It is hard to picture that just about a decade and a half ago the internet was unknown to most people. It has grown significantly since, from just a means to quickly communicate through email to what it is today – a powerful platform for ecommerce. Today the internet is the way to do business. Any modern business from multi-national behemoths to the smallest start-up cannot survive without an internet presence through its website.
An easy to get to website is one that can be reached and used by all users, irrespective of any physical disability they might have or the manner in which they use the internet. This is a sufficiently important condition which has become a legal requirement for certain websites in many countries, especially the U.S., and typically government sites.
An accessible website has business significance because current figures indicate that disabled users constitute between 10% and 20% of the population of most countries. These numbers do not include those who are marginally challenged to whom an accessible website would provide a more rewarding internet experience. Another consideration is the average age of users which is steadily increasing in most countries. With advancing years a number of issues arise such as changes in vision and hearing and a steady decline in dexterity and memory. All told the number of internet users who would benefit from more accessible websites would stand at around 30% of the population, a figure that no business can afford to ignore. Let us consider some of the more common issues involved.
Software companies have gone to great lengths to make web design easy, and today, anybody with just basic skills and no knowledge of HTML can build a functional and reasonably attractive website. Cookie-cutter templates and WYSIWYG design makes it possible to be up and running in an hour or two. Is it good? It’s passable. Is it unique? Not at all. Those template websites won’t do you any good if you want to stand out from the crowd. With that in mind, we’d like to present a few basic web design principles for dummies.
Most commercial websites have particular goals in mind. You want somebody to call you, submit an email address, download a paper, or place an order. In order to facilitate that goal, you need to do more than just put your offering on a website. You need a “call to action.”
For the uninitiated, it may seem repetitive. You’ve already put your product information there, and if people want it, they will buy it. Right? Not always. That final little invitation is often what is needed to tip the scales in your favor. That’s the call to action. In the brick-and-mortar world, salespeople call it the “close.” Good salespeople don’t just present a product, they also go the extra mile to ask for the sale and close the deal. You have to do the same thing in the cyberworld.
Word processors, WYSIWYG web design programs and desktop publishing systems offer a tremendous value in terms of font selection and default styles. Want a major heading followed by a subhead? Within most programs, all you have to do is select “Heading1″ for the first line and then “Heading2″ for the second. But while those tools make it easy, these defaults and templates can be dangerous.
Why? Because we tend to take the path of least resistance. If there is a default or a template, we use it. The problem there is that everybody else is using the same defaults and the same templates. Good web design isn’t meant to be easy. It doesn’t rely on preformatted, cookie-cutter design, and it brings in a creative combination of design elements and typography to maximize both impact and usability.
Web developers currently spend a lot of energy on search engine optimization, but that’s only half the battle. Once you get visitors to your site, you need to keep them there—and convince them to take action. That is the role of website usability. A website needs to be above all, attractive, well-written, and easy to navigate. A highly usable website will deliver better conversions and more return traffic. This isn’t hard to achieve; just keep the following tips in mind during the design phase.
