Web Design and Content: How They Perfectly Balance One Another

One of the most challenging things to achieve when working in the world of marketing is creating a brand that understands the importance of investment and engagement in creative communication. However, most organizations ignore this strategy. Just because a company has a website does not mean that they have an online business. Without a creative design or meticulously crafted content, no brand can commercially scale.

Providing a satisfactory user experience is one of the most important things a brand should strive for. A clear and structured page, intuitive and easy to navigate, with cohesion and consistency across all sections — these are the things that will make users stay in the site and/or return. This directly feeds into creating customer loyalty. Without a budget set aside for fresh, original, and updated content that targets the needs of your customers, valuable opportunities for promoting your user’s experience and increasing your authority are being lost, jeopardizing the ability for your business to grow.

Content that gets attention and results includes a regularly updated blog, client success stories, infographics, videos, a striking portfolio, and any other strategy or element that encourages people to visit your site repeatedly. If your content is outdated, irrelevant, or straight-up dry, users won’t be interested, and your business will struggle to retain loyal customers and ultimately, convert.

Strong content is what makes your site stand out from the other four billion pages on the internet.

It delivers the right message to the right client, which leaves a mark on the customer’s memory and heart. Effective communication to your users is the ultimate determinant of the success of your online presence.

If a creative agency carrying out the development of your website does not think about the link between design and content, your company will be nothing more than a shadow when compared to your competitors. Both departments have to work in tandem. Think of it as a tandem bicycle; with two or more people, the bike moves faster, easier, further, and ultimately, there’s a greater success rate.

Now that we have explained why both departments working together is so crucial for success, let’s dive into more detail and look into what specific activities each department carries out in order to help each other and create the perfect marketing strategy.

So, what does good design have to do with content marketing? Everything. It plays an extremely important role. So important that it could affect your results and conversions.

Here’s why…

Design helps provide visual support to the message, reinforce each slogan, help users digest relevant data, and connect the user with the brand on a deeper and/or emotional side.

Human Emotion

A good design helps catch users attention. We create designs that connect your brand with the intended/target audience. This is made possible, as each and every shape, font color, and font style communicates a subconscious message, evoking different human emotions and potential connections or feelings towards the brand. Once a customer connects with a brand on an emotional level, their trust is earned, and you can engage with them on an intellectual level.

Functionality

Content drives people to your website; design enhances that content. UX design, when done well, helps users find the content quickly and easily. A simple, functional design has organized content, which gives visitors a pleasant experience, keeping them on your site longer.

Let’s look at an easy example of a CTA button. This is arguably the most important part of your website. A great CTA button can direct users, get them to take a desired action, improve conversion rates, and ultimately help your website achieve its defined objectives.

This example shows two CTA Buttons with the same content, but different design. Which one would you click first?

The CTA button example is a clear illustration of providing visual support to content and engaging the user. We also use this strategy when creating Landing Pages. Landing pages are different than website pages. A landing page is a standalone web page, created specifically for a marketing or advertising campaign. On this page, we apply resources like interactive forms, quizzes, calculators, and anything else that will help engage the user, make them stay, and ultimately convert.

Another very useful tool in the marketing world is A/B Testing. AB Testing is essentially an experiment where two or more variants of a page are shown to users at random, and statistical analysis is used to determine which variation performs better for a given conversion goal. We use this tool a lot in the world of web design, but it is also very valuable for content. AB Testing allows us to test content against each other, and see which is more engaging to the user.

Content Roles and How They Impact Web Development

How often do you pick out gift wrap before purchasing the gift? Sometimes? Rarely? Almost never? This basic idea applies to developing websites. The important part is what the site says and the information it gives the user; this is done through its content. Many times, designers and web developers get too wrapped up on how the site looks and forget what products or services the site is actually providing to the user. Now, don’t get us wrong — an attractive site is definitely a plus — but if the user is not able to find the information they need, or cannot quickly say what the business is about, the website is totally a waste.

This doesn’t mean that the wrap for your gift is not important cause a gift wrapped with a nice paper, a big lace, and a note on it will be much more inviting than a gift wrapped with newspaper. Like we mentioned before, both departments must work in tandem, combining strategies that are moving towards the same goal.

Both the web development and content team are in charge of telling the story. This story includes everything from putting together and/or creating the content that the user is looking for and making sure that content is easy to read, correct, and engaging for the end-user.

The content team has a very important role in creating high-ranking content for its clients — this is accomplished by including popular keywords for the topic being discussed, which increases the rank, and essentially aims in getting your page to appear at or near the top position in Google. For this reason, the content team works very closely with SEO. These practices make a huge impact on the final and ultimate goal — that is, getting users to convert in your site.

Wrapping Up 

The web development and content teams are the Yin and the Yang — they perfectly balance each other. Great website design is the form that creates the users’ first impression; strong content is the function — the device that attracts search engines, makes your audience interested, and drives results.