5 Questions to Answer When Choosing a Web Design Template
Hey, have you heard that brick and mortar retail stores are dying off? Any cursory glance at the business section of a newspaper or online publication source these days tells you as much. What’s a newspaper, you ask? Yeah, they’re dying out, too. Designing a web design template is in!
Such is the state of the device-driven world we now live in. This new reality has businesses of all stripes scrambling to update their online presence. Getting your website up-to-date is crucial in today’s world where “talking to other human beings” ranks about 5th on a list of what people use their phones for.
If you’re thinking of developing a new website for your business, you’re not alone. An updated, user-friendly, mobile-optimized website is a must in the online world – and lucky for you, there are thousands of web templates out there than can manage a bulk of the heavy lifting when building a new website.
Here are five questions to answer when choosing a web design template that would work best for your business:
Do you want to be found on Google?
Whether or not you intend to be found through organic search on search engines like Google (though I can’t imagine you wouldn’t want to be found…) is very important for choosing a template. Websites need SEO (Search Engine Optimization) in order to excel in organic web searches – which often requires a breadth of individual pages that are rich with content, among several other things. Those who just want to put a site in place as a resource, but aren’t looking to gain organic search traffic, can opt for a much simpler site with just one or a few pages that are more visual vs. content heavy.
Will this template work well on mobile devices?
As one of Google’s highest determining factors of good SEO, it is absolutely imperative your template design is responsive and looks/works great on mobile devices. While desktop format is important, more and more web visits occur on mobile and tablet devices every day – so a design that is desktop AND mobile optimized will have the best success in communicating and interacting effectively with your audience, as well as improving and maintaining organic search rankings.
What’s your brand theme?
Your website should reflect your company’s brand and vibe. For example, a clean and easy-to-navigate site design would likely be more appropriate for a business with professional services than a graphic heavy, flashy layout. There are many ways to illustrate your brand theme through template design including colors, imagery and voice of content.
What is the purpose of your site?
Are you selling products online or simply creating a resource for information? If your site needs to have a shopping cart, it’s important to be sure your design template is compatible with an e-commerce platform. Most sites are meant to be a place where visitors can learn more about a company’s product or services. Informative sites will need room for plenty of content, while others may only need to rely mainly on visual interest to convey a message.
Do you want any custom development?
When considering a template design for your website, a few custom development additions may be doable, but modifying it too much can create issues with the template. If you’ve hired a web developer, this might ultimately end up costing you more than to budget for a fully custom website. All in all, it’s important to choose a template that will suit most of, if not all, your needs from the get-go.
Nobody knows the future of brick and mortar. What we do know is that consumers are searching for businesses, products and information far differently than they were a decade ago. To cast the widest net, you need to have a presence on the net – and that presence should be optimized with the best web template (or custom coded design) for your business.
