Five Reasons to Make Your Website User Friendly
Ask yourself honestly: what draws you to a website and keeps you exploring? While you may first be enticed by the website’s promise of strong content and incredible products, these draws may not be enough to keep you around if the website hurts your eyes and is impossible to get around.
This is especially true for mobile websites. A staggering 74% of web users report returning to a website if it proves to be easy to navigate on a mobile device. Needless to say, as you design your own website, you will want to keep your own audience in mind.
What all goes into a user-friendly website? Perhaps most notably, the interface should be easily understood, the navigation shouldn’t be too cumbersome, and the site should be easily accessible to a wide range of people.
If you’re still not sure where to begin, don’t worry. We have a guide to help you here:
What is a User-Friendly Site?
Before we jump into the benefits of designing a website with your users’ needs in mind, it’s worth quickly defining what a user-friendly website details. In the simplest terms, such websites meet very specific criteria, including:
Aesthetically pleasing design: When it comes to designing a top-notch website, looks matter. That is not to say that your website should overflow with gimmicky visuals and flashy graphics. It should, however, catch the eye and offer some defining characteristic that makes users remember it and want to return.
Easy to navigate without excessive clicking: There is nothing worse than having to click a link dozens of times just to get to the next page. Users should be able to skip between pages seamlessly.
Simple to use across devices: Some websites look beautiful on desktop. They pop with color and capture attention without causing headaches. Unfortunately, when you visit them on mobile, that all changes. A good website should be able to adapt to any device.
Speedy load times: No one wants to wait several minutes for a page to load, especially when it would be less time-consuming to click away and find a website that loads lightning-fast. Keep in mind that more than half of users (roughly 52%) will leave a website if it takes longer than three seconds to load.
Easy to access: The web makes finding information easier than ever––for everyone! Ideally, you should also integrate accessibility support for users with disabilities.
What are the Benefits of a User-Friendly Website?
All of the points above are clearly important when you’re dealing with websites. The deeper users have to dig for the information they need, the more frustrated they will become. At best, an impossible-to-navigate website comes off as out of touch with modern standards. The worst possible outcome is that a user abandons doing business with you altogether!
Fortunately, you can prevent this. Here are the top benefits of prioritizing user friendliness when creating your website:
1. Increase User Satisfaction
One of the most obvious benefits of improving your website’s user friendliness is a marked improvement in your users’ overall satisfaction! In fact, 90% of web users admit to leaving a site if it fails to load and function as intended.
By improving your site and implementing a variety of often basic design choices, you’re inviting more people to experience your website rather than just click through it. Much like brick-and-mortar stores, the more visually appealing and accessible your website is, the more people will be inclined to stay for a while.
2. Add Visual Appeal
Often, the process that makes a website more user friendly also doubles to make your website more organized. Cutting down on clutter and excessive, unnecessary information makes for a streamlined experience. This often results in more modern-looking websites.
One of the biggest changes you can make in this area is to make use of more headers and subheaders. Many modern website designs also revolve around smaller blocks of text. When possible, these blocks may be further broken down into single-line bullet points.
This may also improve your overall mobile compatibility, to boot!
3. Increase User Retention
Despite the ideal user experience involving less clicks, many well-designed websites actually retain their customers for far longer than older, more interaction-heavy websites. When a visitor to your site finds that they have to click through an endless nesting doll of pages to find the basic information they want, they’ll often leave your site quickly. This is referred to as “bouncing”, wherein a user lands on and then quickly exits your page.
Satisfied users, on the other hand, will stay to read what you have to say. This is extremely important to search engines, where the amount of time that users spend on your site is part of the algorithmic ranking of results. Moreover, this is important to you, as it increases the likelihood that a simple visit will turn into a purchase.
4. Improve Conversion Rates
On ecommerce sites, deeper user engagement often leads to more conversions. When customers enjoy using your site, they’ll spend more time browsing it. This leads to more interactions and more content getting seen.
The longer someone spends poking around your digital storefront, the more likely they are to see something that interests them. For internet-based sellers, this is exactly what you want. You want organic search results to turn into purchases, and user-friendly websites are exactly how you can get there.
However, you also need to keep in mind that your buying process should be as appealing as your visual presentation. When the user clicks to purchase an item, you don’t want to start sending them through several different pages to process a simple order!
5. Boost Your Overall SEO Rankings
Finally, and in conjunction with improved user retention and conversion rates, user-friendly websites have higher rankings on search engines. Also known as search engine optimization, this algorithmic and automated process is how major search engines, like Google, rank and categorize your website. The higher your “rating”, the closer to the top of the results you’ll be.
When people find your page within the first few results of their search, they’re likely to click on it. This naturally leads to browsing your site and, hopefully, investing in your business.
Bottom Line: Reap Meaningful Rewards With a User-Friendly Website
Improving your site’s overall usability might not be an easy task, nor will it necessarily be done overnight. However, the time and monetary investment you make to update and improve your digital storefront will ultimately pay off.
Need help optimizing your website for success? We have the tools to get you there. Reach out to us today!
Ask yourself honestly: what draws you to a website and keeps you exploring? While you may first be enticed by the website’s promise of strong content and incredible products, these draws may not be enough to keep you around if the website hurts your eyes and is impossible to get around.
This is especially true for mobile websites. A staggering 74% of web users report returning to a website if it proves to be easy to navigate on a mobile device. Needless to say, as you design your own website, you will want to keep your own audience in mind.
What all goes into a user-friendly website? Perhaps most notably, the interface should be easily understood, the navigation shouldn’t be too cumbersome, and the site should be easily accessible to a wide range of people.
If you’re still not sure where to begin, don’t worry. We have a guide to help you here:
What is a User-Friendly Site?
Before we jump into the benefits of designing a website with your users’ needs in mind, it’s worth quickly defining what a user-friendly website details. In the simplest terms, such websites meet very specific criteria, including:
-
Aesthetically pleasing design: When it comes to designing a top-notch website, looks matter. That is not to say that your website should overflow with gimmicky visuals and flashy graphics. It should, however, catch the eye and offer some defining characteristic that makes users remember it and want to return.
-
Easy to navigate without excessive clicking: There is nothing worse than having to click a link dozens of times just to get to the next page. Users should be able to skip between pages seamlessly.
-
Simple to use across devices: Some websites look beautiful on desktop. They pop with color and capture attention without causing headaches. Unfortunately, when you visit them on mobile, that all changes. A good website should be able to adapt to any device.
-
Speedy load times: No one wants to wait several minutes for a page to load, especially when it would be less time-consuming to click away and find a website that loads lightning-fast. Keep in mind that more than half of users (roughly 52%) will leave a website if it takes longer than three seconds to load.
-
Easy to access: The web makes finding information easier than ever––for everyone! Ideally, you should also integrate accessibility support for users with disabilities.
What are the Benefits of a User-Friendly Website?
All of the points above are clearly important when you’re dealing with websites. The deeper users have to dig for the information they need, the more frustrated they will become. At best, an impossible-to-navigate website comes off as out of touch with modern standards. The worst possible outcome is that a user abandons doing business with you altogether!
Fortunately, you can prevent this. Here are the top benefits of prioritizing user friendliness when creating your website:
1. Increase User Satisfaction
One of the most obvious benefits of improving your website’s user friendliness is a marked improvement in your users’ overall satisfaction! In fact, 90% of web users admit to leaving a site if it fails to load and function as intended.
By improving your site and implementing a variety of often basic design choices, you’re inviting more people to experience your website rather than just click through it. Much like brick-and-mortar stores, the more visually appealing and accessible your website is, the more people will be inclined to stay for a while.
2. Add Visual Appeal
Often, the process that makes a website more user friendly also doubles to make your website more organized. Cutting down on clutter and excessive, unnecessary information makes for a streamlined experience. This often results in more modern-looking websites.
One of the biggest changes you can make in this area is to make use of more headers and subheaders. Many modern website designs also revolve around smaller blocks of text. When possible, these blocks may be further broken down into single-line bullet points.
This may also improve your overall mobile compatibility, to boot!
3. Increase User Retention
Despite the ideal user experience involving less clicks, many well-designed websites actually retain their customers for far longer than older, more interaction-heavy websites. When a visitor to your site finds that they have to click through an endless nesting doll of pages to find the basic information they want, they’ll often leave your site quickly. This is referred to as “bouncing”, wherein a user lands on and then quickly exits your page.
Satisfied users, on the other hand, will stay to read what you have to say. This is extremely important to search engines, where the amount of time that users spend on your site is part of the algorithmic ranking of results. Moreover, this is important to you, as it increases the likelihood that a simple visit will turn into a purchase.
4. Improve Conversion Rates
On ecommerce sites, deeper user engagement often leads to more conversions. When customers enjoy using your site, they’ll spend more time browsing it. This leads to more interactions and more content getting seen.
The longer someone spends poking around your digital storefront, the more likely they are to see something that interests them. For internet-based sellers, this is exactly what you want. You want organic search results to turn into purchases, and user-friendly websites are exactly how you can get there.
However, you also need to keep in mind that your buying process should be as appealing as your visual presentation. When the user clicks to purchase an item, you don’t want to start sending them through several different pages to process a simple order!
5. Boost Your Overall SEO Rankings
Finally, and in conjunction with improved user retention and conversion rates, user-friendly websites have higher rankings on search engines. Also known as search engine optimization, this algorithmic and automated process is how major search engines, like Google, rank and categorize your website. The higher your “rating”, the closer to the top of the results you’ll be.
When people find your page within the first few results of their search, they’re likely to click on it. This naturally leads to browsing your site and, hopefully, investing in your business.
Bottom Line: Reap Meaningful Rewards With a User-Friendly Website
Improving your site’s overall usability might not be an easy task, nor will it necessarily be done overnight. However, the time and monetary investment you make to update and improve your digital storefront will ultimately pay off.
Need help optimizing your website for success? We have the tools to get you there. Reach out to us today!