One of the imperatives when building a website is delivering a great user experience. Smart and up-to-date UX improves applications in more ways than you think. And we emphasize “up-to-date” because change is the only constant in today’s modern and algorithm-driven world.
So if you’re not eager to see visitors bounce off your website and web apps due to outdated and out-of-touch design, we got you covered.
Read on to see which UX best practices you can implement into the development process to see your business grow!
What Is UX and Why Should You Care?
UX is short for “user experience”. It refers to the experience your visitor has when they visit and interact with your web application. Not every visitor may be tech-savvy, but even if they can’t tell you, they want a logical and responsive interface and a functional app.
That is why the goal of UX is to set the tone for the website’s functionality, organization, and usability. If your web app ticks these three points, then you can rest assured that you’ve done your best to deliver a great UX experience.
How do you meet the needs of a visitor? Well, it’s no simple feat, seeing how UX design tackles layout, visual design, text, audio, brand identity, and interaction options.
Yes, we know, it’s a colorful bunch of aspects to pay attention to, but it pays off, we promise! That’s why we rounded up some UX best practices to help you achieve your goal of building your brand, developing your website, growing your business, or whatever it is you are aiming for!
Proven Methods to Improve UX Design of a Web Application
Do Your Homework
If you thought meticulous learning stops once you’re out of school, you’re flat-out wrong. As we’ve said, the field of UX design changes by the day. So you need to be on the top of your game and do thorough user research.
You need to know who the final user is. What are their interests and needs? Do their wishes align with your product’s core value? Will they like the latest update?
Here are some points to guide you:
- Demographic characteristics: These include the age, gender, lifestyle, and profession of the final user.
- Interest and preferences: What are the interests and hobbies of the final user?
- Apps they use: Find out why your targeted audience gravitates towards your competitors and what are their selling points. Use reviews to find the answer.
Apart from reading reviews, here are other ways to conduct research:
- Search engines: Good ol’ Google rarely fails us in our quests for information.
- Interviews: A wise way to get concise or in-depth answers from target audiences.
- Surveys: Such questionnaires fill you with useful details about user experience at scale.
All of this sets the ground for a great user experience. But UX best practices are void without one crucial thing – simplicity.
Provide Simplicity Through Whitespace
Having a clean design that doesn’t overcomplicate or overload you with information isn’t just smart – it’s modern. Minimalism keeps reigning in 2022 as one of the trends in web design.
Aesthetics aside, taking away unnecessary elements means streamlining the interaction process for your user. After all, you want them to follow the steps you map out on the website in order to perform the final action step. Here are four full-proof rules of simple UX design:
- One intention per page: Too many clickable fields, varying information and different CTAs (Call to Action buttons and text) can dilute your primary goal. It can also push visitors away. If you really want to somehow pile on different information on your web app, then use internal linking.
- Understandable intent: Not only should you focus on a single intent – the user should also know what that intent is. Use elements, buttons, blocks and headlines to make your intention clear.
- Focus on the most important details: Highlight and enlarge the sections and buttons you want to appear most noticeable. Some other elements, such as the “Read more…” buttons under blog previews don’t need to be highlighted.
- Add white space: No, white space isn’t just white. It actually refers to any parts of a web design that isn’t occupied by elements such as images, graphs, text, etc. White space is a UX best practice made to shift the accents and nudge the user towards the action steps you want them to take.
Don’t Forget to be Mobile-Friendly
Statista found that 54.4% of web traffic comes from mobile phones. So ignoring optimization for smartphones is one of the worst things you can do for your web app. It’s akin to painting a beautiful picture and then displaying it in a partially-visible display.
Not only is being mobile-friendly important for SEO, but your visitors are more likely to stay on the web app if it’s accommodated to their smartphone screens. One of the UX best practices in today’s day and age is making sure that your visitors can conveniently follow the required steps and road on your web app to get you those desired results and conversions.
Final Word
Great UX tackles many elements and parts of a web app or website. Focusing on just one of those elements and how they can be optimized for satisfying UX would take us at least 5 blogs each. So that’s why we gave you this rundown full of great starting points that will lead you to awesome UX that accommodates the needs of your target audience.