Although more than a billion websites have been developed since 2014, the science of web design and development will continue to sustain and evolve in the coming years. In today’s competitive business scenario, having a website is not enough to establish a digital presence if it does not meet the latest and trending marketing standards. Poor websites can easily get drowned in the sea of competitions. Understanding why web design and development are important is the key to standing out in the digital marketing world. 

For instance, if you want to maximize the sales opportunities of your DV Systems Compressor, make sure the design of your website is technically engaging, easy to use, and has fresh, relevant content that captivates your audience. Furthermore, the structure and design of your website should value the essential digital marketing features. 

Here are the best practices you can apply to your next web design and development project: 

  • Quick Site Load Speed – Slow-loading web pages is not good for your search engine rankings and user experience. Customers are likely to abandon websites that take longer than 3 seconds to load, increasing the bounce rate on your website. However, you can enhance the site’s loading speed by merging the website elements to minimize the number of HTTP requests.  
  • Consistent Branding – Every time a potential visitor stumbles on your website, make sure that your landing page should provide information about your business with enough content and graphics to highlight your business name, logo, and business offerings, making their search queries easier. Ensuring consistent branding on your website and promoting your business’ story can help effectively increase conversion rates. 
  • Mobile-Friendly – With millions of people using mobile devices to search for information on the Internet, Google has prioritized mobile-friendly websites. The algorithm change in 2015 has significantly changed the way Google displays mobile search results. As a result, mobile-optimized websites have ranked higher in search engines, which helped them build credibility with their target audience. Furthermore, responsive web designs made mobile optimization direct, uncomplicated, and accessible to everyone to ensure a positive user experience when it comes to website performance and functionality when browsing on their mobile devices. 
  • Seamless Navigation – The target audience should only stay on a website for a minimal time. Why? Because the best websites can quickly provide their visitors with the information they are looking for. Ideally, website visitors should be able to browse through your web pages in 3 to 6 clicks. Seamless navigation can be achieved by categorizing your information and creating visible, clickable links on your website homepage. 
  • SEO-Friendly – No matter how good the aesthetic design of your website is, if it is not among the top 10 results of the search engine ranking pages, then it is just equivalent to not having it. To achieve an SEO-friendly website, you need to create engaging, interactive, and informative content and target specific topics to help you establish your website’s authority in your market niche. Creating an XML sitemap can guide search engine crawlers to read and analyze the content on different web pages and inform them when and how frequently your web pages are updated. Do not publish duplicate content to avoid penalty and add alt text to images to boost your rankings in search engines. 
  • Tracking Goals and Conversions – Keeping a track of your progress can help you plan your future business strategies. To achieve this type of tracking, your website should have the functionality to monitor and measure the key indexes, such as website traffic, conversions, etc. 
  • Definite Visual Appeal – Visually cluttered websites have usually have high bounce rates. Congestion of website elements prevents your visitors from finding the information they are looking for immediately. Strategical use of design grids can help you build a webpage that can guide visitors in a particular direction to achieve symmetry. Use clear, legible typography and ample space between content, professionally taken images, and an organized and compelling layout to make your website engaging. 
  • Voice Search Enabled – Voice search has dominated the SEO industry over the years. Optimizing your website for voice search does not only ensure convenience but also boost user-friendly interaction. Over the years, people are using personal digital assistants, such as Alexa or Siri, to search the Internet for information conveniently while doing other things like cooking, driving, or other tasks. 
  • Chatbots Inclusion – Advanced technology has made artificial intelligence a reality. Today, many websites are using chatbots to interact with people who want to learn more about your business. Chatbots do not only make your website interactive and user-friendly—it also helps establish a relationship with your target customers.  
  • Social Media Networking – Millions of people around the world are into different social media channels. Taking advantage of these channels can help you draw more foot traffic and connect you with your target audience. That is why it is highly essential to integrate all relevant social media platforms into your website design to connect your target audience to your business’s social media profiles directly from your website. This will help you immediately widen the reach of your brand, strengthen online visibility, and increase website traffic. 
  • Security – One of the most critical aspects developers and designers need to work on is the security of the website. Including appropriate and effective website security and privacy protocols ensure protection at any cost. 
  • Humanize – Adding images of real human faces can help make your website appear natural and intuitive. The human brain can easily relate to pictures of humans, as well as read and analyze facial expressions. By using photographs of smiling, happy people, your brand can effectively evoke a positive feeling in your target customers. Furthermore, these photographs of happy people can be an effective tool that directs your users to read the headline or click the call to action button. 

If you successfully implement these 12 best web development and design practices when building a website, you do not only attract and engage your target audience but also increase your conversion rates. With help from a professional at Mouth Media, the powerful combination of a good website design and engagement through optimized content can promote a positive user experience, holds their attention and fulfill their needs. 

Implement these 10 key principles for web design and development to build websites that attract, engage and convert. Web development aficionados would agree that websites that intrigue users with good design and engage them with optimized content create an experience for the user that holds their attention or fulfills their needs. This experience, propelled by a fast-loading website and a clear directive makes users act, make purchase decisions or subscribe for more. Is your website underperforming?