UI And Navigation Design 101- Basic Principles You Need To Know

A website’s navigation UI plays a key role in deciding the fate of the site. Despite this, designers tend to disregard it. Let’s take a look at the top principles of navigation design to help you give your users a smooth journey through your site or application.

Make it simple

Your job in creating a navigation menu is to make it as easy as possible for users to find what they’re looking for, and from there to pay you for it. Ask yourself:

A navigation menu by its nature needs to make it as simple as possible for users to locate what they want and then proceed to make a purchase. A few questions to keep in mind:

-How simple is this to understand?

-How simple is this to navigate?

-How simple is this to use?

Use these questions as a guide and pilot throughout the design process. The rest of the tips in this article are just a corollary of this point.

Link everything

A frequent navigation issue that users encounter is when top-level menu items are not made into clickable categories. Your users expect these items to be linked, and often leave your site or get confused if the items are not linked. Linking presents users with multiple ways to land up in the sections you want them to be.

Use Dropdown Indicators

These are typically activated by click or hover. It allows users to access sections of content without inundating the user with too many options all at once and does not unnecessarily send them to an entirely new page.

What’s New?

Particularly for industries that have ever-changing trends, such as technology, a smart and effective move would be to include a “What’s New” menu on your navigation. It encourages return users who frequently check in to your site to check what’s on offer today that wasn’t yesterday.

Make your logo clickable

A clickable logo is typically designed to reroute a user to the homepage. Particularly for complex sites, users find this feature highly convenient. It serves as a quick escape allowing users the opportunity to redirect their journey in an instant (this is vital in case they are lost within the site’s complexities). Users visit your site with a goal in mind — they want/need a product or service from you- so your main task should be to craft the navigation in such a way that they get it as seamlessly as possible.

Wrapping up

Essentially, you need to ensure that your users stick around and utilize your site or product to the fullest. Crafting a powerful UI design isn’t an easy process, but by investing in bespoke UI and UX design services you can have a definite shot at success.