The Best Website Design Ideas - 4 Elements To Create Great Websites

By
Services for Real Estate Pros with Masterdigm

With the continuing growth of internet usage, it gets more important that anyone planning to have his/her own website is aware of the best website design ideas and techniques to create great looking websites. A great looking website design is characterized by its simplicity, professionalism and elegance. It is important to use the right development technology to produce a website design that is not only cool to the eyes of your visitors but also attractive to the search engines.

There are only a few basic principles that we use to create the best website design. Ideas abound how to have a great looking website and I can only summarize it in 4 words: simplicity, bold logo, bigger text and bright strong colors.

Simplicity - Keeping your website design simple makes your site more focused, easier and clean. If a webpage element is not needed, you better remove it from the design. Less is more these days. Look at Skype and you easily understand what you came for.

Simple Website Design

Another website design idea is to have a strong, bold logo. This helps very much in branding, recognition and personality of your website. Needless to say, having a great looking logo will set the tone, attitude and quality of your website.

Strong, Bold Logo

Bigger text is also the trend in today's web2.0 designs. It allows for more white space and the website design looks less cluttered, thus increasing readability and user-friendliness. In addition, incorporating bright and strong color mix aids to draw the eye and create boundaries among the sections and highlight critical elements within the webpage.

Bigger Text, Bright Colors

By implementing the best website design ideas in this article, you will soon be creating great websites that guide the visitors' eyes through the use of a few, well-crafted visual elements and imagery, fewer text volume that convey more meaning and the optimal mix of text, graphics and colors to create the desired look and feel of a website designed for your visitors and the search engines alike.

Read more about "The 33 Things You Need To Know Before Choosing Your Design Team" and get the best information and insights on how to create great looking and effective websites.

Comments (28)

Carolyn Gjerde-Tu-Davis
Lyon Real Estate - Davis, CA
Ca Real Estate
I definitely agree that simple is better.  I think real estate web pages really need to focus on the home search.  That is definitely the most used part of my web site.
Mar 11, 2008 01:44 AM
Kristyn Grewell
CENTURY 21 Goodyear Green Edmond, OK - Edmond, OK
Edmond, OK Homes, Oklahoma Relocation Services
I agree that simple is better.  I want my website to have a very clean user friendly feel.  But my question for you is, then what about SEO?  Maybe I'm totally confused but how do you get the key words in and maintain a clean simple page?
Mar 11, 2008 03:31 PM
Teodolfo - Web 2.0 Expert, SEO, Internet Marketer
Masterdigm - Laguna Beach, CA

Carolyn - thanks for your opinion. in all of my designs, i always see to it that the interface is simple and straight forward. at the end of the day, conversion is higher that way. 

kristyn - simplicity does not affect SEO in any way. in most cases, it even enhances them because the pages are more focused so the Search Engines know right away what you are talking about. you can have a very beautiful and highly interactive website but may not be seo-friendly. on the other hand, your website could be very bland but very seo-friendly. the ideal is to have a very simple, straight-forward website but also SEO- and user-friendly.

Mar 11, 2008 09:10 PM
Anonymous
Miraclestudios

I hope my website will also be categorized among best web design : http://www.miraclestudios.in

Jun 09, 2008 10:19 PM
#13
Anonymous
Great...Great...Now time to cheat on your web developer

This was a great post.  I was paying a person to all of my real estate web site development. Then I realized I could by templates and develop the web sites on my own and get great professional results.

I have just started a new blog called web tools for Realtors and you visit it @ www.webtoolsforrealtors.com

 

I have posted on the right hand side a link where you can purchase templates for about $60.00. This is about the price of half an hours work from my web site designer.

Good Luck!


Jun 15, 2008 05:19 AM
#14
Ken Jansen
REMAX INFINITY - Overland Park, KS
REALTOR, CRS, 913.908.2215

Hi Teodolfo,

Thanks for the ideas. I like the four point summary. I tend to get carried away with the data and over explaining when a  concise summary would work much better. My wife says when she asks me what time it is I tell her how to build a clock. :)

Ken Jansen

p.s. If you have friends or family relocating to Johnson County KS, it would be my pleasure to help them out.

www.KCSmartMove.com

Jul 28, 2008 08:31 AM
Tim Lamont
CBRB - New England - Waltham, MA

Hello,

Dont forget the reason people come to a real estate web site - listings.  If the navigation, information, and tools they are looking for (like email alerts) are not there (and easily found) it wont matter how big your text is, how bright your logo is, or how simple your design is - they will leave and not come back.

Good post.

Aug 02, 2008 02:02 AM
Anonymous
Danny

Wow, i am creating my own website with CS3 and have been reading alot on firefox, dreamweaver and etc.. great points you are making

Aug 17, 2008 01:53 PM
#17
Anonymous
Janet Unkefer

Hello there!  Just wanted to drop a note and say thanks for your tips.  I am brand new activerain, and I am just now beginning to develop my website.  Your information was extremely helpful!

Janet

junkefer@CutlerHomes.com

http://www.cutlerinvestment.com/getagent/show.php?aid=000501213&oid=000500008&chome=1&odoor=1

Sep 04, 2008 08:05 AM
#18
Stephanie Perrault
Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage - Los Gatos, CA
Realtor Associate

Thank you it was a great way to educate myself on ar

Sep 20, 2008 08:27 PM
Troy Erickson AZ Realtor (602) 295-6807
HomeSmart - Chandler, AZ
Your Chandler, Ahwatukee, and East Valley Realtor

I guess that old saying KISS (keep it simple ______) still holds true for a lot of things.  Thanks for the ideas.  I know I can use them, and will use them in trying to create a more user-friendly website.

Oct 28, 2008 07:40 PM
Wayne and Lynda Gomillion
Real Living Hagan Realtors | Pinehurst ~ Southern Pines, NC - Pinehurst, NC

Great Post!... Thanks for the information.

Nov 19, 2008 11:11 AM
Jessica Cox
Perfectly Polished Home - Dallas, TX
Dallas Home Staging

Great tip! I'm in the process of having my website built right now - this couldn't have come at a more perfect time.

Nov 24, 2008 02:42 AM
Anonymous
Medical Web Experts

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Nice suggestions. Actually considering these points, one can design a very good website, which can ameliorate your website marketing technique. When it comes to website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally to serve its purpose. Here are five important rules of thumb to observe to make sure your website performs well that I have had to know from my past experiences. 

1) Do not use splash pages:
Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a site. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like "welcome" or "click here to enter". In fact, they are just that -- pretty vases with no real purpose. Do not let your visitors have a reason to click on the "back" button! Give them the value of your site up front without the splash page.

2) Do not use excessive banner advertisements:
Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to ignore banner advertisements so you will be wasting valuable blog real estate. Instead, provide more valuable content and weave relevant affiliate links into your content, and let your visitors feel that they want to read instead of being pushed to read. 

3) Have a simple and clear navigation:
You have to provide a simple and very straightforward navigation menu so that even a young child will know how to use it. Stay away from complicated Flash based menus or multi-tiered dropdown menus. If your visitors don't know how to navigate, they will leave your site. 

4) Have a clear indication of where the user is:
When visitors are deeply engrossed in browsing your site, you will want to make sure they know which part of the site they are in at that moment. That way, they will be able to browse relevant information or navigate to any section of the site easily. Don't confuse your visitors because confusion means "abandon ship"!

5) Avoid using audio on your site:
If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your site, reading your content, you will want to make sure they're not annoyed by some audio looping on and on on your dental website. If you insist on adding audio, make sure they have some control over it -- volume or muting controls would work fine. 

 

There are many prominent website designing companies, who design the websites which are highly compliant with internet search engine algorithms, hence ameliorating your progress and publicity. Companies like www.medicalwebexperts.com have been considered to be the pioneer in creating web sites, especially in the field of medical healthcare. I suggest you having a look over such companies, and think over it before jumping into some serious business over the internet.

Jun 17, 2009 08:11 PM
#23
SimplrManage LLC
SimplrManage - New York, NY

Oh wow, a lot of people commenting on this with great advice.

Your advice would also be appreciate here:

http://activerain.com/blogsview/1370879/simplrmanage-creating-real-estate-websites-for-the-web-2-0-world

Thanks!

Dec 06, 2009 01:51 AM
An Marshall
Berkshire Hathaway - St. Augustine - Saint Augustine, FL
Your St Augustine Real Estate Consultant

I have always realized the importance of color - thank you for making that point.

Dec 30, 2009 06:20 AM
Dagny Eason
Dagny's Real Estate - Wilton, CT
Fairfield County CT, CDPE Homes For Sale and Condo

Thanks for all of the hints

Jan 22, 2010 01:36 PM
MaryBeth Mills Muldowney
TradeWinds Realty Group LLC - Braintree, MA
Massachusetts Broker Owner

Great suggestions.  I am looking for all the help I can get on increasing traffic to our website, any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

Jan 21, 2011 08:47 AM
Paul Gapski
Berkshire Hathaway / Prudential Ca Realty - El Cajon, CA
619-504-8999,#1 Resource SD Relo

yes i agree with u less is more. keep it simple and informative

Apr 03, 2011 06:07 PM
Paul Gapski
Berkshire Hathaway / Prudential Ca Realty - El Cajon, CA
619-504-8999,#1 Resource SD Relo

thank you very much for the informative and interesting post. I get so much out of the active rain network.

May 13, 2012 01:55 PM