Web Design: "Let Your Little Website Shine" Part 4

"Let Your Little Website Shine" Part 4

Written by Lynne Schlumpf

Thanks for joining me again for this series. We’ve gone over a lot of repparttar

fundamentals of website. We will now get into repparttar 134744

part you really cannot put your finger on, but these things are just as crucial to your success: 6. Is interesting: This is very similar to repparttar 134745

discussion in Element number 5 above. The only thing to add here is that you don't want to just cut and paste from other websites for repparttar 134746

free information I was talking about. How dull can you get! This is copyright infringement anyway. Just sit down and start writing what you know. If you can't write or spell worth a flip, find a friend who is very good at writing and pay them a small fee to research and write on repparttar 134747

subject. You want your website to be uniquely "you" or your company. It should have your personality or your company's unique personality written all over it. Just before you go to sleep at night or while you're taking a shower, some of repparttar 134748

best ideas to make your site more interesting will come to you. (This is when I get my best ideas...you may get yours while mowing repparttar 134749

lawn or driving or whatever) Keep a small notebook handy near those places of inspiration. Write these ideas down and act on them. (doing this while driving is not recommended!) Chances are, they're repparttar 134750

best ideas you'll have. They usually come from your subconscious. I am a firm believer in repparttar 134751

subconsious mind solving my problems for me. When I was a full time computer programmer, I used to go to bed at night with a programming problem really bugging me. The next morning - repparttar 134752

answer was there. Anyway, use your creative processes however best they work for you. A boring site will be worse than a whole site dedicated to "I love my company", as mentioned in Element number 5 above. If repparttar 134753

subject itself is technical and a little boring, so be it. However, if your subject could be spiced up a little, try to do so. And please, don't think that putting cute little images on your site that jump up and down are going to make repparttar 134754

subject matter more interesting. It's like reading a book that has no real depth. It won't take long for your visitors to skim through your site and leave. Surfing repparttar 134755

web is very personal for most people, as well as interactive. They're sitting up straight, very close to repparttar 134756

screen, and they're not sleeping, like so many of us who watch television. Take advantage of how much an Internet visitor is involved in repparttar 134757

experience of surfing to your site. They'll tell everyone, I promise you! Haven't you ever gotten an email from someone you know that includes a link in it and says something like: "You've gotta check out this website. It's cool!" Wouldn't it be great if a bunch of people sent each other those about YOUR website? I'd have to call that repparttar 134758

ultimate compliment of an Internet

10 Tips for a Better Website

Written by Merle

There are just some things that need to be included in every website. If you integrate these tips into your site your visitors will "thank you" for it later:

1) Navigation: Keep it simple (KISS), and make sure it's consistent from page to page. No matter where you place your menu bar -- either at repparttar top or down repparttar 134743 side -- always include a small text menu at repparttar 134744 bottom of every page. If you're one of those people easily impressed with Flash, don't design your navigation with it. There are still some people who don't have or want repparttar 134745 plug-in, so they won't be able to navigate your site. Besides, search engine spiders can't read it, so won't be able to spider repparttar 134746 individual pages of your site if repparttar 134747 navigation is done in Flash.

2) Privacy Policy: With all of repparttar 134748 concern over privacy on repparttar 134749 Web if you collect any type of information from your visitors (even if it's just an email address) you need to include a privacy policy. There are many online templates that will help you to create one easily. Once made, post a link to it on every page of your site.

3) Contact Information: Nothing drives me more insane than having to search through an entire website just to send repparttar 134750 owner an email. Post your contact info at repparttar 134751 bottom of every page of your site, along with your email address. Don't make me fill out a whole form when I just want to send a simple comment. Include your email address, hotlinked and ready to go.

4) Logos & Graphics: Please keep your graphics down to a reasonable size. No one wants to wait two minutes while your huge, beautiful logo loads onto repparttar 134752 screen. If you must use a lot of graphics to get your point across, I've got one word for you: Compression.

5) Fonts: Remember if you stray from using repparttar 134753 standard fonts that everyone has installed on their computers (such as Arial, Verdana, Times New Roman) repparttar 134754 viewer won't see your fonts as intended. Your users' computers will display your site in their default fonts. Stick to standards. If you must have a certain font used you'll have to turn it into a graphic to maintain its look.

6) Make It Sticky: Include interactive features if possible, such as live news feeds. Check out http://www.moreover.com for tons of news feed topics you can paste into your site for free. Use chat rooms, discussion boards, etc. You want to create a sense of community where people will want to return.

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