Many people are trying their hand at web design. Are you trying to become a professional or do you just want to do a good job with your site? Either way, use the tips you find here to accomplish your goals and build an awesome website.
You want to have a site that is easy to navigate, if you want to attract visitors. You should have links that are easy to find, as well as displayed well. Menus will make it a lot easier to navigate around your site. Have links to the main pages available on every page of your site so visitors can always find their way around.
Don't use frames. It isn't the 90's anymore. While frames were helpful in the field of web design back then, they were also problematic. Using frames makes it hard for viewers to bookmark your website and can make scrolling a chore. Use other ways to make your site easier to navigate instead.
Design your page so that previously entered information is saved and automatically used to fill in informational boxes. For instance, if a person registers on your site and a portion of the same exact information is required for filling another form out, ensure that the information they've already put in is saved so that he or she doesn't have to put in this information again. Creating transferable form information will make the overall process simpler and quicker for your visitors, and they will be happy with the time you have saved them.
Learn how to use colors to influence your readers. Every color has a certain feeling that it can induce. For example, using black backgrounds or images could bring up feelings of depression and darkness. The use of a color like yellow is associated with happiness. Take the time to read up on the psychology of colors when determining your site's color scheme.
It is important to have content on your site that is not only interesting, but compelling as well. Website design is critical, but without content, it won't matter. Visitors will return again and again when they find valuable, useful information.
Do not use blinking, scrolling text or other animations. Also, steer clear of sounds or music that plays automatically. All of these things are distracting to users website and provide nothing of value. In addition, connection speeds vary from one site visitor to the next, and everyone does not have the same speed. Those users with slower connections will resent the slow-loading elements of your site.
To help you design a good site, you need to make it so it is simple to navigate. Navigation encompasses everything and is the backbone of your site. So construct a site that flows easily from one area to another, otherwise your site will be very confusing and people will not visit it.
Every website designer needs a good platform to test their work out on, and XAMPP is probably the best out there. XAMPP will allow you to run your test sites with PHP and mySQL, so you will always be able to spot anything that needs to be changed. XAMPP is a relatively light download and it's also easy to figure out.
Anyone wishing to design a great-looking site should consider spending a lot of time on the header image. This is what visitors are noticing as soon as they log on to your website, so having something that's on topic and visually appealing is a good move. Creating your own instead of using a premade header is the best way to go.
You want to ensure that your site is capable of being viewed on all types of operating systems and programs, ranging from browsers such as internet explorer to firefox. You also want to be sure that your site works on both windows and mac operating systems so as many users as possible can view your content.
Just do a google search of web design and how to learn some of the basics with it that can help you along your web design endeavors. The internet has an endless amount of information available to you that you can use to learn anything that you might need to become a good web designer.
Get someone to run a test of your site to see if it functions as you progress. Each addition or change you make, needs to be double and tripled checked by multiple people. Your readers will not appreciate it if they find something is slow, broken or crashes their browser. It is important to always get the advice of others.
Any good web design must include the proper planning as you are getting started. This planning process includes selecting a domain and a hosting package as well as planning out the information layout and designs. Planning is essential to web design, as it gets you ready beforehand to carry out your idea of the website.
Avoid every instance of spammy "sell language" that you possibly can. Studies show that users are likely to jump off of a webpage the instant they pick up the "salesman" vibe. This is because it is said to actually trigger a predatory response in human brain function! So next time you want to sell a product, remember that the potential consumer may view you as a predator and run!
Now that you better understand how you can be a competent website designer, hopefully you also feel you may be able to make a bit of money from it. Knowing how to design your own website is a wonderful skill that you can use to earn extra money building websites for others.
Katlyn Slocum Design
104 SE 93rd Avenue, Vancouver, WA 98664
360-784-1465