Content, Space, Color and Typography are the main components that have the biggest impact on a viewer, and it’s up to the designer to understand how using different design elements affects the mood, attitude and experience the viewer will have while browsing your website.
Content
People visit websites to access information they need, and the design of that website aids in them finding the information they need quickly and with ease.When websites were first developed, it was common to see pages too full of content. They typically had no structure, and it was difficult to find information and read through it to get what they needed. The user often left the site overwhelmed and had a poor experience.
When designing a site now, designers really need to condense and organize their content, as hiding or presenting too much information can lead to a possible loss in potential business. There should be a happy medium between providing adequate and needed content, while not overwhelming the user. This will lead to a good user experience as well as setting the tone for you and your organization.
Keep your content concise, organized and easy to read and navigate in order to aid in the psychology of your users having a positive experience on your website.
Space
The organization of a website can greatly affect how a user interprets a site, so organizing content should be a high priority. When organizing content, the designer should take into account the space that it takes up as well as the white space that’s used or not used!“…white space is often referred to as negative space. It is the portion of a page left unmarked: margins, gutters, and space between columns, lines of type, graphics, figures, or objects drawn or depicted.”1
The white space on a website plays an important role because visually it gives the user a resting place, and it’s a sort of pause that gives the user a chance to rest their eyes.
Take, for example, a website utilizing every inch of screen space. This site starts to feel chaotic and without any negative space present, there is nothing for the user to focus his eye to take a visual break.
Keeping things simple by having a well organized website that uses adequate white space translates into a good user experience.
These are two of the tools you’ll need to create a visually engaging site that encourages visitors to return. Read the next post about color.
References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_space_%28visual_arts%29
http://thenextweb.com/dd/2014/10/22/psychology-web-design/
