In the past, owning a physical store can do a lot to a business. But in today’s world, building your presence online has the biggest impact on a business. There are many ways a business can be present online or market themselves to reach a wider audience.
Businesses can venture on the world of social media, websites or eCommerce, or email marketing. There are hundreds of ways businesses can reach out to their customers or audience.
Of all these marketing strategies, running a website is one of the best and oldest ways to market a business. Like email marketing, running a website or a blog to market a business has been long done.
We all know about how websites affect business, but less is focused on how a website’s design has an impact on the marketing strategy of a business. Many businesses or marketing experts put effort into producing enticing content, increasing Google’s ranking, and so on. However, only a few take into consideration how a website’s design can impact a business success.
Before diving deep into the importance of web design, let us define content marketing to make things clear.
Content marketing is a marketing strategy that finds ways to promote, drive traffic, and attract audiences by producing engaging content. This content could turn a potential audience into a profit for a business.
There are various kinds of content marketing, this includes blogs, videos, infographics, influencers, and more. This marketing content drives traffic to websites or social media.
Now let us take a look at how a website’s design can affect a business’s content marketing strategy.
Accessibility
We all have gone through reading blogs or websites, and we all have one thing in common. We all want a website that is easy to navigate with no distractions or any difficulty to find what we are looking for.
Therefore, if your business has its own website, it’s time to take into consideration the accessibility of your site. Make information on your site accessible to readers. If you have a website with heavy content, try to design a website that gives the readers the ability to locate what they need easily, instead of feeding them information or things that they don’t need.
If a website doesn’t have accessibility, people will be quick to leave your website. This will cause an increase in the bounce rate, which can also affect your Google’s search engine ranking.
Readability
Have you ever come across a website that has almost all of the colors of the rainbow in their content? It doesn’t look that appealing, right? If you feel that way, it is important to know that when you are design or asking someone to design your website, be sure to keep it simple.
When posting content, opt for fonts that are simple. Choose a size that is easy to read, and readers don’t have to either squint their eyes while reading your content or leave your page without looking through.
A user-friendly website taking should be taking this into consideration when they want their content to appeal to the visitors.
- Use a font that is different for the headings and the body
- Must be using a font color that is readable and doesn’t blend in with the background.
- Font size that is not too small to read, or too big to annoy people.
Simple may look boring, but it’s not. This will be appealing to your readers.
Visual content
In this digital era, we are in, we expect that people become more and more visual. This only means that people will likely engage and prefer a website or blog post with visual content. This became the trend because looking at photos or watching a video can be easily digested.
91% of readers who drop in on a website, prefer to read a blog post or a website content that has an image or a video on it. Therefore, remember to entice your readers with visual content that is relevant to what you have written. Use photos, video, infographics, GIFs, and more that will let them stay on your page a little longer.
It is good to know that 40.2% of marketers use infographics or original illustrations because people prefer this kind of content. This is followed by videos and stock photos.
Here are some reasons why you need more visual content on your website:
- 323% of readers are able to understand an instruction given to them in visual form.
- People are more likely to read content, instead of skimming it when images are present.
- More marketing experts and business owners are using visual content for their website
Overall appearance
First impressions last, so make a good one. It’s a common adage that people use and remember when they want to please others. This is true to website owners and web designers too. The overall appearance of a website could affect the traffic that comes into your website and the bounce rate.
You might have the best content with great visuals and an accessible website. However, if your website’s design looks outdated or unappealing, it could affect your marketing strategy.
Therefore, if you want more visitors to appreciate your content and more people to stay longer on your website, choose a simple, clean, and highly professional looking design.
User-friendly web design
When designing a website, it should only be related to a business’s brand or its mission. A website should be created too, and most importantly, with the readers in mind.
A website that is easy for readers to access, or to look for what they need will help them stay on your page longer. Visitors don’t like to stay longer on a site that is confusing and difficult to manage.
Keep in mind that websites should be created for the convenience of your users.
Wrapping up
Now that you have an idea of how important a website should look like, you must start by keeping the users in mind. When you create a simple, user-friendly, accessible, visual website, it is more likely that visitors will stay on your page. The longer they stay, the more benefit your website will have.
Choose a simple web design that will go hand in hand with your content marketing strategy.
About the Author
John Ocampos is an Opera Singer by profession and a member of the Philippine Tenors. Ever since, Digital Marketing has always been his forte. He is the Founder of SEO-Guru, and the Managing Director of Tech Hacker. John is also the Strategic SEO and Influencer Marketing Manager of Softvire Australia – the leading software eCommerce company in Australia and Softvire New Zealand.