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When creating a website, it’s natural to want to share as much information as possible. While visitors have come to your website to learn more about those pieces of information, that’s all they really want to see: pieces.
This isn’t the first time the shrinking attention span of your site’s visitors has come to the forefront of our conversations on website design best practices. That’s why we talk so much about increasing your site’s speed, using high resolution imagery, and employing powerful calls-to-action in order to hook your visitors and keep them engaged.
While most of these suggestions and solutions typically focus on improving the overall imagery and functionality of your website, messaging is something we don’t touch upon often. As a web developer or designer, you’re (usually) not responsible for writing copy. But just because you don’t write it doesn’t mean you can’t have an effect on it.
Messaging is important. Aside from the utilization of relevant imagery, messaging is the only way you can effectively communicate to your audience what your website is all about. So how do you share all of the important details about your website and business without going overboard and cluttering up the clean and polished design you’ve developed?
Adopt a minimalist approach.
What is Minimalism?
When we talk about minimalist design, there are two brands synonymous with the definition and underlying principles behind minimalism: Google and Apple.
Both of these brands rely heavily on the literal use of white space around the most important elements on their websites. White space—also known as negative space—simply refers to any space on a website that is devoid of elements. It can be used around an image (like in the case of Apple), around text, or around a call-to-action (like in Google’s case). Wherever white space is employed, it’s almost always a clear indication that there is something important to be found within it.
While white space is one of the most commonly highlighted features of minimalist design, there is quite a bit more that goes into it than that. Minimalism is about achieving more with less. Less words. Less competing images. Less complexity. Just less of everything… so that what remains will shine through very clearly.
Now, of course, we’re not advocating for websites to be super basic. On the contrary. In minimalism, there still needs to be a strategy behind the design and copy, and the website should have the ability to intrigue and lure in visitors with sharp pops of color, images, and messaging. Ultimately, it all comes down to striking the right balance.
And that’s where you come into play.
How to Communicate Effectively through Minimalist Design
As you aim to employ a simpler approach to your site’s design, it’s important to keep in mind why you’re choosing to do this:
To make your business look more professional and credible.
To establish more balance and develop a look that’s overall more aesthetically pleasing.
To bring focus to what’s most important on the site: the content.
To keep the site navigation simplified and easy to get around.
To communicate your website’s mission and goals without overwhelming or confusing visitors.
And that’s really what all this boils down to. If you can’t get your website’s message across within that six to eight second timeframe during which your visitors are paying attention, what else will possibly motivate them to stick around?
Minimalism will help you cut down on the excess clutter and give visitors an opportunity to focus on the basic—and most important—details of your site until they’re interested and ready to navigate around the rest of it.
When you’re ready to start using a minimalist approach to site design, here are the most important points to remember:
Prioritize
The most important messages should be placed front and center on the website. If they don’t answer the questions “What do you [the website or business] do?” and “How can you help me [the visitor]?” then you either need to ditch that content altogether or place it somewhere else. (See #3 below.)
Analyze
In order to ensure people are reading those crucial pieces of information and finding your calls-to-action right away, you’ll need a tool to help you figure out where visitors are actually looking on your site, so you can strategically place your messaging there.Google Analytics is a good place to start. Heat map technology will also be important in identifying where visitors are prone to looking on your site. (You can either get a heat map through your A/B testing provider or in plugin form, like this one.)
Minimize
Not every bit of information related to your website’s products or services is going to be considered top priority. However, that doesn’t mean it’s not essential to either telling the website’s story or in giving visitors additional information they might be interested in.You may have ongoing news announcements you want to share, but don’t want to take up prime real estate with a news widget. Or you might want to give visitors an opportunity to download a free white paper, but don’t want to build a sidebar just to have a place for it to appear on every page. That’s where tucking these messages away—or minimizing them—can come in handy. (We’ll give you some decluttering tips on that in the next section.)
Reassess
There will come a time when you wholeheartedly believe that something looks good on your website, but then you discover that your visitors haven’t been that receptive to it. Do you know why? Do you have a guess as to what can be tweaked to get them more interested? That’s where A/B testing comes in.A/B testing is a great follow-up to applying any sort of minimizing effects to your website. While you may think that floating social media icons tucked into the footer will help declutter your site, your visitors may not feel like having to scroll down to the bottom of the page to find and click on them. A/B tests will give you the opportunity to test out how best to apply these minimalist touches.