Articles on Website Design
- Finding a Search Engine Friendly Content Management System
Excerpt: What is a Content Management System? A Content Management System (CMS) is a third party software application which allows web site administrators to add, update or delete content, photos, and documents to their web site in "real time". Many web sites are modified using these web-based tools as...
- Gone in 6.74 seconds...
Excerpt: ...Or The Do's and Dont's of Entry Page Design If you have published something on the web, you are most likely familiar with the two basic areas that web publicity can be divided in: getting visitors to your site, and keeping them there (actually there is also a...
- Get More Out of Adsense
Excerpt: Tips to Improve Contextual Targeting on your Site As an Adsense publisher, I am often annoyed to find my web pages filled with public service announcements (PSA) and ads unrelated to the content of my site. Fewer relevant ads means fewer click-throughs and ultimately lower Adsense revenues. However...
- Content Management Systems - Choosing the Right One for You
Excerpt: Why choose content management? Content management systems are everywhere on the web these days, helping thousands of web contributors pump out robust sites loaded with content with easy and constant fresh updates. Whether you're looking to build a deeply functional community-based web site overnight, or just too lazy...
- Five Assistive Technologies Web Designers Should Be Aware Of
Excerpt: Mouth or Head Wands These wands are either held between the teeth, or positioned in the middle of the forehead and held in place by a head band. They are used to activate keys on a keyboard and in rare cases a track-ball mouse. People who...
- To Go or Not To Go for Virtual Tours?
Excerpt: Since the onset of web we have seen some web properties doing well sans all those graphics, whereas other are relying solely on graphical extravaganza, whether still graphics or animations. So it becomes necessary for you to decide "Do You Really Need some Virtual Tour (360° Tour) add-ons for your...
- Common Sections for Your Website
Excerpt: I've focused in the past on some individual sections of your website that you should consider implementing. What I'm going to do now is give a brief overview of a number of pages and sections that are common in websites. Home Page This page should have...
- Using Graphic Images On Web Pages
Excerpt: Perhaps one of the biggest mistakes web page designers make is to misuse or overuse graphic images on web pages. Designers become so enthusiastic about using new technology that they tend to focus on "look what we can make for you" rather than a web page's functionality. Web...
- Finding The Perfect Domain Name
Excerpt: Have you been pounding your head against the wall trying to come up with a great domain name for your website? Don't feel bad, it is getting harder all the time. In the early days of the internet you could of grabbed lots of great domain names. How great would...
- Site Maps and Your Website
Excerpt: Sometimes websites have so much information available that it becomes difficult for visitors to get to all the information. There are many tools available in such a situation, including a site map. First off, let's define what a site map (or sitemap) really is. Broadly defined, a site...
- Web Design for Speed
Excerpt: Have you ever noticed that some sites are much faster than others. Or that some specific websites take a notably larger amount of time to load than others? Have you ever seen a site that begins by displaying only the background, and then shows the text all at once several...
- 8 Steps To Creating A Sticky Website
Excerpt: A well designed website is important to attract more and more prospects coming and being interested in what you have to offer. Websites with poor designs are still being created and they tend to clutter the Internet everyday. Nevertheless, not every website should be filled with fancy designs either. ...
- 10 Ways to Lose Web Sales
Excerpt: The basic elements of a web site include the content, the appearance, and the mechanics of a site. Mistakes made in any of these areas can have an impact on your sales. You can avoid some of the common errors by learning what they are. The following list points out...
- Adsense Blindness - How To Beat It!
Excerpt: Adsense blindness is a topic that is becoming more relevant with each passing day based on the enormous success of Google's Adsense program. The amazing success of the Adsense program has led to what seems like universal adoption of Google's ad serving technology. The problem is that the ubiquity of...
- Tips on Creating a Site Map
Excerpt: A quick search on Google for advice on creating a site map initially threw up many links to software you could buy or download for free to create a site map. But why do you need a site map? Basically as websites get larger and more...
- Website Colors That Turn Off Your Customers
Excerpt: Using too many colors or the wrong combination of colors on your website could alienate or turn off customers completely. Out of any form of non-verbal communication, color is the quickest way to communicate a message and meaning. And, marketers spend oodles of time and money determining the colors to...
- How to Develop a Website Outline
Excerpt: Developing the website outline The development of a website should be a complete and deliberate process. You will have many files and graphics that support your site and they need to be kept organized as you develop your website. This way whenever a change or update is necessary...
- Printing and Sending: the Two Things Users Want to Do
Excerpt: There's something you have to realise about the way users interact with articles. To put it simply, they don't just want to read them: they also want to print them out, and send them on to their friends, family and colleagues. If you can make it easier for them to...
- Cascading Stylesheets: 5 Reasons To Use CSS
Excerpt: Cascading Stylesheets has become more and more important in today's webdesign. But before you decide to get started using CSS you should know why CSS is so important and what its advantages are. 1. The content is separated from the design Because you are...
- Selling your Art Online - Website Tips For Artists
Excerpt: If you plan to sell your art online with your own unique website, my advice is simple: Be Different! There are hundreds of artist websites online today that are all making the same mistakes. The first problem I would like to note, is the use of long multimedia...
- Deliver Your Web Site From Evil
Excerpt: 1. Backup your website on the server. If you have more than one important web site, put them on different web hosts. Don't rely on your web host for backups. Find two different hosts which allow SSH access. Get an account with each. FTP the backup...
- Web Page Optimization
Excerpt: We all want to have the most attractive website that leaves a visitor wide-eyed and completely dazzled. Usually an extremely attractive website design involves lots of graphical elements, increasing the overall page size which causes the page to download slowly to the browser. This article will provide some useful tips...
- Best Practices Guide About Domain Names
Excerpt: Domain names are the first step in implementing your Internet marketing business plan. Domain name represents your brand. Many people know very well the importance of brand in the "offline" but even those can make mistakes in their Internet brand management. Domain name is the first step in successful Internet...
- What Is RSS and How Can It Help You
Excerpt: RSS is a very important tool that lets you easily syndicate the content on your website to readers all over the world. It can help you drive visitors to your website, increase ad revenue, expand your website's reach, and move to the top of the search engines. First...
- ASP vs. PHP
Excerpt: When building web sites, ASP and PHP are very popular languages. Here's my opinion on whether ASP or PHP is best. ASP vs. PHP Both ASP and PHP are languages used to build Dynamic Web sites that can interact with Databases and exchange information. ASP (Active...
- Streamline Your Website Pages
Excerpt: Squeezing the most efficient performance from your web pages is important. The benefits are universal, whether the site is personal or large and professional. Reducing page weight can speed up the browsing experience, especially if your visitors are using dial-up internet access. Though broadband access is the future, the present...
- How to Optimize Web Site Navigation
Excerpt: Make no mistake. the most impressive looking and product-rich web site will fail to convert visitors into paying customers if they are unable to more quickly and easily find what they are looking for. There's a lot of competition out there. Develop and design a web site that's easy to...
- Missing Images?
Excerpt: Vince Barnes has a wonderful article at HTML Goodies aimed at an annoying problem many beginning web designers suffer: images not showing up once their pages are uploaded to the web server. 'Here's the problem: you've worked on your pages and got them just the way you...
- Using Keyword Density for Google AdSense
Excerpt: With the decline of meta-tags, keyword density ranges have become very important. They've also become very controversial. Here's the thing: you want a high enough keyword density--at least 7%--that your keywords rank highly in the bigger search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, DogPile, and HotBot. But, you don't...
- Overview of Paint Shop Pro
Excerpt: Paint Shop Pro is one of the most popular image editors out there. Even though it's increasingly geared towards digital photography, you'd be surprised just how useful it can be to web designers. Installing Paint shop Pro is pretty much a "no brainer". You put the CD in...
- FireFox 1.5 Released
Excerpt: FireFox 1.5 was released yesterday. I've now upgraded and can report the the process was very smooth and I was able to find updates for most of my extentions, including all of my most used extentions. This is a major upgrade, but except for the faster performance moving between...
- Ten Tips for Killer Website Design
Excerpt: Does website design make a difference in how long people will visit your website or if they'll stay and shop? You bet. You've seen the websites that scream "bad idea" and you know those folks are losing potential customers to their ineffective website design. Whether you are an internet newbie...
- Flash Tricks For Improved Search Engine Rankings
Excerpt: [Frugal Webmaster's note: While I personally think the disadvantages of Flash with resprect to page usability make the techniques described in this article a poor choice for most web sites, there are some web sites where these ideas are just what the doctor ordered.] Normal wisdom says that...
- What is Wiki?
Excerpt: Wiki is web server software that allows users to contribute content. Collaboration is the key to Wiki, which is designed as a powerful system for online communities to build web pages and web sites. Unlike blogs and forums, all users are allowed to contribute and edit existing content. Wiki is...
- Big Business Web Design Disasters
Excerpt: When you think of the world's most successful businesses, what names come to mind? Most likely, consumer-oriented giants such as Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Sheraton, Disney, IBM, and General Electric. Not only have they spent billions on advertising to buy their way into your head. They offer convenient products and services that...
- Ten Ways To Irritate Your Website Visitors
Excerpt: Let's face it. It is really hard to come up with new ways to fully irritate visitors to your site. I thought I would share some ways that I have found to irritate visitors and drive them away, thereby saving you money on your hosting bills. These tips...
- Most Often-Overlooked Contributors to Poor Search Engine Rankings
Excerpt: As a search engine marketing consultant, I see a lot of websites that haven't been optimized for the search engines. Over the years, I continue to see the same problems with what I call "non-optimized websites." Typically, the biggest issues tend to be basic website design elements that are not...
- Tips on How to Design a Great Site
Excerpt: Have you ever walked pass a shop that, for some reason, you just felt that you had to go in? Maybe it was the décor, or the window display, or the pretty girl, or a combination of all those but something in the shop called out to you, "Come in"...
- Using .Htaccess
Excerpt: A .htaccess file is a file that works on Apache and other NCSA-compliant webservers. The name is actually a bit of a misnomer due to the fact that hyper-text access is only a small function of what it's capabilities are. The .htaccess file affects the directory it is...
- How To Make Your Site RSS User-Friendly
Excerpt: Despite all the hype and fuss surrounding RSS recently, for the majority of mainstream Internet users, RSS still remains a mysterious orange button sitting on your web site. They are totally unaware of this new method of syndicating information on the web. This is not necessarily bad news!...
- How to Build a Basic CSS Layout
Excerpt: Designing without tables by using CSS layouts is fast becoming the new standard on the Web because of the benefits mentioned in my previous article. Web browsers used these days are now able to render web pages proficiently. In this article I will endeavor to create a basic 2 column...
- Should You Bother Learning HTML To Build Webpages?
Excerpt: The most popular method to build webpages today is to use WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) software. Microsoft FrontPage and Macromedia Dreamweaver are prime examples of WYSIWYG software. Both programs allow you to create webpages as though you were creating a document with your favourite word processing...
- Usability: The Top Ten Weblog Design Mistakes
Excerpt: Usability guru Jakob Nielsen's latest Alertbox column is on the top ten weblog design mistakes. "Summary:Weblogs are often too internally focused and ignore key usability issues, making it hard for new readers to understand the site and trust the author." As usual Nielsen has...
- Nvu Review
Excerpt: Article by Erich Bihlman Ongoing growth in the availability of strong open source applications encourage keeping an eye out for Open Source alternatives to commercial applications. With the release of Nvu there is a potential alternative to FrontPage, GoLive and Dreamweaver as a graphical web editor. ...
- Keep Your Navigation Consistent!
Excerpt: Article by Jamie Kiley One of the single most important aspects of effective navigation is consistency. Why? There's a simple reason: Visitors want familiarity. They are more comfortable and more trusting if they know things are going to remain the same from page to...
- Designing your Website's Directory Structure
Excerpt: Article by Stephen Bucaro Any kid, and their grandmother too, can make a webpage. There are many "wysiwyg" webpage design applications that let you create a webpage as easy as typing text. But only a few people can create a website. The stumbling block is knowing how to...
- How to Add a Search Engine to Your Site
Excerpt: Article by Herman Drost When visitors arrive at your web site you want them to find the information quickly otherwise they will lose patience and move on. A great way achieve this is to add a search engine or search box to your web site. Since most visitors...
- Your Website Hurts My Eyes: Seven Reasons to Tone Down Your Advertising
Excerpt: Article by Dina Giolitto So you're on the computer, as usual. Your eyes are smarting. Your back hurts. You want to jump in the car and sail down the highway with all the windows down and your hair flapping in the wind. But before you call it quits...
- Web Usability: The Basics
Excerpt: Article by Trenton Moss What is web usability & why is it important? Web usability is about making your website in such a way that your site users can find what they're looking for quickly and efficiently. A usable website can reap huge benefits on to your website...
- Writing Benefit-Driven Web Copy – 4 Steps to More Sales
Excerpt: Article by Glenn Murray You've identified the benefits you offer your customers, but how do you turn a list of benefits into engaging web copy which converts visitors into customers? Recently I wrote an article explaining how to identify the benefits you offer your customers (
- Integrating Advertising into Your Web Design
Excerpt: Article by Stephen Bucaro If you are going to be placing ads on your website, you'll want to put some thought into how you'll integrate them. Poor integration of ads into your website will cause visitors to click away fast. Successful integration of ads into your site can...
- Are You Driving Away Potential Customers?
Excerpt: Article by Karin Peavy When a prospect lands on your website will he or she understand what you are presenting? Do your ordering/sign up instructions make sense? Can prospects easily find the information they are searching for? If you don't know the answers to these questions you may...
- Designing your Web Site for All Browsers
Excerpt: Article by David Bell Let's face it. Building a web site that browses consistently on multiple platforms and multiple browsers is not always as easy as we would like. It is safe to say that most designers spend most of their time building their sites on...
- Accessibility... The Basics
Excerpt: Article by Alan Cole An accessible website is one that allows as many people as possible to access the information contained within it. An important subset of accessibility is allowing people with visual, aural, or physical disabilities full access to the information and services available in the same...