First impressions.
The first impression of your website is a critical ‘make or break’ moment.
It’s an opportunity to excel and set your brand apart, convey trust in the blink of an eye, and ensure that the initial visit to your website won’t be the last. The glue that holds it all together is design, the aesthetics and feel of your site, and the consistency of images, graphics, and content.
Design is your brand’s golden ticket and might even be an entry to an exclusive club that few brands ever realize. Amongst the best? Think Apple. McDonald’s, and Home Depot; these brands are instantly recognizable and enduringly memorable.
Many people hear the word ‘Apple’, and their mind’s eye automatically depicts a simple apple with a bite taken out of it. McDonald’s golden arches are instantly recognizable, evoking a Big Mac or what some consider the best fries on the planet. “I’m lovin’ it” is almost guaranteed that you’ll be loving it over and over in less than a second.
Home Depot’s standout but simple orange design recalls the 2019 slogan' do over' - ‘how doers get more done’—and possibly contributed to the brand’s whopping $21+ billion growth in the 2020 fiscal year despite pandemic supply chain challenges.
Findings from a 2012 study show that visitors to a website took only 17 milliseconds to form an impression. The key ‘make or break factors’ were visual complexity, i.e., the site’s visual appeal, attractiveness, and aesthetics, and prototypicality, i.e., how well images and content reflected the brand’s services and offerings.
Sites that were simpler in terms of aesthetics—look and feel—displayed images and content that were related to one another and relatable to the user. This shaped that user’s first impression, affirming the weight that good aesthetics bring to your brand.
Other studies have shown that a site’s aesthetics influence:
These three attributes, especially credibility and trust, can elevate your brand from an SEO standpoint and influence how and if search engines display it to the world.
A great design - layout, colors, fonts, readability - translates into a great user experience and, hopefully, a return customer. It is the language that evokes emotions and creates brand equity.
It is understood universally across cultures and continents. It can help transform a lurker into an active participant and turn 17 milliseconds into an extended visit repeatedly.
One of the first ways to get there is to ensure that the design of your website is user-centric. Rather than starting with a blank canvas, consider the end goal(s):
Your website’s design helps visually validate that visitors have come to the right place at the right time for the right reason(s).
When it comes to ensuring user-centricity, several important but basic design conventions must be considered.
A site should be easy to navigate, present an easy-to-spot hero section that automatically conveys your brand's role in the business sphere, and make conscious, deliberate choices about font/typography.
Scale (using size and space to highlight or underscore certain brand attributes or details) and patterns (i.e., how a user scans the page/pages) should be consistent.
Be deliberate in how content and images are grouped. Do they belong together, and do they make sense when seen side by side? Can your content breathe?
Is there enough whitespace between concepts, or are you trying to say too much in too little space? Does your design leverage borders or background elements to draw attention to the most important details?
Do your images consistently convey the right information about your brand? Are they too generic or not generic enough? Do the colors in the images mimic or complement the colors in your logo and collateral materials? Does the design accurately reflect your industry?
Conveying information in a consistent format across your site, regardless of the medium that carries that information, conveys that you are consistent in delivering your services, the quality of products, and a commitment to the customer, all of which contribute to building trust and credibility.
Is your site accessible? Increasingly, brands are asked to ensure that the user’s abilities do not interfere with or prevent comprehension of the information conveyed through colors, layout, graphics, images, and content.
Consider your design as something that is the opposite of disabled and, rather, is enabled or enables:
Artificial Intelligence (AI) fuels how efficiently your brand and design team works so that they can focus on what matters most: creating a website that showcases your strengths, boosts your credibility, develops trust, underscores user experience, and conveys empathy in a visually appealing way.
It helps your team enhance innovation and drives the dynamics and functionality of your site. AI is the caterer, and your brand & design team are the brains and brawn behind the event.
Your website's visual appeal is simply one piece of the design puzzle. At Brand3, we hold the rest of the pieces to create the story you want to tell, a story that, when presented with all of the elements in place, boosts your brand to new heights.
Let’s talk and create a lasting impression together.
