Are you aware of web design best practices of each page on your website? If not, it really is worth your time to familiarize yourself with them. Especially if you are in thinking about or in the middle of redesigning your website. Choosing what types of pages to include on your website is highly dependent on your business.
There’s no way we can give a one size fits all solution that will work for every business. But what we can do is provide an overview of web design best practices for the most common pages your website will likely need. In this post, we’ll show you how to approach creating each page to help you deliver value to your audience.
Homepage Best Practices
The homepage is the most important page on your website. This is the page most visitors that view your website will see when your site first loads. That means you need to make a bold first impression and draw them into your website. 88% of online consumers are less likely to return to a site after a bad experience.
Ensuring your following web design best practices is especially important for the home page. From here, you want them to stay on your website and explore other pages. Remember this: the longer they stay on your site, the more likely they are to become a customer.
- Define your audience and communicate your services to them clearly. If it isn’t obvious who your services are directed at, it needs to be.
- Communicate your value in a customer-centric way. Clearly explain what you offer, but also emphasize the benefits your customer receive. The most successful businesses empathize with their audience and deliver the root benefits they’re after.
- Keep it simple. Less is often more. Don’t put content on your homepage just to fill up space. Make sure every element on your homepage is justified and serves a purpose.
- Use “You” more than “We”. If you’re confused as to why see bullet point number 2.
- Give them a place to go to. Make sure there are sections on your homepage that give a preview of what other pages of your website have so potential customers can explore your website.
Service Page Best Practices
An easy to understand service page is essential for converting a visitor into a marketing lead. If they’re viewing your service page, they are probably in the market for what you offer. To do this, your copy should be clear and concise. Emphasize the net benefits your customer will receive.
The best way to do this is to put yourself in their shoes and think what need/desire they are trying to fulfill. You will notice this becoming a theme throughout this post. The best way to create copy inline with web design best practices is to keep it focused on your audience.
- Make your headlines benefit driven. Don’t just say your product is awesome. Instead, emphasize the awesome benefit your customer will receive from it.
- Keep the copy simple and concise. It’s tempting to be super descriptive and talk up every benefit. But in this case, it’s better to be simple and to the point.
- Make sure your CTA (Call-To-Action) buttons stand out and are well placed. Use active verbs such as “Get in Touch” instead of “Contact” to encourage more conversions.
- Think about including a form page on the main or sub-service pages if it makes sense for the design. If they’re on your service page they are in the market, and you never know when they will decide to pull the trigger. Make it easy for them to convert is one of the cornerstones of web design best practices. The path of least resistance will encourage more conversions.
About Page Best Practices
The About page is your chance to make a human connection with your audience. This is one of the core tenets of web design best practices. Be human, not robotic. Why? Done right, you can differentiate yourself amongst the local competition and gain peoples trust.
Today more than ever, people expect more than just your a product or service from your business. They want a company to have a compelling service and identify with their core values. They’re buying an idea, concept or lifestyle just as much as they're buying a good or service.
- Emphasize your background and story behind your business. Explain your mission and the why behind your business. Creating a narrative behind your brand is essential for differentiation.
- Make a human connection with a personal copy. Avoid corporate buzzwords (like strategic, innovative, synergize etc.). People will roll their eyes.
- Show off your team and what makes your businesses culture unique. Make people want to do business with you.
FAQ Page Best Practices
Creating a Frequently Asked Questions page is especially helpful if you are in a highly regulated or complex industry or if your customers just happen to have lots of common questions before making a purchase. A good FAQ page alleviates potential customers concerns and educates them about your business, industry, and offerings.
- Think through the most common questions your customers have and write up solid answers for them. It’ll save you time in the long run.
- Figure out what is most likely preventing a visitor from contacting your business. What are the major pain points or concerns they may have? Then write up a question and answer that alleviates those issues.
Process Page Best Practices
Creating a process page for your website is a good idea if you are a service business. This gives potential clients a good idea of what they can expect if they hire you.
Check out our web design process page here for a good example.
It follows all the core web design best practices outlined in this post. Namely, benefit-driven copy and clean design. After viewing this page, potential clients of ours will have much fewer questions about what it's like to hire and work with a web designer. Below is how to achieve the same outcome for your process page.
- Emphasize your customers. Don’t explain why your process is the best. Explain why it is best for your customers.
- Do you do things differently that benefits your customers? Make sure they know about it.
- Explain the why behind your process. Don’t just state it. This shows you’ve thought things through and will alleviate concerns or skepticism.
Testimonial Page Best Practices
Testimonials are very important for establishing social proof and increasing sales. Visitors on your website will expect you to say good things about your business. That’s a given. But if other people are saying good things? That changes things. 90% of respondents who recalled reading online reviews claimed that positive online reviews influenced buying decisions (Dimensional Research)
- Testimonials are huge for social proof. Use them on your home page when users are just discovering your business. Also, use them on your service or contact pages when they are close to converting.
- Get a system in place for soliciting reviews and testimonials from your previous clients. The best way to build a solid supply of reviews is to stay on top of it.
Contact Page Best Practices
The goal of a contact page is for a user to get in touch with your business. That means filling out a form or having them call or email you directly. That’s it. The last thing you want to do is make the page too busy. That will hurt conversion rates. Following the below to ensure your contact page is optimized with the end goal of converting in mind.
- Keep it simple. We recommend just a header, paragraph, form, and maybe contact info and social links. Again, this is all highly dependent on your business type and size.
- Show the user where you are located. They may not reach out to you if they don’t know yours near them.
- The more form fields, the lower your conversion rates. Try and only ask for the information you need to set up that initial introduction.
Writing the Website Copy for Each Page
Once you know what web pages your website will have, then you can start planning the copy and content that will fill them up. Great web design will draw your visitors in, but engaging copy and valuable content are what gets them to stay and convert into a sales lead. The design and copy of your website must complete each other in order to be truly effective. Because of that, we recommend waiting until you have sketched out the website wireframes before starting to brainstorm the copy.
By following this workflow, you can create a website that follows modern web design best practices. Rest assured, we will go over how to do just that in the next post of this blog series.
