User want familiarity They are more easy and more trusting if they know things are going to remain similar from page to page. They have a some sense of confidence from knowing what to expect.
If a user can speedily become familiar with your navigation, it's much simpler to actually navigate. And of course, that's the whole reason of navigation, right?
Besides familiarity, there's a second cause to be steady. It promotes your credibility Steadiness in your navigation promotes you present a unified, cohesive image to your users. In other words, you look polished, well-thought-out, and on top of things. Your users find the impression that you "have it together".
On the other hand, if your navigation is unsteadiness, it replicate badly on you and your company. You'll look muddled and unprincipled.
Here are three ways to uphold steadiness in your navigation:
1. Use global navigation
(which is a set of your key links that emerges on every page of your website in the same place).
Global navigation is a complete requirement. It guarantees that user can always get to the main sections of your site speedily and easily.
Global navigation alternatives must be the same on all web page. Various websites resoundingly fail in this area. Often, the order of the links varies from page to page, or some links are missing on few pages. This confuses even experienced web users.
2. Maintain the placement and appearance of buttons and secondary links the same all over the website.
I recently ran across a website that used 3 completely dissimilar styles of buttons in as many pages. This difference blew any unified look they hoped to have. It also made it hard to make out which graphics were links and which were not, since there was no consistently-used symbol for "click ability".
On another site, secondary navigation options were on the left on few pages and on the right on other pages. That's a no-no. Users will not at all be sure where to look for added alternatives, particularly since this site was visually busy. Don't move links around from page to page.
Link colors, fonts, button styles, and placement should be the similar all over the website. The aim should be for user to instantly know a link when they see it.
3. Maintain conventional design principles. In addition to being steady within your website, you also require to be steady with other websites. Don't get too far out on the edging in trying new things.
If you apply a navigation plan that's totally unlike from what you see on most other websites, user will likely be puzzled. Make your navigation look and function like something user will be well-known with from other website.
