Building a website for a small business is a huge deal especially for entrepreneurs starting out in the industry. They are under pressure to make sure that their site is successful at helping them build their brand online. An online website builder makes it easier for startups to get their website up by handling the technical side of website development. This tool is ideal for business owners and individuals looking to create sites that reflect their brand and their personality.
One of the advantages of building your own online website is you get full creative control over the look and feel of your site. You can personalize it and make it uniquely yours. The best part is that you can do this at a minimal cost.
But what makes a professional website? Here are a few design elements that you can introduce through yoru free online website builder to make your online space exude reliability and professionalism.
Limit your color palette
Color reflects your brand image and personality more than anything. Certain shades and tones have the power to elicit emotions on people. Red, for instance, induces the appetite. Yellow is for wisdom and innovation. Purple gets associated with wealth and luxury. The right kind of colors can reinforce your brand’s message and can also help in brand recall.
When choosing color schemes for your free online website, consider your brand’s personality and the kind of image you want to build. Take care not to choose too many colors because your site will run the risk of looking disorganized and incoherent. A general rule of thumb is to limit your choice to 3 colors - a main color, accent color and a neutral shade. Strikingly allows you to choose up to 2 color combinations and customize the shade according to your preference.
Use a lot of white space
White space or negative space refers to the blank areas on your site. These open spaces help keep your pages looking clean and organized. The use of white space is very common on professional websites because it can be effective in drawing the focus on your visuals. It helps users find what they are looking for on your site. Strikingly’s modern website templates allow you to play around with white space when you create online websites on the platform. Instead of image backgrounds, you can use block colors to emphasize your content.
Choose your font wisely
The right choice of font style contributes to the entire look and feel of your site. Prioritize readability when choosing typography. Script fonts, for instance, may look elegant and fancy but you have to think about your user as well. Will the fancy font make it easy for him or her to read your content? If he can’t read your content, having beautiful font is useless.
Strikingly enables you to play around with font styles by giving you hundreds of different options to choose from. You can also upload your custom font to the online website maker to make your site more personalized.
Add high quality images and visuals
When you create website free online, it’s important to reel your readers in with engaging visuals. Use high-quality images to reinforce your message. If you have the budget for it, a tastefully shot video can also attract users into sticking around and giving your content a bit of their time. People are visual by nature and they are more likely to be attracted to a site with interesting images than one that is text heavy.
Quality is more important than quantity, however. Grainy and stretched out images can turn people off. They can also make your site look amateurish. If you want to look professional through your website, you want to use visuals that look like you put a lot of thought into them before putting them up online.
