Evaluating a web design project will call you to look at how specific design aspects have been implemented and how they relate to user flow. A web design review is simply an analysis of your web design to determine if it works to meet your goals in terms of deciding to create a website in the first place. An analysis of user experience is all and one part of what determines if your website lives up to your expectations.

Web design has more to do than graphic design. With over 500 million sites available on the web, yours must be more than just beautiful. This is corroborated in the post by the New York Times. It must be functional and appear within the first page of Google search results; the least is not enough.

Textual Content

In website design, bad typography gives a poor and repulsive impression about a website. Users would instinctively navigate out of it, not to mention reading. And as a rule of thumb, 5 generally accepted features characterise a good textual work in web design:

  • three levels of headers — no more no less;
  • a maximum of two font types used consistently through the website;
  • font size of at least 14 pt. In this design aspect, it is pertinent for in-text links to be noticeable. The “show more” and “show less” feature is indispensable in the case of long texts and write-ups.

Homepage

Internet users are flicky, and in web design, it is common knowledge that if your main page does not straight away answer the major questions of the users likely to visit your page, you have a bad website. For a gym website, the first thing a person would want to know is the opening hours and gym packages offered. A post explaining the benefit of exercise should not be the focus of the homepage. Good web design follows the rules of simplicity, from appearance to content, as far as this design aspect is concerned.

Your web visitor must instinctively know how to navigate through the web pages as well as what call to action to follow. The visuals of the homepage must be powerful enough to drive the visitor’s focus. In recent months, beautifully designed texts and sentences that match the overall web design graphics does the trick. This design aspect of a web design project usually seems to be overemphasised with little regard for the site structure.

Structure and Navigation of Your Web Design Review

Structure and navigation represent the level of ease of access a user has to your website. To check your web design project in this regard, you must be ready to evaluate your website design critically:

  • make sure your web content is distinctively categorised. No more than 5 categories.
  • avoid making your navigation too deep. For sections that cannot be conveniently merged, make an extended drop-down menu.
  • use breadcrumbs to show your users their current position on your website. Not every site sees the need for this design aspect; it is a competitive edge. You must maintain a consistent design type for web pages and of course, make an exception for your main page if you want it to act as a cover;
  • you could also provide an integrated Search box, with all possible keywords related to your niche taken into perspective when creating your content.

How to Conduct Web Design Review

User Experience

Tested on billions of users, UX rules and patterns are pure science that comes from years of research in web design and allows little to no creativity. Your web design project team has done a great job if there is:

  • a functional distinction between the buttons and the links on your website;
  • if the forms are organised and arranged correctly;
  • if the check and radio boxes were used properly;
  • if the primary action is repeated on display. In case you need your guest to check on your website, try and leave them with more options. Provide a button at the base and a link to land them on the desired page of your post.

Pro Tip: Make the main action accessible from multiple pages.

Visual Content

Humans are attracted to beautiful and well-organised visuals — those of your web site are what will grab and pull them into further exploration. The right selection of visuals would enable a vivid experience. For adult, gambling, and gaming websites, such as new slot sites, explicit design and graphics should be engaged, but for e-commerce or law firms — photographs depicting work environment and culture, products and services are just enough.

Make sure your web design project uses pictures that generate added value to the illustrated material. Optimise image size so as not to slow down your website. Avoid Flash animations as they have no native support in most modern browsers. Make sure all icons and clip-arts have a unified expression. Rework the default social share buttons into your general style. And finally, make all videos click-to-play.

Adaptability

Consider different screen resolutions of your audience. The top 3 would be for Mobiles, Tablets, and Desktops. Ensure the components of your web design have fast loading on all devices, eliminate finger scrolling obstacles, and test the scaling for people with poor eyesight. Also, check your columns to be sure they do not intersect and if your screen stays normal as the web page changes.

How to Conduct Web Design Review

Page-Interaction

An effective website design must respond to users’ activity. The interface of your site should be interactive in all its elements as the user navigates through. Explore the functionality of the scrolling wheel, highlight logo and page transition links, make your pop-ups pertinent, utilise smart active corners and hints such as “Hold & drag” or “click to spin” for interactive content. Finally, to see how users engage with your website, you can use any of the dedicated review tools listed below:

  • Clickdensity
  • Google Analytics
  • ClickTale
  • YSlow for Firebug
  • ClickHeat

What is your favourite part of this article on “How to make a Web Design Review,” and why? What design aspect would you like to get more information on? Do you need an analysis of the best website review tools available for use? We would like to discuss more with you in the comment section below!

Author’s Bio

A graduate of Computer Science, Thomas Glare is a reputable writer for America-based startups and a website developer. He is passionate about delivering satisfying advertiser/consumer platforms for business owners on the Internet and making websites that “work.” Thomas is also an avid advocate for a consistent website review.