Websites have long evolved from just providing information to visitors. Users today expect your website to allow them to find information quickly, offering a comfortable overall experience. Everything from the aesthetic of your site to the placement of your CTAs can impact how long visitors stay on your page. The good news is that it is easy to make your website more user-friendly.
Here are some ideas to get you started on making your website more user-friendly.
1. Listen to Your Users
Getting inputs directly from your target audience will allow you to discover missing elements you might not see on your own. Users often know precisely what they don’t like about a website. It’s your job to take those comments and turn them into positives by fixing any features your visitors dislike. Platforms like Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager and Crazy eggs will provide you with valuable insights on how users actually interact with your site.
2. Loading speed
Web users expect your site to load at lightning speed (less than 2 seconds), even on mobile devices.
There are some tools out there that will allow you to check your site speed, including Pingdom and Google’s Page Speed Insights. These sites will also give you tips on how to speed up your site. Two simple things you can do to start are checking your server’s speed and optimizing any images.
3. Make Main Navigation easy to understand
The navigation bar is essential because it follows the site visitor throughout their journey on your site and serves as a tool to go back to the landing page.
At the same time, you need to limit the number of categories in your navigation bar, so it doesn’t become overly bulky—you should also place it in the same location on every page. Conduct some A/B testing with your bar, trying slightly different positions, tab arrangements, and even wording. This will tell you what users prefer and what works best for your site.
4. Choose Colours Carefully
Choose the colours for your website carefully. You need a perfect balance between beauty and clarity. Not only does your colour palette need to make sense for your industry, but the contrast between the background and text needs to be enough so that the visitor can read texts easily and not strain the eyes.
5. Improve Your Site Layout
Keep in mind that about 80% of the internet users own a smartphone and they are spending more and more time accessing the Internet via their phones.
With that in mind, having a responsive layout becomes even more critical. Does your site look good on both desktop and mobile? It is more important that mobile users can see things without having to zoom in every few seconds and navigate easily throughout the site.
6. Pay Attention to Call-To-Actions
Do you have strong call-to-actions (CTAs) on your pages in locations that make sense? Site visitors who decide to buy or register for your newsletter would want to know how to take the next step. Make this simple by using a strong CTA that’s easy to locate.