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Internet site Style Advice To Help You Now
1. Internet site Style Advice To Help You Now
No matter what sort of website you have, it is important to make sure that it follows the principles of
good website design. A poorly designed website will drive away visitors and frustrate those few who
persevere. The following article can help you design a high quality website and attract more traffic.
Use JavaScript to include a custom font on your webpages. Libraries like Typekit and Google Web
Fonts make it easy to include esoteric fonts on webpages, even if most visitors don't have those fonts
on their computers. It works by embedding the font itself into JavaScript so that it can be decoded
by the client on the fly.
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.
Keep your front page as simple as possible. Visitors to your site will decide quickly from your front
page if they want to stay to look around or leave just as quickly. Make sure that you provide a very
clear description about your business or other purpose for your site. Other information on your site
should be minimal, but still clear, so that you don't overwhelm your visitors.
Always mark files that must be opened in
an external program with an icon. Many
sites host PDF files, and less commonly,
DOC files, that must be opened in Foxit
Reader and Microsoft Word/OpenOffice,
respectively. These files should be marked
with an icon representing the file type,
and a link to download the appropriate
viewer if the user does not have it.
Every page of your website should have a
way to return to the main page, or "home."
This ensures that when users navigate
deeper into your site, they always have a
way to start over if they lose place of what
got them to the page they are on
currently.
For the best layout, make sure that the colors you choose for the background and font are restful to
the eyes. Choosing moving backgrounds or neon colors can make it hard for people to read, and they
may navigate to another web site. However, include pictures to break up your content and make the
site complete.
If you already have a particular web hosting solution that you know you are going to use, keep its
limitations in mind as you design your website. For example, do not create a website that relies on
2. specific programming languages if your web host does not support these languages. It is fairly
simple to find out which technologies are supported by your web host. Make certain that your design
is something that is within the limitations of your host.
Try designing for all screen resolutions. A simple website can always encourage visitors to remain
and read the content. If your site doesn't look good for a specific resolution, the visitor may leave
since they cannot view it. Designing a stretchier layout that fits any screen resolution lets you know
that all visitors can enjoy the content.
Anyone wishing to design a great-looking site should consider spending a lot of time on the header
image. This is what visitors are noticing as soon as they log on to your website, so having something
that's on topic and visually appealing is a good move. Creating your own instead of using a premade
header is the best way to go.
When building a website, enlist the help of Adobe Dreamweaver. Even novices can understand this
program quickly. It is feature rich, with lots of layouts and templates. It can also help with testing
the http://webdesign.about.com/ site so you know how it will look once on the server.
One of the first things you should do is select and reserve your domain name. Be creative and pick
out something that you want, but make sure you reserve it now so that you can still have it later on
down the road. Many people might have the same idea as you. The whole world is very connected.
Use your artistic skills to design websites. Always be prepared for inspiration to strike. When a great
idea pops into your head during a meal out, scribble your thoughts on a napkin. If inspiration strikes
at the office, VPN to your home computer and put the idea in a text file so you can use it later.
Avoid using Captchas, except in the case of new user registration. Visitors dislike captchas, and
dislike the feeling that they must solve a complicated problem just to see a web page. Unless your
viewer is already a regular at your site, they will probably leave and go somewhere else.
You want to ensure that each webpage within the domain, and it's sub-domains, has a tagline that
can be clearly seen. Use large text in bold that will grab attention, as this is the first thing seen by
visitors when following links. It will immediately let them know what the goal of the page is, the
offer it's providing, the reason it exists, or the purpose of it. Most of google plus the time, this
determines whether or not this visitor remains on your page or exits out.
3. Learn what you can about cascading style sheets. HTML can do some of the work, but CSS is what
makes the design part happen. These style sheets serve as a reference guide for your site to make
sure each page has a consistent look. This can make changing your site simple, too. If you need to
change a font color, for example, you'll only need to change a single line of code.
Think outside the box when you are looking for website inspiration. Television programs, artistic
exhibits, even commercials are good sources of inspiration. You should stay vigilant and look around
you throughout the day because you never know what might spark your next great idea.
Include pictures of your office space and workforce, instead of using stock photos all over your site.
The more your visitors feel that they know who they are giving business to, the more likely they are
to choose you over your competitors. This design tip can do more than you would think to boost your
business.
Optimize every image you use for the web. If you look through the internet, you can find a lot of
examples of images that are too large and they slow down the webpage's load time. Make sure you
have optimized each image you use. Save the image as a JPEG or GIF and aim for the file size to be
somewhere between 5k and 20k.
Excellent website design isn't optional; it's absolutely necessary for a successful website. Between
the breadth of the information available on website creation and the speed at which the field
evolves, understanding it and staying up to date with it can be tough. The tips above, however, are a
really good start in making sense of all that information. Use what you've learned here to improve
the website you have or build something brand-new.