Imagine you navigate to a website, and just after it loads you are bombarded with a complete lack of logical flow. Pop-ups pollute your experience the deeper you scroll, ads are everywhere, and navigation is non-existent. Naturally, you gravitate towards the search bar and type in a search hoping that this will be the pinch that wakes you from this non-navigable nightmare; only to be faced with nothing.
Your next move? Leave with the hopes of never returning to the chaos you just experienced.
Unfortunately, this is a relatively commonplace event and it all spawns because of poor UX (User Experience). This is where the opportunity for UX optimisation comes into play.
Let’s dive right into this concept and unpack everything you need to know about UX optimisation to help you keep your visitors happy and prevent them from doing the proverbial ‘wake-up-pinch’ when navigating your website.
What is UX optimisation?
UX optimisation is the process of optimising the graphics, layout, design, and technical elements of a webpage to enhance the overall enjoyment a user has when visiting a website.
How do you optimise UX?
Here are 5 tactics that will help you improve the UX of your website:
Minimise forms
No one enjoys giving out their personal details, but data collection is key to business success. Requesting unneeded information can hamper your user’s experience and reduce conversions.
You can improve the UX of your website by removing unnecessary fields from your forms. This will help streamline the signup process and reduce user friction.
Link intuitively
Links invite users to click somewhere that will lead them elsewhere on (or outside) your site. These act as visual clues that pave the direction for users.
When misused, links can lead your users on a non-sensical journey with no end goal. For best results. Link in a way that will naturally enhance the user experience.
Optimise for mobile
Mobile usage continues to climb with no rate of slowing down, and a mobile friendly website is a fundamental part of UX success.
Spend some time optimising the mobile responsiveness of your site.
Streamline your navigation bar
The navigation bar at the top of your screen serves a vital purpose; it’s what connects users to other sections of your website. Think of it as the compass to your website.
For best results, declutter your navbar by moving less crucial nav items to interior pages. This helps to create a clear layout that enhances navigation. Additionally, link your logo to your homepage; visitors use this to reorientate themselves.
Simplify your design
The best UX often comes in the form of a clean, sleek, clutter-free design.
In this regard, visual simplicity is going to be your best friend. The cleaner your design, the easier users will find the information they need.
Avoid overcomplicating your UX design.
Does UX improve SEO?
UX helps with SEO because it assists in the creation of a site that is frictionless and one that people enjoy. UX and SEO should not be thought of as separate entities; instead UX should be thought of as a building block of creating good search performance.
At the end of the day, everything from optimising mobile responsiveness to linking intuitively and minimising forms can help you create pages that people feel enthusiastic about enough to link to, tell their friends about, and recommend; eliminating the need to pinch themselves in hopes of waking up from a navigation nightmare.
