Must Know Web Design Best Practices
In part one of the six-part Digital Marketing Webinar Series our attendees learned web design best practices to prepare your company’s website for 2015. You can click through our presentation below!
So what’s changing? Practically everything. Websites are evolving from being “nice to haves” to essential lead-nurturing tools. Consumers today engage via a multitude of online channels and with a variety of devices. Management is now looking at digital spending with an eye on ROI. Many organizations are re-prioritizing their websites, and now see them as stars in the marketing mix.
FACT: Globally, smartphone contracts are expected to reach 5.6 billion by 2019. That’s triple the 1.9 billion contracts that exist today!
Web design best practices are an entirely new market dynamic no company can afford to ignore. In the past, many websites have been treated as online eye candy, support tools that were not always viewed for sales accountability. Those days are over.
2015 website visitors have very different needs, depending on who they are and where they are on the path to purchase. To be effective in designing websites, the website experience must answer a prospect’s needs throughout the different stages of the buyer’s journey. Mobile users have half the bandwidth and are twice as impatient. Web design best practices transform your website design to deliver a multi-screen friendly experience with content relevant to user intent. Most importantly, good website design must deliver measurable impact of that content across organic search and other digital channels.
That means in 2015, designing websites strictly for visual appeal is no longer enough. This new marketing climate has revealed three major ways website design falls short.
First, when designing websites it is primarily for visual appeal. The new reality: to be effective in 2015, a website must still look great, but must work much harder to convert site visitors to customers. Second, the content of the website is strictly transaction oriented. This limited functionality keeps a site from working its hardest. Third, marketers have taken a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to search optimization when it comes to web design services. New Google search rules have rewritten the SEO game, making relevant content more essential and valuable than ever.
As a marketer, you likely have competing responsibilities and fill many roles within your organization. Make the most of your time by first understanding the new 2015 mandate of web design best practices for an actionable website. This website design transformation can make your website a lead development and sales powerhouse. By adapting web design best practices you will refine and create new revenue via sales or leads from your website, and thrive in the 2015 digital economy.
