The short answer is: probably.
There are experts, websites, books, and countless articles written on the power of simple when it comes to the web. Ironically, they’ve begun using words like visual complexity, cognitive fluency, and prototypicality to describe just how simple your website should be. But, there’s a much easier way to check in on your own site. Here’s the question I ask all of my clients (sometimes over and over again.)
“What’s the ONE thing you want your visitor to do?”
That’s it. And you cannot creep on the one thing rule by making the answer complicated. Do you want your visitor to sign up for your newsletter? Purchase your training course? Subscribe to your podcast? Call you? Watch cat videos for hours?
Once you’ve decided on the one thing you want your visitor to do on your site, your entire design/redesign needs to revolve around that. Sure, you’ll need content on your pages that doesn’t necessarily directly relate to your one main goal, but your main goal should always be the center pillar or theme of the design.
If you’ve got more than one “main goal” for the site, it’s probably too complicated.
Here’s another easy way to tell if your site is too complicated. Take a screen shot of it, then scale that screenshot down to a thumbnail size (about 250px wide). Is it still easy to look at? Here are a few examples:
Simple
Note that simple does not have to equal plain or boring.
Complicated
Complicated usually means your eye has no idea where to look first.
Try these two exercises with your own site and see how you might be able to simplify your website for better usability and higher conversions.
Bonus tip: Sometimes it requires an unbiased eye to tell you if your site is too complicated. If you aren’t sure you’ve got this simplicity thing down, try submitting your site to a usability testing service to get some real-world feedback. One of my favorites is UserTesting. They provide free “Peek Tests” that are quick, five-minute overviews of your site, or more in-depth tests in which you can ask specific questions. Give it a try and you might be surprised what comes up.
