subject: Web Site Development - Top 20 Dos And Don'ts To Create Highly Successful Sites [print this page] Great website design is central to your website's success. If the design is effective, it would increase traffic to the site and also improve sales. On the other hand, a bad design can discourage website usage despite excellent products and service.
Keep in mind the following points while you design your site if you want it to be successful:
Top 10 Dos of Website Design
1. Do simplify onsite search and navigation. Your website design should enable quick and easy search of required information. All pages also need to have the important links to information that would boost the user experience. As a rule of thumb, it should take less than two to three clicks for customers to access desired information. The faster your customers can navigate through your website and find what they are looking for, the more likely you are to get repeat visits from them.
2. Do keep your website content simple and easy to understand. Develop clear, effective and to-the-point content to seize customer attention and help them understand better what you have to offer. Develop content such that it focuses on customer problems and offers efficient solutions to them.
3. Do give your site a consistent look and feel. If you want your site to look professional, it is necessary to be consistent in fonts, colors and layout of pages. This is especially important with regards to the interlinked pages.
4. Do make your site accessible on multiple browsers. Users may visit your website using many different web browsers like Firefox, Internet Explorer or Chrome. If you plan to make your site available on mobile phones then include testing on mobile browsers to your test plan.
5. Do put your contact information on every page. List your physical address including other contact information like phone and email on the 'Contact Us' page. It is also important to list phone and email at the bottom of each page for easy availability.
6. Do make sure that each page has the most relevant information at the top of the page so that the user knows precisely what the page is about and if they want to scroll down or not.
7. Do use high-quality graphics and pictures. Images on your website, including your logo, should be of high-quality to draw in the customer and generate interest but should not take too much time to load.
8. Do use bullets, icons, boldface and italicized words, color and headline to attract customer attention to significant segments of your content.
9. Do make sure that your security and privacy policy are easily visible to customers and stated in clear terms. Take all important steps to make your website secure for customers.
10. Do use clear and concise page titles. Website visitors see web page title in search results and clear effective titles can appreciably increase the traffic coming to your website.
Top 10 Don'ts of Website Design
1. Don't clutter your website. Unorganized web pages are hard to read and navigate. Limit the amount of information you provide on each page. Each page should preferably deal with only one topic, product or category. If you plan to place advertisement on the site, make sure it does not interrupt or you would lose the visitors.
2. Don't make excessive use of bandwidth consuming audio and video features, such as graphics, animations and photos. These can make your pages slow to load, annoying the customers and deterring website usage.
3. Don't make content difficult to read by using offbeat text fonts or color combination. Additionally, don't include distracting visuals on your web pages.
4. Don't add needless irrelevant information or features to your website. Adding content and features on your website that don't carry any meaning for visitors is a waste of time and bandwidth.
5. Don't let the content of the links get stale. Periodically refresh the content and update the links to pertinent information. Outdated links are annoying and can seriously affect your business reputation.
6. Don't use jargon or overly technical terms on your pages unless your website is designed to address the needs of a small segment of technical people. Moreover, do not use conflicting information in your site. In addition to confusing customers, such information gives a highly negative and unprofessional image to your website.
7. Don't use flashing icons and text as that can distract browsers and could possibly be detrimental to the popularity of your website.
8. Don't stuff up your web pages with advertisements. Also, limit pop-ups as they can irritate buyers.
9. Don't include introductory advertisements on the first page before your web content appears. Such advertisements put customers in a sore mood even before they look at your content.
10. Don't just brag about your company's achievements. Provide your customers easy to consume information and back it up with references and customer testimonials to permit them to judge your performance.
Follow the dos and steer clear of the don'ts to develop an effective website, and greatly increase the probability of successful web entrepreneurship.
