In a past article entitled Is Your Web Site Important To Your Marketing Strategy, we talked about how consumers can equate visiting a Web site domain with visiting a physical business. Conversely, a “physical business” can be referred to as an “internet property” or “internet real estate”. When you get right down to it, your Web site domain should not only be professional and insightful, but have a look and feel that can be comparable to the handiwork of an interior designer.
According to the Sheffield School of Interior Design, there exists an essential three-step method that is key for designing any good room:
1) A successful room is functional.
2) A successful room expresses a mood.
3) A successful room exhibits a sense of harmony.
We at Image Cog firmly believe that “just having a website is not enough.” Just like the three-step method in interior design, there requires a similar approach towards strategizing to creating and maintaining a Web site.
1) A successful Web site domain is functional:
Navigating should feel as natural as reclining back into a seat. All hyperlinks should be as reliable as placing a glass atop of a nearby table, knowing it will not fall over. In other words, your business’s Web site should compliment itself while making the interactive experience for a user streamlined so as to feel comfortable engaging in without thinking twice.
2) A successful Web site domain expresses a mood or tone:
This aspect of your Web site’s development can be dependant on two factors:
How the atmosphere within the company is on a daily basis.
Just as a formal setting in a room might be designed with the intent to evoke a mood of conscious etiquette, your business’s Web site might, for example, want to display a sense of bourgeois and expertise through complementary imagery, a subdued color pallete, and a stringent, contextual tone if the atmosphere within the company is of the formal suit and tie attire. Remember that the physical atmosphere your company chose to set was a conscious decision made on what was most appropriate to help your company compete with in its industry. The design choices made on your site must be equally deliberate.
How you wish to present your company’s image to your target audience.
Just as a room is filled with bean bag chairs and an outside view of the ocean, depending on your audience, your company’s image might want to be portrayed as laid-back through a soft, yet vibrant color palette and a casual, contextual tone that retains that necessary level of experience and appeal that your target visitors are looking for. Your audience, target or best customer, should be your guide. Here again if you are conscious of what will be appealing in the physical setting, you should make every effort to be consistent in the virtual setting.
3) A successful Web site domain exhibits a sense of harmony:
Harmony is just as important for a business’s Web site design as it is in interior design. Just as Japanese interior design uses natural colors to minimize the feeling of clutter and serve as a simple background, matching color tones, and consistent layout design and font style must work together to create cohesive continuity between one another to convey the asthetics necessary for a pleasurable experience.
There is much more to the process of web design than many Web site domain owners would give it credit for. The similarities to interior design are also quite close-knit and worth examining further in future articles. Though, if after reading this article your Web site is suddenly conveying a different message to you than it was before, discuss this further with your webmaster or design firm to make sure your “internet property” is poised to be as successful and presentable as possible.
The goal is to provide for the needs of all your potential users, adapting Web technology to their expectations and never requiring readers to conform to an interface that places unnecessary obstacles in their paths. – Web Style Guide
