5 Web site Design No Nos - What To Avoid Whilst Constructing A Web site

1 - Use ample of colours
Using loads of colours is a sure way to get carried away and take the smart look from the web site. Too much is just that. You only need a handful of colours that compliment each other. Yes, employing 30 different colours on different blinking backgrounds may make the links stand out, but at what cost?

Also, be very attentive of the colour palette you settle on. I was lately asked to use a theme on a website, with part of it red wording on green and the rest green copy on red. An out of the ordinary combination, in particular as the website was for an opticians, who could be dealing with red-green colourblind customers…

2 - Hide the navigation
Unbelievably, heaps of people design sites and miss essentials of the navigation from the screen. I’ve had graphic designers pass me final proofs to work from, that the customer has signed off, that straight away I look at and spot an essential part of the navigation is missing.

It does sound impossible, but on shopping blogs I have seen designs that are missing simple bit such as a link to the shopping basket or checkout. If a customer adds a product and then goes back to view more, but then wants to checkout, they easily cannot buy from you.

3 - Design for paper
Not having a dig at graphic designers (as some work very well on sites), but there are also lots that do not get their head round the fact that a piece of paper is totally different to a site. Several times I have been passed layouts that work on a widescreen, but would necessitate horizontal and vertical scrolling on a normal sized screen. Or the layout calls for a variable screen width, but all of the components are fixed width.

You have to allow for the fact that there are a myriad of browsers, operating systems and screens in use and they will all show your website in a different way.

4 - Merely test your web site in one browser
Different browsers will display your site in different ways. The formatting between, as for instance, Internet Explorer and Firefox can be slightly different when using certain techniques. A site that works in one browser does not always look its best in another. It is a difficult and frustrating process, but you have to check your site in different browsers, different operating systems and different screen sizes.

5 - build a web site and sit back
I am always surprised at the number of people that think that building a web site is the lifeline their business needs. Pay a few hundred for a website and then they will be run off their feet fulfilling orders.

This is not the case. Only because you pay for a site, this does not mean that it will be an overnight runaway success. With every new site you need to market it. That means promoting it to customers and local marketing, promoting it through social media and article writing, pay per click schemes, optimisation and a whole lot more.

Without marketing, your web site is as good as non existant.

Article Source: http://www.gamblingarticlessite.net

Written by Keith Lunt, who presents a website design Merseyside service. If you want to know more about website design, call into our website design blog and watch out for our new free Ebook, coming shortly!

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