No matter how brilliant your website design is, if it is hard to reach
the content of your site then your site is as useful as an empty
shell. Here are some tips to improve the usability of your website to
ensure it serves its functions optimally.
The first method is to make sure the typography of your content is
suitable. If you have large blocks of text, make sure to use CSS to
space out the lines accordingly. The longer a single line of text is,
the greater the line-height of each line should be. Also, make sure
the font size of your text is big enough to read easily. Some sites
have 10-pixel-tall text in Verdana font; while that may look neat and
tidy, you have to really strain your eyes to read the actual text.
Make it easy for visitors to find content that they want on your site.
If you have thousands of articles on your site and a certain visitor
wants to find one single article from that pile, you have to provide a
feasible means to enable visitors to do that without hassle. Be it an
SQL-driven database search engine or just a glossary or index of
articles that you have, providing such a feature will make sure your
visitors can use your site with ease.
Ensure that your site loads fast if you do not want to lose visitors.
Most internet users will leave a website if it doesn't load completely
within 15 seconds, so make sure the crème de la crème of your website
is delivered to the visitors as soon as possible to retain their
attention.
Last of all, test each and every link on your site before it goes
online. There is nothing more effective in tarnishing your
professional image than broken links, so be very careful about that.