In the world of business, presentation is immensely important. You would not go into an important meeting with your shirt untucked, food stains on your jacket and toilet paper trailing from your shoe and expect to be well received by potential clients. And how you present yourself in the real world is just as critical to success as how you present yourself online.
A website will be the digital storefront of your organisation, so just as you would endeavour to keep any bricks and mortar premises in a neat and tidy condition, so too will you need to spruce up your site and ensure that it is working as it should.
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Good website design is not just about making the interface intuitive and getting branding right; it should concern the nuts and bolts of optimisation, from improving page load speeds to catering to visitors who may be using smartphones and tablets.
Whether you turn to a web design agency in London like britishwebsites.co.uk or choose to handle this internally, a business cannot afford to neglect its website if it is at all concerned about how it looks to outsiders.
Consider the Competition
One of the best ways to establish whether your website is living up to expectations is to compare it with competing sites, or even sites that you use regularly but are not direct rivals, to see how it holds up. No site exists in a vacuum and any presentational problems, glitches and loading issues will be easier to spot if you have some perspective on the matter.
It is also important to consider the impact that the content of pages will have on visitors and not just from an aesthetic point of view. The quality of things like any embedded multimedia files and the coherence of the on-site copy are critical in winning new customers, rather than putting off casual appraisers.
Mobile Friendliness
Mobile optimisation has been a growing concern for businesses, and rightly so. Soon more people will browse the web from smartphones and tablets than desktop machines, meaning catering only to those using full sized PCs with mouse and keyboard interfaces will alienate a huge chunk of potential customers.
Mobile friendliness is also important from an SEO point of view, especially in the wake of Google announcing that this is now a ranking signal that it takes into account when calculating organic search positions.
Even desktop browsers are learning lessons from the mobile world, all in the name of improved efficiency and user experience. Which is why businesses cannot afford to ignore this emerging trend without risking their reputations.
A responsive approach to site design is seen as the way to go by many since it eliminates the need for separate desktop and mobile URLs as well as preventing any potential errors with redirects. But because of the pressure of mobile optimisation, many businesses will need to start from scratch or carry out a thorough overhaul of their current site to ensure they keep pace with the rest of the industry.