Given the fact that a growing number of people are using smartphones to make online purchases, business owners simply cannot afford to get their UI or UX design wrong. Failure to provide a professional smartphone user experience can be a matter of life and death for just about any company looking to engage with their target audience.
Although many UX trends are derived from real consumer metrics, they don’t always yield measurable results in key performance indicators. It would be risky to adopt these trends without checking whether there are actual statistics to back them up.
From the moment people visit your site, there should be a responsive web interface implemented on the front page, to guide them across the buyer’s journey. Even so, it’s all too easy to make a seemingly small yet devastating mistake that can have a significant impact on your business.
The following are five common mistakes in-house UI/UX designers must avoid at all costs.
1. Designing for aesthetics rather than usability
Creativity is certainly important when designing a website with personality. Attractive photos and classy color combinations are a must if you want your website visitors to fully appreciate all that you have to offer.
However, in developing a functional website, usability is far more important than just appearance alone. This is especially true for mobile phone users since they’d prefer to be able to scroll through multiple listings with ease.
If you want your site to be successful long-term, make sure your site loads quickly and is easy to navigate so that users form a better impression of your brand.
2. Forgetting to add a visible “Call to Action” button
What are your website visitors suppose to be doing? Provide an easy to see, “call to action” button that jumps out at the user. This button should be a different color than the rest of the page and also large enough for them to press without accidentally selecting other elements on the screen.
Improperly positioned, unintuitive navigational buttons will confuse users who are trying to find information on your website. For many e-commerce sites, their goal is to get customers to buy items in as few steps as possible. Blogs that are after subscribers should use straight-down forms that can be read from top to bottom on smaller screens.
3. Using the wrong font size, type, or color
Your text must be readable if you want website visitors to remain engaged and recommend your site to others in the future. Contrast is important in choosing colors; black text on a white background is your best bet in most cases, but you can also use any color combination that allows your text to stand out.
Use only web-fonts to ensure your text can be read with ease on any device. A large type is recommended for landing page titles and blog headings. If you need to use small text, space it apart properly to ensure people can still read it.
4. Not paying attention to responsive design
Responsive design is a must for a flexible display across multiple screen sizes. It ensures that your site’s layout will change according to computers, tablets, and smartphone devices. Keep in mind that Google takes responsive design into account when determining website placement on its search engine pages.
This also ties into the level of enjoyment users get out of interacting with your UX. For instance, a responsive UI would not require users to zoom in every time a page loads. It also should not have menus and widgets blocking the main content.
5. Not finalizing content before launching the site
An untold number of UI/UX designers use “placeholder” content to design a website. It becomes a problem when a site looks fine on the preview but ends up cluttered after actual content has been added.
If a description or paragraph is significantly longer or shorter than the placeholder content, the text may either appear to run off the page or leave a page looking bare.
Always have all your content ready before applying it to a template. Be sure to let a UI/UX designer run usability tests on your new site so it will be presented in the best possible light. Give your website visitors a memorable user experience by putting time, research, and thought into your design choices.
The result of your hard work will be more than worth it once you create a website that stands out from the competition, attracting potential customers both now and in the future.
