- Getting Started in Web Design
- Mastering Web Design Software
- Learning How to Code
- Earning a Degree
- Creating a Personal or Professional Website
Nowadays, an Ecommerce website designer is a vital part of any company’s marketing strategy. Without a website, companies must rely on brick and mortar sales alone. If you ever search for “website designer near me”, then by now you should know how website efficiency, or having a website alone should help you increase your sales.
A website allows any company or person to reach out to a broad audience, and a well-executed professional website design is created in a way that converts visitors into customers of your product, service, or brand.
Getting Started in Web Design
The best web designers know that good web design is nearly unperceivable and feels intuitive to the user. Knowing this, it makes sense for beginners to focus on the fundamentals of website design, including basic drawing, web design theory, and practices that prevail in the industry.
Basic Concept of Drawing
With a little knowledge of graphic design, a website designer can put drawing skills into good use. Although drawing is not vital for most of a web designer’s job, there is importance in being able to illustrate ideas that are needed to express certain ideas to clients and team members. Most ecommerce website designers need to be capable of drawing basic graphs and grids to help them be able to clarify their professional website design or layout plans. A designer should have a general concept of drawing shapes, shading, roughing out tabs, incorporating basic logos, and more in their initial website designs.
Website Structure Understanding
Building a professional website design takes a good understanding of website structure. The main reason for that is to adapt to the ever-changing needs of an e-commerce business. Most businesses change their virtual presence in order to be aligned with recent innovations. As the company changes to apply new processes, services, products, or partnerships, the webpage will need to reflect that. A website designer will need to adapt to these new aspects to keep up with the evolving structures of business and technology.
Nowadays, e-commerce website security and the shifting requirements of search engine optimization are the critical tasks web designers have to fully understand. It boils down to what makes a page appealing to users from start to finish.
Taking User Experience into Account
An understanding of UX design principles will help any website designer regardless of the nature of the business. It indefinitely makes websites behave in a way that users want and expect. Take note, a good user experience design will allow visitors to stay on your site. You have a better chance of helping a customer with their purchasing journey if images, content, and other add-ons on the site load faster.
Best Practices
One of the most important parts of web design is to apply best practices which include having a user-friendly interface. As mentioned aforehand, you must take user experience into account when designing a website. From the ease of finding something, the convenience of having a 24/7 chatbot, to implementing readable content through the use of effective background.
Metrics to Define ROI
Finally, in getting started with web design, a web designer must be able to critique your own design work to see what you might have missed editing and what else can be improved. Your client should be able to see a return on investment and won’t have any questions. At the end of the day, you want your clients to be satisfied with the budget they have allocated for web design.
By learning how to read and use key metrics to measure your results, you can help build a case for whether or not specific steps or processes of your website design strategy were successful. These metrics will then help you create and improve results by continuing some approaches and at the same time changing a few others.
Mastering Web Design Software
In every industry, becoming an expert or being fluent with the key tools is the one that determines the gap between success and failure. Especially in the web design industry, your very edge is having expertise in using software and programs that would help create a beautiful and meaningful website. Simply put, there is a highly limited chance to excel in the field without knowing the basic programs that are going to impact your career. Take note, the best web designers are fast and effective, using key programs as if they were second nature. Here are some of the web design software the best website designers use:
- Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is your best bet to edit specific images. While you may not be doing a lot of photo editing for clients as a website designer, you should understand the basics of a program that is used in the design industry. Adobe Photoshop is commonly used in resizing and compressing images to be suitable for web viewing. A professional website designer should know how to crop an image to properly fit within specific spaces in the design while maintaining the quality of the image. You might even need to change file formats to better suit your needs.
- Adobe Illustrator
For fonts, vector images and line-based art that are not pixelized, Adobe Illustrator is getting the job done. Since many computers may not have the feature to download the same font, you need to create an image that can be placed as a graphic or image within the design so every user will see it with the same font. You may need to adjust logo colors or create customized button graphics for your client, so knowing how to use Illustrator is key to creating unique add-ons on a website.
- Adobe Animate
Most web designers have been trained on Adobe Flash for website purposes. Adobe discontinued Flash and replaced it with a similar tool in Creative Cloud called Animate. This program allows a user to turn vector images and text into animations. This is incredibly useful for increasing engagement in websites and apps.
- Adobe Dreamweaver
In a web development team, web designers should also understand how to write and edit code. This is where Dreamweaver comes in handy. Dreamweaver is a text editor that has tools to help you edit your code faster. You will find hints in the software program that will help you learn HTML, CSS, and other coding languages faster.
- Adobe Premier Pro
If you are to incorporate a video as part of the content. Web designers are often expected to help create video testimonials, tutorials, advertisements, and other short clips that help the client promote their website. A basic grasp of video editing and manipulation will be helpful when you are incorporating client content on the site.
Learning Basic Coding
HTML/CSS
Commonly used are the basic languages called HTML/CSS that will not only help you know how to code but edit code as well. To differentiate the two, HTML typically establishes the structure and content of the page, while CSS is what indefinitely controls the design.
Javascript
As one of the most in-demand programming languages, it is important for website designers to know JavaScript. The feature to work across multiple website browsers such as Firefox, Chrome, and Internet Explorer is highly important for interactive websites.
Python
Many website designers consider Python a beginner’s language. However, Google, NASA, Instagram, and Pinterest all rely on this language to work on their platforms, which makes them complicated. The language is capable of working with desktop as well as mobile devices.
PHP
Websites like Facebook, WordPress, and others are powered by PHP. Not all web designers need to know PHP, but those that want to develop and design anything on WordPress or Facebook will have to know it.
Earning a Degree
The best way to prove your knowledge and skills is to earn your degree and back it with a strong portfolio as well as experience. Companies are more likely to hire you if they feel you are up to the task – college shows you at least have the basic education to use the tools properly. On top of that, educating yourself through online schools will help you earn a certificate that could also verify your knowledge.
On top of mastering basic tools and programming languages, college classes should give you an in-depth understanding of design theory, audience expectations, and best practices as you look to enter the field of web designing. College should ensure you have a basic understanding of writing and communication skills that will allow you to work professionally with clients and fellow designers.
Creating a Personal or Professional Website
Of course, since you are a website designer, you would want to create stunning work that catches the eye of your potential employer. This means that you have to carefully test your own website – checking load seconds, looking at responsiveness, trying out personalization, and testing website navigation for users’ experience.
Finally, you’d want to feature clients or projects you’ve worked on that show the range of your capabilities. Utilize the portfolio section of your website to highlight companies and other websites that you’ve designed for. If you haven’t started a career yet do a lot of volunteer work. This way you can showcase a portfolio with a wide range of designs.
Wrapping Up!
A career path is an ultimate goal for any educational process and the creation of a website. You need to keep your eye on the prize and leave any education or licensing with a purpose to fulfill your skills. You will have decisions to make along the way that will help you know which way to turn as you exit and grow as a website designer. You will want to continue to improve and make yourself an invaluable asset in the company you will work for and the career you will take on.
