How to Create a Style Guide For Your Business Website
The way you design your website leaves a very strong impression on your site visitors. This design must be according to a set of guidelines that are in sync with your site and brand objectives. A website style guide represents this and must be created in a well planned and strategic way. The documentation helps designers and developers to have a framework while working on your business website.
It makes the design and development process simpler and more efficient. Here are some tips to create the precise style guide for your business:
Understand The Brand
You need first to know the values your brand stands for. It is important to know the story your brand wishes to communicate to its target audience. Go through your brand communication guide and get insights about how your brand must look and what must be its emotional appeal.
Assign Responsibility
You need to assign responsibilities in the design and the development team. Each of the teams can have a brainstorming session to finalise on each of the aspects.
Analyse Competition
While developing the style guide for your website, you can go through the websites and style guides of your competing businesses. You can observe elements that would be common and those that you would want to use as your differentiators from them.
Create A Plan
A website style guide is dynamic, and changes can be made to it according to the changing business circumstances. You need to plan your guide in such a way that any iterations in the future can be managed easily.
Style Guide Inclusions
A style guide should explain the purpose for which it is being developed. It must showcase the kind of elements you need to put you on your website and talk about how to use them. You must also mention the place and situation for using the design elements.
It helps in maintaining consistency of the website design across the site. The visuals on your website must be consistent, and the identity guideline outlines the kind of visuals your website should have.
Logos
You need to show examples of the logo usage in your style guide. It must also include the Dos and the Don’ts of the logo usage on the site. Create a spacing guide for the logo to ensure there is enough white space wherever it is used.
The Colour Palette
You need to give the exact colours that your site designers can use. Once you have an identity in place, you know which colours are on priority for your brand. Provide the hex code of the colours, so the team gets a clear direction.
Choose The Icon Type
The type of icons that are added to your site must also be in sync with your overall brand personality. The iconography must be consistent throughout the website. Icons are critical to your website design, and you must choose your icon style carefully.
Image Styling
Images are important for all products and services. You might need to add product and services photos or photos related to your team. You can add a guideline related to the kind of mood that your site photos should carry and location they should be shot in. You need to talk about your company culture in the guide so that the images can be aligned accordingly.
Font Guideline
The font usage on the website must be consistent as well. You must define the fonts can be used on the site. This should include fonts for headlines, subheads and body copy. The line spacing and font colours must also be specified.
Guidelines for Copy
Your website copy is one of the first things that your site visitors read. It is a medium to tell your brand story to your target audience. Your website style guide must include the writing style and-and tone of the copy. It must also include the way in which certain product or service related words and phrases need to be used. The text numbering rules, date and time rules and full stop usage must also be stated clearly in the guide.
Buttons
You need to create a section in your style guide that shows how buttons and links should be used on the site. The specifications should include the hover states and number of times a button can be used on a page. Add the buttons styles and colours as well.
Header Hierarchy and Typography
You need to define the where and when to use which kind of headers such as H1, H2, H3 and so on. Headlines are a crucial aspect of any website, and a clear-cut hierarchy helps in bringing consistency to the way they are being used. You need to define the typographic elements on your website and then provide a guide to help add them in the precise situations. You can define the type of headers or body you need for certain elements such as quotes or reviews or any other such elements.
The design and development team of a website does not always remain the same. A style guide helps in creating a format that can easily be used by the team to make changes on an existing website. The growth of your website becomes a smooth process with a style guide in place. Your website is a source of leads for your business. It is crucial to ensure it is according to the brand communication guidelines and connects with your target audience emotionally. A style guide helps your website to achieve a standard design that is critical to get the desired number of leads for your business.
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