Web Design Information |
|
Why You Should Hire a Professional Website Designer
Your web site should always adhere to standards! A professional web site designer will provide you with a standard compliant web site that is cross-browser supported. What does this mean to you? Why should you care? Any site that isn't standard compliant can "break" in older browsers, or simply not display at all in, say, text-based browsers. If you are a small business, this could be the difference between a conversion and a lost sale. That potential customer just went to your competition. Also, a standard compliant web site will have "clean" HTML, XHTML, or XML code. This allows search engines to index your site easily and improves your Search Engine Rank Position (SERP). What good is your web site if no one can find it? Read more about the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) Web Standards and Guidelines. But you aren't a small business? That's ok. Non-profit organizations can lose potential members and/or donations due to a lack of credibility. Individual web sites are no different. If you don't care if people can visit your site, or not, why even bother publishing your web site on the World Wide Web? Think it's too expensive? Not at all. An ethical, professional web site designer should be able to provide simple web sites for as little as $50. A is for... Accessibility! A professional web designer gives you all of this plus they ensure that your site is accessible to people with disabilities. Too often, web sites are not created with people with disabilities in mind. For example: The wrong font colors are used causing people who are color blind to be unable to read the text; and proper code and navigation are not utilized for individuals who are blind or vision impaired. Another benefit with Return on Investment (ROI): better indexing for those Search Engines. Read more about the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). You should make sure that the professional web site designer you hire provides all of the above and should adhere to the most common, professional ideas about web design, like the following: 5 elements of professional web site design: 1. Clean web site design/structure. Only a few years ago, the web was a mass of blinking, twirling, animated images and scrolling text. Today, things have changed. Design principles focus more on simplistic, clean development and ease of navigation. How wonderful for all of us wandering around the World Wide Web! The problem now with most sites is the lack of flexibility. Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and other design tools make changing and updating a web site's pages with little effort. And that translates into less time the web site designer is spending on maintaining your web site - and that equals less dollars out of your pocket, especially if your designer is getting paid by the hour! 2. Good usability. Usability goes hand in hand with standards, accessibility, and cross-browser compliance. When you achieve all of this, usability is a natural by-product. Usability can be best defined as: how easy the average person (without disabilities, etc.) can get around your web site, or how "usable" is it. If someone has to hunt for a link back to your home page, or hunt for how to contact you, then you have a usability problem with your web site design. 3. Fast loading, small web page files. As a rule of thumb, a visitor will wait 8 - 10 seconds on a 56k dial-up connection for your web site to display - then they'll leave. Most web designers agree on a limit of 50 to 60k total for a page. This includes: the html page, the images it will load, the size of the external CSS page(s) and JavaScript pages. Keeping these last two pages (CSS and JavaScript) separate will go a long way to increase the loading speed of each page. However, it must be kept in mind that these external pages DO effect over-all page loading speed. 4. Proper use of technology. Only one thing needs to be mentioned here - a professional knows the best way to use technology and when to use it. Using a 250k flash intro page - just so your site looks cool - is not making the best use of the technologies available. In short just because you can, doesn't always mean you should. A professional web site designer will advise you of the technologies available and make recommendations based upon your individual needs in how to best include any advanced features into your web site. 5. Ability to convey information. Clear, concise information (text) on your page should immediately convey to the visitor what you site is about. A professional web site designer will work with you or your copywriter to ensure that you are conveying what is needed and appropriate. In closing, if you want a professional looking site that is available and usable to the widest group of people, you should hire a professional web site designer. Have more questions? Please feel free to contact us. Tami Jones is the owner of Illuminations Web Services: an affordable website design company based in Knoxville Tennessee. Dedication to helping "illuminate" the internet and make it a reality to other small businesses is their #1 goal.
MORE RESOURCES: Best web design software of 2024 TechRadar Top Web Design Firms Announced by SEMFirms for May 2024 24-7 Press Release Graphic design trends | Web Design and Content Marketing Crescent Vale MDS launches new web design services Boating Industry Website Design Competition - MCWT Michigan Council of Women in Technology New Insurance Lead Generation Company Increases Online Visibility for Niche Insurance Agencies and Carriers Kentucky Today Moving Your Website into the Web Design System (WDS) Washington State University Why (and How) I Learned Web Development as a Data Scientist Towards Data Science 33 Best Web Design Companies 2024 Built In 9 Chicago Web Design and Development Agencies To Know Built In Chicago Top Web Design Trends 2024 Designmodo BFA in Art - Graphic Design | Undergraduate Programs | Visual TWU Texas Woman's University 8 Things I know about ... Web design trends for 2024 Worcester Business Journal 30 Best Web Design Agencies To Partner With in 2024 Influencer Marketing Hub TSTC Marshall spotlights online web design and development program Marshall News Messenger Why isn't Adobe doing web design better? Creative Bloq Fastest Online Web Development Degrees Arizona Education News Service Sweb CEO puts AI to work for small business web design San Antonio Report Design Studies (Minor) | College of Liberal Arts UNH's College of Liberal Arts Website Design | Alton | Edwardsville | St Louis RiverBender.com How to Design an ADA-Compliant Website | CO- by US Chamber of Commerce CO— by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce How to design a website: A beginner's guide CNN Underscored Jessica Sorden's Transformation from Corporate Burnout to Web Design Maestro - by Carly Winchell The Ark Valley Voice Empowering Innovation: Shopify and Google Cloud Partner to Transform Customer Experience (2024) Shopify Jeremy McGilvrey, A Houston Web Design Agency, Inks Long-Term Lease In Prestigious Williams Tower Office Space Yahoo Finance Valpo Web Design & Marketing helps businesses through intentional design and forward thinking Valpo.Life 6 ways AI is changing web design Creative Bloq Are you up to build the next best website? Get started with one of these 5 web design courses Fortune Information technology students delve into web design with capstone project University of Missouri College of Engineering Valve and Picnik vets Hatch new idea — a no-code web design platform for 'tech curious creators' GeekWire Valpo Web Design supports NWI No Child Hungry in fight against food insecurity with new website Valpo.Life Web Design Statistics 2024 and Facts Enterprise Apps Today Valpo Web Design & Marketing | Partners Valpo.Life 5 seriously useful AI web design tools Creative Bloq 25 Awesome About Us Page Examples For Web Design Inspiration Search Engine Journal 18 Free Web Design Tools, Winter 2024 Practical Ecommerce Michelle Belleville Science@NASA How Google perfected the web The Verge Locofy.ai's accelerates web design-to-code with AI as it pioneers Large Design Models Markets Insider The best free blog websites Creative Bloq Mizzou alumna uses web design expertise to give back to engineering, community University of Missouri College of Engineering Best web development tool of 2024 TechRadar 17 Free Web Design Tools, Fall 2023 Practical Ecommerce The 39 best free web fonts Creative Bloq Top 12 Web Design Agencies in the US for 2024 Influencer Marketing Hub How web design trends have evolved Creative Bloq 25 Best eCommerce Website Design Examples for 2024 Influencer Marketing Hub Regulator: “Harmful” Web Design Could Break Data Protection Laws Infosecurity Magazine 6 great tools for testing responsive design for websites Creative Bloq |
RELATED ARTICLES
Website Design Mishaps - How to Avoid Costly Errors That Can Crush Your Chances of Success Designing your website can be a difficult task especially if you decide to do it on your own and you have no experience. There are many websites and web hosts that provide tools to allow you to build your website, but if you have no knowledge of what works and what does not work in web design, you could be setting yourself up for a big fall. Affordable Website Design In Manchester If you have a business, big or small you may be thinking of getting yourself a website.The world wide web is another way of spreading your message or selling your product. Web Site Turn Ons When you develop a sales brochure, you have a mental checklist of what needs to be in it. You probably look at brochures from other vendors. Be Friendly to Search Engines The object of search engines is to give their visitors a list of web pages relevant to the search words, in the order of relevance to the search words. So what do they want from websites?Relevance to a search:The frequency of the search word on a web page is an indicator of its relevance. Designing Beautiful Artist Websites - 12 Tips To Showcase Your Art 1. Who needs an artists website?Not everyone! If you are currently exhibiting in multiple high-end galleries and making a handsome income, a website may not be for you. What You Should Ask a Web Designer Before You Hire Him You've thought about it and you're ready to go. You're ready to give your business an online presence. How To Shop for a Web Design Firm? While few companies can boast as we do that our first ten clients are still with us today, many companies often change Web design firms to get a new perspective on how their Web presence could look and perform. The following paragraphs serve as a Buyer's Guide to use when shopping for a new Web design company. Do You Hate Your Website? Web Site Sales To Hit $316 Billion Over The Next 6 Years What dollar amount does your web site contribute to this $316 billion dollar trend?Have you spent thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands on your web site only to discover that it attracts more flies than customers?Do you hate your web site, your web developer or your entire IT department?Do not despair! You are not alone!A great web site is crucial in order to effectively communicate to a business's target audience. It is important for Chief Executives and small business owners to pay close attention to the effect that their web site has on their business. The Importance of Choosing Your Website Keywords Carefully The importance of choosing your website keywords carefully is very high. The reason for this is many search engines rely on keywords, at least partially, to help determine the rank of your web page when certain keywords are searched for. Website Re-Design? My site is working fine. The links work. Save Thousands of Dollars by Creating Your Own Web Site With the advent of the Internet a whole new vista of business has opened up. Many erstwhile opportunities otherwise not available to us, many markets which were previously inaccessible are accessible to us now. How to Make a Website (Minus the Headaches) There is nothing wrong with making your own website if you are looking to save some money. Be prepared however, for your finished product to resemble an after school project; cutesy, homemade touches and all. What Drives Repeat Visitors To Your Site? There can be zillions of reasons why your visitors return to your web site. One might be very interested in seeing your animated photo on your main page, but kidding aside I've gathered 12 elements that invites your visitors to repeat their visits. How To Attract People To Your Web Site and Leave Their Contact If you have a website, you want your visitors to stay longer on your website and get more sales. Here are 10 ways you can do to improve it. Immutable Laws Of Effective Navigation - Part 1 The first immutable law of effective navigation: It's gotta be readily available.Visitors should not have to hunt for your navigation or wonder where to find it. Save Time and Boost Profits with Free Content Public domain gives you a head start creating ebooks, ecourses, newsletters, teleconferences, website content and email registration incentives you need to keep in constant touch with clients and prospects.Public domain refers to information free from copyright protection. Make Your Web Site User-Friendly You can create a website that attracts customers, not repels them, with a little common sense advice.Everyone wants an attractive professional looking website. 7 Tips To Increase Sales With Your Ecommerce Web Site Ecommerce is just exploding right now on the Net. More and more people are doing their shopping online. The Testimonial Trick One of the most popular methods of traffic generation is the link exchange. Not only can they generate fairly targeted traffic from other related web sites, the number of quality links to your site is also a major factor determining your web site's ranking in major search engines like Google. Nine Effective Tips For Improving Your Website's Usability Web usability is perhaps the most important factor in any web design. This is the driving factor that keeps your visitors coming back to your website. |
home | site map |
© 2006 |