Visiting a website is like going shopping in a new supermarket. You notice how the place looks, what it feels like to walk through the doors, and the colours before you've had a chance to find out whether they have what you want. If it's not to your liking and there's another shop round the corner, you might opt for a brighter, more homely location.

It's the same for your website, it is the first impression your organisation or charity makes on potential customers. It's also the area where people will most likely return to look for more information about your brand, resources, or an understanding of your field of expertise. You need it to feel professional from the instant they enter your site's home page to when they go down the aisles of your blog's back pages.

Here are our 5 ways to stay professional

1. Be Consistent

Consistency is what binds everything together, like having all the musicians in a band playing in the same key. People are not always aware of inconsistency, but they sense it. We're all nervous when we visit websites, and if we're given any cause to click away, we'll probably jump to another site without even thinking about it. It's important to keep your audience interested. Pay close attention to your website's structure. Is there a pattern to how your website's sections connect? For sub-heads and smaller text, keep the fonts consistent. Examine the colours: are they uniform throughout? To allow people to easily move between similar pages while still feeling oriented, try to maintain the same format.

2. Only use high-quality imagery

The right pictures may transform a daily browsing session into a kind of visual therapy. It is entirely feasible to outdo your competition by having images that appear professional and perhaps creative. If the pictures are incorrect, the entire site becomes disrupted. Use hi-res pictures that will scale well and don't be afraid to spend a little money on excellent photography (we suggest unsplash.com, unless you have a professional photographer in your midst). Take team photos at the same time, in the same place and on the same day to ensure that there is uniform lighting throughout. Your website will go beyond what you think it can if you do it correctly.

3. Link it all together

When it comes to attracting returning users, connectivity can make a difference. Every website has links, but some websites are more difficult to navigate than others. It's like the difference between getting lost in the backstreets of an unfamiliar city and walking down a well-maintained street. By clearly linking your homepage to the site's most essential sections, you can effectively direct your users. Create a logical route for readers to follow and write each link in a way that it can be read out of context. For instance, “Get in touch with us,” linking to a contact page or “Check out our testimonials,” linking to your case studies. Never, ever, ever use “Click here” or any other nondescript terminology that does not clearly represent the destination page.

Consider where your readers may want to go after reading the end of each blog post or page. It's like having a gorgeous shopfront with a door that won't open properly when you come upon a useful page but can't seem to get to the next interesting place. At the end of a new entry, include links to related blog entries, or a contact page for each description of your services. Users may not thank you in words, but they'll be more inclined to stay on your site and become a valuable lead.

4. Curate your content

Consider who your users are, what kind of language they prefer to read, and where they are most likely to read it. When people use a computer at work, they view websites differently than when they're on the Tube with their phone. Check to see if your language is appropriate for your brand and that the titles are catchy. Also, make sure enough snappy subheadings are breaking up the body of the text. Keep it simple by displaying the most essential information at the top of each page so that visitors don't have to scroll too far to discover what they're looking for.

5. Focus on your users

There was a time in the 90s, especially when visiting your local council website when having landed on the homepage with only one question in your mind (‘what time are the bins collected?’), you then had to navigate through eight pages of irrelevant information to find the answer.

The first websites were developed primarily for employees within the company, not for potential customers. But you'll be able to do so much more! If you're targeting an audience outside of your business, you'll have to work a little harder to explain what consumers might want, but they won't have to.

Don't be fooled into creating your website following your organisation's structure; rather, consider what questions your external users would ask and how you may quickly direct them to where they want to go, using language that will make sense to them.

If this article piqued your interest in learning how to give your website a professional appearance, please contact us and let us know how we can assist you to take it to the next level.