12 Tips And Tricks For Increasing Your Conversion Rates Through Web Design

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According to research conducted at Stanford University, 46.1% of internet users determine the credibility of a site by its design. This means that as much as you might concentrate on SEO, social media or leads marketing, your overall site design will still be a crucial factor when it comes to conversion rates.

Another study found that 63% of people were more willing to consume an aesthetically pleasing website as opposed to a plain one. So it’s extremely important your design is attractive, and can keep users engaged with your site. A properly designed website also increases the chances of your site being ranked higher on search engines.  

Here are 12 web design tricks that will help give you a boost in web conversions.

1. Keep your website simple

The number one principle in web design is to keep everything simple. In order for your users to interact effectively with your site, they’ll have to be able to navigate through it easily. Before releasing your site to the public, you should first ask yourself whether there’s a simpler way of creating the site. You can refer to other sites in the same industry to check the industry norm.

Simplicity doesn’t mean you don’t put new features onto your site. It means you have to create a clean design, which is uncluttered and can be used even by a third grader.

2. Highly visible call to action (CTA) button

Website conversions generally occur through the call to action button, so you should ensure the CTA button stands out on your site.  Leverage the use of color and positioning to make the most of it, and choose the right wording for your CTA button in order to convince the end user to click on it.  

A well-designed call to action button needs to be centered or placed on the left of the content. It should also gel with the content for that specific page, in order for it not to be seen as a advertisement.

3. Color scheme consistency

Many studies have shown an increase in conversion rates when certain colors are used in a website. Consistency is key, here. In order for you to have a great web design, you should pay a lot of attention to the color scheme you choose. If you choose to have a certain element represented by a specific color, it’s important you keep the same consistency throughout the whole site. You should also try to avoid using many different colors on your site. Three colors are the preferred norm, with one of these colors dedicated to the ‘call to action’ buttons.

4. Unique selling point

There are millions of sites on the internet, and chances are whatever you are offering is already offered somewhere else. Therefore, your key challenge should be to create a unique value proposition which differentiates your products or services from the rest.

This value proposition has to be centrally placed within your website to make it easy for users to view it. Without a clear value proposition, most users fail to understand why they need your product or service.

5. Consistent branding

It’s important for you to brand your website as you would brand your company. By branding, we mean you should ensure all elements are placed in the exact same way. All your logos and fonts should be of the same type, size, and color. You should maintain similar image styles across your site. If you have items such as forms, or ‘call to action’ buttons, you should ensure they are positioned exactly the same way on every page.

6. Use high-quality images

As a design rubric, always make sure you use high-quality images for your website. You should also consider the type of image you are using. You should not use anything bland; instead, source images that are appealing to your users. Studies indicate that sites/blogs with high-quality, compelling images get 94% more views than others. So choose wisely when it comes to your site’s images. You can also check out sites which have free stock photography, such as Pexels and Negative Space.

7. Mobile responsiveness

In order for your site to boost conversion rates, it should be responsive across all devices. A large percentage of people access the internet through mobile devices. If you fail to provide a mobile version of your site, your conversion rates might be quite low. Make sure your site looks as crisp and clear on mobile devices as it does on desktops.

Are you wondering how you can make your site responsive? There are thousands of freelancers who can convert your pre-existing site to a mobile one today.

8. Reduce the number of clicks

Good web design makes sure users can get to pages or information using the shortest number of clicks possible. You should also avoid having too many popups on your website. This is a good way of turning people away.

This is a good design tip for e-commerce websites as well. You should make sure your users go through the whole process seamlessly. Don’t add too many extra steps.  This is one of the main reasons shopping carts get abandoned.

9. Minimise user input

When designing a form for your site, ensure you minimise the user’s input. Only ask for important information, because users are bored of filling forms out. If necessary, you can integrate your site to social media plugins that extract information about the user in a one-click process. Platforms like Wordpress have a number of such plugins.

10. Make use of negative space

There are generally two types of space; positive space and negative space. Positive space is the space that contains all elements in your site. Negative space is the empty space on sites. This refers to the space between paragraphs, lines of texts and letters. Good web design makes use of empty space when delivering their content, as it makes content easy on the eye and easily consumable.

11. Increase load times

Your page load time can affect your conversion rates significantly. A mere one second delay can lead to a 7% reduction in conversions.  Therefore, you need to make sure your site is loading quickly in order to achieve high conversion rates. To test your site’s load time, use tools such as GTmetrix or Pingdom.

12.8 second rule

Finally, it’s important to note that the attention span of any user is around 8 seconds. Your content needs to grab your user’s attention to get them to stay on your site a bit longer. Catchy content always leads to high conversion rates!

Conclusion

If you focus on putting these 12 tips to use, you will be on the path towards higher conversion rates. Keep in mind that good site design goes hand in hand with SEO, and lead generation. If you want the best results, never substitute one for the other.

Do you have more tips and tricks for increasing conversion by using web design? Share it below with other freelancers.

Posted 12 September, 2017

TomCoulter

Designer // Writer // Creative

Tom is a Design Correspondent for Freelancer.com. He is currently based in Melbourne and spends most of his non-work moments trying to find the best coffee.

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