Design is one of the most critical aspects of any marketing and branding strategy. The impact of good design on conversion can be vital for any business but often times it gets overlooked at the expense of jamming as much information as possible into the available physical space. This could be space on a web site, a business card, a brochure or any other marketing material that you can think of.
What is Whitespace?
Whitespace, also referred to as “negative space”, is an aesthetic tactic utilised in design. In its simplest definition, whitespace refers to the strategic visual sections of a page/illustration that are left unmarked and thus uncluttered by any other aesthetic detail. Think about the margins we leave at the edges of a Word document, or the space we leave around an image on a web page. These are all examples of whitespace.
Why is Whitespace Important?
Simply put, whitespace is important because it is extremely difficult for our brains to process too much information all at once. Just think about those old phone books with tiny text squished together in order to fit as much information as possible into one small box. It is overwhelming to even look at a page from a phone book, let alone processing that information.
On the flip side of this spectrum is the overuse of whitespace, which can also be problematic. Too much whitespace will fail to guide the users towards additional content that is present off-screen, creating an ‘illusion of completenes’. It is especially important to keep this in mind for mobile design, as big chunks of whitespace on desktop can translate to even bigger spaces on mobile devices.
Less is More
The idea is finding the right balance to convey the necessary information in the most digestible way possible. Case studies suggest that appropriate use of whitespace in web design increases conversion rates by almost 20%! By giving your audience some breathing room in between your content blocks, you are in fact allowing them to process the information that was just thrown at them. It may seem odd, maybe even counterintuitive to think that less content in a given space produces better results in sales but when you think about the barrage of information that we face everyday in the digital age, less is really more.
When it comes to visual aesthetics, it boils down to each individual’s personal preferences. With that in mind, here are some websites that I think showcase great examples of efficient use of whitespace:
One of the benefits of UGC is the fact that consumers can bring their own perspective of the product to the table. If a company has 100 customers it means that there are 100 different ways that people are experiencing the product. What better way to make things interesting than to let your customers share these experiences? This can really help a brand develop its own personality in the digital space.
As great as it is to generate valuable content, what ultimately matters is the results. The return on investment on UGC is completely measurable through social media analytics tools and Google Analytics so that businesses can tell what is working and what is not. It is the ideal way to drive revenue and demonstrate value by measuring the engagement.
With e-commerce rapidly increasing in popularity among millennials, purchasing behaviour is naturally evolving with it. Millennials, otherwise known as Generation Y, are estimated to be the largest consumer group in the US history. According to market research reports by 
These days, consumers have inherent trust issues against corporations. Every time we see an ad that says “free …” we are immediately suspicious. Consumers know that there is no such thing as free when it is coming from a company that is looking for ways to increase its bottom line.
Social proof theory suggests that people are automatically drawn to things that they know others already like and trust. This goes hand in hand with building trust, as the more people are talking about a product (and hopefully saying good things), the better the chances of recruiting more customers. This works from both a consumer and a business perspective. When people don’t have enough information or are unsure of what to do, they turn to a larger group of people who have more knowledge than them. As for the companies, it is a great way to legitimize their claims about a product through actual users validating it for them.
As these cases indicate, sex in advertising works when it comes to creating awareness and buzz for your brand. The question is whether it’s the sex that sells or the controversy it creates. To answer this, let’s take a look at a study conducted in 2007 at the University College London. This research looked at the recall of sexual and non-sexual television commercials embedded within programmes, with or without, sexual content. To do this, the researchers divided 60 adults into four groups, two of them watching a sexual program (Sex and the City) and two of them watching a non-sexual TV show (Malcolm in the Middle). Each TV episode was embedded with either sexual or non-sexual commercials to measure brand recall. After the experiment, the participants were asked to remember the names of the brands they had seen during the commercials. The results, as you can see below, are quite fascinating in that the group that watched Sex and the City had a much lower recall rate than the other group, regardless of the content of the commercials. The researches concluded that the existence of sexual content in a program impairs the ability of the brain to focus on other content.