A company’s website speaks volumes about it. Irrespective of whether you are a brick and mortar company or an online company, it has become a necessity to maintain a website today.
But having a website isn’t just enough, what goes into it and on it is equally important.
Creating a Good Professional Website
Here are a few tips that should be followed when designing your website.
Appearance
Your web page must be designed to make people take notice of it from the start. So design a website that can catch the attention of individuals surfing the net.
Design an appealing layout that stands out from other websites. Don’t use too many colors as an overdose of colors can be very distracting.
Make sure that there are good number of tabs for each page in your website. If there are too many pages, you can integrate the ones that belong to a specific category into a drop down menu.
This is the easiest way to ensure that the page is not clogged with information. The best thing to do is to check out some of the websites online which you think are well designed and get ideas for your website.
Content Font
After you have designed a layout you are happy with, the next step is to make sure that the content font is perfect. Use fonts like Arial and Helvetica which are used popularly for their professional, yet elegant appeal.
These fonts give your website a professional look. You can use different fonts for headings and the content – but make sure that they look good together.
Avoid using arty fonts like Forte and French Scripts MS for content. You can use them for headlines, but for smaller text, they are a definite no-no. You can also include html tags wherever needed to prepare your website for on-page search engine optimization.
Themes
Add a theme that matches the subject of your website perfectly. If you have a video gaming website, you can have themes of any of your favorite video game. Ensure that the theme is eye catching!
Search Button
Don’t forget to add a customized Google search button on your website. If users are looking for content on your website, they can easily search for a particular topic using the customized search button. This eliminates the time taken to search content on your website.
If you don’t have a search button, then it is wiser to index the article pages in a chronological order so that visitors can easily check the content they are looking for.
Website which is Easy to Navigate
Design your website such that it facilitates ease of navigation. A user shouldn’t have to wait for more than 30 seconds for a page to open on your site. Tabs need to be clearly displayed in places where users are most likely to look.
These are some basic tips to be kept in mind when designing a website. Ensure you’re your website is neat and clean. That is what attracts a reader’s attention the most. Make your website stunning, and enjoy a steady stream of traffic!
Penny Cooper is a senior blog writer with copywriting service firm Godot Media. She has interests ranging from social media, copywriting to following web technologies and trends.
Hi Penny,
How are you?
Its true, when you have a wonderful appearance, people will be attracted and stay for a while and start clicking icons on your site. This is what I do before when Im not yet in this marketing world.
All the best,
Avatar
The content font is one of the most ignored items when it comes to designing websites. Also although related to the design hiring a good copywriter to optimize the content is also a good idea.
It is true that many people don’t take the issue of content font into practice, I’m myself do flop in this area. But, from now, in my next design, I will make sure that I use good and standard font especially like the one recommended by Jane.
Thanks @Nishadha for your comment
Designing website does not mean you need to become expert in Java, PHP, CSS or any language. Just simply making your website/blog as simple as you can without to much images and flashes because this will cause very slow loading on the part of a reader . Also make sure that it is visible or compatible to all browsers.
Thanks for sharing those tips on simplifying web site. I think adding a theme is very good idea. You can achieve a lot with that simple step.
Great post; I’m really starting to get interested in the ability of the actual website and it’s look in decreasing bounce rate and increasing time on site. Do you have any tips or other posts you have written that have suggestions in regards to what styles and/or colors to use that may be more visually appealing to people? Thanks
Hi Avatar, I am doing good. Thanks for asking. 🙂 @Nishad: Yeah, I have seen many websites with content in many different fonts and it seems so distracting! @ John “make sure that it is visible or compatible to all browsers”- that s another valuable pointer here.. @ Prancuziska Kasa- I am glad these tips are of use :). @Richard: Simplicity is the key here.. It is always safer to use white background as it is pleasant on the eyes.
Excellent post! this may help those web designers to create more attractive sites.