Good Web Page Design
A Web Hosting Article Contributed by Jamie Wilson
Good Web Page Design
Web page design is often tacky and overdone, or filled with too many bells and whistles to be of any use, or impossible to navigate. There are thousands of examples of poorly designed pages out there. Here's how NOT to design bad web pages.
Web Page Design 101 -- Keep It Simple
The human eye is easily distracted by moving objects, by different-looking objects, or by anything unusual. If you want your site visitor to actually pay attention to the things on your page, design your web site in such a way that there is nothing to distract your viewer. Unless it's actually necessary, you shouldn't include any flash animation, or animated gifs. Leave out the fancy web site music that generally manages to embarrass your visitors by blaring out at work. Fancy stuff annoys people. It doesn't impress them.
Designing a Simple Web Page
Your first step is always figuring out what you really want to communicate to your customers and page visitors. You want to get all this information in there first, and elaborate afterward if you have space. Remember, you can always create another page.
Lay your page out simply and in a logical order. Put your main contact information at the bottom, but put a link to contact information at the top of the page. Link your logo to a page that emails to you. Remember that the most important real estate on a web page is the top and the right, and put the most vital information there. Don't put a huge graphic at the top -- you're wasting an opportunity to communicate with your customer. In the seconds it takes them to look at that impressive graphic, they may decide to surf to the next vendor's site rather than mess with this one.
Don't underestimate the value of white space. Instead of filling your whole page with text or images or other things, separate portions of your page with white space so that your reader's eyes can have a rest.
Designing the Plain Vanilla Web Page
Plain vanilla -- a web page with few or no decorations -- was touted in the early days of web design. Basically, a plain vanilla page is set up with a table to separate the main text and any sidebars, or text running parallel down either side of a page to communicate different information from your main text. A navigational toolbar tops the page, the title is centered over the main text, sidebars with advertising, additional information, or more navigational tools run down either or both sides of the page, and another navigational toolbar sits at the bottom. That's it.
Don't put too much text on any single page; you don't want the reader to scroll too far down the page before clicking to the next. If you must put fancy stuff on your page, give your reader the choice not to view it. And keep all your important information at the top of any page you create.
Most importantly, remember the internet is a way to communicate with your customer, not a way to show off. Keep it professional and clear, and you'll be well rewarded.
