Website First Impressions

You’ve heard the phrase, “Don’t judge a book by it’s cover!”, right? And yet, we still do. That’s where our first impressions are made. It’s true that your potential customer will make their first impression of your website within the first second or two. That must mean the first impression is purely visual. Your potential customer hasn’t had time to read anything yet. They have only processed colour, layout and space. So what does that tell us.

Design matters! It isn’t just about making things look nice – design is visual communication, and it’s important to know what you’re communicating in those first few seconds before your customer has read a single word.

Here are 5 top tips to make the best first impression.

1. Use Strong Imagery

A picture paints a thousand words. Great lifestyle imagery can bring your products to life and tell a story that will certainly catch the attention of your potential customers and help your website give a great first impression.

2. Utilise Colour

Colour can be a very powerful tool on your website. Where do you want to draw your customers eye? Use colour to guide them there. An example could be during your sale period. You can use colour to draw your potential customers attention to a “Sale” tab in your navigation.

3. Space

Similar to colour, space can help draw attention to your most important content by eliminating distraction around the area you are trying to highlight.

4. Typography and Layout

Always make sure your titles, call to actions and section headings are in a clean, easy to read font. Contrast is important, especially if you are using text on top of an image. Readability is always the most important measure when dealing with text!

5. Instil Trust

One of the first questions a potential customer will be asking themselves is, “can I trust them?”. Highlighting those trust messages early is crucial to that first impression. Do you have a 5* trust pilot rating? Do you offer “no hassle returns”? These are the things that a potential customer will be looking for and can definitely have a positive effect on first impressions.

Instilling trust is even more important when considering new customers and in particular international customers. Check out our international ecommerce guide for more information on that front!