How good web design attracts more customers

When buying anything, how it looks matters to most people, and buying online is no exception. Beyond how good the product or service itself is, the virtual shop window you sell it in carries just as much weight, and it becomes part of the image your business projects.

Good design is therefore fundamental to attracting customers. A few recommendations that make the difference:

Make it pleasant to look at

Online shops with an attractive appearance measurably encourage people to browse for longer, and time on site correlates closely with buying.

Match the design to the business you are

The design has to line up with the image you want to project. A premium product on a cheap-looking site sells neither the product nor the price.

Make navigation obvious

An intuitive design that makes finding things easy. If a visitor has to think about where to click, you have already lost part of them.

Make it fast

Optimise so the site responds quickly. Loading time is one of the few design factors that affects both conversion and search ranking directly.

Make it responsive

The layout has to work on any screen. More than half your visitors arrive on a phone, and a site that forces them to pinch and zoom loses most of them before they see the product.

Say what you want them to do

Every page should have one obvious next action, visible without scrolling. Sites that look beautiful and sell nothing usually fail on this point alone.