There are numerous things that can affect user experience and a perfect web design is one of them. Most people consider web design as aesthetically important. However, web design is more than that. Expert web designers consider various elements while creating a web page. They make sure to enhance the end user’s experience and provide them with an attractive web page. The visual elements, as well as the presentation of content, are important factors that play a pivotal role keeping visitors on a specific page. Moreover, the responsive and functionality of a site is also essential.

Described below are some highly influential elements associated with web design, which affects user experience.

Polished Presentation

A perfect design provides a polished and professional look of a website to the visitors, clients and prospective buyers. This is essential as it presents your website as a legitimate company or service provider in a given industry. Moreover, unique web design helps your website to stand out among the rest. This is the first thing that a user sees after landing on a page.

If a company has hired the services of a professional web designer, a visitor immediately notices it. This fact alone can create a sense of reliability as the users ascertain that your company is a well-established entity and they can get the best services from you.

Captures Immediate Attention of the Audience

Whenever a visitor lands on a web page, the initial few seconds are of great importance. It is a time when the user decides to stay on the page or move on to another one. A nice and eye-catching layout and visuals are capable of keeping visitors glued to your website for a reasonable time. After this, chances are there that a visitor may show interest in your services or products.

As there is loads of information on the web, users want to get relevant and authentic information. For this purpose, they try to limit their search by staying on a web page for only the amount of time it takes to decide if you can be what they are looking for. Hence, it is essential to capture your audience immediately with a superb web design and attractive visuals. Here are the basic ingredients to help retain visitors:

• Create visual interest by introducing suitable typography
• Perfect combination of color and page layout is also necessary
• Bright and catchy banners are capable of delivering your message in the desired manner
• Add such things which help to keep your audience engaged
• Interesting animation can help to draw the attention of a visitor

You can also use interesting design elements such as shapes, patterns, icons, textures, color, and give your site a nice look.

Enhance Functionality

Apart from rendering a clean presentation, a perfect web design also holds the ability to add more functionality to the website. The important factor to keep in mind is the responsiveness of a website. A nice web design gives the desired appearance to the site and maintains it on various screens. Seasoned designers ensure that a particular website appears in the same manner whether accessed using a desktop or a smartphone. It enhances the user experience by offering a simple to handle layout.

Builds Trust and Emotional Connection

Consistent and unified design elements, which provide a clear visual presentation, can help to gain the trust of a user. A sense of trust builds up and the audience starts believing you as a reliable company.

A web design can create an emotional connection between the user and your brand. Professional designers deliberately use vibrant colors, shapes and branding materials (logos), which connects your brand with the website through emotional appeal and symbolic design.

Proper Distribution of Content

Giving your user all the information at once is not a good idea. This removes the sense of curiosity about your page. Moreover, it is difficult to digest the readable content or information without any break. Hence, the visitor leaves the site without bothering to open the next page of your website.

A well-designed website introduces required breaks within a large amount of content. In addition, it helps to maintain the visual strength of a web page. The information should be laid out in an easy to digest way and necessary information should be highlighted.

These are the elements of a suitable design:

• Select a reasonable size and easy to read body text of your web page
• Use illustrations and introduce necessary breakups within content
• Try using icons, influential quotes or infographics
• Seek visual hierarchy by setting your headings to a required size, font, and color.
• Utilization of sidebars with a view to summarize or highlight essential information
• Use of white space in the appropriate way

Human Faces and Web Design

Human faces play an essential role in your web design strategy. The emotional responses attached with the human face are more effective than any other ingredient of a web design. In enhancing the user experience, the addition of human faces suggests that you are utilizing the emotional aspect of the visitor. Therefore, it is possible to gain prolong engagement with the user.

In addition, humans prefer visuals, especially faces. By seeing a face on a web page, people immediately relate themselves to such an image. So it is not difficult for a web designer to utilize this factor for influencing the reactions of the users and their overall experience.

• Why human faces are so Important in Affecting the User Experience

It doesn’t matter what type of content is available on a web page, the visitor will instinctively gravitate to the visuals of human faces before they will start reading the text. This fact is proved by the ‘Eye-tracking study’.

The study shows that a face provides the first impression of a website to the users and keeps on influencing the user experience until the end. Experienced web designers use human faces as a perfect tool to enhance the user experience. Why are human faces necessary for improving the user experience?

Faces Promote Trust and Connection

When we talk about winning the confidence of the users, there is nothing which can provide better results than human faces. Designers may establish a sense of trust by handling users with an emotional attachment.

• Trust: The “About Us” page is available on almost every website. Similarly, most of these pages show the images or pictures of the CEOs, the team members and that of other people involved in the business. This strategy helps to build a trustworthy relation with the user. It is of great importance for industries like medicine, education, and childcare to gain such a trust. It takes no more than 50 milliseconds for a user to draw an opinion regarding a particular website. Therefore, a face can assist in winning the trust of a user in this short time.
• Connection: The foundation for an association between a website and the user depends on the strong connection. Using human faces for making a positive connection is the most viable option.

Also published on Medium.