Web design firms are raking in major profits offering a service you could do yourself. Don’t fall prey to having someone else do for you what you can learn on your own. Begin by looking over the following information to better understand web page design.
Use a sensible background for your site. Some sites use moving GIFs in the background, but that can make text hard to read. In order to preserve your website’s focus, and make it easy for your visitors to comprehend, you should choose a background image that harmonizes well with your site instead of clashing with it.
Preserve the personal information users submit on your site safely. For instance, people may already register with your site, and you should have it set up to preserve their information if they choose so they don’t have to register again. Saving the user’s information in this way simplifies work for them, and is much appreciated by your website visitors.
Consider buying a website development program to help design a better website. You will be happy with the professional product these programs can produce. If your site doesn’t look nice, you won’t get many visitors to it.
If the site you are designing is large, make sure to include a search option. The best place to put your search text box is in the top right hand corner as that is where the bulk of websites put theirs. You can add search functions to your site with Google and FreeFind.
Adding some relevant pictures is always a good way to make your site more interesting and attractive. Pictures help make your website more user-friendly. People will spend more time on your site looking around when they see pictures they want to click on.
Resist any temptation to use pop-up windows when you design your website. They may seem helpful, but they are seen as more annoying by visitors than not. If customers see these popups and get frustrated, they may not come back to your site.
Search Engines
Don’t use frames. Users may like pages with frames included, but the information inside of those frames is not included in search engines. If search engines can’t reach some information on your website, your rankings will be lower. When that occurs you do not get many visitors.
You want the navigation to be simple and easy. Navigation link placement is very important and ensures visitors stay on your site. The navigational structure must be neat, consistent, and easy to access for your users to have a better experience.
Do your best to optimize the loading times on every page of your website. Visitors are not going to wait around for a slow site. Some techniques you can use to insure fast loading pages are reducing Flash, minimization of CSS coding, and reducing Flash and graphics on your page.
Do not add pop-up advertisements to your site. Having well placed ads can add income to your site, but popups will only annoy your visitors. This usually results in visitors not returning to your site. Keep the ads you do use simple; you don’t need crazy pop-ups.
Your website should begin with a relatively small amount of content on each page. A huge amount of content may be hard for you to organize and may confuse and annoy those who come to your site.
Target Audience
Figure out your site’s target audience and ask them what they’re interested in with a website. This will help you design the pages and create the features of your site. Advice from what your target audience wants to see is pertinent to the design of your site.
Use graphics to increase the entertainment value of your website. To add interest to your site, it is wise to do some creative things, such as wrapping text around images. Your visitors will stay longer and return more often if your content has visual appeal.
Remember — website development doesn’t need to cost a lot. There are certainly expensive design tools out there, but many companies offer software with similar features at a fraction of the cost. Open source applications can often do the same job as applications that cost money. Therefore, using open-source software can save you a large amount of money.
Think about unusual inspirational sources when you are considering site design. You can also get ideas from other sources such as magazines and TV. Be on the lookout, because you never know when you will find something to get you motivated.
Always allow for feedback from visitors about your website creation. What one person finds attractive, another one may not. If you can, ask members who are part of your target audience to test drive your site and provide feedback.
If you are targeting a local population with your website, consider purchasing a country code top level domain. This guarantees that you have the domain name for the part of the country you are targeting. You can use a ccTLD to help direct regional viewers to your site who may not have otherwise found it.
When you have the basic idea of website development, you can start to branch out and learn more. The tips you learned showed you how easy it can be. You just have to apply what you’ve learned and start practicing.