Why User-Friendly Websites Are So Important

When we talk about user-friendly websites, most people go to the concept of attractive or pretty looking websites. While that is a good place to begin, it is not really what we are referring too with user friendly staffing firm websites.  We’re referring to usability, user experience, and user interface.  Today, we’re going to talk about navigation, flow, readability, and ease.

Staffing Firm Website Navigation Driving Candidates and Clients
Let’s kick off with navigation. Every visitor to your site is trying to find what they’re looking for as easily as possible. In the past, we simply talked about the number of clicks it took to get anywhere and that has now morphed into an absolute need to make your site intuitive to the user. Think about LinkedIn and the fact that no one trains anyone on how to use that piece of software. It is because everything is designed to be as intuitive as possible.

In your navigation, have you layered your pages in a way that gets people to their desired content as quickly as possible? Have you looked at unnecessary pages (For example: contract, contract-to-hire, and direct hire pages)? The contract, contract-to-hire and direct hire pages are simply an element of your existing technology staffing or healthcare staffing or engineering staffing website content, they are not pages anymore. Think about it for just a second and you will realize that all clients and all candidates now know what this means, and it is no longer necessary to over explain it, but you do want it referenced where appropriate. This is just one example of the changes of how to look at your website navigation and determine what needs to be updated, modified, or removed. Think of your navigation as the accessibility to your site by the user. If you make it too hard, they will leave.

Content and Site Flow and Readability
So, now your navigation is easy for users, but what about the flow and readability of your pages? Have you looked at your content to reduce unnecessary words, sentences and paragraphs? In order to create a powerful message that is synthesized to what you need? Does one area lead you to other areas of your staffing firm website? Or distract?

Flow and readability are two areas that help you from a user perspective as well as search engine optimization perspective. Flow leads users to the conclusion you want and the actions you want. For example, if you want candidates to search for jobs and apply to you, have you strategically located those elements near content that draws them to that? Readability is part of SEO scoring and can be difficult due to our profession and the need to use many complicated words. The higher-level reading score can hurt you in your search engine optimization so balance it carefully.

UI and UX for Your Staffing Firm Website
We all look at our sites and determine how well we have done by whether we like what we are seeing. But, have you sat down with candidates or consultants that already like you and have them use the site and give you notes on improvement. User experience can be broken up to a couple of categories, but the most important is how your audience utilizes your staffing firm website. The fact that you like your site is great and now it is time to get feedback from clients, candidates, and consultants in order to improve navigation, flow, readability, ease etc. When we talk about UX and UI, we need to hear from our audience and they are the most important voice.

Everyone keep in mind that we live in a culture of immediate gratification. We want our news served up to us. We want information at our fingertips. If a candidate wants to search for jobs and apply, they better find it quickly and if a client wants to reach out or learn more about you, please don’t make it hard for them. Review your sites and we look forward to assisting you.

About S.J.Hemley Marketing
S.J.Hemley Marketing is a marketing and sales consulting firm focused on driving tangible results for professional services firms. Brand matters, but not without ROI. With over 20 years of sales and marketing experience within staffing and recruiting, we have helped to drive successful branding, sales training, lead generation activities as well as defining marketing strategy for top organizations.