Site Layout Optimisation

Introduction

Layout is one of the most important parts of a website. And it is the reason behind failure of many sites. I am saying this because I have seen many sites which are too traditional in design. And it gives a bad impression to the user.

So, its important to have a good layout. There is no hard and fast rule regarding this. But the only rule is “simplicity” and “relevance”. Simplicity means to keep things easy for the users to understand, grasp and move through. And Relevance means to keep only those things which are required.

I have seen some sites having Calendars, COVID figures, Weather information and Almighty knows what else. I have also seen some sites with useless information in the sidebar and the footer. Not only this, but the most important pages (like Home Page, Contact Us Page, About Us Page) have that information which a user does not require.

How the Home Page Should Be

We will often find 1000 words novel written on the home page. Why? For SEO! The idea is not to make the pages decorated with words but with information that is required. e.g. A news website should have different sections (covering different categories of news) and top news links from each section. I love New York Times for its home page.

New tork Times Design
Source: New York Times

The excerpt should be short and compelling. And featured image should be well edited, preferably with some text on it. BUT, the font should be simple. Please avoid too much decoration. It makes the image look worst.

How the News Article Page Should Be?

The article page is what a website stands on. It should be somewhat like this:

It should have a featured image, a bold and big title, content in large font, use of images (along with captions), share buttons, links to facebook groups, telegram group and whatsapp group, related articles etc. The sidebar can have top articles, subscription box and ad.

Keep the font colour dark enough. The headings should be preferably in different colour or extra bold. You can use Oswald font for headings.

What Other Pages Should be There?

  1. Contact Us Page: You can either add an email or a form (Google Form, Zoho Form etc).
  2. Advertise: Give a brief idea of your statistics, available ad spaces, audience base, geo etc.
  3. Work With us: Searching for new recruits is one of the good practices.
  4. Terms and Privacy: They should be there.

Site Design to Follow

You can get inspiration from these sites:

  1. New York Times
  2. Time.com
  3. NDTV
  4. ThePrint
  5. TheQuint