As a designer, you are drawn to aesthetics, which is likely the focus of your website. However, it takes a deep understanding of psychological principles to make emotional connections through content, usability and visual design to help convert your visitors to clients.
In this episode I chat with Patricia Alix-Villa, the owner of Fancy Girl Design Studio to unlock the secrets to leveraging the principles of psychology to get website visitors to take action.
Why psychology is important to website design
You want your website to convert visitors into customers. Psychology is the best way to influence visitor decision-making based on three essential aspects:
1. Your content
2. Website usability
3. Visual design
These elements provide a seamless, pleasant experience to help motivate visitors to take the actions you desire. These actions might vary and are driven by your calls to action such as giving you a call, filling out a contact form, signing up for your mailing list, or maybe downloading something.
Visuals are no doubt important in the design industry and are the first thing people notice. However, if visitors find your navigation is clumsy or your content lacks substance, then those visuals won’t get the response you need.
Creating cohesion
Even if you do include the three essential aspects, if they lack cohesion, you’ll also miss your mark. Determining how you want visitors to feel when they arrive on your homepage is the first step to achieving that cohesion. Your main message must communicate your unique value proposition whether it’s a succinct tagline, or a few neat, well-worded sentences that sum up your offering.
Your homepage is what influences a visitor’s perception of everything else they see or read on your website. If your content doesn’t align with that first impression, your website lacks cohesion.
Emotional connections through headings
Emotional connections can be triggered with visuals, but the words in your headings are what encourage people to explore further. In fact, most people will simply scan your headings instead of delving into your copy. Your headings are critical to communicate your brand message effectively and efficiently.
Efficiency is important because if you get too caught up in descriptive adjectives instead of action words, you won’t get your message across. People nowadays are also very sensitive to being spoken to by what they perceive to be AI generated text. This is often related to meaningless, frilly adjectives that tend to muddy up your message.
Simplify everything
Scanning also applies to your navigation. You’re far better off providing a direct link to where you want visitors to go instead of offering several options. People can only choose one option, so make sure it’s a good one.
The more choices you give someone, the longer it takes them to make a decision. Being direct encourages them to take the action required. You want to lead them easily, with an image that impresses them, a tagline that speaks to them and then something that drives them to get in touch. What could be simpler?
The first thing people see
There’s really no getting around the fact that people focus on the first thing they see. So, the old rule of keeping the important stuff “above the fold” works. By doing this, you decrease the “cognitive load” so people don’t have to figure out the mystery of using your website. You make it obvious which improves usability and user experience.
That’s not to say you can’t be creative. It just means you want to balance your creativity with a focus on ease of use. Your words, images, colors and design will set you apart while keeping your logo, what they’ll find on your website and a call-to-action front and center will allow them to act appropriately.
Understand your target’s habits
There’s been a shift to using “hamburger menus” instead of the traditional visible navigation bar. However, a hamburger menu is nothing but a pile of lines in the corner of the screen to someone using a computer. Unless you’re targeting the very young, there’s a good chance your ideal client is likely still using their desktop and won’t realize they have to click the lines to see that menu.
A responsive website works for both mobile and desktop users, showing conventional navigation for those on a website and a hamburger menu for users on a mobile device.
Reduce the cognitive load
It’s easy to get carried away and find new, witty ways to engage visitors to help you stand out. However, the more creative you get, and less conventional approach you take, the more you add to your visitor’s cognitive load.
You want to stick to the same naming conventions for each section of your website, such as About, Blog, Services, etc. instead of trying to get clever, even if it’s in an obvious but charming way.
The same goes for buttons. Why should someone click it? What action will they take by clicking it? Do people even know they can click at all? Wherever you want them to take action, you need to make it clear they can do so by telling them what to do.
Using logical hierarchy
Always use a logical hierarchy with a main heading, sub-headings, bullet points, etc, so your pages don’t feel chaotic and disorganized. Although you might want to get creative using things like side bars, buttons to content, etc., it’s best to reduce cognitive load and not force people to learn how your website works.
Avoid these two common mistakes
There are two mistakes that lead to missed opportunities for designers:
1. Not putting your headshot on your home page to put a face to your brand and build trust, and
2. Not including customer testimonials to speak to your work and help visitors understand whether you’re the right person for their specific needs
The most important elements of design psychology
When laying out your website, there are a few things to focus on to help people respond positively:
- Keep it simple without too many patterns or distracting backgrounds
- Think clean and use conventions that allow people to navigate effortlessly
- Make it easy to act with clearly marked buttons
- Use headings free of flowery words to clearly and efficiently communicate your unique value proposition
- Enlarge headings to make them stand out and more scannable
- Choose an age-appropriate font size for your audience starting at 12 points for younger visitors, 14 for the average person and up to 18 for older visitors
Most important of all, you need to know your ideal audience’s pain points, values, concerns, and preferred language to design a website that meets their expectations.
Episode highlights
Here are the highlights from this episode:
- 9:54: Why psychology is important to website design
- 12:17: Creating cohesion
- 15:29: Emotional connections
- 21:19: Simplify everything
- 23:33: The first thing people see and understanding people’s habits
- 28:18: Reduce the cognitive load
- 31:00 Using logical hierarchy
- 32:19: The most important elements of design psychology
- 35:38: Avoid these two common mistakes
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