Only Noobs Design Beautiful Websites

Introduction

• Beautiful Designs: Common on Dribble, Behance, Instagram, and even win design awards.
• Key Clarification: Design solves problems and serves a purpose. It's objective, not art.
• Focus: Functional, purpose-driven design to generate traffic, sales, subscriptions.

Examples of Functional Websites

• Best Websites: Generally simple and not 'beautiful.' Examples include Google, Facebook, YouTube, Amazon.
• Metrics: These sites prioritize functionality and user experience for metrics (e.g., traffic, sales).

Why Functional Over Beautiful?

• Cost: Best designers and developers are expensive and focus on building profitable sites.
• User Intent: Users seek simplicity, speed, and ease of use — not beauty.
• Practical Reality: Beautiful designs can be complex, slow to load, and non-responsive.

Drawbacks of Beautiful Websites

• Responsiveness: Hard to make beautiful sites responsive to various devices.
• Performance: Beautiful websites often take longer to load.
• Coding Complexity: More CSS, harder to maintain with no real benefits in user experience.

Building User-Friendly Websites

• Five Pillars: Layout, Typography, Colors, Images, Content.

Layout

• Structure: Rows and columns. Ensures adaptability to different screen sizes.
• Spacing and Size: Consistent gaps and spacings, using numbers divisible by four.
• Consistency: Repeat layouts for user familiarity.

Typography

• Font Size: Hierarchy determined by importance (headings big, paragraphs smaller).
• Consistency: Use one or two fonts.

Colors

• Palette: Limited colors for clarity and style. Primary, secondary, and an accent color.

Images and Icons

• Quality: Crisp, optimized images, relevant to content.
• Resources: Use free icon and image websites.

Content

• Core Element: Good content drives traffic and fulfills user purpose.
• User-Centric: Ask users what they want and deliver that.

Final Tips

• Trial and Error: Websites evolve. Keep gathering feedback and improving.
• Realistic Goal: First version won't be perfect; focus on continuous improvement.
• Key Takeaway: Professionals build user-friendly, content-focused websites, not just beautiful ones.