How To Evaluate Website Mockups
In most web design processes, there’s a phase where the design team offer you a set of Photoshop mockups & ask “what do you think?”. In both agencies & client organisations, this usually ends in a round-table discussion (or email thread) centring on a single question:
Which mockup looks the nicest?
Unless the primary objective of your website is to appear as a screenshot in magazines, this is fundamentally the wrong question to focus on. While it’s important for the site to reflect your brand aesthetic, and to visually reassure your visitors that you are what they’re looking for, the most important thing to remember at this stage is that your website is there to be used, not just to look pretty.
An excellent way to avoid falling into a two-hour discussion over the “which looks the nicest” is to put together a grid beforehand of elements you consider to be important to a successful design. Here’s a neutral example:
Ask your meeting participants to score this grid prior to the meeting & you’ve already achieved two really important things:
- Avoid the focus on ‘Does it look nice?’
- Enable everyone’s opinion to be heard (rather than naturally swaying toward the most senior/most vocal meeting participant)
The grid above is a very neutral approach, but it’s worthwhile tailoring this for each design project to make sure your target audience(s) and objective(s) are all covered. This is a very quick, simple thing to do, but can pay huge dividends in eventual site performance by looking at the real things that matter early on in your design process.
