Website Design

1. You have recently changed focus, acquired a new company, or launched a new product or service.
2. You can’t update your OWN content.
3. Your site looks OUT of date.
4. Your website lacks a consistent look and feel.
5. Your website does not work in ALL browsers.
6. Your website is not accessible on mobile and tablet.
7. Your website lacks calls to actions.
8. Your website does not include social media integration.
9. Your website is not up to par with your competitor
10. You would like to launch a stand-alone product or conference microsite.

When it comes to designing, or redesigning a website, it can be easy to get hung up on the aesthetics. “That shade of blue just doesn’t look right …. Wouldn’t it be cool to have the logo on the right side of the screen? …. How about we put a giant animated GIF in the middle of the page?”

However, depending on what you’re trying to achieve with your company website design, you will likely need to consider more than just the look of your website.

There are billions of websites out there. How to make sure your website design stands out and is easily accessible and user friendly?

How can you tell if a website is subpar? It’s easy and most people can tell right away when a website is lower quality even if you can’t readily identify the technical issues. If your web design is inadequate, it can severely damage your brand.

Website users form opinions almost immediately, whether they realize it or not. A website that is difficult to navigate, that is visually unappealing and/or cumbersome, users will move on to another website.

Make sure your website adequately reflects your brand identity and your corporate values, is clear and easy to use and creates the right impression of your organization. Great website design will go a long way to boosting your brand.

Never forget that the main purpose of your website is to provide a visually appealing and easy to use experience for your customers. Make sure that all the infrastructure elements from navigation to site speed are the highest quality possible.

Overcomplicating the site with flashy graphics will not necessarily enhance the experience of your users. It can actually drive users away if the speed of the site is slowed as a result or if the experience of navigating the site is too confusing. Make sure your website design keeps users on the site as long as possible and keeps them coming back.

Your web design should also create the right mood and experience for your users. Making customers feel that they are dealing with a high end, professional organization can dramatically increase the power of your website.

With the dramatic rise in tablet and smart phone usage, the design of your website needs to ensure that it is compatible with various devices. The more flexibility you can build into your website design, ensuring that it can be accessed through multiple browsers and devices, the better. Did you know Google will penalize your search engine ranking if your site is not mobile friendly? Excentric designs and builds responsive WordPress websites, ensuring accessibility on desktop, mobile and tablets.

The design of your website needs to be consistent across the entire site, reflecting your overall brand design from start to finish. Make sure the navigation, usability, look and feel and even style of web writing remain the same throughout the site. This can be achieved while still bringing some originality to each page or section of your website. A professional website designer can provide input on how best to achieve a web design that is consistent but not boring or overly repetitive.

Certain web design conventions have become recognizable to most internet users over the years, such as:

• Locating the main navigation at the top (or left side) of a page
• Locating a logo at the top left (or center) of a page
• Ensuring that users can click on the logo to return to the homepage
• Having links change color/appearance when you hover over them

The importance of maintaining these simple yet important conventions in your web design cannot be overemphasized. Keep the user experience consistent to ensure you get the most out of your website design.

So what is SEO? Search Engine Optimization is one of the main reasons that company’s feel the need to redesign their websites. SEO is a way of writing and designing web pages to increase their ranking on Google or other search engines such as Yahoo and Bing.

To start increasing Google rankings, keep the following in mind:

• Publish relevant content
• Include important search words in your headings and body text
• Update content regularly
• Have a link-worthy site with cross links within your site and reciprocal links to and from directories, affiliated sites/partners etc.
• Include web page descriptions, page titles and website meta descriptions
• Use alt-tags for web images
• Compress web images for better site speedEnsure you don’t have broken web links or unfound pages (404 error)
• Link to your social media accounts — or better yet, include a live social feed on your website. Example: see the Excentric Social Page — and give us a LIKE while you are at it!
• Submit your site to Google for indexing

To keep your website safe, make sure your website CMS and plugins are regularly updated. Work with your system administrator to ensure that your WordPress version remains current and that your content management system is updated. Strong passwords are also very important.

Excentric can provide assistance updating your WordPress or HTML-based website content or web design.

Here are a few of the services we offer:

• Updating your WordPress CMS and Plugins
• Adding new content (images, video, new pages, etc).
• Designing visual elements (need a new banner image, a new button, promo graphic, etc).
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
• Technical assistance and updates
• Troubleshooting (repairing broken code or formatting).