Choosing the right font for your site is more important than you could ever imagine and even more difficult, as there are so many options out there! So, how do you choose the right font that will capture users’ attention and convey the right message?
The typography of your site can communicate more about your brand than you might think. In addition to your website’s design, it is a visual representation of your brand, which is why when you choose, you need to choose wisely. Finding a font that amplifies your brand’s voice while simultaneously looking sharp on screen could be quite daunting.
Did you know that Steve Jobs is considered the Grandfather of Typography? Yes, when he was creating the first Mac, he created ten font designs for you to choose from. This was a complete breakthrough in design at the time. He knew that typography can hugely improve the user’s experience. Today there are thousands of options available and here are some guidelines that might help you narrow it down:
User experience and readability
Have you ever noticed how your eyes become tired from reading certain fonts? This, in addition to overall aesthetics, is one of the many reasons why choosing the right font for your website and your overall brand is so important. Therefore, choose a font that is easy to read.
Subconscious messages
Believe it or not, certain fonts convey certain messages subconsciously. You won’t use the same font for a medical website as the font you’ll use for an ice-cream shop’s website. Fonts can convey messages like trust, stability, strength, elegance, sophistication, creativity and more. While working on your website, consider the tone of communication and match your font to that. If you want the user to trust your content, go for fonts with traditional heritage like Trajan or Times New Roman. To portray a progressive and modern message, consider a font with clean lines, thinner weight and a minimalistic design.
Aim it at your audience
Even though you want a font that conveys your brand’s identity, you also want to aim your font at your audience. Consider your audience’s age group, gender, profession and disposable income. These should guide you to choose a suitable font.
Versatility
With technology being so versatile these days and us having numerous devices to gain access to websites from, it is important to choose a font that is easy to read on laptops, cell phones, iPads and more. Before you choose your font, have a look at it in different weights (bold, italics, normal) and different sizes.
Font load times
One thing that is very important to remember when choosing a font, is to look at whether the typeface and font you choose is web browser friendly. People don’t have patience for slow loading times, and it could even harm your site’s UX. Something like Google fonts’ web-based font files render perfectly in a browser. You can also try Adobe Typekit, Fonts.com, Webtype or Fontspring.
Less is more
Stick to no more than four fonts on your website. The guideline is: One font style for headlines or page titles, one font style for subtitles, one font style for body content and one font style for quotes.
Colour
Choose one or two font colours and stick to it. Keep the colours linked to your brand.