Content-first Design: why it’s important

The focus is growing on Content-first design, an approach that puts content back at the centre of web page and application design.

The approach to design is a universe in continuous evolution, especially in terms of the design of web pages or app interfaces. Recently, the philosophy of Mobile-first has been strongly affirmed, therefore a design that starts from the universe of smartphones and tablets considering how these devices are today the main vectors of online traffic. In the last year, however, more and more experts are pushing the Content-first Design, or a digital creation that puts content back at the center. Why is this trend becoming more and more important?

The “Content is king”

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With the affirmation of minimalism on the web and apps – as well as design currents such as Mobile-first, responsive design, parallax layout and much more – the design process followed a path where the structure dominated the content. Although content remains of fundamental importance for the success of a website or mobile service, as a primary factor of attraction for users, the idea that content itself must be created, shaped and adapted according to the design has come to the fore.

The distribution of boxes on a page defines where the text should appear, for example by strictly defining its maximum length, spacing, carriage returns and much more. The same happens with other more multimedia forms of content, such as photographs and videos: these elements, in fact, tend to assume dimensions and positions always according to the design.

The Content-First approach, on the other hand, reverses this axiom. This style of development, in fact, starts from the analysis of the content to build around it a design structure that can contain it at best, in order to bring it back to the center of any online interaction, raising it.

In a nutshell, we return to that “Content is king” theorized in the first half of the 2000s – and still valid today – with a design that is at the service of what we want to share, not vice versa.

Why start from content?

Today’s leading designs have the advantage of being visually pleasing and easy to navigate, but perhaps too dispersive when it comes to attracting the attention of the user on the content rather than on the overall beauty of a site or app.

According to the analysis conducted by Timble, users only identify and read between 20 and 28% of the text on a website, because they are distracted by other elements.

A decidedly low percentage, considering how the creation of the same content requires time and effort, as well as worrying because it could prevent you from effectively transferring your message, whether it is an informative intervention or marketing.

Starting from the content for the design, instead, allows you to put the text back at the center of the dynamic, finding the structural solution, graphics and aesthetics that maximizes the visibility by the user and, as you can easily guess, even the use and traffic generated.

Advantages

When designing a website or application using a more classical approach, text and other content management usually reaches the final stages of development. It is not by chance that developers and designers are used to studying the spatial arrangement of texts and other elements, providing special boxes, but not their most intrinsic meanings.

In fact, in the design phase the content is frequently replaced by “fake text”, of which the classic Lorem Ipsum is certainly the most famous alternative.

A Content-first design, on the other hand, assumes that it is exactly the opposite of the one described. Texts, images and multimedia elements are carefully analysed even before the interface design phase and become an integral part of the development itself.

This is because, in order to maximize user attention, it is not only important to define where the content should be displayed, but also how the design can influence – positively or negatively – the topic and the message of the content itself.

The advantages of this approach are considerable. As already mentioned, the message is transferred more effectively, maximizing the response and attention of the user by proposing content where he expects it most. Furthermore, it allows to increase the coherence of the whole site, with a perfect synergy between the content and the visual design itself.

Again, a more solid structure is created, designed to last for a long time, without the need for continuous restyling. Among the disadvantages, however, a much more extensive and expensive design phase, both in terms of time and people employed: obviously the designer will have to enter in perfect synchrony with those who create, disseminate and consume the content.

Pubblicato il 25 October 2019