Content is the ‘king’ in your website. This is obvious from the fact that the main aim of all the websites is to provide information to the visitors. When the visitors cannot get the information clearly, (which can be attributed to a lot of factors psychological and otherwise) they are likely to leave your site and look for other sites that can provide them the information they are looking for.

 

Let us take a look at three things which every designer must consider when they are about to choose fonts for their website(s).

 

 

Don’t Compromise on the Usability Factor

Usually, visitors complain of readability in websites. They can face a problem with websites that have either too small /too large fonts or a low contrast between font and background and all these factors limit the usability of the site.

The users will be looking at the content for a long period of time and so, the font must be comprehensible to them. When users find it difficult to comprehend your content just because the text is disproportionate, so dark that it is overwhelms them or so light that they can’t read it well, they will simply press the “x” button and leave the site without proceeding further.

Thus, you must take care of the font size, color, style or weight so that users can access the website content easily. Also, see to it that the white spaces and text wrapping is proper or not. When you do that, the visitors will stick to your site.

 

Know the Preference of Your Target Audience

You must consider your target users’ preferences when you select the font and style in your website. Basically, you must know who your users are and align your font type and style with their taste. This ensures that the content is easily read by them and does not become an eyesore.

For instance, fonts with a floral twist can be used on feminine sites to appeal to female users while colorful, decorative fonts can be used for children (particularly in headings and subheadings). Similarly, if you are targeting business executives, then you must keep the fonts subtle and simple. Once you get the hang of it, you can effortlessly select fonts for your sites.

 

Maintain Hierarchy and Contrast

 

 

Creating a hierarchy in your fonts is important to influence your users. As a rule of thumb, you must keep three fonts per page for headers, sub-heads and body text. You can make the headline font big and bold in order to create maximum impact on your audience.

Do remember that using more numbers of fonts can confuse the users and make your site look less professional. However, certain elements – like buttons meant for taking a call-to-action, can have a different font as compared to the rest of the content on a page.

In addition to hierarchy, you must maintain significant contrast between the color of your font and the background color. A bad contrast can make the users squint in order to read the content at one go, whereas a good contrast makes them scan the content easily and  helps make the text more readable to the users. For instance, you can go for a light background if the font of the text is dark. It makes a website look neat and the content more legible and readable.

You will surely see a great number of visitors to your site when you implement the above tips in your website.



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24 Responses

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    Jun 15, 2012 - 10:06 AM

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  23. Maneet Puri
    Jun 22, 2012 - 02:23 PM

    Great Post! I agree with all your points especially the second one, however I would also like to add that one has to think from the view point of a common visitor. Matching the text with appropriate images and if you are following a theme then keeping the text accordingly is a must. Therefore, one should play safe in taking such important decisions as ‘texts’ are the medium through which your website interacts with your target audience!

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    Jun 30, 2012 - 04:17 PM

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