Enhancing User Experience Through UX Design
User experience (UX) design is a crucial aspect (and one often overlooked) of web design that focuses on improving the overall experience of website visitors. The goal of UX design is to create websites that are user-friendly, easy to navigate, and provide a positive user experience.
UX design starts with understanding the needs and goals of the target audience. User research involves gathering information about not just what the site owner wants the site to do, but also the user’s needs, preferences, and behaviour to design a website that meets their needs.
This means that there needs to be a certain amount of understanding what the logical pathway to explore the site would be; which page flow is the most likely to be clicked by users, which option will grab the attention of your ideal client, what will keep a user on the site longer, etc.
UX design highlights the importance of:
- Interaction design – where interaction design is concerned with the design of interactive elements on the website, such as buttons, menus, and forms. UX designers ensure that these elements are easy to use, intuitive, and provide feedback to the user.
- Visual design – where visual design is an essential part of UX design that focuses on the appearance of the website. UX designers use colour, typography, and other design elements to create a visually appealing and engaging website that communicates the brand’s identity and values.
When it comes to UX design, there comes a certain amount of user testing that is highly important to partake in. This is where it’s more than just the site designer and the site owner clicking through the site to see what makes sense, but also feedback from trusted clients to see if what you think makes sense, actually makes sense!
By using trusted clients to provide feedback, it allows them to identify any usability issues which could include accessibility issues such as buttons and links being too close to make clicking difficult, colours not being contrasted enough; as well as page flow issues such as users skipping pages previously considered as a higher importance level than what it actually is.
UX design is often not tested enough in small web builds, either as a cut cost measure or timeframe measure, but as your business expands and your website needs grow, it becomes a critical design step to ensure that your site delivers exactly what is needed for your business.
