A lot of Internet users are convinced that the only thing web design ever does, when done well of course, is to make a website look great. This is partially true – but far from what web design is all about. There are many factors and aspects related to web design and the things that it affects. Search engine optimization – or SEO – is one of those things. Web design and SEO go hand in hand, affecting each other’s performance.
The very first thing you must understand as a business owner is that a website is not a choice – it is a requirement. Your company must have a site that will solidify its image and value on the Internet. This site of yours will have to properly convey your business message and provide your target audience with valuable information about your services or products. The only question is: how do you design such a website? The answer is simpler than it may seem at first – you need to hire a web design agency that has experience and qualifications in your particular niche. It would help if you didn’t have to worry about finding a good design company. Given the market realities, there is an overflow of agencies due to the high demand of these types of services. And, of course, a lot of these web design agencies would be happy to design, develop, and launch a website for your company – a website that can help you boost your client conversions, ROI, sales, and more.
However there is one thing you want to pay particular attention to. When you interview candidate web design agencies, you want to find out which services they offer beyond just web design. You should find a company that is able to take care of your site’s content and search engine optimization. Without these two things, your website is going to be as good as if you’ve never had it. SEO is one of the things that can make or break your online success.
As for now, let’s imagine that you have already launched a website. Let’s say you’ve created it using one of the many free website builders found available on the web. So, you’ve launched it and tried to optimize it by using either SEO services or figuring it out yourself. But, no matter how hard you try, the result is always the same – it comes out horrible. You can’t get anywhere near the first page of search results. Well, you should’ve trusted the designing of your website to someone that has a profound understanding of the web design process, knows a lot of designing techniques, and has access to professional designing tools and knows how to use them. There are many ways your website’s design affects your SEO directly. And if this paragraph describes your situation then it is about time to find and hire a reputable web design agency. The agency should help you to either re-design your current site or build a new one from scratch, meanwhile taking into account everything related to SEO.
Below we have described some of the issues related to web design that may potentially harm your site’s SEO.
Unreadable Text Content
Website content is meant to be read. But if the font on your website is too small, none of your visitors will be able to read anything. A color pattern that makes text illegible creates the same situation. For example, white text and a yellow(ish) background are a nightmare, migraine inducing combination.
When your text content is too hard to read, users aren’t going to waste their time trying to make sense of everything on your web page. They will give up and go to one of your competitors whose website has legible content.
Your web design agency may also use a readability tool that will help them make certain your site’s visitors will always be able to read your text content comfortably.
Content That Isn’t Exactly Useful
For a web user, the entire point of visiting a website is to get something useful out of the provided content. That could be information regarding services or products, or it could be something to entertain the visitor. When your web content isn’t useful, don’t expect your visitors to stick around for long and become loyal customers.
Web-users also don’t like bad grammar, poor punctuation, and typos in the text content on websites. Make sure your web design agency has a professional copywriter that can deliver high-quality content that is interesting, valuable, and readable.
Non-Responsive Web Design
In the event that your site is not responsive, even though mobile users have already outnumbered desktop users, don’t be surprised when your site’s ranking and traffic aren’t anywhere close to where you had envisioned them to be.
Not one mobile user will keep on browsing your website if the design doesn’t display properly on their mobile device. Because of this restriction, you are going to lose not just traffic and a good position in search results, but potential sales as well. Moreover, Google has recently rolled out a search engine update – Mobile-First Index – according to which responsive sites have a priority over non-responsive ones. All your efforts to optimize your website will make little sense if you don’t take care of the mobile aspects of web design.
Conclusion
Business owners sometimes get so preoccupied with their work that they stop noticing everything that negatively affects the results they are ultimately working towards. To avoid these types of situations, web design agencies always take their projects through user testing. It helps them reveal any possible errors or issues that negatively affect user experience. Doing this at different stages of the web design process helps achieve the best web design possible in line with the client’s particular requirements.
When you hire an experienced and reputable web design agency, you essentially access a talent pool far greater than other possible options. You get to work with a hive mind that is a collection of skills, qualifications and experience with copywriting, web design, web development, SEO, and more. And it’s not about trying to get the cheapest option on the market. While it may not be the most affordable service, web design is a necessity, if you want to get the most out of your website and turn it into your 24/7 marketing and sales assistant.
While your website needs to look great, you must be sure that its SEO is as good as the site looks, if not better. Your target audience should find out as much valuable information about your brand as possible, so you can gain their trust. This will later translate into lead generation, which is a direct path to the ultimate goal – client conversions. Taking care of your website’s SEO is like filling your car with premium oil – it will make the engine run smoothly for a long, long time.
