Seven ways to instantly make your website look more professional

What makes a bad web design?

I’ll just briefly touch on what makes a bad design. So you know what to avoid, then we’ll look into what we should be doing.

The worst websites are incoherent and inconsistent, this means a range of font sizes, a series of completely unrelated stock imagery, a range of line heights through the paragraph text. Weird inconsistencies in spacing. A large range of different and unrelated colours. All this stuff makes you look unorganised and clueless. Your website is seen as a reflection of how you run your business, so your job is to make it look organised and professional.

Below is an example of what not to do. By all accounts, lingscars.com is pretty successful, but I assure you she’s a one off.

Use no more than 3 fonts

There’s so many fonts out there, so many options to choose! Don’t give yourself a headache, keep your text legible, consistent and easy to read.

I advise using no more than three fonts and using a tool like https://fontpair.co/ to help you choose the right combo.

Use no more than five colours

It’s tempting to use every colour under the sun, but don’t. Keep your colour pallette simple and neutral. Website colour palettes should guide users to take action, not confuse them and give them a headache with a rainbow of colour.

Use Adobe Kuler to help you pick a set of colour tones -> https://color.adobe.com/create/color-wheel/ 

Make sure that you use high contrast between text and background colours, Google loves it and your users will love it too.

Maintain consistency in your colour tones

Consistency is a powerful tool in appearing more professional. In fact it’s the cornerstone of establishing a recognisable brand, let alone a well designed website.

Maintain a consistent tone to your images and photos. You can use “image presets” to make all your image have the same colour tone, which will give a consistency to your brand. 

Choose a preset colour tone  and stick with it. Adobe lightroom or Photoshop is best, but you could always use something like this https://www.befunky.com/features/photo-effects/

Use Consistency and symmetry throughout the design

Use consistent, margins, padding and font sizes throughout your website to give the design balance and symmetry. An organised and consistent use of design elements will make your website appear more professional and give the impression of a better overall design. 

Let your content Breath

Nobody likes to feel claustrophobic and this applies to people using your website. Give your website content space to breath through appropriate use of margin and padding. 

Use appropriate line-height on your headings and body text to make text more legible.

Use professional photography and video

Imagery makes up a large portion of your website, and can set the tonality and feel. So it’s important that you put some effort into making sure that you effectively use imagery and media.

The easiest way to do this is to hire a professional photographer / videographer to produce some creative and original material for you. This will not only make you look more professional, but will help you to build trust and connection with your user. 

Yes it might cost you a few hundred pounds to hire a photographer, but in most cases, it’s an investment well worth making.

Avoid using too many Call to Actions buttons

The call to action is a powerful website element which should be used with caution. If you use it too many different call to actions you dilute the power of it to entice users to click and you’ll confuse them with too many options. 

And there you have it! Seven practical ways to improve your website design without being a creative genius.

I hope you enjoyed my tips and get them implemented to improve your website. But if it all sounds too much, I’m always here to take you from amateur to professional, get a callback to discuss your project today