The Internet is taking over people’s daily lives, so make sure that your web pages are a part of this success. By taking a few moments to review the information given here you can rest assured that visitors will stop by your site for what you offer.
It is important to choose great graphics for your website design. Keep in mind that PNGs are much better than large and poorly working bitmap images. Use PNGs for images over 256 colors for text buttons and the like or use GIF files for images smaller than 256 colors. For photos, JPEG images work well.
Make sure there is a prominent tagline on your site A tagline will be a motto or some statement about your business focus. There are about eight crucial seconds to grab and keep a visitor’s attention, so having an easy-to-understand tagline is crucial.
Choose the right graphic formats for your site. Bitmap images require a lot of disk space and are unwieldy. For non-photographic graphics choose a PNG if the graphic has less than 256 colors. Otherwise, choose a GIF. JPEG files are best for photographs.
Always, always remove old or outdated information off your website. If your website is advertising a festival that occurred three months ago, your readers will just leave. It is an expectation from users that you maintain the site and keep your information fresh, or else they think your site is ill-kept or abandoned. Put removing outdated content on your to-do list, to do every 2-4 weeks.
Always keep your opening page simple. Those who are shopping the web will make snap decisions about a site based off its front page. Be descriptive when you talk about your business and what you offer that is unique, but keep other information minimal to avoid your visitors getting distracted.
Your content should be useful and interesting. Design is certainly important, but the content is the reason that people will come back to your site. When the content on your site is valuable and useful, visitors will continue visiting your site.
Ensure your website can pass the NoScript test. The NoScript extension can be downloaded for Mozilla Firefox; doing so will allow you to be sure your site can be read. Some content isn’t going to work without using scripts, but you don’t want to have a blank site with scripts turned on.
User experience is the most important aspect of any website. You as a web designer have to think about the needs of the end user all the time. They should include interaction, usability, accessibility and the overall users experience. These are some important considerations to make. Seeing things from your visitors’ perspective will benefit you greatly.
Use professional-looking, and readable fonts. Most corporate sites use just a few basic fonts. Some fonts, such as comic sans, are ones that you want to stay away from. Unique fonts tend to default on most user’s computers if it’s not available to them. Doing this can make it look even worse.
Go ahead and sign up for a newsletter that can inform you about web design periodically, so that if you ever lose sight of your website creation goals you have a place to come back to and begin once again. Anyone can benefit from something like a newsletter, regardless of whether they are a pro or novice.
Functional websites work out for all visitors, regardless of their browser, so it’s essential that your website is tested across all the major platforms. What works in Internet Explorer may not necessarily show up correctly in Firefox, Chrome, or Safari. Test how your pages display with all major browsers prior to launch.
Talk to other web designers to make sure that you have adequately learned what you needed to in order to build your site. You should ensure all the knowledge you have learned has been retained. You don’t want to be creating a website and get confused.
When you are going to design a site, find specific individuals among your target audience and ask them what they personally want to see. This helps with what design will work best and determine what features you should make available on the site. When you get advice from the audience you’re targeting it can help you with what your site should be like.
Have someone test your website out for functionality every step along the way. Whenever you add something new, you should have a person come by and give you constructive feedback. For instance, you might not be bothered by a video that loads slowly, but someone else may have a different opinion. Get opinions from the outside to keep the proper perspective.
Avoid using too many graphics. Graphics are critical, but they can also clutter up a page. Graphics are not to be used for decorative purposes only. They need to add true content to the site. Having the appropriate number of graphics that do not create clutter improves the usability of your website, too.
Develop good time management skills as you are creating a website to help you get it done on time. There are a lot of smaller tasks that go into creating a site; you may think it would be best to put these tasks off. Before you know it, those little tasks have piled up and have become overwhelming. Therefore, you must finish up these tasks as quickly as possible.
As stated above, designing a great website is not as hard as it seems. After you get the hang of it, designing web pages becomes much simpler and easier to create sites that have great looking content. Be sure to put the above tips to use.