Web designer, in simple terms, makes a site look good by carrying out several responsibilities such as creating the layout, displaying the menus listed on the site, and small details, such as fonts, colors, and graphics to be used. They use design programs to create visual elements.
Website designers usually have to have expertise in UI, or user interface, which means they strategically design sites that are intuitive and easy for visitors to navigate. let’s dig into this career and see what it takes to become a successful web designer.
What do web designers do?
Before talking about the skills or education needed, let’s uncover the daily tasks of a website designer so you can see if it’s something that suits your interests. Regularly, a website designer will:
- Design and layout websites
- Think through the navigation of a site to provide the best user experience
- Design sample pages and create mockups
- Work in Adobe programs to create visuals, graphics, or animations
- Register web domains
- Organize files
- Collaborate on website updates or “refreshes”
- Coordinate with writers and designers to create a site
Web designers create and maintain websites. They are responsible for developing websites and testing them to ensure they are attractive, responsive, and have an intuitive user interface.
What kind of skills should you develop to become a website designer?
Get a basic understanding of how the web works
While you don’t need to be a skilled coder to build websites today, understanding the technical structure of the web will ensure your designs can be developed into functional web pages. There are three basic languages you should learn:
- HTML, which forms the structure of a web page
- CSS, which dictates the styling of the web page and all its components
- JavaScript, which manipulates HTML and CSS so you can bring a website to life with interactivity
This will be useful because you will better understand how a website works, which you can then put into the form of a website design.
Hone more skills for becoming a web designer
Generally, a web designer’s skill set falls into two types: hard skills and soft skills.
Hard skills are the skills you learn to design websites. For example:
- Web design theory
- UX research
- Visual (UI) design
- Responsive design
- Wireframing
- Prototyping
- HTML & CSS
- A/B testing
- SEO Web Design
- Platform-specific tools, templates, plugins, etc.
Soft skills are professional management skills you learn throughout your career. For example:
- Communication
- Negotiation
- Active listening
- Empathy
- Sales acumen
- Project and time management
- Client management
- Collaboration
- Accounting
Your role as a web designer will influence the skills you will need. For example, if you work as a freelance designer, you will need client management skills. However, if you work for a company, you will benefit more from active listening and collaboration skills.
You will also find that many of the resources you use to learn web design also offer training on soft skills with exercises to apply them to your daily work.
Have a good communication
A designer needs the ability to talk to companies about what they want, ask questions about the intended audience, and convey their ideas for an effective site. Being able to communicate is just the start, companies also want responsive designers. A responsive designer keeps the company informed, explains emerging issues, and discusses deadlines.
Time management
As a web designer, you may prefer to freelance where you work with multiple companies at once or you may work for one company. Whatever the choice, you still need to have the ability to manage your time effectively to keep multiple projects on track.
Good taste in visual design
Of course, A core part of a website designer’s job is creating the visual elements for a site, so a solid understanding of design principles is a must. Visual design incorporates a variety of best design practices that hone in on things like proportion, symmetry, typography, and color systems.
Learn about UX design too
UX design, or user experience design, influences how a person feels when visiting a site. A designer’s goal is to create a layout that is easy to navigate and visually pleasing, resulting in a positive customer experience.
To produce the right experience for an audience, a designer often conducts audience research and studies actions taken on the site to build a website experience that resonates with a brand’s target market. Of course, the success of a web designer is determined by visitor satisfaction when visiting the website.
Conclusion
Maybe this article doesn’t cover all the things a website designer must master. However, knowledge must continue to increase as your experience increases. Don’t be afraid to start.
