Everything about your website gives valuable information to your potential customers, the typography, layout, content, etc. But the style of your website especially says a lot about your company, whether you want it to or not. We’ve mentioned it before and we’ll say it again, your website is often the first impression many customers will have of your company, so it’s important to make sure that impression counts and is giving an accurate representation of your business.

What kind of impression is your website giving?

Style Types

There are many different styles of websites including professional, minimal, teen-oriented, grungy, earthy, etc. Your audience, products/services, and company culture play a big role in determining what style suits your company best. There are lots of ways to communicate each of these styles, getting your ideals and character across through pictures, amount of white space, colors, typography, icons, etc. Here are a few popular style ideas and what they might say about the company using them.

• Soft gradients and shadows, lots of white space and clean font choices – This site is very professional with clean lines and a sophisticated look. The company sells high-quality services and targets quality clients.
• Curved lines, soft colors and cursive fonts – The feel of this site is feminine and will connect well with a female audience. Feminine sites don’t always have to use pink, but soft colors in general work well to communicate a feminine influence.
• Lots of white space, minimal colors with no gradients, and great pictures – This site has a classic feel and will connect well with many audiences, with it’s clean lines and easy to navigate layout. A minimal look works well for many companies, especially if that fits in well with your company culture.
• Great rugged textures, dark colors and bold fonts – This grungy site has a rough and rugged feel, communicating with a more fun-loving, outdoorsy or youthful audience. Depending on the usage of these items you could really have some fun with it and create a unique look.

It’s important to keep in mind that the style of a site is a combination of many different factors (only a few are represented here) and these style types are just generalizations about a large style category. Your company may not fit into any of these directly, because each business is unique and has it’s own style and look.

Colors

Color is another big factor in the style of a site and how people perceive who you are. Dark versus light colors give a different style perception and bright versus dingy hues do the same. The range of colors on the color wheel each hold a certain significance and meaning for people, something that you should take into consideration when choosing what colors to represent your company. Red is a vibrant color and can portray romance and love or excitement and energy. Blue is a more peaceful color and depending on the hue can mean anything from serenity and calmness to professionalism and trustworthiness.

Most people perceive the style of your site without directly thinking about your typography and color choices, they see it and digest the information to make a perception decision in their head. The style of your site plays a big role in how they think about your company so it’s important to find a style for your site that suits your company well and communicates the ideals that you wish to display. Think about your own company site, is it communicating the right message about your business?