5 Design Tips for Travel Websites

Are you struggling to create an effective web design for your travel website? Maybe you’ve tried different design techniques, but none of them seem to get you more traffic?

If you can relate to these struggles, don’t worry. Travel website design can be extremely complicated.

 

Travel websites tend to be very content-heavy with a lot of videos and images. After all, if you’re trying to inform users on locales they’ve never been to, it takes a lot to establish a connection!

But oftentimes, this leads to travel websites that are cluttered and confusing to navigate. How do you make sure you strike the right balance?

 

Keep reading for the top five design tips for travel websites.

1. High-Quality Images

High-quality images are essential to websites in every industry. However, they’re arguably the most essential to those in travel.

 

The right image can strike an emotional chord in a user and inspire them to explore new destinations. Images help tell stories and allow users to picture themselves in the locales you’re promoting.

 

But, as important as images are, you need to make sure you find the right balance. Too many images can cause your site to look clunky and load slowly.

 

Make sure your images are used to complement your content and aren’t there purely for aesthetics.

2. Simplified Searches

When people visit travel sites, they’re usually looking for a specific piece of information. It could be the name of a local cuisine or information about Denver airport to Vail transportation.

 

Whatever the case, you need to make sure it’s easy for them to find the info they’re looking for. Having a search bar at the top of the page is a great way to achieve this.

 

Also, if your site involves booking, you should make it easy for your customers to do so. Booking processes that are complicated or slow will cause you to lose customers.

3. Mobile Friendliness

It’s official–mobile search has surpassed desktop search. What does this mean for your travel website?

 

The next item on our list of design tips is to use responsive design to ensure your site is mobile-friendly.

 

Responsive design means creating one version of your site that automatically resizes itself when someone visits on their mobile device.

 

It’s easy to maintain since you only have to create one site. Plus, Google loves responsive design, so it’s good for SEO.

4. Subtle Colors

As we said earlier, images are the main visual event on your site. The colors you use on your site should work to enhance these images, not detract from them.

 

You should choose colors that are subtle in tone. Monochrome, muted shades, and pastels all work great. For a more classic look, black and white is also a great option.

 

Staying away from bold colors will prevent your site from being overly stimulating.

5. Seamless Navigation

Well-crafted travel websites evoke strong emotions in their visitors.

 

When someone visits a travel website and feels inspired, they’re likely going to want to hop around the site for awhile. As they gather more information, their dreams of travel continue to grow.

 

If your site is slow or difficult to navigate, inspiration can quickly turn to frustration.

 

To help keep the wanderlust alive, make sure your travel website is easy to navigate. The best way to ensure easy navigation is to have people test your site and report back on their experience.

Travel Design Tips: Wrap Up

By implementing these design tips, your site should start seeing more traffic in no time.

 

Of course, it doesn’t hurt to get some inspiration from other designs.

 

Check out some inspiring site designs here. We also invite you to contact us if you have any questions.