsive websites do not perform well. So you can opt for either dynamic serving or separate URLs for feature phone mobile users. Separate URLs work well in smartphones as well.

3.    Stick to the conventional website structure that people are used to – When you experiment with your mobile web design, users tend to feel lost and confused on the site. It is important to eliminate complexity and stick to the site structure that users are familiar with.

Thus, instead of going by what the ‘experts’ say, it is best to find out what the users want, and design your mobile website accordingly.

Read More

Using Unique and Memorable Illustrations in Web Design

You may have very well worked out the navigation plan, the content structure and the development part of your website, but something that really catches the eye of the user first is the aesthetics of the site. Sometimes even the most technically-advanced websites fail to make their mark due to the missing aesthetics. Using recognisable and memorable illustrations in the web design completes a website and makes it look visually appealing.

Business websites are not merely set up for providing contact information about your company; rather they are a very important branding tool that can help you reach out to the target audience and convey your message through your website. When using illustrations for branding purpose in a website, understanding the marketing aspects and user preferences is vital.
Using illustrations instead of icons and symbols makes your brand more attractive to the audience. A web designer can partner with an illustrator to create memorable and recognisable illustrations, so that whenever people see them, they immediately connect those to your website.

Where to use illustrations?

Illustrations in web design are an important branding tool, and it can be used in many areas of your website. Presented below are just few of the places illustrations can be used on a website –

• Logo – A logo generally is about a creative punch line and some design. But combining it with an illustration can have greater impact.

• In the header – Again using a distinguished illustration on the header of your website can be seen as your brand’s signature. So whenever the illustration is there, people would know which brand it represents.

• Background – Web designers can give a unique effect to their sites by using illustrations in the background. Illustrative backgrounds have the power to captivate the target audience quite easily. However, the designer needs to have special skills to use illustrations effectively in the background.

When using illustrations in a website, it is important to maintain consistency to have the maximum impact. Moreover, taking inspiration from other websites can also greatly help in empowering your online brand through illustrations.

Read More

Style Tiles – Simplifying the Web Design Process

When working on a web design project, the most common approach used by most of the web designers is creating different wireframes, getting the clients approval for one of them and nailing down the layout. This seemingly-simple approach doesn’t always work this way because it takes more than that to convince a client. So to simplify the design process, there is a better alternative to wireframing, and that is Style Tiles.

For those who are in initial design stages, using Style Tiles for better visual understanding is a great way to get started. Majority of clients aren’t too sure of what they want, but they know what they don’t want. So, with the help of Style Tiles you can provide the options for fonts, colours, textures, and other interface elements that they would want to be used in their websites. This way, in a single web page, you provide them multiple options to choose from. This approach is similar to what the interior designers do. Before beginning the project, the interior designers show their clients the paint options, texture options and fabric options to choose from.

This is a great alternative to creating wireframes that consume more time because you have to create a full mock up, which has to be too precise. You no longer have to get involved in complicated logistics in creating those wireframes. All you have to do is give multiple options to the client, get their approval and begin the work on the actual website. If the client changes his mind in the mid of the project, you always have other options that can easily replace the existing ones.

From typography to colours and button styling to patterns, everything can be shown to the client in a single page. This tool provides a visual direction to the website designer as well as to the client. Designers who are aiming to create a website that attracts the users and creates a brand, using Style Tiles instead of structuring the page and worrying about the size ratios between elements is a safe bet.

Go for Style Tiles, if you want to save your time and want to provide a clearer visual experience to the clients.

Read More

Fixed-Position Menu in Website Design – Enhancing Site Navigation

Navigation has always been the most crucial element in website design because this is what determines how well users can explore the site and find the right information. There are numerous ways of setting up the navigation menu to make the site not only easy to browse, but also enhances the overall appearance of the site. One of the most popular navigation styles these days is the fixed-position menus.

In websites design that use traditional navigation style, users have to scroll up each time to access the menu. The fixed-position menu or sticky menu, on the other hand, remains static in its place, so that it doesn’t move up as the user scrolls down the web page. More users prefer websites with sticky menus because they can be accessed even when the web page has been scrolled down. This also ensures that people can move on to next web page in less time when the websites has a sticky menu in contrast with the websites with standard navigation menus.

Here, we outline some of the common benefits of fixed-position menus that most web users have experienced –

-    Quicker navigation

-    Ease of use

-    Higher accessibility of web pages

-    Mobile-friendly

-    Improved user experience

While it is not suitable in every situation, fixed-position menus can be a good alternative to traditional ones when it comes to improving the usability and user experience. Though it is mostly preferred for the primary navigation menu, fixed-position style is also used is the side bars and footers.

For web designers who are considering to use sticky menus in their websites, must have a look at the tips mentioned below in order to make the site easy-to-use.

Use CSS – Most web designers use CSS to create fixed-position menu as it is easy to implement and quickest to code. The position, margin-top and z-index have to be adjusted in order to make the menu work for your website.

Should not compete with content for attention – The position of the menu bar has to be determined carefully so that it does not obstruct the content or takes away all the attention from it. Content should always be the most important element of the web page and the menu should ideally be either on top of the page, on side bar or at the footer. Positioning it in the centre of the page is a bad idea as it obstructs reading of the content.

Ideal for websites that have long web pages – The perfect situation for using sticky menus is when the web pages of the site are too long. This menu style ensures that the user doesn’t have to scroll all the way up to reach the menu.

Do not use iFrames – This tool can be used for creating fixed-position menu but it should be avoided because it hampers cross-browser compatibility and search engine optimisation of the site.

Read More

Web Design Services: How to Choose the Reputed Company?

If you are thinking to design or re-design a website, then this article can help you out. These days, almost every company is having its own website. All the essential information including work details and contact information are given on the website. Thus, websites play an essential role in the success of a company.

Always remember the fact that users surf those websites only which they find user-friendly and appealing. If they find the website to be dull or outdated, they immediately move to the next website. Thus, it is crucial to have latest web designs which are eye-catching to the customers.

If you really want to make attractive and appealing web pages, you will definitely need the website design services. There are several trustworthy as well as professional IT companies which are offering excellent quality web design services. A reputed designing company can provide you with professional guidance which can bring positive results in your business.

Web development as well as design can sound easy for the people, but in reality it includes several efforts and planning to achieve the preferred results. Always choose that company which offers unique web page designs. This will attract more potential customers for your business.

Prior choosing any company for designing your website, you must check its portfolio. By looking at the portfolio, you can easily review all the project details of the company. Apart from this, make sure that the company you are choosing has expertise in various designing software such as Adobe, Flash, Java, etc. The staff of the company should be professional and well trained.

Read More

How to Simplify Navigation through Responsive Menus in Mobile Website Design?

Responsive website design is now a widespread concept in the industry – thanks to the rising popularity of smartphones and mobile web technologies. The entire focus of responsive websites is to ensure finest viewing experience by combining a fluid layout and media queries to fit different screen sizes. The ability to easily read and navigate with minimum resizing, panning and scrolling across a wide range of devices makes responsive websites ideal for this post-PC age.

Responsive Navigation Menus – Enhancing User Experience

Responsive menus are the key to successful mobile websites. With the help of CSS media queries, the task of designing responsive navigation links becomes easier. There are different points to consider when designing a responsive menu, such as having a different style, different content or different location on the page. Adapting to a responsive menu not only simplifies the navigation but also enhances the design and the user experience.

To understand how to use responsive menus for superior navigation and user experience, we present 4 easy approaches –

• Changing the visual design to fit narrower screens – The screen resolution of smartphones and tablets are smaller than that of PCs and laptops. This means that, when viewed on the narrower screens, the visuals wouldn’t be as appealing as they are otherwise. This is why, adjusting the visual design to portrait and landscape modes can help a lot.

•  Improving tappability of navigation links for touch devices – In smaller devices, mouse is replaced by the thumb, which is relatively bigger in size. Tapping on the small links with the thumb sometimes doesn’t always take us to the right link. This is why adjusting the size of the navigation links using CSS and making them look like buttons greatly improve their tappability.

• Adjusting the location of the menu – The placement of the menu bar is also an important factor when focusing on simpler navigation and better user experience on mobile devices. On small screen devices such as mobile phones, relocating the menu to the bottom of the page (above the footer) makes sense because when the user has finished reading that page, they know where to go from there using those navigation links at the bottom.

•  Displaying different menu styles – There are variations in the screen size of mobile devices. Using CSS, you can display different styles of the menu in difference devices. For some websites, radical alterations to the menu are required, while for others a different structure would do.

Each approach has different implications, and before you adopt any of these for your mobile website design, it is important to consider a number of factors such as the focus of the website, the nature of the menu and the requirements of the target audience.

Read More

Website Visitor is the King

It would not be an over-rated inference if we say that the visitor of the website is the king. After all, the business owner needs regular visitors to run the business. They (the visitors) are the potential customers who ultimately turn into customers. All that is needed is a good website. Now, good is an ambiguous term – a good website is the one that caters well to the needs of the visitors. Over the years there has been a revolutionary change in the field of internet technology. Web development has turned into a learning subject, and the process of web designing has been streamlined.

 Looks matter – but not always 

 

It’s definitely a myth that looks matter the most. Beyond an iota of doubt, looks do matter, but not at the cost of speed. Some visitors constantly complain that whenever they try to open a website it takes ages to load. Magnum opus pictures, jazzy flash files and loads of other stuff make a web page difficult to open and load for any visitor. A good web designer would know that one should never force it. Credibility is all that matters and so does speed. An ideal web page design would definitely please a visitor. Web designers in Sydney exactly do that. They create fresh and pleasing web pages.

Ranking matters – but not at the cost of penalization

Website ranking is important because a visitor usually opens up a website as per descending order in Google. To lure target customers/visitors some web designers just play around keywords and meta-tags. But, Google is smart and has been evolving over the years. Google has deployed smart tools and other means to catch hold of rogue websites that overuse keywords and meta-tags. The moment such a website is found, Google is quick to blacklist it. Designers of website in Sydney know the value of content. A good content writer would write juicy content so that hungry readers can sink their teeth into the quality information the web page gives out.

The interface of the web page

The web page’s interface should be such that it responds quickly to the visitor’s activities. The experience of a user is the foremost aspect to consider when designing a website. A web page should respond quickly to keyboard/ mouse input and give out the desired results. People these days use android phones with touch screens. So, the interface of a web page should be really quick in response when a user taps on the touch screen. This also means that this is the age of mobiles, so the website should work on all platforms. Every penny spent matters, so websites should churn out profits to their owners.

Read More