In this period of time when businesses are thriving over the internet, having a strong Content Management System (CMS) lays the foundation of a successful website. Every web development company believes that having an aesthetically pleasing website alone doesn’t get the job done. Instead, it has to be highly functional, secure and offer top-notch user experience. This blog will walk you through the top 6 essential guidelines for CMS web design and development. These will help you as a business owner or a newbie developer to a great extent in creating a CMS site that connects with your audience and delivers expected results.
Understanding Your Audience
The first step when it comes to starting an effective CMS web design and development process is to understand the target audience correctly. A deeper understanding of your target audience, their preferences, their interaction pattern and needs is quintessential. Kickstart the process by creating different user personas from your different set of target audience. Start collecting data with the help of surveys, analytics and social media touch points to know their preference and problems. Once you get this understanding, you will be in a better position to explain to your partner web development company about specific design and development choices.
When the CMS web design and development process is taken up with the audience in priority, you can definitely expect higher engagement and conversions.
Choosing the Right CMS
Any cms web developer will agree that choosing the right CMS for the work holds the key. Factor in scalability, support, customization features, and ease of use while selecting a CMS. Some of the most popular options according to CMS website design experts are-
- WordPress (Most extensively used because of its user-friendly interface and a wide range of available plugins.
- Joomla (Popular due to its flexibility)
- Drupal (Perfect choice for large scale and complex websites)
This decision needs to be taken on the basis of the expertise of your partner CMS web development company, nature of your business, and the future aspects. A CMS that aligns with the skill level of your partner web development company and business objective will ensure that the CMS web design and development process is a lot more streamlined and effective.
Responsive Design is Key
When you plan for CMS web design and development always keep in mind about the responsive design. A responsive design allows your site to seamlessly adapt to multiple screen sizes and devices. In a world driven by mobile internet users, ruling out such a feature is one mistake you will never want to commit. Ask your partner web development company to add flexible grids and layouts, images that can scale itself to different resolutions, and an efficient touch-screen navigation. Your CMS web design expert will utilize tools like CSS media queries to create this responsive design. Before going live, test the website on multiple devices to ensure that it is responsive in nature.
Adding such a responsive feature not only helps you engage users but assists in terms of enhancing SEO score of the site as well!
Optimizing for Speed and Performance
Every CMS web developer will agree that website speed is one of the most crucial factors that affects user experience on the site. Other than this, it also has a significant impact on the site’s visibility on the search engines. Ask your partner web development company in charge of your CMS web design and development gig to optimize the solution for peak performance. They can do it by compressing images, leveraging caching and reducing HTTP requests. Proper use of tools such as Google PageSpeed Insights can help immensely to identify performance bottlenecks.
Some coding practices such as reducing CSS and JavaScript, also work wonders when it comes to enhancing the speed of your website. Always remember that a fast loading website will help retain users and enhance their satisfaction. And it is needless to say that when a user is satisfied and on your site for a long time, the chances of conversion increase significantly.
User-Friendly Navigation and Layout
When it comes to CMS web design and development, the user experience is heavily reliant on intuitive navigation and layout. Ask your partner web development company to organize the content in a logical hierarchy. This will make it easier for the user to find what they are looking for on your site. The efficient use of clear description labels for navigation elements along with an uncluttered layout is recommended. Well thought out call-to-action buttons also help a long way when it comes to guiding users through the site. When your CMS is user-friendly, it will not only enhance user experience but also foster engagement and retention rates.
Regular Updates and Maintenance
When talking about CMS web design and development best practices, one just cannot do away the maintenance and updates aspect. The effectiveness of the CMS depends on regular updates and proper maintenance of the site. Make sure to keep updating CMS software and plugins to rake in benefits from the latest features and security patches. If your partner web development company is offering maintenance, ask them to perform checks on broken links and outdated content. This will keep the performance of the site on track and allow the CMS to function smoothly without any issues.
Conclusion
CMS web design and development is a process that requires detailed consideration of all the above mentioned pointers. Unless your CMS site is compliant to such best practices, the chances of it reaching a substantial range of audience is very meek. Always remember to work with a reputed web development company for your CMS site. While there are numerous CMS web development company, you need to take up extensive research to get the best one for your gig. Make sure to check their expertise and the skill level of developers assigned to the project. Ask them for their portfolio to check whether they have worked in your niche or not. Once you know them and have a proper discussion about your requirements and their approach, that is when you finalize and move ahead with them. Choose wisely!
