From time to time, we feature travel or location-based websites in our lineup of excellent web design. Because destinations must compete with thousands of other potential vacation spots, finding some stellar examples of design is easy. The difficulty comes in narrowing down the many options to find a site like Visit Sweden, which stands out the little bit more.
For this month’s award, we limited our selections to country-wide websites that looked at a travel destination as a whole, including things to do in the area and tips for vacation planning. The site we chose falls under an informational category, yet it will bring revenue to locals from tourists.
Sweden has a population of approximately 10,551,707 people and makes up around 0.13% of the global population. The government is a monarchy with a democracy and the country is a member of the European Union.
Winner: Visit Sweden
Visit Sweden made the list for its easy navigation and engaging content.
Sweden is a country filled with sweeping landscapes of islands and lakes. The cuisine is unique as you go from the countryside to cities like Stockholm. If you love architecture, you’ll find many interesting buildings to study. During the holidays, you’ll find Christmas festivals and markets to peruse. Some of the things you’ll want to see include:
- Vasa Museum features a 17th century ship
- Historic center of Stockholm Old Town, with canals and cobblestone streets
- Stockholm City Hall for art pieces
- ABBA The Museum if you love the famous band
- Drottningholm Palace Skansen open air museum
- Royal Djurgarden
- Abisko National Park
Why We Chose Visit Sweden As Our Winner
Many of the travel sites have a similar layout. Although we love the hero video on the home page, many destinations include videos to engage users. However, Visit Sweden not only hit the typical good design choices but they added some engagement and value that made the site stand out from similar ones.
Informational Boxes
Just under the hero video are three boxes that include some highlights to answer questions the typical site visitor might have. We felt these boxes indicated the site designers did their research on the pain points of the target audience and strove to solve those issues.
The boxes are a bright yellow that pops against the white background. They are titled:
- Where to Go
- What to Do
- Explore Map
Accents
Still looking at the yellow boxes, we also liked the accents to direct users to move through the content on the site. Arrows point to elements such as:
- Northern Sweden
- Middle Sweden
- Southern Sweden
- Eat & Drink
- Design & Architecture
- Nature & Outdoors
Navigation
Like all concise navigation bars, Visit Sweden limits the choices to five areas of the site.
- Where to Go
- What to Do
- Where to Stay
- Explore Map
- About Sweden
We also appreciated the bar at the very top that lists the other websites and press and media resources.
Content
Excellent content pulls people into the site and keeps them there long enough to learn why they want to visit Sweden. Some of the articles on the site are popular topics the target audience would search for, such as:
- When and Where to See the Magical Northern Lights
- 15 Festive Christmas Markets in Sweden
- Why Sweden Is the Perfect Destination for Solo Travelers
Links to Social
The footer of the site has exactly what users might expect to find. You’ll see some social media links to:
- Threads
- TikTok
- YouTube
Note that they turn to platforms in countries where tourists come from as well as ones popular with their own citizens. They share multiple videos on YouTube, which gives them some short-form videos to pull users in. Around 61% of Gen Zers watch short videos on social media and will often visit the linked website.
Color Palette
The bright color palette serves to create excitement. The white background allows the designers to use bright colors, such as the pops of yellow to grab attention. The call to action (CTA) buttons are also a vivid yellow. Other pops of color come from the photographs included on the page.
Clutter Free
A lot of clutter on the page can distract people from the purpose of your site. It’s preferable to focus on a few elements and give users only a couple of choices on where they go next on your site. The more streamlined the buyer’s journey is, the more likely people will get your goal.
Load Speeds
The simple, minimalistic design and optimized images makes the page load lightning fast. The second you pull up the page on your desktop, it’s already in place. The lag is barely noticeable on mobile devices.
Investing in a server with enough resources, reducing scripts and optimizing visuals all work to make the site fast.
Mobile Responsiveness
The site stacks on mobile, which provides an excellent experience. The navigation turns into a hamburger menu, saving space and making areas accessible. The yellow callout boxes stack one on top of the other, which works well to keep the text at a readable size.
What We Would Do Different
Overall, the design is almost perfect. The only thing we might add is a resources page for interested tourists to find legitimate travel companies. While we understand that the government doesn’t want to recommend any particular services, not having this resource could lead to site visitors getting scammed and not seeing the Sweden they want.
