
There is quite a bit that is involved in website design. If you are not prepared, dealing with all the minutiae can be quite daunting. If you use these tips, you will be prepared to handle everything that website development throws at you.
Use fixed-position navigation. This technique locks the navigation panel on the site in place whenever the user scrolls on the page. It benefits virtually everyone who will visit your site.
Ensure your site can pass the NoScript test. Download the NoScript extension in Firefox and test it on your site to see if it is still readable. It is necessary that you pass it in order to sell items or services online as most of these functions require script or you won’t be generating revenue.
Speed is vital online, so be sure your pages load quickly. If Internet users have to wait a long time for your website to load, they will probably leave your site before it loads and vow never to return.
Avoid using a lot of graphics. Some images are necessary. However, too many are overwhelming. You need to not use graphics to decorate things, you need to be sure they’re making your site better. Your site will be much more usable and user friendly when you minimize the use of graphics.
Design your front page to be a minimal as possible. People surfing the web will quickly decide if they are going to delve into a website based on the front page. Blow the horn about your business and its unique qualities, but reduce the amount of extra fluff on your site.
Alt Tags
Be sure you’re using ALT tags for the images while you design a website. ALT tags are used to provide a description of the images on your site, which will help any visually impaired visitors. If images are links, your ALT tags can help you describe the link’s behavior, too. Also, search engine crawlers use ALT tags, so your site is going to rank higher.
Use relevant meta tags to increase site traffic. Good meta tags help search engines understand and categorize your website’s content properly. Poorly designed meta tags will not reflect the content of your website and will not help attract visitors.
Web Browsers
Keep in mind that it is very important to have your website design tested on many different web browsers. Each web browser has a slightly different way of how they illustrate the website, and in a couple of cases these little differences could have major effects on the experience for the user. Learn which browsers are used the most. Check your website on every one one of these browsers, and do not forget mobile web browsers that have become popular.
Try writing a good “About Us” page. So many sites have dull, boring information on these pages. Make yours exciting! Give visitors insight into you, the designer. Help them understand how you began designing websites, which other designers you consider to be mentors, and where you are going from here.
Hosting your own site is a bad idea, even if you’ve got the money to do it. You should design it yourself (or at least as much as possible), but allowing someone else to host your site frees you up and allows you to focus on other things besides the site’s safety and security.
You can only benefit from consulting a professional who deals with website development every day. This could be the depth of information that you need, to build a solid foundation in web design.
If you want to have videos on your website, you should first confirm with your web host that they will allow this. Many hosts do not permit video hosting to be used on their servers. They do this because FLV files can take up quite a bit of space on a public server. Just make sure you check before doing this so that you do not waste a lot of time and effort.
If you intend to design more than one website, you should learn to design under multiple platforms to improve your skills. Learning Java, MySQL, PHP and other platforms is going to help you for years to come. It does not matter if you are designing for yourself or for your friends, you should work on becoming a multi-faceted web designer.
Any advertisements that you put up should be minimal in size. You want people to feel comfortable when they’re visiting your site. Therefore, add content that will not look like clutter on your website, and your visitors will be so impressed by how professional it looks that they will return.
You should just pick up the main points of website design here since you cannot become a professional in a single night. With a couple of basics, you will learn how to turn website creation into a fruitful venture. If you get confused, or you aren’t sure what to do next, simply come back and review the tips above.