In the modern digital era, web builders have made website creation accessible to everyone, regardless of coding skills. As someone switching careers into user experience without a background in computer science, I have found myself among the many beginners and small businesses turning to platforms like WIX, WordPress, Squarespace, and Webflow. Personally, I have explored different WordPress plugins over time. However, I realize that despite their ease of use, ensuring clean layouts and structured designs can be surprisingly challenging and easily overlooked when creating new content for websites.

First, WordPress is NOT All-in-one Solution.

Before delving into the topic, it took me a while to realize that WordPress is a content management solution, distinct from all-in-one website builders like Webflow and WIX. Its scalability and versatility make it applicable for diverse scenarios, contributing to its staggering 43% market share. However, mastering WordPress requires a certain level of knowledge to deliver designs that resonate with website visitors.

It’s Essential to Deliver Quality Content

Regarding the attributes of WordPress, it is important for designers to deliver engaging layouts for content. It often leads to common errors, such as overflowing content blocks or inconsistencies in font size and spacing. Many creators focus solely on the end result without implementing a structured approach. However, every element on a webpage plays a crucial role. Without a well-organized structure, identifying and rectifying errors becomes time-consuming and compromises the visitor’s experience.

Moreover, structured content aids collaboration by providing a clear overview of the page’s logic. This enables other designers and content writers to follow the established structure, ensuring consistency when creating new content.

Additionally, designing the structure hierarchy during content creation requires a deep understanding of the content itself. This ensures reader engagement and facilitates the assimilation of new information.

Therefore, structuring content hierarchy in web builders is essential to maintain consistency, prevent minor errors, ensure user engagement, and foster efficient collaboration when creating content on websites.

How to Make it Stay Well-organized?

Exploring the challenges and potentials of content creation on WordPress, I sorted out a few highlights to help improve and design layout/content structure on WordPress as follows. These five bullet points served as a checklist, especially when you are creating new posts/pages following the existing templates and theme design.

1. Familiarize Yourself with Blocks and Templates

Browse around the website you’re working on to see what plug-ins and what types of template you are going to use. Especially for outsourcing WordPress websites, it is important to know its purpose, use scenario and flexibility for all blocks and templates. If a company has built up their own customized theme, keep the styles and variants in mind and try to apply them consistently.

2. Structure Content Before Adding Blocks:

Avoid the common pitfall of cluttered, unreadable content by structuring your content beforehand. Identify and categorize content into two to three topics, ensuring each section’s hierarchy is logical and easily digestible. Consider factors like tone and paragraph length to enhance readability.

3. Separate Different Content Sections

Using “group”, “column” or “theme section” is a bit confusing in the beginning. For example, if a theme section includes an image on the left and text with a call-to-action button on the right, keep all related content together. This approach streamlines content management, facilitating efficient updates and collaboration.

4. Standardize Spacer Heights

Maintain consistency by standardizing spacer heights for different purposes throughout your website. If three pages share the same logic, you can do, for example, 120px spacer for top and bottom in one section and 60px spacer between two description in the same section. This will help uniform the aesthetic layouts and be more efficient when updating the pages.

5. Check mobile screen size, especially using columns and groups

Don’t overlook mobile responsiveness, especially when using columns and groups. Test your website’s layout on mobile devices to ensure that content remains well-organized and visually appealing.

By adhering to these guidelines, I’m sharing them to help maintain consistency, and deliver an optimal user experience on any WordPress websites.