As many of you know, I have decided to pause the writing site of my career for a time to focus on the website design career. What I’ll be discussing today is how important simplicity can be in design.
When it comes to web design and development, it can be tempting to opt for a flashy, colorful, and noisy website. However, one thing you quickly learn in the web design business is that a little simplicity can go a long way.
Case in point, in my work for both Well Prepared and HEALTHandMED, I took the websites from a cluttered, bulky — you could say “top heavy” — layout and changed it to be cleaner, less complicated and modern. Yes, it looks simple and there aren’t as many things going on or as many things to click on as there were with the old websites, but that’s not a bad thing at all.
Especially in the world of eCommerce, customers don’t want flashy, snazzy, and complicated. They want fluid, fast, and simple. Unless you’re a major company like Amazon or eBay, which tend to have more flashy designs, you can’t afford to have an overly flashy website. Unlike Amazon and eBay, smaller eCommerce companies don’t have the long-standing reputation nor the guaranteed repeat customers of these two giants.
That’s not to say that a web design shouldn’t have some snazzy elements. A little flash is fine, as long as it points the customer where they need to go. Moderation is key in web design much like it is in life. Too much of a supposedly good thing can actually have dire effects on a website’s performance, while not enough of it can make things seem too boring.
A little simplicity can go a long way, as long as it’s done right and provides a high quality experience for customers, no matter what device or internet speed they’re using.