Top tips to make your wayfinding signage easy to follow

Your customers, staff and suppliers shouldn’t have to feel like they’re stuck in an escape room when they visit your business premises. Unfortunately, all too often, visitors find themselves lost or frustrated because signage fails to guide them properly.

Whether you manage a retail park, leisure venue, office complex, school, tourist attraction or large warehouse, effective wayfinding signage makes all the difference in creating a positive experience.

Here’s a practical guide to help you create directional signs your visitors will want to follow.

Creating a clear hierarchy of information

People don’t need to know everything. Your signage should prioritise the key messages that visitors need first. Start with broad directions, then gradually narrow down to the finer details.

For example, a sign might point initially to ‘Reception’ or ‘Car Park’, with smaller text below directing to individual departments or rooms. And people don’t need to know directions to those specific spaces until they’re nearer to the general area.

Use a clear hierarchy of font sizes, colours and symbols to organise information logically. Larger, bolder text draws the eye immediately, while smaller text offers extra clarity without crowding the sign. Avoid stuffing too much information onto a single board. Once again, some things – in fact, most things – your visitors won’t need to know straight away. You’ll only confuse them.

Maintain consistent design and strategic placement

Your wayfinding signage should look and feel like part of the same family throughout the venue. Use consistent colours, fonts, icons and materials to reinforce your brand identity and reduce confusion.

Changing styles between floors or zones breaks the visual flow and can mislead your visitors. They might even think they’ve strayed into a different organisation’s premises.

Text on wayfinding signs needs to be large enough for people to read easily from the distance they’re likely to be standing. For example, signs in car parks or along busy roads require much bigger lettering than signs inside office corridors or classrooms, where visitors are closer.

As a general rule, outdoor directional signs should have letters at least 75mm (3 inches) tall to be readable from around 30 metres away. Indoor signs, where people are nearer, don’t need to be as big. Sizes vary, but letters between 25mm and 50mm should be plenty large enough.

The proper spacing between letters and words is essential, too. If text is cramped, it becomes harder to read quickly. That leads to frustrated visitors because it slows their progress.

Also, take lighting into account. Larger, well-spaced letters perform better in tricky light conditions, such as low light or bright glare. Whether the sign is placed in a dark corridor or a well-lit room full of windows can completely change how easy it is to read.

Next, let’s touch on placement. Position signs where people naturally pause or make decisions, such as entrances, junctions, lifts and stairwells. Signs tucked away or placed too far from decision points go unnoticed, making them ineffective.

Also, keep your directional signs at eye level (ensuring they’re also accessible to wheelchair users and those with limited mobility). That’s where people’s gazes naturally sit.

Avoid common mistakes for accessible and inclusive signage

One of the worst wayfinding traps you can fall into is information overload. It’s very easy to bombard visitors with too many words, options or jargon (such as industry-specific names for buildings or rooms). You’ll just leave them baffled.

Keep the language simple, clear and familiar. For instance, instead of ‘cardiology department’, consider ‘heart clinic’ (if that suits your audience better). In some cases, even ‘Building A’ may be most appropriate, with a key somewhere to define Building A as the cardiology department.

Another big problem with many organisations’ wayfinding signage? Contrast. It’s a good thing in this world, because it enhances legibility and makes signs easy to read in all lighting conditions.

That said, steer clear of colour combinations that cause visual strain or exclude certain people, such as reds and greens for those with colour blindness. Also, make sure the colours don’t clash, as it just looks like a poor design.

On that note, make sure the design considers everyone. Accommodate all the realistic potential needs of your site visitors. Incorporate tactile elements or braille where suitable. Pair clear icons with text to aid people with reading difficulties or non-native speakers. Facilities open to the public must follow the Equality Act 2010 and British Standards for accessible signage.

Finally, tailor your wayfinding strategy to your venue. Different sites require different approaches.

For example, retail parks benefit from large, clear signs directing visitors to key shops and facilities. Hospitals work best with zone-based signage. Offices and education settings probably need a blend of permanent signs and temporary notices for events or changes, and so on.

It all depends on what your premises need.

Audit your existing wayfinding signage

Here’s a quick rundown of the things to consider when planning your wayfinding signage:

• Can people read the signs easily from the distance they’ll be viewing them?
• Is information presented clearly and in a logical sequence?
• Does the design remain consistent across the entire site?
• Are signs positioned where visitors naturally look or stop?
• Is the language straightforward?
• Is the contrast strong enough for all realistic lighting conditions?
• Have accessibility features like braille and tactile markers been included?
• Do signs comply with local planning rules?
• Can the signage system adapt to temporary changes or future expansions?

Take the time to carry out this audit. If you can, consider bringing in someone who doesn’t know the building to do it for you. They’ll pick up on certain things that you might subconsciously take for granted or overlook.

That’s where a professional signmaker like PB Signs can help. We provide expert site surveys to examine visitor flow and the effectiveness of your wayfinding signage. We’ll develop bespoke solutions to balance your brand style, practicality and compliance, so your visitors can find their way around without a problem and feel like they’re at work, not at that escape room we mentioned in the introduction.

So, what are you waiting for? Reach out to us today for an obligation-free chat about what you need. We’d be delighted to explain how we can help.