PROJECTS
Headers
A lot of effort goes into the average homepage design
because it’s often the first point of contact in the customer
journey. However, it’s important to not be so eager to impress that
you end up chasing users away.
Here are some things to avoid:- Scroll down hints
Something as simple as a homepage shouldn’t require instructions.
If utilising the fold to the maximum, just leave a little space at
the bottom that suggests there’s more to see. Don’t add more
cognitive load when it isn’t necessary. - Sideways text
Sideways text is for aliens with sideways heads. Just no! - Lack of clarity
Make it super clear what you’re offering. We don’t need to
sound cool or smart in order to sell our product; we just need to
confidently communicate the product’s value proposition. - Anything unconventional
Unless you’re an entertainment or lifestyle brand, unconventional
visual design trends rarely appeal to anybody outside of the
Dribbble audience and, even then, an overload of visuals is usually
headache-inducing when a site has to present multiple products
and functions. There’s definitely more room for visual design with
entertainment and lifestyle brands but we should be mindful of
choices and design in moderation.
WHAT TO AVOID
ON THE HOMEPAGE
IN-DEPTHAvoid silly stunts like scroll down hints and sideways text“Users will jump ship
when something seems
too complicated,
regardless of how
inviting a website looks.
Keep it simple”
PHOTOGRAPHY
Let’s start with some photography. The benefits
of co-working are highly documented, so for that
reason I’ll be skipping user research for the sake of
the tutorial. Here’s a quick summary:O Remote workers feel lonely
O Remote workers need convenience (sockets,
Wi-Fi, coffee, etc)Obviously there’s much more to our user’s
persona but there’s also only so much value that
we can actually communicate above-the-fold and
the header section is vital for capturing attention,
so the ethos of less is more needs to be employed.
Users also have a decent idea of what they want
when it comes to co-working – specifically, they can
easily visualise where they’d like to work for several
hours every day.
Photography is the ideal way to convey all of this.
An image is easier to scan and digest than a couple of
sentences and the image we’ve chosen of people in a
workspace invokes all the right emotions:O Community
O Productivity
O ConvenienceThis is our first purposeful decision. Just remember
that, once again, that we would ordinarily start
proceedings with user research and a validated
wireframe, which would guide us as to the UI
elements we’d need on screen.WORDS
The header is looking awesome already but what are
we offering and why should users want it? The image
says a lot – it certainly looks like the kind of setup
that most remote workers would want – but we need
to confidently clarify what is being offered without
falling into the trap of trying to sound overly smart.
Be direct, as confusion will untether the
connection we’ve made. We could try something