Today in the life of a Digital Scientist, our Developer, Dom, explains website iconography: What it is, and the benefits of having icons to both your site and business. With extensive experience in website development and graphic design, our team has mastered the art of crafting icons that improve user experience, simplify navigation, and strengthen brand identity.
What Is Iconography?
Iconography is the use of visual elements such as icons and symbols to represent services, features, or actions in a clear, concise, and recognisable way. Well-designed iconography enhances user experience by making information easy to interpret at a glance. When implemented correctly, icons provide a visual language that helps users quickly understand a website’s content and functionality. Additionally, they reinforce brand identity, support messaging, and contribute to making a site more memorable and unique.
This glowing question mark icon represents inquiry and curiosity, showcasing how iconography uses simple, recognisable symbols to convey meaning. Iconography is the art of designing visual elements that communicate ideas quickly and effectively, strengthening brand identity and enhancing user experience.
The Benefits Of Icons on a Website
Website design icons offer numerous advantages for websites, improving both usability and engagement.
Strengthening Brand Identity
Custom icons reinforce your business’ personality by keeping the visual style consistent. This ensures that the website maintains a cohesive and recognisable identity, making the brand more memorable. Icons help to visually communicate the brand’s essence, creating a distinct and professional look that could resonate with users. With custom icons, you can stand out in a competitive digital landscape, ensuring users associate specific visuals with your brand instantly.
This artist’s palette and brush icon represents creativity and design expertise, strengthening brand identity through visual consistency. The red, grey, and silver colour scheme, along with the circular wave effect, is seamlessly incorporated into the customer’s logo and website, ensuring a cohesive and recognisable brand presence.
Improving User Experience and Navigation
Icons reduce page clutter by eliminating the need for long text descriptions. This results in a cleaner and more efficient design layout, particularly for mobile devices where space is limited. Navigation icons serve as signposts, allowing users to find what they need faster and more efficiently. For example, a shopping cart icon immediately signals a checkout function, while a magnifying glass icon prompts a search feature. Well-placed icons contribute to a smoother browsing experience, leading to higher user satisfaction and lower bounce rates.
Enhancing Engagement
Humans naturally process images faster than text, making icons an excellent tool for grabbing user attention. Well-designed icons act as visual cues, directing users to important sections of your website, such as call-to-action (CTA) buttons. This can significantly increase click-through rates and conversions. Furthermore, icons create a more dynamic and engaging website experience. Whether through subtle animations or interactive elements, icons can make user interactions more enjoyable, keeping visitors engaged for longer. For example, the icon next to this is used in an automotive website for one of our clients. This icon is normally animated, set to a spinning animation to fit the automotive theme.
A wheel icon for an automotive client that is normally animated and spins in place or moves across the page
Magnifying glass icons are a universal icon for searching
Boosting Accessibility
Icons make websites more inclusive by assisting users with different reading levels, cognitive abilities, or language barriers. Universally recognised symbols ensure that all users, regardless of background, can navigate the site with ease. A well-thought-out iconography system enables users to engage with content without relying solely on text, making information more digestible and accessible. Additionally, icons paired with tooltips or labels provide extra clarity, ensuring that every user understands their function.
Emphasising Unique Selling Points (USPs)
Icons can effectively communicate a business’s key offerings in a visually appealing manner. They help highlight essential product features, service benefits, and competitive advantages, making it easier for users to understand what sets your company apart. Icons also enhance comparison sections by breaking down features in a structured and visually engaging way, for example the design beside this outlines the standards of service that can be expected supporting users with making informed decisions for an airport transfer business.
A safe contractor accreditation has elements of iconography
Increasing Conversions and Driving Business Growth
Strategically placed icons can guide users toward desired actions, such as making a purchase, signing up for a newsletter, or booking a consultation. Call-to-action buttons that incorporate well-designed icons stand out more and encourage clicks. By simplifying the decision-making process and reducing friction, icons contribute to higher conversion rates. Additionally, when icons are used in trust-building elements - such as security badges, customer testimonials, and guarantees - they reinforce credibility, increasing user confidence and likelihood of completing a transaction. Such as this icon for a facility management client that we have. This icon is for approved safe contractors, meaning that the client are trustworthy and apply their trade in the safest ways possible.
Best Practices for Using Icons on a Website
To maximise the benefits of iconography, you should follow these key dos and don'ts:
Dos
- Keep website icon design simple and recognisable: Ensure that they are easy to understand at a glance.
- Maintain consistency: Use a uniform style across all icons to create a cohesive design for your site.
- Use universal symbols: Stick to well-known icons, such as a magnifying glass for search or an envelope for email.
- Optimise for different screen sizes: Ensure icons are clear and legible across devices.
- Enhance navigation: Strategically place icons to guide users through the website.
- Stay on brand: Custom icons should align with your business’s colour scheme and design aesthetic.
Don'ts
- Avoid overly complex designs: Icons should be simple enough for users to understand instantly.
- Don’t mix too many styles: Inconsistent icon styles can make the website look unprofessional.
- Avoid obscure symbols: Use common symbols that users will recognise immediately.
- Don’t make icons too small: Ensure they are large enough to be visible and clickable.
- Avoid overuse: Too many icons can clutter the page and overwhelm users.
- Don’t assume users will understand icons without testing: Always validate icon usability through user testing or as part of conversion rate optimisation efforts.
The Business Benefits of Iconography
Icons go beyond just making a website visually appealing; they provide a wealth of advantages that directly impact business success. Here’s a deeper look into how iconography can ultimately benefit businesses:
Enhancing Customer Trust and Perception
High-quality and professional icons create an immediate sense of credibility and reliability on your website. With well-placed clear icons, your site appears more polished and user-friendly, encouraging visitors to trust your business and your offerings.
A shield with a lock to represent SSL security, ensuring that a site is fully secure and safe
Supporting Digital and Print Marketing Efforts
Supporting Digital and Print Marketing Efforts
Icons are versatile assets that can be used not only on websites, but also in email campaigns, digital advertisements, social media posts and printed materials such as business cards or leaflets. This helps maintaining a unified and recognisable brand identity across both online and offline marketing channels.
Reducing Customer Support Queries
Reducing Customer Support Queries
Clear, self-explanatory icons help to improve the user’s comprehension, decreasing the number of customer inquiries about navigation, product features, or service details. This allows your business to allocate fewer resources to customer support and focus on scaling operations.
An example of a service icon to highlight hedge cutting to compliment their service breakout elements
This icon was utilised to accompany a page link to the service covering domestic construction services increasing page engagement which is a positive user signal to a search engine
Boosting Website Performance in Search Engines
By enhancing navigation and usability, icons contribute to lower bounce rates, increased time spent on site, and higher conversion rates. These improvements positively impact search engine rankings and overall digital performance.
Encouraging User Engagement and Interactivity
Encouraging User Engagement and Interactivity
Interactive icons, such as hover effects or clickable elements, encourage users to engage more with the website, leading to a more immersive browsing experience. This can significantly boost the likelihood of a visitor taking meaningful actions.
An icon section on a client's site used to represent a service and encourage the user to click further into the site
An icon to show that a customer is saving money, these are more likely to make customers rationalise their purchases as customers prefer to save money
Driving Sales and Business Growth
Driving Sales and Business Growth
Icons act as visual cues that guide users toward completing transactions. Whether highlighting product benefits, showcasing payment security, or drawing attention to promotional offers, well-placed icons play a direct role in increasing sales and revenue.
We often make purchases emotionally and rationalise those purchases logically. On that basis, well designed iconography aids in the creation of positive feelings, inspiring the user to take action, subsequently leading to greater leads or sales.
How Pixel Perfect Help
Creating effective iconography requires expertise in both design principles and user psychology. Our Pixel Perfect websites are built with skills honed over the years, mastering industry-leading design tools such as Adobe Creative Suite. Our team specialises in crafting bespoke icons that not only look great but also drive engagement and conversions. Whether you need icons for your website, or marketing materials, we ensure they align seamlessly with your brand identity and business goals.
Let us help you enhance your website with expertly crafted icons, ensuring clarity, engagement, and a professional touch.
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