If you believe professionalism is the only reason to have a good website, then that alone should be enough to convince you. You should note that 57 percent of users say they won’t recommend a business with a poorly designed website.
While a professional appearance is certainly important, there are many more reasons to invest in a quality website. In an ever-changing digital world, let’s talk about web design and what makes a good website in the modern era.
Why A Good Website Is So Important
Briefly, take a moment to consider where most users spend their time on the internet. Overwhelmingly, they spend time on sites like Facebook, Google, YouTube, and similar big brands.
Well, these brands make their fortunes almost entirely off their websites, so they have to invest heavily into the quality of their sites. A byproduct of this is that users become accustomed to this level of quality.
For many small businesses, this means living up to those standards or falling behind. Like it or not, those companies set the standard for the internet, which is why a good website is important.
Secondarily, there are some key benefits that living up to those standards offers. Here are a few examples.
User Experience
User experience (UX) is the quality of experience that users have on your site. Many factors contribute to UX and business owners have control over all of them, including:
- Page loading time
- Mobile-friendliness
- Navigation system
- Linking structure
- Page structure
- Clarity of information
- Redirects and errors
The list goes on. User experience helps your website’s bottom line in a variety of different ways, including improving organic traffic, increasing conversions, and more.
Improving these factors will ultimately help establish trust in your brand, increase user retention, and build brand loyalty down the line. With a high bounce rate, you won’t get that chance.
Improved Conversion Rates
A quality website leads to a lower bounce rate. High retention of user traffic offers plenty of benefits to your company’s bottom line, primarily by improving your conversion rates.
Having a clean navigation system, fast load times, and an overall user-friendly website will prevent unnecessary hurdles for your users. If you’re tired of pouring money into ad campaigns for limited results, then you likely need to invest in your website.
When users click on an ad, they’re essentially looking for instant gratification. They want to know how to get from point A to point B as quickly as possible, and if they don’t figure it out, you will lose them.
On the other hand, a quality website will be associated with a quality product in the minds of your users, which will lead to higher conversions and save you money down the road.
Search Engine Optimization
The good news about search engine optimization (SEO) is that it goes hand-in-hand with UX on nearly every front.
See, search engines like Google have a job to do, and that’s to match highly relevant and quality content with its users. Because of this, it would reflect poorly on search engines if they were constantly promoting websites with poor UX, so Google uses 200 ranking factors related to your website.
Essentially, an investment in UX is an investment in SEO, which is the best driver of organic traffic. An improved navigation system, fast loading times, and mobile-friendliness will only help your ranking.
However, that’s not all your website will do for your SEO strategy.
Improved Content Marketing Strategy
Whether you update a blog, vlog, or another database regularly, content marketing is critical to your SEO strategy. You can post the best content in the world every week but it won’t matter if you don’t have the SEO foundation to support it.
Building Backlinks
A major part of an SEO strategy occurs entirely off of your website, but it can’t be neglected. If you aren’t familiar, backlinks are the links from other websites to yours, and they are the primary factor in a website’s off-page ranking.
However, a link from a directory (while important) is not as valuable as a link from The Wall Street Journal. Building a quality backlink channel undoubtedly takes time, but the payoff is huge.
Well, the best way to do this is by creating “linkbait”. You need to give other websites a reason to link to yours, which starts with a quality website.
Remember, a website is the foundation of your entire digital marketing strategy. It’s where you bring ad traffic, email traffic, and where your content marketing strategy lies. If it lacks quality, it will also lack outside support.
Branding
Finally, we come to branding. In case you don’t already know, a brand is a lot more than just a logo, and your website is the best place to display what your brand embodies.
From color scheme to font to the tone of voice your brand uses, no other mode compares to the control you have on your website. Social media platforms, email templates, and other outlets demand some level of conformity.
However, on your website, you have total control over what is displayed (and how) which provides ample opportunity to create a brand image that resonates in the minds of users.
Building a brand takes time and consistency, but a memorable brand identity will help keep your business afloat for years to come by promoting both recognition and retention among your target audience.
What Makes A Good Website?
Remember, SEO value doesn’t make a good website. SEO is a byproduct of a quality site and content strategy, not the primary objective of a website. Here are the elements of web design that actually matter to your business.
UX Design
Your website design elements, like your content strategy, should focus on the user first and search engines second. If your intentions are primarily for the benefit of your users, then it will show in the finished product.
Whatever website you design, it should be easy to use for anybody stumbling on any page across the entire site.
Quality Content
Every great website comes with unique, quality content. If all of the information and products on your websites can be found elsewhere, why should anybody visit your site? To stand out from the competition, you need a quality content marketing strategy.
Limited Errors
Redirects and errors spell trouble for both your user experience and SEO prospects. When you come to a page that says “404 error,” it doesn’t reflect well on the website and leads to frustration when you are trying to accomplish a task.
Many users take note of such events and choose to avoid sites for which they experience these errors. Site cleanup is very important for a good website design.
Proper Branding
As we mentioned before, a website should be the best display of your brand out of any of your assets. If you’re hiring outside help, ensure that they offer branding services to help with your brand strategy. Users should be able to easily identify your brand on the first page they find.
Marketing Integration
Your website should act as the center for your entire digital marketing strategy. SEO, social media, email campaigns, and advertisements will attempt to drive traffic here, so your website should be reflecting the message of each tool.
Conversion Funnel
Conversions are different for different organizations, so whatever you are trying to accomplish should have an easy way of doing so.
If you are trying to have users sign up for a newsletter, offer these on every page. Want them to buy a product? add catch calls to action (CTAs) on every page.
Whatever your objective is, make it available, recognizable, and easy to use for anybody visiting your site.
Professional Knowledge
The truth is that there is no substitute for hiring a professional web design service. Finding a web designer that focuses on UX design and that is able to work with your brand’s image is the best way to ensure you end up with the right product.
In any case, a good website should be clear, easy to follow, and for the benefit of the user. Unfortunately, a DIY website isn’t going to cut it when you are trying to live up to the standards of the tech giants that rule the internet.
How To Design a Good Website
Now that you know what makes a good website, there is no time like the present to get started. The sooner you build your website, the sooner you will see quality results. Stay up to date with our latest news and feel free to contact us with any questions!