Why is Website Organization so Crucial?
The way a website is laid out can play a significant role in a business’s success in reaching its target market of consumers. A law firm especially has an interest in ensuring prospective clients are able to easily navigate its website.
It may seem daunting to try and guess what design features to employ on your website to attract a client you haven’t yet met. Fortunately, several studies have already been released that help shed light on what web users are looking at on the websites they visit. Here are some of the findings:
- Web users are only reading about 28% of the content on each individual web page they visit.
- Vertical reading habits: 80% of a web user’s time is spent reading content above a site’s page fold (i.e., content they don’t scroll down to see).
- Horizontal reading habits: Well over half of a web user’s time is spent focusing on the left side of a website’s content.
Attention Focused at the Top 
source: nngroup.com
Horizontal Attention Leans Left 
source: nngroup.com
Taken together, these studies start to paint a picture that can be put to good use in the law firm web development and design process. The ultimate result is the creation of a website that will maximize your law firm’s potential to not only attract relevant web users but also more confidently ensure these potential clients are seeing the information necessary to decide to take the next step in retaining your firm’s representation.
Case in Point — Oliff PLC
“An idea can only become a reality once it is broken down into organized, actionable elements.” – Scott Belsky, author & co-founder of Behance.net
Based on these studies, it becomes essential for a law firm to design its website in a way that maximizes a web users’ ability to quickly find the content they’re searching for. Materiell recently approached the design and development of a website for Oliff PLC with these factors in mind.
Oliff PLC is a law firm that represents clients within the Unites States and overseas on a variety of complex intellectual property issues. Its potential client base ranges from multi-national Fortune 200 companies and universities to smaller business and even individual entrepreneurs. Materiell was consequently tasked with designing a website that would appeal to a diverse demographic of potential Oliff clients.
Materiell developed a clean, professional website for Oliff, keeping the web user trends reflected in numerous studies in mind. Special emphasis was placed on ensuring navigation existed close to the top of the law firm’s home page to account for users’ vertical preferences, while mouseover drop-down menus near the left side of the page make locating information about Oliff’s areas of practice almost instantaneous.
Maximize Your Site’s Potential
Potential clients seeking legal representation have a lot of choices these days, and the internet is often the first place they look when researching their options. It is essential to tailor your law firm’s website for maximum effectiveness based on known web user trends. Materiell takes a holistic approach to each of our client projects and employs web design and development strategies that will best suit a client’s unique needs and business goals. Contact us to discuss how our experienced team can take your law firm’s website to the next level.
