Get Ready (to build a Website) with Me
There’s no tea to be spilled, but we will share three key considerations to address before you build a new website.
Content Readiness
AKA - Gathering the building blocks that will form your finished website
Website builders are great, they make putting together a website a much simpler task. You don’t even need to know how to code. You just need to get used to the interface of whichever content management system (CMS) or web builder you’re planning to use. Many builders even offer a variety of templates you can choose from. So you choose you’re template and you’re good to go, right?
Wrong! Having a template is useful for figuring out how to lay out content, but you need content to put there!
Using Content Tools Effectively
While it’s getting easier to develop content with AI tools that help you write text and generate images, not to mention loads of stock image providers, you still need a person to write the prompts and browse the stock image library. You must initiate and guide the process. The guidance piece is important - you’re responsible for the accuracy and of the content you publish. So for your own credibility’s sake and professional image, check over AI content before publication - both text and images - while AI can produce some amazing images this doesn’t guarantee they match your brand style, or are without noticable oddities when you look closely.
Think of your website like a picture frame, without a photo to put inside, it’s might still look okay, but it’s not going to show anything meaningful. It’s style without substance, which does give a certain impression, but lacks real depth and fails to capture the full opportunity to communicate details.
Gathering Content
It’s great if you can use existing content from brochures, catalogs, social profiles, previous photoshoots, etc. but you may also need to create new content to fill any gaps. There are a few ways you can do this. In our opinion a hierarchy of content creation methods (from least to most preferred) might go something like this:
AI and stock content, raw and unmodified
Human edited AI and stock content
Personalized human generated content, edited with or without AI assistance
While stock images and AI generated content have their place, providing useful supporting graphics and helping you flesh out your website content, using them without discretion like using the stock family photo in your frame and putting it on display - it convey’s the idea of family, but it’s not your family. Make sure to go over text and images and ensure they’re conveying what you want and are pertinent to you and your organization.
At the Landing Studio, we operate with the assumption that you know your organization best. You know your business, your clients, your office, your people, and what makes your organization great. A website built on content that communicates this specialized knowledge is the best kind of website.
Organizing your Website
AKA - Laying out your content so visitors can find what they’re looking for
Imagine this. You enter a store wanting to buy a specific pair of running shoes. You know this store sells these shoes and that they’re good shoes because your friend purchased this same pair at this store recently and was raving about them. As you enter you look around and see all sorts of apparel, but no shoes immediately visible. You look for signs or a store associate for a few minutes, but neither are anywhere to be found. The store is large and you have other things to do so you abandon your search and move on.
Basically, the idea I want to illustrate with the shoe anecdote is that even if a particular course of action is positive or could benefit a person, if there are barriers to completing an action we may simply abandon it. In the book Nudge the Final Edition, Thaler and Sunstein state that “we can do more to facilitate good behaviour by removing some small obstacle than by trying to shove people in a certain direction" (2021, p. 107) and states that “if you want to encourage people to do something, Make it Easy” (2021, p.107). In other words, smooth the way for the action you want to see.
“As consumers, we’re accustomed to finding exactly what we need, where we expect it to be...And what happens if we don’t find it? We give up within a few seconds and move on.”
I see the the “Make it Easy” principle at play in website buiding as well. In her article about information architecture, Klancar discusses people’s tendency to be easily deterred from a particular course stating “As consumers, we’re accustomed to finding exactly what we need, where we expect it to be...And what happens if we don’t find it? We give up within a few seconds and move on” (para. 4). Klancar, speaking in the context of user experience and web design implies that that when website users face barriers like difficult to find information or the possiblity of having to hunt for answers, many will simply give up and look elsewhere. It follows then that when designing a website, you want the organization of your content to follow convention and be arranged in a way that consumers can easily find what they’re looking for.
You want your website to be an easy pathway towards a desired action. To that end it’s best if you make it easy for them to do thing like:
find the information they need about your services, your company
start the purchase process
get in touch with you
As for how you organize your website to make these task easier, you can really spend a lot of time considering and adjusting before getting things just right. It can be a difficult task if you haven’t given it a thought before. A helpful place to start is to look at your competition; Klanacar lists “Analyze Competitors” as a main step in developing a website’s information architecture.
Indeed, it can be very helpful to use your competitors websites as guides for how to layout your own. Some questions Klanacar suggests asking include:
“Where do they display information?”
“Which information is common denominator?”
“Is the website easy to navigate?”
and “What makes is good and what makes it bad?”.
Look at things like what content is given top of the page priority, what and where the action elements (buttons, contacts, products) are, and what information is most prominent. Use your findings to inform your own website layout. Commonalities can serve as guidelines for what website visitors expect and where they might think to look first for certain things.
In summary, if your website is organized and clear, it becomes easy for visitors to use; it becomes easier for visitors to make decisions; and it encourages them to take action. You don’t want you website or processes to become barriers to action, but to be effective and effiecient tools to support users and your business.
The Importance of Branding and Design
AKA - creating a cohesive, visually appealing website to send the right message to users
Finally, lets talk about branding. While what is you say is important, so is the visual context in which it is displayed. A cohesive website where there is visual continuty and relevant, impactful graphics leaves a good impression on users. It shows attention to detail and a clear established brand identity. It shows professionalism. It can give users confidence in your capability. On the flipside when your branding varies, it can reflect poorly on your business. Consider this quote from Darrielle Evans writing for Hubspot:
“...poor design signals unprofessionalism and incompetence to potential customers. Outdated aesthetics, broken links, and inconsistent branding make businesses appear untrustworthy. In competitive markets, this perception drives potential customers directly to competitors with more polished digital presences.”
So branding and visual indenity is important. As much as we say don’t judge a book by its cover, website visitors are often doing just that. We judge organizations by their content.
What does this mean when you’re getting ready to make a website? Practically speaking, it means that to create a good website should follow the same branding throughout, and in general, follow good design practices (visual).
Decide on your Branding
The branding elements we’re talking about are primarily the visual ones (though tone of written content should also be consistent). For your website and any other marketing materials you produce you should decide on:
a brand color palette
a main logo
fonts to use in your marketing
tone, mood, style of images
Follow Good Design Practices
maintain appropriate margins and spacing
proper photo resolution
appropriate framing
clear legible text
visually highlight important information using size, color, placement
In short, make sure that your website looks good. Consider that your website may be your first chance to make an impression on customers, and dress it up accordingly.
Conclusion
Most businesses can benefit from having a website, and a well-designed website can do even more than give you simple presence on the internet. A well-designed website is a tool for you to communicate more effectively, for you to show your professionalism to create trust and be authentic, for users to find what they’re looking for more easily, and become customers, supporters, or clients more easily. A well-designed website supports your goals.
Resources
Evans, D. 17 bad website design examples [+ what they got wrong]. Hubspot. https://blog.hubspot.com/website/bad-vs-good-design
Klancar, P. (April 17, 2023) An Excellent Beginner’s Guide to Information Architecture. CareerFoundry. https://careerfoundry.com/en/blog/ux-design/a-beginners-guide-to-information-architecture/
Thaler, R. H., & Sunstein, C. R. (2021). Nudge: The final edition. Penguin Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.