“8 Tips for Designing A Great Website” – Reviewed

This past week RISMEDIA sent out an article that had a feel of a re-purposed article of advice from the 1990’s – “8 Tips for Designing A Great Website” by Ivana Katz.

I wanted to take a moment to comment on this article because it really is missing concepts for marketing today.

“Select a color scheme and stick to it”

Anyone who has been through my training will note that I recommend using a blog format for sites these days not only for the ease of use, functionality, and portability (you can access controls from any computer, anywhere), but also for the great templates that are available to use.  You don’t have to be a web designer to create a great site.

It is important to choose a color set that is appealing to the eye of your visitors, and has a clean layout.

“Provide an easy-to-use navigation system”

Most blog templates will give you an option of where the page navigation can be placed.  You ened ot make sure that it shows up either along the side or at the top of the layout – above the fold.  That means in the area that shows in the screen without having to scroll down on the page to see it.  This menu buttons should stand out and be noticeable.

“Don’t go overboard on special effects”

This is a great point.  Back in the 90’s it was popular to have animated clipart, blinking buttons, and scrolling words throughout your site.  Stay away from creating a site that has a lot of movement, and is hard to read.  Today’s marketing is about simplicity.  Don’t distract your prospects from what you really want them to do at your site.  Video should be the only animation, and even then it should be informative and focused on the call-to-action.

The article also talks about using link colors that don’t blend in or contrast too brightly with the background.  This is important because your links are subtle calls-to-action and you want them to stand out, but not be obnoxious.

Another thing to think about, when creating links, is what your link actually says.  Never use “click here” as the words in your link.  Have keywords in the link to describe what the prospect is clicking to, and be sure to include an “ALT” tag for the link that is keyword loaded, also.  This is the verbiage that appears when you hover your mouse over the link.  These link tags will help you tremendously in the search engines, because they help describe what your site is about.

The final point of the article is that “Content Is King”. I can’t agree more.  Content is what keeps people coming to and staying at your site, and it’s what the search engines are going to read to determine if it fits the phrases and keywords that prospects are searching for.