In a world that in essence has become digital, usability is one of the most important and fundamental characteristics of a website. Driving the traffic inward remains a significant aspect for web application development, especially in terms of marketing. But, what if the visitors swear not to come back again due to an inferior experience? All your marketing ventures and enterprising aspirations would seem quashed under the feet of the targeted audience. Here is where usability and ease to navigation comes into play. Although the aim of a website is to provide information, it is the ease with which that information is provided that defines its utmost success.
Needless to say,usability is a major aspect of website design and development, which cannot be overlooked at any cost. So, following are the ways in which usability of a website can be substantially improved:

1. Navigational comfort – When it comes to interpret the habits of the audience navigating through your web pages, always remember the rule of “glance and scan”. Most people do not read the entire content and almost all the people scan through the web pages before actually reading the content. Making the information accessible to the users is important, and that with navigational ease is indispensable. Choosing a layout that is simple and using that one layout for all the web pages is primarily important. Also, keeping a check on the number of clicks letting it be as few as possible, although not at the cost of compromising the ease of navigation. Every section of the website must have a landing page of its own. Beware of horizontal scroll bars; it is an unforgivable offence in web design and development.

2. No clutter – As mentioned before, users have a habitual tendency to scan through the web pages. If their scanning activity reveals sections, images, content, etc. that are irrelevant or repeating, they will easily lose interest in your website altogether. To avoid this, remove all those extra sections from your web pages that may detract the user’s attention and interest.

3. Readability rules – The world today is obsessed with videos and images when it comes to wielding websites. One will, in no way, appreciate and afford to lose the few readers they have by impeding their reading experience over the website. It is important to use adequate amount of white spaces effectively on the web pages so that the content does not look crammed and irritating to read. Moreover, paragraphs and lists must be well-formatted to improve user’s experience rather than deteriorating it.

4. Access delayed is access denied – The term “4G speed” has become an everyday affair and some people might have started to wonder and anticipate about “5G!” In such a scenario, one cannot expect to retain users if they are unable to access through the web pages or open links quickly or watch videos, due to decelerated load time. “Time is money” might be a cliché, however, when it comes to the user’s time, this cliché must be taken earnestly and efforts must be made to enhance the load time, before the user decides to click the ‘cross’ button on the topmost, rightmost corner.

5. Uncurbed search – Some people have a tendency to search using complete phrases and whole sentences. For example, to search for the best books written by Jane Austen, most of us would type: “Jane Austen books” or “Best books of Jane Austen”. Some people might however, use the complete phrase: “the best books written by Jane Austen” or a more elaborate sentence. Imagine if google.com limits the size of search by imposing a small limit on the number of characters. Its omnipresence, omnipotence, and omniscience will be jolted down. On a general note, it will be beneficial for your website to have a large number of characters in the search box to accommodate for a long query.

6. Optimized design – Have you ever used a website that had an awesome design and navigational ease on desktop and an equally awful experience on a smartphone, or vice-versa. Such websites exhibit partial sincerity of the web application development team towards usability, and a complete ignoring for an optimized design. A website must be device optimized and responsive. Whether a user is on a traditional platform or a cutting-edge device, optimized design ensures ease and refinement in usability of the website.

7. Multiple paths – People have different habits while browsing through a website. Some navigate in a systematic manner, some go for searching their specific requirements, and some just browse aimlessly. Whatever the approach may be, users must get what they want irrespective of their specific tendencies towards finding information from the website. A user can get to a landing page by direct search, or through the navigation bar, or through some other source such as marquee text, newsletters, etc., contributing to the enhanced usability of the website.

8. Typographic traps – Usability of the website can be greatly enhanced by improving its readability and legibility. A proper visual appeal can highly enrich the website and maximize the traffic towards it. One must bear in mind not to use too many fonts. Similarly, using too many colors to give a rainbow effect is also to be avoided. Color blindness being a common condition makes the use of red and green color in the website unfavorable.When it comes to size of the text, be consistent with the text and the respective size for it. For example, the size for Times New Roman and Arial may not be same in the content. A link must be an informative text to let the users know where they will be reaching upon clicking it. It must have a standard color, which is blue—universally and conventionally. The color must change after being clicked and visited and non-visited links may have different colors.

Your website may be an online repository of gemstone or a digital Eldorado, but if, to find some relevant information, one has to go on a hunting expedition through it, the very purpose of its existence is beaten bashfully. Better usability results in an optimized website, providing better user experience that can be conducive to your growth by leaps and bound.