10 Blog Design Principles to Boost Conversion + Examples!

Design is more than just a few tricks to the eye. It’s a few tricks to the brain.

— Neville Brody

Good design sells

Period. That’s just a fact of life no matter if it relates to furniture, electronic devices, cars or the Internet. In each of these cases we deal with a product. And product means interactions. Reading this post you also interact with a product. It seems that marketers frequently underestimate the power of design, which in fact is as significant and powerful as the content they create.

A well-designed world is a better place to live in

Think of taking a walk around Times Square. Hundreds of people, skyscrapers, traffic jam, Spider-Man, Naked Cowboy, another Spider-Man, people selling Broadway tickets, Batman, noise and a plague of billboards screaming at you from everywhere you look. Feeling dizzy? You feel overwhelmed and exhausted.

Now, take to your hand, let’s say, New York City Transit Authority Graphics Standards Manual. Now you hold a simple, yet beautiful catalogue, filled with just perfect amount of pictures and illustration. Because of good typography it’s readable, encouraging and captivating. You just want to leaf through it because it’s unobtrusive and enjoyable.

These two seemingly unrelated situations actually have something in common and it’s not only the city of New York. They both expose a person to an experience. Our daily life consists of a set of such interactions, no matter if it comes to buying tickets in a ticket machine, using a laptop, booking accommodation online, using an elevator or preparing coffee with a coffeemaker. They’re all products of different sort, of some design, and they all provide people with very different experiences. The more logical, honest and functional design, the more pleased and satisfied the client, the bigger likelihood he or she buys it and recommends it to someone else.

A well-designed Web is a better place to buy in

Undoubtedly, content is the most fundamental aspect of communication as it broadcasts the information about the company and product. It communicates so called 5 Ws, namely, Who, What, Why, When and Where that are then represented by the website and blog. 

It’s crucial to bear in mind that apart from content, there’s also another dimension that is just as important. It’s design and how customers interact with the content on the website. How they experience your blog or website affects visits, sharing, subscribers and, eventually, conversion. Conversion rate reflects not only the quality of content but also the quality of website and blog design. That’s why it’s good to hone this duo.

If you’re a content marketer, your job is to create valuable and shareable content that boosts conversion. This, however, doesn’t rely exclusively on the quality of content, but also on the quality of website and blog design.

Today, we talk about 10 principles of blog design that boost conversion.

1. Static menu bar

It just comes in handy. Static menu bar with various buttons is accessible from every place on the blog, no matter if a reader’s in the middle of scrolling or reading a paragraph. Being able to instantly go elsewhere is just convenient and increases usability.

2. High-contrast CTA button

We’re all into conversion, right? That’s why CTA buttons, whether registration, demo or other sign-up button, should contrast with the blog layout so that they’re catchy to the eye. Also, CTA buttons should be placed on the static menu bar.

3. Social sharing buttons

We all know that social reach is the question of to be or not to be. Whether it’s at the beginning, at the end or elsewhere, your blog should have sharing buttons on a static menu bar. It’s nice to place social sharing buttons that show the number of shares.

4. Social Media buttons

Static menu bar should be also equipped with Social Media buttons linking to your company social media profiles.  Social networking sites can be a great source of customer leads. By the way, find out how to grow your business with Twitter, Facebook Groups and LinkedIn!

5. Newsletter sign-up

Make sure it’s at one’s fingertips, either on the static bar or at the end of an article. Encourage your readers to stay up to date with your latest posts.

6. Create a pop-up with CTA

While readers are scanning your blog, it’s good to surprise them and have a pop-up with a newsletter or a free trial sign-up. Some blogs have a pop-up that only after signing-up for a newsletter allows visiting the blog. Well, this idea is highly debatable.

7. Related articles

Each article should be accompanied by other relevant articles.

8. Homepage button

Static menu bar should have the homepage button that allows going to the homepage from every place on the blog. Readers can instantly visit the homepage in case they want to see, for example, testimonials.

9. Typography

Unfortunately, typography is frequently pushed into the background. Majority of information on the Internet is still represented by text, so make sure your text is readable. Choose proper font, its size, line spacing, word spacing, headings etc. Good typography is appealing to the eye and enjoyable. It makes reader return to your blog.

10. Resources

Create your own resource center and put there some white papers, guidelines and ebooks based on your own research. Customers like to browsing through resources as they know where to look for updated content. Becoming an expert and influencer increases customer trust that eventually results in more leads. Resources can be accessible from the menu bar. Also, it’s worth the effort to put links to related resources at the end of an article. 

Blog design is as important as content. Make sure that both of them are well-thought and honed to perfection. We hope you’ll bring the best out of our article. May it serve you well!