How Web Design Impacts Content Marketing

It has been said that our attention span is now shorter than a goldfish . 

Goldfish -> 9 Seconds

Humans -> 8 Seconds

Whilst this might be a difficult statistic to prove, it can't be denied that with the increase in everything digital, our attention span has lowered significantly. Take a quick look at the analytics for your website and note the average bounce rate for each page. The likelihood is a fair few of them will be above 70% . 

The internet has provided us with an unrivalled opportunity to free information as and when we need it. Because of this, we will not hesitate to leave a website if it loads slowly or does not meet our requirements quickly. 

Your website's design will directly impact the way visitors perceive your brand. Colour, style, tone and font all add up to create a first impression. This first impression will normally make or break a conversion opportunity. 

It's your website's job to make an impact in this short time frame. 

The Content Marketing Institute, an online resource that provides information on everything content marketing related defines this as:

"Content marketing is a marketing technique of creating and distributing valuable, relevant and consistent content to attract and acquire a clearly defined audience – with the objective of driving profitable customer action."

How does this differ from advertising or other forms of marketing? By being valuable. Content marketing campaigns create content that people seek out and want to consume, rather than avoiding it the moment they realise it's an ad or sales pitch. 

Blog posts are one of the main forms of content that businesses are creating. 53% of marketers say blogging is their top content marketing priority (Source: Hubspot ). Whilst blogging has many SEO benefits, how does it actually impact viewers and sale conversions?

Providing value on relevant topics to your business creates a strong, trustworthy perception amongst your viewers. If you have answered all the questions your customer has, why would they then go to a competitor for the product? in fact, 47% of buyers view 3-5 pieces of content before engaging with a sales rep. (Source: Impactbnd ) 

One of our clients Kandoo Adventures provides a great example of this with their blog. They provide volumes of accurate, detailed information about subjects relevant to their service. As a potential customer searching for information about travel tips, best festivals, trails and treks, I would be able to gain a wealth of knowledge from their blog alone. 

In this example, Kandoo Adventures are setting themselves apart from their competition by providing value without trying to sell themselves. This helps to create an authoritative presence in their field, which can then influence their prospects decisions when choosing who to purchase from. 

Despite having an in-depth, valuable and informative piece of content, what good is it if no one reads it? This is where your design is important. Many of us don't consciously realise it, but we will judge a website within "the first twentieth of a second" according to researchers in Canada (Source: Go Nature ).

The five-second test is a little more well known and provides a strong base for gaining qualitative data. This includes showing a user a screenshot of your website for only five seconds, then asking them questions about what they saw and what they think. This is a powerful method as you will quickly find that a lot of participants will have strong opinions about your site in such a short time. This goes to further emphasise the importance design has in creating this initial perception.

Whilst we can think of design overall, it's beneficial to split it into four key elements:

Without considering accessibility you could potentially make your most important pages obsolete. After all, it doesn't matter how good your content is if your audience can't find it. 

As web designers, we take great care in applying the best practices for navigation. In the last decade, traditional navigation has slowly been replaced by drop-down menus. Why? because it's substantially easier to navigate to a page when you can click it directly opposed to traversing multiple pages. In more recent years, the push for Hamburger menus is growing and navigation is moving towards a simpler design. 

Content-heavy websites can often suffer from accessibility issues. It's important to be able to convey all the information you need to about your brand, yet, it's more important to consider the user. No one wants to have to read through paragraphs of bulk text to then click a button to then be directed to a different page to then have to follow a link.

The process is as unappealing as that sentence. This is why it's recommended to explain the critical information on the page. If you have more information that you feel would be beneficial to your audience, turn it into a blog post. 

As said previously, your website will be judged within the first few seconds. If the design isn't impressive, it's likely that the visitor will leave and visit somewhere else. This is what primarily drives brand perception. 

Your content will be judged for professionalism. Likewise with any services you offer. For example: if you are a web developer and your website looks like it was built in 2001, chances are visitors are not going to choose you to build theirs.

Your design should generate trust. It needs to be inviting, inform the viewer of who you are, what you offer and should accurately reflect your brand. This includes your values and mission statement. 

If your website looks visually unappealing or outdated, your users will be hesitant to consider you a valuable and trustworthy resource. Many forms of content require the user to trust and believe that the advice you are giving is right for them. The inability to create this trust will impact the overall success of your content. Ensure that your design is up to date, professional and designed to reflect who you are as a brand. 

The overall look of your site is important for the first judgement but what happens when they begin reading your content? Ensure your text is consistent, visually appealing and most importantly: easy to read. Nothing is worse than trying to read a post that has multiple different font choices and sizes. Majority of the time, a singular font can be used site wide. 

It can be tempting to change the font on your about page or maybe change your name to be in a different font to everyone else. In theory, it might break up the text, but in reality, it makes your site look unprofessional and in some cases, overwhelming. 

Sometimes your font is dictated by other resources you have. You can match your site font to that used for your logo or other online resources. Font colour should never clash with the background, this means no blue text on a blue header. It sounds obvious but you'd be surprised as to how many websites still have these errors. Text size should vary where needed but should be readable at all times. Generally speaking, your headers should be larger to attract attention. 

Your body copy also needs to be clean and sized enough so it's easy to read, regardless of whether you have 300 words or 3000. Don't be tempted to make your font smaller to limit the scroll of the page. Users are more likely to leave immediately if they have to manually zoom in to read your content. Whilst some of these seem minor and obvious, they have a major impact on how effective your content and strategy is. 

Visuals will always be king. Over the last few years, video content has started taking over the online space. Forbes has listed that Internet video traffic will be over 80% of all consumer internet traffic in 4 years. Why are visuals so impactful? Many people are visual learners: using graphics, photos and videos to fully understand topics and new information. Infographics are a good example of this. Users are able to learn all the information that they would through a blog, through a simple, visually pleasing graphic. 

It's essential to use media like this with your content. More often than not, the two can complement each other. The most common form of this is through page headers. These are images at the top of web pages that are designed to answer a question. These might be questions you haven't even asked yet. They allow users to understand who you are, what you do and how you do it. This enables you to influence their perception of your brand.

From a design standpoint, visuals should work well with the layout of your site. You should not try to shoehorn in a piece of visual content for the sake of having it on your website. Users should be able to scroll through your website without feeling like they are being bombarded with additional content. At the same time, they should be able to interact with photos and videos where needed.  

Web design contains many different elements that play important roles in content marketing. This being said, your site should always be designed with your visitors in mind. Regardless of whether or not your website is content heavy, ensuring your visitors can read everything and navigate with ease should be your priority. 

You will begin to see far better results when your visitors can seamlessly interact with your content and gain the value they are looking for. If your visitors have to think about every step, they are likely going to turn to a competitor for the information. 

When thinking about the appearance of your website, it would be beneficial for you to have this done professionally. A web developer will not only understand industry practices better but will also be able to convert your idea into an easily navigable website. you also get the added benefit of having a professional, uniquely designed website. 

Looking to have a website designed or redesigned? Give us a call on  01332477575 and we'll talk through your requirements.