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Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Design tips for good websites

By Gordon Heralds

Facebook, Yahoo, Google. What do these three differing websites have in common? Their striking colour and design. These juggernauts of the internet have maintained their online positions in part due to their professional and attractive design. Read on if you want to learn how to do this.

Links are of vital importance to good website design: if they are broken or faulty, it will not make for a happy browser, so you should invest a little of your time in regular checking and fixing. Scheduling is a must.

One common mistake is to rely on JavaScript, which, whilst useful in development opportunities, is disabled in most browsers and therefore will make your site inaccessible to a lot of potential visitors. All web browsers are different and display their content differently. There will be different versions of each software platform, and using JavaScript too much will render your site useless. This is disastrous.

Be an inspiration to your visitors. One of the hallmarks of a good website is an explanation as to why you do what you do. Your visitors are interested. Feed their interest with a good ''About Us'' page and tell them why you are involved in web design. Tell them who your inspirations were. Tell them where you wish to go.

You should seek a professional host for your website, as self hosting brings with it the challenge of organising the security and safety of your website. For this reason alone a professional host should be your main consideration.

On every websites' page is a meta-tag. These little pieces of html code that show up on all the search engines and creating high quality meta tags are a major design consideration. If your meta tags are poorly designed or do not accurately represent your content, your visitor numbers will be low.

Proof-reading one's content is something a lot of webmasters forget about or ignore, and this is to their detriment. Your content makes up the main body of your site, and if it is badly written and full of errors, why should a visitor think your web designs will be any more professional? You should check all your content for errors and mistakes to ensure good copy and a good visitor experience.

The internet is a worldwide tool and therefore you should make sure your content is viewable across the world. The dates and times of your website should be represented by a specific timezone, and your customers should be able to view prices in their own currencies. Do not cater to one group of people: make your content as accessible to as many people as possible. Web design skills are very important, and practice is never wasted: start your own page and experiment with simple HTML and PHP scripts until you are comfortable with them.

The odds are that you won't create an internet juggernaut along the lines of Google or Facebook. However, this doesn't mean you should neglect website design. With good design skills you can create attractive websites even better than the big beasts. This article provides lots of good info. Use it well.
 
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