User Experience Tips: Website Layout
Dec
24
In web design, one of the most important elements involved with providing the client with a website that their customers/audience are going to really spend time at is pay attention to something known as ‘user experience’. This is simply the study of what the user of a website goes through (or experiences) when they visit said website. Today we are going to talk about how to apply some lessons of user experience to our website through the layout of our content.
Website Elements
One of the first things to consider is what different elements we are going to be working with. There are a few things that every website must have in order to function as a website is supposed to. These are the header, navigation, content, footer, and in some cases a sidebar.
Header
The header of a website usually contains a few things. First of all, what the title of the website is, or often the logo of the company or organization that the website is for. Another thing the header may often contain is a subheader that has some basic information about the website. This can sometimes be a tagline for a company, or just a description of the website.
Most users will expect at least those two pieces of information to be in the header of the website, and since the header is located at the very top of a website, it is seen as very prominent and important information. Choosing what is placed in your header very carefully can have a great impact on the experience the user gets out of the website, especially in those first few moments from when the user arrives.
Navigation
Navigation is quite obviously an essential part of any website. Typically a website will contain multiple ‘pages’ with different categories of information and content. Most often, the navigation of a website will be in a list form, containing each different page of the website (typically, though sometimes external links are included as well). One other thing to note is that the navigation is (typically) placed directly under the header, or at least not far from it.
The first thing we can consider with navigation is that it should be noticeable. Now you also need to make sure it doesn’t become obtrusive either. The navigation, being an important part of the websites essentials, needs to be easily found (preferably without even trying), but it is also not as important as the content itself, so it must not overtake the main areas of a website.
Content
The content is always whatever that page is made to display. Most of the other layout elements are often pretty consistent throughout all pages of the website, whereas the content section changes every time. What goes here depends on whatever that page is made specifically for. From this we can conclude that this area should have the most prominent of importance among all the elements.
How you style the content area is important because that content is what the user came to the website initially to get to. Making sure there is enough space allocated for this area is a must, and also placing it in a very visible place, preferably viewable without scrolling. Keep all this in mind as the content is the purpose of a website and it gets a majority of the attention when a user goes to the website.
Footer
Footers are something that most websites have, but are not always paid attention to, or even noticed at some points. This isn’t to say you can’t make your footer noticeable by adding more to it, but typically footers contain solely copyright information, which most users are not concerned with.
So when designing a footer, keep in mind the unobtrusiveness that it should have (unless there is more there that needs attention), and remember why it is called a ‘footer’. Almost always, the footer will appear at the very bottom of the page.
Sidebar
Sidebar’s being optional depending on if the content of the website needs to have any sort of aside, or side information. Sometimes the side bar will contain the above-mentioned navigation, and other times, it will offer an extended navigation (categories on a blog, with main navigation holding pages), and lastly, sidebars will contain side information for the main content area.
As the name suggests, the sidebar is often place to the side of the content, and is usually in the shape of a vertical bar (i.e. – not taking up more than a third of the horizontal page real estate in comparison with the main content). The sidebar can often be very important, so is usually very noticeable next to the content, but again, we don’t want to steal away too much from the core of the website.
Layout Priorities
In any layout, the position and specific design of each element plays a role in determining what kind of importance, or of how high a priority it is in comparison to the rest of the page’s content. Things such as size, position, contrast, spacing, and font-sizes, as well as many other things, can all contribute to something appearing either more important, or less.
Making sure you arrange and design elements according to their importance to the website is of utmost importance when designing for user experience. Keeping in mind that the use is supposed to guided to the information they are seeking, they are not supposed to have to struggle searching for it. The first step to accomplishing this is understanding what the user is coming for.
Keeping content easily scan-able for headlines, lists, excerpts, etc, can help a user navigate through long content to find what they need. Even offering a click-able table of contents for specially long pages is often a good idea as well. But no matter what, remember to keep information unburied. As in, if there is information on your website, it should be able to be quickly noted by the user, and be able to be found in as short of time as possible.
Conclusion
All in all, user experience is very important to a website’s sucess, and the best tip there is to give is to think like the user. Imagine all possible paths that a user may want to take upon arrival at your website. Applying this in combination with a proper website layout and keeping content priorities in mind can result in a great user experience, and a good impression on you or your company.
This entry was posted on Thursday, December 24th, 2009 at 3:25 pm and is filed under Web Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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