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Web design: not one size fits all!
Web design isn't that simple when you think about how many different monitors, operating systems and browsers people use today. It's easy to prioritise looks when deciding on your final web design, but making sure the web design actually looks good for everyone is perhaps even more important. Remember, people drift towards the 'back' button if a website doesn't display right!
A professional website will display correctly on any screen size or browser. Any oversights in the initial web design or development stages could potentially exclude a segment of your target audience. Good web design agencies will obviously address these issues from the start, and it's a good idea to go with a professional for this reason. A large part of website creation is testing, double testing, and triple testing how the web design will look on different screens, browsers and systems.
The most popular screen size is 800 x 600 pixels, so it's common to find websites keeping within these dimensions. However, smart businesses are learning to optimise their web design in other ways. Checking Google Analytics to find out the screen resolutions most used by your visitors is paramount. You might find that 90 percent of your visitors have screen resolutions wider than 1000 pixels, and that only 0.5 percent of people have screens smaller than 800 pixels wide. In this case, why leave all that surrounding space blank when your web design should be making use of it?
Conversely, you might find that a good 65 percent of your visitors use netbooks or smart phones with very small resolutions. A website designed for larger screens might be too detailed or hard to navigate on a small device. Having a smart-phone-compatible web design is almost indispensable in this day and age, and a simple change in your web design means you can cater for these visitors and potentially halve your website's bounce rate.
You also need to think about who you want looking at your website, and why? Do you want to grab people sitting at desktop computers, who can spend a longer time looking through your website? Or are you targeting busy, on-the-go types who might look for your site on their iPhones in a hurry? Keep your marketing strategy in mind every step of the way. It's important to never stop thinking about your visitors and how they receive your web design.
