Website Design, Website Development, UI, and UX, Isn’t it too much to digest? If you are an organization looking to revamp your website and start your interaction with an agency, you may come across various questionnaires to be filled by you. It is because they want to understand your expectation from the website. You may come across various Industry technologies that you may have never heard before in life. If you wish to have a professional and latest trendy website, it is obvious to get it done through an experienced and best website development company.
Once you plan to go ahead with the work you may come across various questions/queries like:
- What is your target audience?
- What is your target Market?
- How do you need UI/UX?
- What type of website you are looking for?
Apart from these, you may also have to ask yourself
- What is the difference between Website Design and Website Development?
- What is the difference between UI and UX?
- Do I need a Normal or a Responsive Layout for my website?
- Whether it should be CMS based or HTML website can do?
If you have so many questions in your mind, this article is best for you. We have made our efforts to explain the terminologies used in the Industry like User Interface (UI), User Experience (UX), Website Design, and Website Development. Once you go through this article you will be very clear about the Industry standards.
Everything about Web
Let us start with the basics of Website Development to help you understand the terminologies before even we dive deeper further:
1. User Interface (UI):
It is considered as a part of web design process that will study and analyze the way people interact with the website or the mobile app. It includes the gesture control and buttons or click-to-actions on the places in the design.
2. User Experience (UX):
It is about having complete perspective of the user. An agency interacts with various users to understand their behavior while browsing the website or a mobile app. UX is studying many other areas of the website but mainly focuses on the behavioral study of the user.
3. Website Design:
Web design is a gamut of various terms we have used above. It includes everything from UI to UX. While designing the website an agency takes care of the visuals as well as the usability of the website.
4. Website Development:
Once the website design is final after the client’s approval, an agency will start the website development process. Website design deals with the front-end part whereas website development is back-end processing of the design.
As you have gone through the basic terminologies, it is clear now that none of the tasks are independent but are interlinked and overlapping many times during the complete process of website development. UI design influences UX design and website development support it.
In an ideal scenario, you would like to hire specialists in all these departments. Due to budgetary constraints, you may have to choose a Website Development Agency that can provide you the best website design and suit your budget too. If you keep hunting you may find the best website development company for the task you wish to achieve.
Now, you would also like to understand all these in detail so that you can decide finally to achieve your business goals.
Let us have a deeper understanding of each of the aspects below:
1. Web design
Gone are those days where we used to search and hire a “Web Designer” to design a website. It was one person for all the aspects of your website design. In the modern world, we have seen many people engaged in the process of website designing by any agency.
Today we see additional terms like Information Architecture (IA) to ensure site navigation-link mapping and Conversion Rate Optimizer (CRO) dealing in fine-tuning of design to ensure increase in signups, sales, etc. As long as we see more such profiles coming, it will not be a one-person job but will need a group of various specialists handling each aspect of the website in this competitive world.
Web design is more than graphic design. Web design relates to the functionality and visuals of the website. Web designers should be aware of the functionalities, trends, technical constraints as per the screen, user expectations that tend to change frequently. A web designer manages to consider the basic pointers like color patterns, font types, font size along with design for various screens. Their expertise lies in creating the graphics, icons, elements, banners, etc. The process of designing includes creating prototypes, testing prototypes with stakeholders and then incorporating the feedback in the design as a final output.
Most of the designers are also fulfilling responsibilities of a Business Analyst to create the Wireframes, structural design as a prototype or mockup.
2. Web development
Website development is part of the backend development using the codes and coding standards. It is more of technical aspect than anything else. Your developers will handle this part and let you see the final output as a website or mobile app. You are not expected to understand this part or discuss it as it gets more technical in nature. Website development is divided into two parts:
Front-End: It is a part of website designing and takes care of front end. Front-end is also known as Client-side. It is the way the website or mobile app screen looks like to the end-user once hosted on the server or domain. The front-end developer gives life to the wireframe structure and fulfills the need of the client. Usually, it is done with the help of HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Usually, web designers see things from design perspective and skip the development hick-ups that may come up; so, a developer has to coordinate during the design phase as well.
Back-End: The back-end developers as the name suggests take care of the website back-end. They handle the coding, database, and testing the data that is delivered to the front-end. Back end developers are experts in languages like PHP, .NET, Java, Python, etc.
However, there are developers who can handle both the aspects of the website development i.e. back-end development and front-end development. Generally, such developers or freelancers are used if the budget is low and you wish to risk your brand aspect.
3. User interface (UI)
Now that you are well aware of website design and website development, it is time to learn and understand the User Interface design. We all use UIs without thinking much about it like we use hamburger menu while browsing the website but might not be aware of the reason for its existence. It is just that we all know that there are 3 lines at the top which represent the MENU on the website.
If a layout can take you smoothly till the end it is called a Good UI Design. If you have to search for a service button or call-to-action on the page, it will certainly distract your overall experience. Good UI is also about utilizing the space of the page. A good UI designer will help in using the space optimally. UI design is also linked with Interaction Design (IxD) that specializes the way user interacts with the design. It can be interacting over to a pop-up box, chat, forms, call-to-actions, etc.
4. User experience (UX)
User Experience as the name suggests is more about the user journey and their behavior. It is considered completely from the perspective of the user. The more you get deeper the study further gets more strategic to understand the changes required in the design to ensure the user sign up or click on the call-to-action.
It is important to understand that even if we are explaining it separately for more clarity to you but the fact is that “UI” and “UX” go hand in hand while designing the website. There is a direct relation between using UX design and optimizing your business goals like conversions or sales. It is important to understand that most of the conversion from people comes as a part of their emotions and instincts. It encourages certain behaviours to help them have conversions.
Which one do you need most?
After carefully reading and understanding the context of Website design, Website Development, User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX) at least now you will be able to identify easily the difference between all these aspects. If your budget allows hiring all these skills that are fine else you should be able to prioritize one or a few of them. It all depends on the need and prioritization of the company or brand. It also depends on your goals.
To further help you understand the difference between all and to keep the pointers handy while selecting the Website Development Company, here we have created a table for you. If you have a current website then you should check these pointers for user experiences.
Some problems can be easily fixed if you know the solution and if you can categorize those issues easily. We have tried explaining a few cases that come under each of the categories.
If you still face problem in analyzing and understanding it, you can contact us on enquiry@binduradigital.com or Call: +91- 91400 14256