Why good ideas sometimes kill good web design

Perhaps the way you choose to design is beyond the ordinary creative thinking, but sometimes, too many ideas will kill the good design.

I have always thought that the more creative people are more likely to become good designers, but when I learn more about design, I feel that creativity is not the whole of design.

The idea that pushes you into the door of design may not be the furthest thing that takes you. Many designers are usually engaged as visual designers, and then begin to touch UI, usability, accessibility, user experience, interactive design, and gradually become UI designers, user experience designers and interaction designers.

Indeed, creativity, inspiration, and creative zeal "seduce" you into the realm of design, but when you want to be a better designer, you will find that too many ideas can hurt your design.

Why?

The main reason is that we are designing for the user. The sooner you realize this, the better. User psychological changes must be complex, but one thing is certain: By default, users are lazy, they choose the quickest and easiest way to complete operations and tasks. Too complex layouts, too-creative solutions, and reconditioned wheels don't make the user any easier, as the result can be imagined.

So, the designer's question becomes this: how to find the balance between creativity, artistry and original design, and also have to take into account the intuitive, without losing practicality, but also in the business has good feedback?

Starting with the prototype concept

According to Google's research results, users prefer to look simple (low complexity) and familiar (highly typical) of the site.

When people open your Web page, it takes only 50 milliseconds for them to have the aesthetic judgment of the design on your site. The first impression of your brand and product is so formed, is left almost at this moment was decided.

"When the design conflicts with the expectations of the user, the user's first impression of your design will be hurt and disappointment inevitable." ”

--javier Bargas-avila, YouTube User Experience Center, senior user experience researcher

You may have seen thousands of websites, and when I asked you how to design a blog site, the layout you thought might look like this:

We can almost do one such test for all types of websites: electric business websites, corporate websites, university website, product shows, media websites, electronic magazines, and so on.

So, the prototype of a blog site is not complex, the left side is a large content area, the right side of a functional sidebar, it may include recommendations, advertising, social media, mail subscriptions and other functional modules.

Does every blog look like this? Not necessarily, but most bloggers choose this layout.

When users open your blog, they know to sign up in the sidebar and find your social media account. When this design becomes a set of conventions, users will undoubtedly feel natural and convenient, but as it does not exist, users can not find the natural feeling frustrated.

Therefore, I believe that the mind always has a reasonable prototype of a particular type of Web page, which will be very helpful to design. On this basis, you can try to adjust the details, change the module with the style, test the different ideas, add the original design.

Of course, all of this is based on your target audience. If your site is designed for creative workers, their expectations may be quite different from those of ordinary users. A typical type of Web site is no doubt boring for them, they need a broader mindset and a more open brain hole.

On the other hand, if your site is not designed for a specific group, you may need to use a more secure design to ensure that you are as close to the typical web design prototype as possible. This time, too creative design, will let the expectations of users feel disappointed, confused, or even leave.

Don't let the user think

In fact, the network has long been the conventional design standards, such as how big the logo, navigation, how to layout, search box where and where the login box, and so on. Even the meaning of the icon, the name of the site elements (such as home, Sitemap, contact), button style, layout and visual level have rules.

These standards make it easier and quicker for users to find what they want. Try to use these rules to make the design work so that it works in other places.

These popular UI elements are styles that are familiar to the user.

Don't reinvent the wheel. I think you do not want your design from the navigation bar to start away from the user expectations, and do not want to see the user face the site in the Bie icon a look like a crazy face. Be sure to remember that users want to do their tasks as quickly and directly as possible, don't let them hesitate, don't let them think.

The amount of content that a particular interface level can withstand is relatively fixed, and the more complex the structure of your site design, the greater the amount of information it will carry, but the more energy users use to explore the site.

If you break the custom of Web design, there are exceptions. This design is logical if you know exactly what your site users are, and your extraordinary designs are designed to provide them with the pleasure of discovering.

I think you've seen a lot of unique pieces of Web site, and some of them will use a few horizontal scrolling pages to create a different browsing experience. These interesting explorations will be sought after by designers and creative workers, which is what I call the exception.

But this kind of idea is not suitable for the local library and City Hospital's official website design, because the website faces the user group to be very widespread, has many users and does not have the rich website browsing experience, such design can let them be disturbed, therefore does not have this kind of creativity to play the space.

Similarly, I strongly recommend that you follow the usual practice of designing, and if you want to make changes and adjustments, try to make decisions after testing.

Don't just trust intuition--look at what the user thinks. If you are the author of a new design, you should assume the test of the usability test of the new scheme.

Play the creative role in visual design

Now that you've mentioned so many "can't move" areas, then where is the fun of Web design?

When you do visual design, you can and should also play the creative. Try a different font and color collocation, in the layout, white, spacing between the look for ugly slave lyrics, in the illustration and scrolling effects to make users stunning.

Looking for creative solutions to simplify design, minimalism does not allow you to hide functionality and content, but to improve results by reducing it. Indeed, actually doing minimalist design requires more creativity than complex design.

Help your users achieve goals in fewer steps and shorter time. Use creativity to help users solve problems, or break your visual design by introducing more patterned designs to fix problems, or use action calls to resolve conflicts.

Think carefully, in addition to the Convention, the standard, creativity in the web design has enough space to play.

Don't get me wrong--creativity and fun always exist in web design, but you need to be aware of where rules are needed and where you need creativity to sway.