Many people believe that designing a website is
difficult, but that in only true if you do not take the time to learn
how to build one. Like pretty much everything done on the web today,
there are many software programs available which can make web design
really simple.
Continue on for some great tips on how to choose the best web design program to build your site.
Before you publish any web page, check it carefully for broken links.
Nothing is more frustrating to a visitor than clicking on a link and
being taken to an error page. You can check your links manually, or
there are programs that will scan your site for you and report any
broken links.
Allow users to cancel an action if they so choose. This could mean
ordering products, opting in to an email newsletter, or returning to the
homepage from deep within your site. If visitors cannot cancel an
action they are not interested in, such as providing their contact
information, they will feel they do not have a choice and won't buy
anything.
Give your visitors the ability to search your site so that they can
more easily find what they are looking for. If someone cannot find what
they are looking for right away, their next thought will be to look for a
search field. Put this somewhere obvious and include a search button.
Always ensure you are giving meaningful feedback, as this is what
creates the communication between a website and its visitors. For
example, if an action taken by a visitor results in an error, do not
simply display "error occurred."� Instead, provide a message that
explains what happened and how the visitor can correct the error by
taking a different action. Without this feedback, visitors are more
likely to grow frustrated and just give up by leaving your website.
Have a site map. These are useful to your clients and the search
engines, as they give a detailed overview of your entire website. It can
be a guide for viewers searching for a certain part of your site, and
also allow you to keep track of its structure and layout.
Use a tracking service, rather than displaying your visitor counter
for all to read. Many websites still display their counters, yet they do
not serve any real purpose. There are many high quality tracking
services available, and some are even free. Use these instead of showing
off how many people visit you.
When designing your website, you should avoid using too many
different types of fonts. You must also consider how different fonts
appear on the standard computer screen; smaller serif fonts (Times New
Roman, for example) are somewhat hard to read. Most sites use Vedrana,
which is easily read in different colors and sizes.
Do not use images for your background. When you think about some of
the biggest websites on the Internet, they do not have images as
backgrounds. When you use image backgrounds, you represent yourself as
someone who is not well-versed in web designing. Images as backgrounds
also cause your site to load slower, which can lead to user frustration.
Make text easy to ready by using colors that contrast or backgrounds
that are easy to read text on. When your text is harder to read because
the background or text color creates eye strain or portions of text that
are unreadable, site visitors are less likely to stick around.
As stated in the above article, web design today is made simple with
the many easy to use software programs that are on the market. If you
can follow some simple instructions then you too can enter the world of
web design.
Apply the tips from this article so you can understand what to look for in a web design program.
