You only get one chance to make a first impression, and this is as true of websites as it is of people. An unpleasant or inefficient design can drive people away almost immediately. Use the following tips to help keep visitors coming back to your site.
Make sure the color combinations that you use on your site don’t hinder their ability to be read. Make sure that text can be easily read against background colors. The text opted for should be dark in color, with a lighter color used for your backgrounds. Let some of your friends see your site and give you some advice before going live.
Offer to store personal information for returning users. Saving data from one form to another, like username or email address, is imperative. Doing this will make everything much easier for the people that visit your page, and they will definitely appreciate the time saved.
With a newsletter, you’ll get repeat users. This can be an excellent way of building your client base. Place the signup form in a sidebar on your site, and keep track of the people that sign up. Only send out a newsletter to people who have subscribed to it, otherwise you will have angry customers.
Large sites should always have search capabilities. Try having a search box in the upper-right of your homepage that allows searching for terms on your site. You can use Google search or FreeFind, as they both give you access to an engine which is free and simple to use.
Create Professional Looking
Use Photoshop to create professional looking graphics for use on your website. Using a program like Photoshop can help amateur web designers create professional looking sites really fast. Not having this software can lead to a design which looks amateurish and untrusthworthy.
No matter how flashy your website is, it is vital that you keep the sizes of your website’s files small. Your file sizes have a lot to do with the speed of your site loading. It is always a good idea for your website to load as quickly as possible. You should remember also that some visitors may not use an Internet connection that is high speed. You want to perform a test to make sure your site performs well, even with dial-up modem connections.
White is a good choice for your page background color. White puts the focus on the content, making it easier to read. If you are trying to to exude a professional tone, a white background lends a trustworthy feeling to your site. Complex backgrounds distract your readers and visitors, and might slant your page towards an unprofessional image. With backgrounds the simpler, the better.
Meta Tags
Never underestimate the value of great meta tags throughout your website. Quality meta tags will help search engines point interested people in your site’s direction. Well-written meta tags will garner the most visitors to your site.
It is vital that you are aware of the fact of your need to design your website so that it displays properly on a range of different Internet browsers. Your site may look quite different on different browsers, so don’t be caught unawares! You can do a little online research to discover which web browsers are most popular at the moment. Use all popular browsers to test your site, including the mobile web ones.
While development platforms can ease the coding process, many are not as efficient as a plain old text editor. Utilizing a platform allows you to focus on the design aspects of the website, while having the platform handle the technical aspect of creating the code. However, if you prefer to lessen any errors while getting hands-on experience, using classic text editors should be your choice.
Get signed up for a design newsletter to stay current on website design trends. This way, if you ever are at a loss for ideas, you will be able to find inspiration through the newsletters. For rookies and veterans, newsletters come in handy.
Practice by designing small websites to see where your strengths and weaknesses are. You need to begin with perhaps a few basic pages with just enough information so that you can determine how you feel.
You really should have a dedicated space set aside, where you can design websites and manage your own site. Get rid of all distractions, and have you work space organized and ready for when you go to work. You want to build yourself a work space suited to the needs of website design, where all the tools you’ll need are within easy reach.
The design of a website is an important factor in how popular this site will become. Your visitors should get a good first impression. The tips contained in the above article should help you design web sites that will maintain interest and keep people there.
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