In today’s modern age, the single-page website, or sometimes known as a one-page website, has become increasingly popular. More and more businesses around the world are choosing the non-traditional approach for their online platform.

A single-page website consists of… you guessed it… a single-page. This page may span for a few sections and contain bitesize pieces of information and content. This is ideal for small businesses who want to deliver a story and engage with their customers in a short space of time, given an average user will stay on a webpage for about 15 seconds, this might just be the right way to capture them.

Advantages of a single-page website

Cost-effective

One of the biggest advantages of a single-page website is cost-effectiveness. This is why it attracts so many businesses to it. Due to the lack of pages on the website, it’s easier to design and develop. Thus resulting in a lower price than your typical multi-page website.

It’s also great if one page is really all you need. If you think having multiple pages will not match what you’re trying to go for, by all means, do consider a single-page website. You can achieve the same things you would do with a traditional multi-page website if done right.

Telling a story

Businesses love to connect with their customers through their brand image. This means informing the consumer about your brand story and finding ways to make them relate to it. With a single-page website, you control the order in which your customers view information. This means structuring your sections to utilise space and feed your customers information the way you intend it to be viewed.

Single-page websites tend to have higher engagement than traditional websites, due to the fact all the user’s needs are all on one page. This can help improve overall traffic and conversions.

This can be ideal for restaurants who want to show off content such as images and videos and include an integrated menu, all from a single-page. This means their users will not have to look around to find useful information. Everything will be delivered to them from one page.

Strong design

The main focal point for a single-page website is the design. Designers love getting to work on a single-page design. It gives them total control over how they want it to engage users. With single-page websites, it’s important to outline everything which will be going into the page beforehand, including content and sections. This will let the designers know what to create and style for.

Single-page websites can include a navigation bar, but these won’t take you to a separate page. Instead, they will transport you to whichever section it points to. For example, clicking on the menu option or contact option will scroll you down and drop you off at the relevant sections. This paired along with the freedom to scroll on your own, we can tell why users appreciate a well designed single-page website.

Making changes to content is easy

Not to say making changes on a traditional website is difficult. But, there’s something about having all your content on one page, that makes making changes a breeze. Even with multiple sections, content is separated into manageable chunks so you’ll be whizzing around the backend of the website like a pro.

Responsive Design

Single-page websites look great on whatever device they’re being viewed on. Designs are much easier to optimise. Users on mobile will love how easy it is to scroll through the page, with it resembling the likes of Instagram, which users are familiar with.

It’s important to get the correct balance of content with design on single-page websites due to the limited space you have. You want to utilise the space and not flood the page with text.

Examples of single-page websites:

https://www.curve.app/en-gb/
https://thebarongrooming.co.uk/
https://www.viavan.com/

Disadvantages of a single-page website

Lack of pages

Sometimes you need more pages to fit information on. This might include having pages such as:

• Mission page
• Products page
• Approach page
• About page
• Team page
• Purchasing/Donate system
• And more…

Due to the nature of a single-page website, there’s always a limit to how much you are able to fit in and as we mentioned before you do not want to overpopulate a single page with too much content, there always needs to be a balance. This can be harmful to user engagement.

Difficulty sharing content

Sharing content from pages on a traditional website is easy, you simply copy and paste the URL of the page you’re on or use the designated sharing buttons. Because the information is separated by pages, you’ll be able to pinpoint the page which you are wanting to share. For example, a page from a portfolio.

With a single-page website, all the information is situated on one page, so the link would be www.thesinglepagewebsite.com and you’ll have to tell the person to scroll down to the section which you want them to view. This is a minor disadvantage, but it could be the reason a user chooses not to share the website as they aren’t able to filter through to the exact content they wish to share.

SEO

Search Engine Optimisation on a single-page website might not be as effective as a traditional website. This is due to not having the ability for Google to index more than one single page. Businesses sometimes want to separate their services or products on search engines and a single-page website doesn’t allow this.

You also do not want to incorporate a lot of keywords into a single page either as this can be detrimental for Google’s quality score rankings, which decides where you rank on Google. So bear this in mind.

Page load time

This ties in with SEO because all your content is on a single page, the website will typically take longer to load up. Images and relevant videos will all need to load in unison to help make the page appear as it was intended to be. You don’t want sections to appear before others as it may reduce user engagement.

This can be countered with selecting a good hosting package. Your page will load up more streamlined and eliminate the chances of inconsistent loading we mentioned above.

Analytics

Utilising analytics can be difficult on a single-page website. It’s hard to see which pages are proving to be popular and which aren’t. If you’re experiencing high bounce rates, it can be difficult to pinpoint which sections or elements are causing this.

Is a single-page website right for you?

The argument has both significant advantages and disadvantages, but will ultimately come down to what you offer and how much information you need to get across to your users. The industry you’re in will also be a huge factor, with some industries requiring multiple pages to deliver information and suitable user experience.

Still unsure whether a single-page website is right for your business? Contact us today and one of our experts will be able to help you decide.