Are you interested in web design? If you do, then you need to learn what you can about website development, and this information can help you.
Graphics are important for any designer but beginners should focus only on the standard graphics on their first several builds. Bitmap images require a lot of disk space and are unwieldy. Use PNGs for images over 256 colors for text buttons and the like or use GIF files for images smaller than 256 colors. For pictures, use JPEG images.
Test your site to ensure it passes a NoScript test. This is a Firefox extension you can download, and it will check your site’s readability. Some content, such as ordering systems for products, can’t work without scripts, but if your site is simply blank with scripts turned off, that’s bad news.
Visitors want to have access to a website quickly, which is why your pages should load easily. If a visitor needs to wait while the page loads, they may click off your site and not return.
Make sure that every page on your website loads as quickly as possible. Users with slower Internet connections might decide that the wait isn’t worth it if your site loads slowly. A visitor who has to wait a long time to see your information will move on.
You should update your content and get rid of expired content regularly. If your website is advertising a festival that occurred three months ago, your readers will just leave. Users want to spend their time on sites that are cared for, and leaving up old information shows a lack of attention to the site. Review, update and delete content as a matter of course.
Be very careful to remove outdated content from your site. If you have something on your site that lists an event that happened months ago, chances are you have lost some readers. Allowing information that is outdated to remain on your website is a sign to users that you have not taken the time to update your site and it implies that you don’t care about their time. Create a timeline for your updates, and clean up any old promotions or information that is not current.
Try researching keywords. Though your primary focus is on supplying proper content and information to your customers, you need to build a customer base. You need to understand the proper keywords that will attract visitors to your website.
Is your site easy to scan? Tests have shown that the majority of online readers avoid reading everything on a page; instead, they just scan it for information that is of importance to them. Having text in certain areas to create a more bold appearance will catch the attention of readers who quickly scan each page. It is also important that the key information is at the top of each page. This will satisfy your visitors and have them coming back for more.
Internet Connection
While you want to keep the aesthetics of your site in mind, you also need to make every effort to keep your file sizes to a minimum. This is because the size of the files dictates the speed at which your website loads. Of course, having your website load quickly is the best scenario for visitors. You must keep in mind that not all visitors will have a fast Internet connection. Check your site, and make sure that it can load quickly even with a slow dial-up internet connection.
Learn about shortcuts, and use them often. When it comes to web design, there are many shortcuts; as you become more familiar with the field, you are sure to find fast ways of doing just about everything. It doesn’t take that long to learn about the HTML code that you can insert into your website’s design to help you edit any page without having to upload the page again.
It is vital that you are aware of the fact of your need to design your website so that it displays properly on a range of different Internet browsers. Each web browser has a slightly different way of how they illustrate the website, and in a couple of cases these little differences could have major effects on the experience for the user. There are now many websites that you can visit to find out which web browsers are most commonly used by internet users. View your website in each of these browsers to ensure that the page will be viewed correctly.
As you were reading this article, you should have felt more at ease with approaching web design. You probably don’t feel as overwhelmed about website creation, now that you have this knowledge.
Do not use pop-up windows. Nobody appreciates new windows popping up automatically when they visit a webpage. Many people will close a site immediately if it uses pop-ups, even if it’s a site run by a well-known brand or company. Therefore, you should keep annoying ads off your website, in order to avoid irritating your visitors. If you are required by your hosting service to have pop-up ads, you may want to consider obtaining a new web host.