Ten – Deadly ‘Web Site Design Sins’ and how to avoid them (Part One of Three)
by: Guest
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1) Do you want to be FLASH?
Having a whole site developed using flash by a
specialist design consultancy can result in an exciting and even exhilarating
media experience for your customers, the main points to keep in mind as to
whether to go �All Flash�, �No Flash� or �Some Flash� are as
follows:
Is your customer base likely to view your website
via a high-speed connection, for example are you in the B2B (business to
business) space?
Who is your main target audience? If you are
selling to mainly home users who may still have a slow dial up Internet
connection then no flash or a very limited usage of carefully constructed flash
will be the only real option.
If you are an established business who has already
built a strong and loyal client base and do not need to worry about search
engines to achieve your expected or projected revenue, then using Flash for your
entire website can be an exciting choice, especially if the design consultancy
are excellent at what they do. A Flash website can be a captivating online
experience, one which can both engage your target audience and project
interesting dimensions into your clients interaction with your business,
something which cannot be achieved to quite the same degree on the usually more
flat and less engaging standard non interactive websites.
You need to be mindful of the technology utilised
by search engines to find your all important content, as the web is based upon
different technology to Flash and as such, at this current moment in time for
the majority of website designs it is worth restricting the usage of flash.
Utilising Flash to provide your target audience with a more engaging user
experience can be a fantastic choice as long as it is built around a solid html
based architecture; this will ensure that using this great media tool does not
spell disaster for your online organic marketing.
If you are looking to run a campaign or
advertisement on your website or are looking to incorporate a few elements of
flash it can be a powerful tool to engage your prospective target audience. It
will not be long when the use of streaming media and flash media becomes an
everyday part of the web, as Telco companies entice more and more people away
from the chains of dial up Internet unleashing the true power of the
web.
2) Do not do a �DIY� website design -
Generating the correct image for your organisation,
whether small, medium or large is imperative in today�s business world, like no
other time in history has it been more important for you to create the right
image with your target audience, one that resonates with them, one that allows
them to identify with you and conversely you with them.
People are now targeted every day with so much
information and with so many choices it makes it imperative for you to
communicate with your target audience so that they can recognise and
differentiate you from the thronging masses, if you do not then how can you
expect to gain their attention and ultimately their business? DIY web site
creation at the outset may appear to be a cost effective strategy, and if you
have the time and expertise to become an expert, (or at least produce expert
quality work) whereby you utilise design tools to re-create the template into a
unique custom looking design, then it may be a viable possibility. Though, for
the majority who do not have the time, creative flare or technical skills to
produce expert quality work you are more likely to produce low quality design
that will be perceived as sloppy, unprofessional and third rate. For those who
opt for a template design it will be a false economy as at first glance your
business website may appear professional, though as with all template designs
your business will have the look and feel of hundreds if not thousands and
thousands of other business websites. Why create a whole business around the
design, look and feel of a thousand of other websites when you can utilise the
services of an affordable web
design company who can create a unique masterpiece for you that
will propel your business into a league of it�s own. In the crowded streets of
this superhighway you want to make sure that you have another gear to be able to
drop down into so that you can leverage full steam ahead leaving the opposition
whirling around in confusion.
3) Navigational Design and Structural
Architecture:
Using a Design house that can look at these
elements of your website and build them into the design as they map out and
structure your site is a key component of successful website design. The vast
majority of web designers miss the point completely in this area, either the
design is weak or the navigational design and structural architecture is all
wrong. If you utilise a professional company who use skilled expert designers
that work along side other professionals with diverse backgrounds in areas such
as corporate learning and development and/or marketing then you are sure to
achieve a resounding and satisfactory result for your business. These companies
are rare, though there are a few who do exist, unfortunately they tend to charge
a small fortune for their services, however if you look in the right places
there are still companies out there who offer this quality of work for an
affordable and fair price. You need to partner with a graphic design agency
that have a diverse and multi-skilled background, a team that understands and
achieves great design whilst always adhering to core principles of navigational
design and structural architecture. Your business deserves a team whose sole
aim is your immediate and continued future satisfaction. When these core
principles are adhered to then during the SEO phase of your website promotions
the need to spend unnecessary time and money on the navigational redesign &
architectural modifications to your website will be minimised, if not completely
eradicated.
However if you are in the unfortunate position of
owning or being responsible for one of the many websites that suffer from this
very real and prevalent problem, then there are a few Expert SEO (SEM) companies
out there, whose extensive skill set and expertise can provide you with SEO
solutions to rectify and undo all the damage inflicted by a previous novice
provider.
Even with a great looking design, poor navigation
will ultimately lead to fewer returning visitors to your website, and
consequently less sales for your business. One analogy that springs to mind, is
the business that has a prime position, fantastic street frontage and a great
fit out, though with absolutely no parking in the immediate vicinity of the
business, undoubtedly creating another unwanted road block between the customer
& the business. Roadblocks push your potential customers to another business
that is easier to deal with, otherwise known as your competitor. If visitors
cannot easily find the information they are looking for within your site, or
they experience error pages, broken links, or pages with too many moving objects
(animations, scrolling menus and text, motion driven flash, marquees) then they
are likely to either completely leave your website, never to return, or will
miss important information that you wanted them to see. Create an environment
where the customer wants to stay, a place where they can find what they are
looking for, and a place where buying from you is made hassle free and easy,
after all that is the reason they are looking at your website in the first
place.
Keep your navigation simple by creating clear links
on all web pages, do not provide the visitor the reason to click elsewhere, or
even leave your site altogether.
Ensure that you do not fall into the trap of having
endless web pages that scroll down forever. Websites who utilise this
adaptation of one endless page of information are thankfully set to become a
thing of the past, a little piece of unimportant Internet history.
Another terrible and deadly design sin is the use
of the horizontal Scroll bar; it is a little like the sales man who has a weak
and feeble handshake and cannot even comfortably look you in the eye. It is the
ultimate design sin and one you cannot allow under any circumstances. There
will never be a justifiable requirement to employ such a terrible piece of
navigational design within your website.
Another important and usually overlooked usability
guideline for navigational design is the need to help users understand where
they've been on your website, where they currently are, and also where they can
go to � Try to think about it as Past, Present, and Future.
Take the necessary time out to ensure that your
website includes a sitemap, this will ensure that advanced users have the
ability to navigate your web pages easily, some more advanced users will often
navigate a website this way, at the same time as creating a page that is easy
for human users of your website to understand you will also ensure that your
pages are presented in a format that is preferred by some of the main search
engines, this will allow them to index your pages and follow the deep linking
within your site so as to discover more of your websites all important content.
There are other methods which can be utilised to govern the way search engines
view your site, one of which is through your robots.txt file, again something
else that is better placed in the hands of a expert SEO
company
About the Author
Ten Deadly ‘Design Sins’ and how to avoid them
supplied by courtesy of BrandArt – ‘Your Graphic Design Experts’.
Brandart is a graphic design
company based in SYdney.
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