As a web site owner, I spend a lot of time online. I also spend a lot of time at other sites. These are top seven tips I have discovered make or break a web site other than its design appeal.

1.WHERE ARE YOU? When creating a web site, tell people where you are, or whom you are targeting. I have read several regional online newspapers that haven't included their physical location. For these sites, this information is very vital. For example, http://www.clickart-gallery.com, is an art gallery featuring only Australian artists, so country information is important and you can find it listed in about us section of that site.

2.CONTACT US. When gaining trust of an individual, possibly a person who is new to Internet, letting them know how they can make contact is vital. E-mail is most important. It needs to be easy to find. Again if relevant, you should include phone and fax numbers and a physical street address if you have a traditional business as well as your web site.

You may be amazed at how few sites have this feature, those that do often have it tucked right away; it may take six or seven clicks to find it! All but most dedicated surfer will go away before going this far. That means a valuable potential customer goes away without you knowing. And they probably won't come back.

Do you have a means to capture information about your customers - legitimately? Do you ask questions, run surveys, encourage them to join a mailing list or any other means of leaving their information? If not, why not? You could be letting some future customers leave without you even knowing.

3.TIMELY INFORMATION How many pages at your site are not where you say they are? It can be very disappointing or frustrating to have 404 Page Not Found Errors because something has been moved. A simple solution is a custom 404 page that lists major areas of your site.

How many of your pages have broken links? Some sites excel at broken links and missing images. This translates as lack of interest in your customers. We all end up with one or two problems occasionally and best way to overcome this, besides vigilance when designing pages, is to encourage your visitors to tell you. An easy to use program is Xenu which checks your entire site for broken links. On your web site, you could consider providing a way to let visitors know of problems they experience. Most won't but if someone takes time to let you know, acknowledge them for their help.

Where you have names, addresses, e-mails and phone numbers on your site, keep them updated. It is annoying (and sometimes disappointing) to have an e-mail come back undeliverable because address is no longer valid.

When using dates, it is VITAL to update. My local computer store used dates on their home page, informing customers they were behind as they were going on holidays soon. That message was displayed for almost two years! That was not a positive image to send to their visitors. What image do you want your site to present to wider community?

THE KEY TO EFFECTIVE WEB SITE DESIGN by Breal Web Design ************************************************************ The key to effective web site design is good planning. Without planning and organisation, you will end up with chaos. Once you have a design plan, content is next consideration. This applies equally to new and existing web sites.

To create your plan for a new or existing site, sit down and consider what your site will achieve. Get out a piece of paper and a pen, draw a circle in middle and mark it 'home'. Draw boxes connected by lines radiating out from centre circle and mark them with each of main areas your site will cover. Don't forget a site map if your site has more than 8 or 9 pages. Repeat this process for each secondary circle until you've planned your site. If you've already got a site, do this exercise and include every page on web site.

Good navigation is vital and poor navigation leads to visitor frustration. Once you've created your plan, you can create logical navigational links. Make up to 8 main navigational links to use on all pages of your site. You don't want to confuse your site visitors with too many options. You can offer more choices later, as your customers drill down into your site.

If you have lots of links, then consider creating pages that list each group of links instead. For example, Click Art Gallery, (www.clickart-gallery.com) has hundreds of pages within site, but only 8 main links. Two of main links are to sub navigation pages. The first is an 'arts' page. This lists all pages on site only relating to displayed artworks. The second is a 'services' page that lists all extra services on site.