Planning UX for your project?

Having knowledge of building online presence is one thing and going forward with a plan is another. I have seen many people with great ideas of online business / app / website, but due to lack of planning it didn’t work out the way it could.

There are some unwritten rules to be followed before planning your project.

Don’ts:

• Never look for ready made themes online for your business category. The template is generic, your website can not be build on a generic strategy. Your project may or may not need elements from the template.
• Never look for competitor’s websites, this is a mistake many of the business owner or new designers make. They think that if my competitor’s website is helping his business a similar one can help mine. It is similar to using ready made themes but in this case you’re just copying an existing template instead of using it.
• Avoid sharing your social media links on the website, you don’t want to move website visitors to social media, you want them to come from social media to your website.
• Don’t just start with every single though coming on your mind, note all ideas give them a second, third, fourth and fifth thought and then decide if you really need it on the website. I’ve seen people making changes and after few days coming back to initial design.

Do’s:

• Spend more time on planning. I’ve seen people spending most of the time in planning once they have a full proof plan; they build their project in much less time.
• Have a set of questions to be asked to your users which will give you a clear idea in building the user experience. If you know users age group, gender, location, education, how tech savvy they are, you will have a clear vision of your UX.
• Set goals of your project what would be a best out cum of your project? What are your expecting from user? Buying product / service, filling enquiry forms, click on your phone number/ email address, getting your mailing details.
• Once your website is built, add it to Google Webmasters, Google Analytics, Set up at least basic SEO, Sitemap.
• Keep the most important thing in mind, when it comes to design LESS is MORE. If you want to go through an example compare Google with Bing or Yahoo.

I learned above points from my personal experience, incase you think I missed any point, kindly feel free to drop a comment.