Designers, especially beginners, more than other guys, love to show all their skills, tricks and other designer high-calorie buns. We take everything that is, and we push on the site in equal proportions. From above we pour abundantly on uniqueness, innovation and fashion. Nothing is clear, but everything is there.

Often it is impossible to stop in time, and you realize the problem when, alas, the scales are already broken. To prevent obesity, the site requires a diet, the secret of which is extremely simple: setting goals, reducing calories, balanced physical exertion, hard restrictions and willpower. Just like people.

1 Awareness of the Problem

So, the first step in solving any problem is its awareness. If the problem is not obvious - it is not obvious to you personally, or it simply does not exist - you cannot fix anything. Stop working. If you are one of those who are dissatisfied with their result and want to change it, it means that you are on the right track and are ready for step two.

2 Goal Setting

Focus on the main thing. It sounds obvious, but the temptation to add calories and in the secondary elements on the site is very high. A well-designed site grabs attention and directs it in the right direction. Despite the fact that the human brain is multi-tasking, it is still easier for him to handle one task. If attention demands everything around, most likely you will not notice anything. In addition, in the future, if you suddenly come to a standstill, the correctly chosen focus will help you to understand where to go and keep your design slim like RedLeos An Agency of Marketing.

Calorie Reduction

If you want your site to be simple and effective, then reducing the number of elements is mandatory. The minimalist design has been popular for many years, but this does not mean that your site should be so, it is important to make it more balanced.

A large number of details can easily spoil the perception of the whole picture. The color palette, the number and size of images, the fonts used, the amount of content on the page are all areas of concern that require increased attention. Take away too much, get rid of the noise, throw away all the visual trash.

The site as a whole and its individual elements should be built according to priorities. Individual elements of the site should not compete with each other. Placing priorities, it is important to analyze the main elements, compare them with each other, ask the question “What is more important?”, And, not sparing, remove too much.

Balanced Exercise

Your design, as an experienced guide, guides the visitor from section to section, without interrupting his movement. And if this guide has grown fat, then the route from point “A” to point “B” risks remaining unfinished. Its much important point especially for affiliate or eCommerce site and most of the affiliate cms designing agencies cares about it.

To prevent this, it is important to learn a number of principles:

Moving attention to the site should be thoughtful, built and logical. This can be a step-by-step movement towards the goal or a movement from a larger to a smaller one.

If any elements have a similar meaning, group them. Look for a single meaning in disparate elements and bring them together with a background, a single heading, surround with a common space.

And on the contrary - it is important to separate elements of different meaning. Contrast will help reduce the monotony of the information. It can manifest itself in font sizes, in used forms, in color, thickness of lines, and, of course, in the space around the elements. Here it is important not to overdo it so that the visitor has a dazzling start in his eyes.

Alignment of elements on the page also eliminates confusion. This will help modular grid, composition and common sense.

Pay attention to empty space, allow pollock to "breathe." The use of space is not a fad of designers, and not even a question of taste - it is first and foremost a convenience. Emptiness itself is a powerful element: it allows you to bring together and separate, focus and place accents.

5 The benefits of restrictions

Creative freedom makes you drunk. Sobriety of mind, limitations and discipline are the essential ingredients of a viable project. Therefore, it is important to say in time:

NO to design excess

The machine-gun burst of all sorts of applets, screensavers, stunning effects and other design innovations will make the site flash epileptically, and will certainly surprise, but will not solve the main task. The author thought he was doing fashionably, incomprehensibly and in a design manner, but he got multi-level ceilings made from drywall. You need to surprise with the product, quality, service, and design in this case only help.

NO free pictures

In spite of the fact that you most likely need the best pictures in the world, be it kittens or an elaborate drawing, it is better to avoid free collections. First, the site owner risks one day to receive a letter similar to the following: "We are suing you for illegal use of our images, tremble." If the images are really free, you can easily get lost in the total faceless mass, having found the same images on thousands of other sites.

NO meaningless chatter

Sites under the string with text are terrible. Excessive enthusiasm for long greetings, text descriptions and conversations about oneself is catching up on visitors with dreary horror. A large number of words "eats" the space, overwhelms the site and leads to a clumsy appearance. Reducing the font size in this case is not a panacea. Help the user to see what you want to tell - use icons, diagrams and illustrations. If a large amount of text cannot be avoided, then use techniques that make it easier to read: highlight keywords, use headings, write small paragraphs.

NO pop-up windows

Although the time of aggressive pop-ups has passed, but where they are still found, it causes the same persistent rejection. The most usual reaction to the appearance of suddenly pop-up windows will be leaving this site. And with each new such case, the stock of trust of the target audience will be depleted. Avoid aggressive obsessions.

NO sounds on site

The cheerful melody that begins to play when you enter the site will certainly please you, but most visitors are annoyed. You may not know where they are viewing your site: at work, in a noisy room, or near a sleeping child. It is always easier to close the site than to look for the mute button. Let the user decide for himself.

NO bad search

First you need to answer the question, is it needed? If the site has five pages - no search is needed. It may be worthwhile to use the existing solutions and get away with an external search on the site from Google or Yandex. In any case, low-quality search can pretty exhaust the nerves of your visitors.

NO bad navigation

The worst of all the options when a visitor comes to your site and does not know what to do next. Intuitive navigation will help to avoid such disorientation, the structure should be simple, and the links should be similar to links. If the choice is between "unusual" and "convenient", choose the latter. Sometimes it is better to adhere to standards.