The Five Key Elements of Successful Web Design
There are so many challenges to designing a great website, with technology constantly changing and expectations rising so quickly. Any time you browse the internet, you are evaluating the effectiveness of every website, whether you are aware of it or not.
For whatever reason you are launching a website, the goals are going to be the same. You want to keep visitors interested and allow them to move freely from the home page without getting jammed. If at any point a visitor feels confusion, chances are they are moments away from leaving.
Early exits from your site defeat the purpose. In fact, it may force you to decide on the viability of certain key features of your site. This trap can be avoided if you design your site well from the start. Remember, it is much easier to upgrade a well-constructed site than to start over from scratch. Follow these five tips to get web design right the first time.
1. Navigation is easy. Your website must be easily traveled for it to be successful. Topping the list of consumer complaints is always this topic. Try to make it simple to get to different pages and, then, simple to return to from where they came. Cutting down on the amount of links on the home page is always well-advised, as more will undoubtedly pop up in the future. Use drop-down menus instead. Also, don’t be shy about adding highlight links to key features, even if they already have a standard link constructed.
2. Construct a clean layout. Like a postcard, the home page of your website is ideally a perfect marriage of ideas and pictures. Websites can repel visitors when one or the other is lacking. Layouts which have plenty of open space are welcoming and tend to invite longer visits. Also, remember that certain fonts can come out distorted on different operating systems, so find a style that will translate.
3. Accommodate all screen resolutions. The more content your site has (i.e., for journalism or other long articles), the bigger the challenge will be to zero in on the ideal screen resolution. A layout which can stretch is ideal, as you will cut down on the amount of problems and limit scrolling.
4. Try to minimize the load times. Everyone knows the feeling: If a page doesn’t load, it’s a matter of moments before leaving the site. Excessive amounts of graphics and showy presentations can cause your site to load pages slowly and turn off the visitor. The same goes for scripts and codes that aren’t even being used. A leaner site will keep visitors engaged.
5. The future is written into the plan. Since the materials you have used will definitely changing in the coming years – as will the internet itself – web design must include a glance into the crystal ball. Scale your codes so they hopefully need fewer changes in the coming time period. A review of the recent past will be helpful.
Damian Papworth knows business owners have issues with Small Business website structural. This is why so many have basic structural mistakes. To help he wrote the book Small Business Websites, guiding business owners on the internet in a style that is ieasy to understand.
