How To Design A Website – Forbes Advisor

While you can customize your website to suit your unique needs or style, there are certain steps that anyone looking to design a website must take. Follow the instructions carefully to find out how to design a website, from defining your website’s purpose, choosing a website design platform, designing the architecture, filling in the necessary content and launching your website.

1. Define the purpose of the website

To design a website that delivers the results you expect, you need to define what you want from it. Think about why you are designing the website – who your target audience is and what you are aiming for. Are you trying to drive downloads, sales, reservations, appointments booked, engagements, or even a larger audience?
It is crucial that you have a crystal clear understanding of the purpose of the intended website. Knowing this will help you employ the right content strategy and be guided by choosing the right platform, theme, and page architecture.

2. Choose your platform

Once you know why you are building a website, you can look at website builders. These do-it-yourself (DIY) tools will help you create a website yourself, even if you don’t know a line of code. And there are those designed for specific purposes, such as: E.g. e-commerce, blogs and portfolios.

Website builders come with customizable templates for adding your text and images, and many also take care of domain registration and hosting. However, you have to use the drag-and-drop interface to style each website page yourself. So choose one that suits the purpose of your website.

3. Gather your branding elements

Elements are details like colors, fonts, and images that bring your site together. So, when designing your website, keep your brand identity in mind.

Start with the color scheme and work with a primary color and one or two complementary colors. Then choose a text style that suits your brand. For example, serif symbolizes formality and authority, sans serif, modernism and writing, creativity.

Also add images to grab users’ attention but make sure they are relevant and of high quality so that they make the right impression on users.

4. Choose a template or theme

Next, choose a theme or template that represents your site’s layout—the way images, text, and buttons appear on your site. Themes are pre-designed layouts that help you design your website, even if you’re a beginner.

Most platforms have a set of templates divided into categories, and each category has built-in features relevant to a specific industry. So, preview them to choose one that is most relevant to your site.

Note that if you want to build your website with WordPress, you will need to get web hosting from a third party like Bluehost or Hostinger and install WordPress. With it, you can access your WordPress admin dashboard, install a theme, and import demo content for premium themes.

5. Plan your site

To make designing easier, visualize the pages that will appear on your site and how they will link together. For example, if you know how many pages your website will have, their content, and the general layout, you’ll have a guide to work with as you start designing each part.

6. Design each site element

With your template or design and your website map in hand, the next step is to start designing each website element, such as: Your menu (or site navigation), header, footer, search bar, and any additional elements you want. to have side. Using elements like the following will structure your site and make it easier to navigate.

• Menu: This element displays the articles featured on your site. Make sure it’s accessible on every page and only shows a few elements – you don’t want to cluster visitors’ screens.
• Header and footer: These elements improve user retention. The header should include features like the navigation menu and your logo that you want visitors to find quickly. A footer should provide more information, such as B. Contact Information and Terms of Use.
• search bar: Use a magnifying glass or box, but place it in a conspicuous place on each page. The top left or top right corner is often the best.

7. Customize your web pages

Your content depends on the purpose of your website, so you can customize it to suit your needs. However, every website should have the following web pages.

• Home page: Every visitor lands here, so it’s a good place to summarize your site. Add your logo, company name, what readers should expect from you, and a navigation menu that makes browsing your site easier. Make sure this page is organized and eye-catching.
• Product or service page: This page should let visitors know what you’re offering them and allow them to make a purchase. For an e-commerce site, create a page for the catalog display and another to show each item in detail.
• About Page: This page should introduce you to visitors, tell your story, communicate your values ​​and highlight what makes you different from other brands.
• Blog page: If you intend to use blogging as a content marketing strategy, you need to create this page that will display snippets of published blog posts. Users can then click on one that interests them.
• Contact page: Tell website visitors how to reach you. This can be done via phone calls, emails or social media platforms. Also, you can add your physical address, a live chat widget, and a contact form.

Other pages you can add:

• Custom 404 page: When visitors go to a page that isn’t on your site, you should direct them to a page that displays “404 errors.” You can further customize yours by including your logo, a link to your homepage, or a light-hearted message – “Congratulations! You found our error page!”
• FAQ page: This page is dedicated to answering common questions that visitors may have. This way, website visitors don’t have to contact you.
• Credentials: Here’s your chance to blow your trumpet. Add reviews from previous customers that show how you’ve helped them. Also, view trusted brands that have given you awards or written about you.

8. Test and launch your website

Before your website goes live, test the load time, content readability, linking and mobile responsiveness, the contact form, and any other elements that may impact the user experience. Let family members and co-workers give their feedback on your site’s design. If there are no problems, go ahead and publish your site.

Also, keep updating your website based on its performance, trends, and current business operations.

9. Optimize your content

After designing and launching your website, you should plan to optimize your website for smooth user experience. Here’s what you can do.

• Mobile Responsiveness: Most website templates are now mobile responsive – your content is reformatted to fit different screen sizes. However, to be on the safe side, consider enabling a mobile app. You can test your website in browsers like Safari or even Google Chrome on iPhones and Android phones.
• Internet link: Internal links allow users and search engine tools to see you as an authority in your industry. You also keep people on your site, so use hyperlinks to direct users to other relevant web pages.
• Media Optimization: To avoid low rankings, higher bounce rates, lower click-through rates, and longer loading times, work on your media files. Make sure they aren’t too big and that you don’t have too many photos or videos on each page. Also, show only relevant images and videos.
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO): SEO involves optimizing content such as images and text to increase the number of people visiting your website. Examples of such optimization measures include adding alt text to images and using human-readable URLs.

The best tools for designing a website

In order to source and customize text, shapes, colors, and images needed to design the sections and pages of your website, you need specific apps and tools. With these tools, you can create the best designs without having to start from scratch.

• Website Builder: You need a website builder like Squarespace or Wix with the features needed to build the website you want.
• Design Tools: A design tool like Canva works well for graphic design and photo editing. Expert Marketplaces: Marketplaces like Fiverr and Upwork have several experienced website designers who can help you with design tasks.
• Logo Creator: This tool is necessary if you haven’t yet designed your company logo and want to do it alongside your website design process. Examples are Logo Maker and Adobe Express Logo Maker.
• Photo Apps: Use photo apps like Stockphoto.com and Unsplash to find visually appealing images for your text.