Let me tell you from personal experience, it is extremely frustrating to get to a website without a method to contact a *real person*. Sometimes, websites (especially corporate variety) are designed to answer frequently asked questions, but not unusual ones.

A short time ago, I was in need of an antivirus program for an NT server. Many antivirus programs are designed to work with NT workstations, but not servers. I learned that hard way - by buying software and being unable to install it. (I later discovered they all have "corporate" versions of their websites offering their server software, but there is no link to corporate websites from their consumer-oriented websites.)

It took me weeks to get through to any of major antivirus software vendors to ask them about NT server software. With Symantec, I was completely unable to find an email address at which I could contact a real person. Their menus excluded my question for their feedback forms. Neither was I able to find a phone number on their website - I had to search software manuals from products I had bought previously.

If one antivirus vendor had gotten back with a straight answer to my question in a day or two, I probably would have purchased their product before others responded.

Needless to say, it left me with a very sour opinion of Symantec. I will probably never buy another Symantec product for my own business, nor recommend them to others.

Don't let this happen to you! Offer as much contact information as possible on your website, and have real people respond to it in a reasonable period of time.

Another thing to consider is, which font to use. I prefer simple sans-serif fonts such as Arial or Helvetica because they are clean and easy to read, but Serif fonts such as Times New Roman can be readable and appropriate in many circumstances. Script fonts, or any other hard to read font should only be used in rare situation that calls for it... and sill, it should and must be legible. Perhaps use of a special novelty font can be well used in a page headline, if it suits nature and tone of subject matter, but never as font for main body text. You may think that some extremely illegible font looks cool, but please, think about viewer... after all, isn't it what THEY think that matters?

Have some mercy on all those eyes out there!

The same rule of simplicity applies to how you justify your text as well. Be consistent with your use of text; it does not make sense to have one body paragraph Left Justified, then next body paragraph Centered. Just same, it does not make sense to have one paragraph wider than next if they are same type of paragraph.

And lastly, I must stress importance of being consistent. You might have nice individual elements on your site, but if you don't have a clear system in place, a "method" to madness, then all your "neat" stuff can go out window. Be consistent! All in all, if you did everything I have said so far, but were not consistent about it, then your design would suffer greatly.

Just remember, if you start simple, be subtle when it comes to emphasizing anything (especially text), and be consistent with layout and hierarchy, you will achieve clarity... and of course when communicating information effectively is crucial, clarity is everything.