Design & Development Articles

May 2005- Good Web Site Design
by Peter Cross

There are very few web pages on the internet that clearly state what is "good web site design" and what is not "good web site design". That's because it's completely subjective - like what is beautiful and what is not beautiful, and so it takes a highly opinionated strong ego like this one to step in there and say "OK folks, this is what it is." Now I jumped on board the internet back in 1994 after I began to believe that not only would it be "The Next Big Thing", but that it actually does offer the human race the potential to connect all our minds together in an entirely new way. When I decided to create my own web site, I first had to take a good look at as many music and other web sites as possible in order to learn what not to do before I could visualize what I should do. I've visited thousands of web sites since then, I've talked to countless net surfers about what they like and don't like, and we all tend to agree on some major points:

Bad Design Consists of:

1. Text that is hard to read, including use of tiny fonts against black backgrounds and illegible
   fonts against picturesque backgrounds.
2. Anything that slows page downloading speed. Net surfers are impatient and they will hit their back button to exit out of a site where pages take too long to download. Avoid any plug-ins that have to be downloaded in order simply in order to view your page.
3. No clear "Mission Statement" on the home page. Web surfers want to know immediately what a web site is about - they don't want to have to read several pages to get it and then decide the time spent wasn't worth it.
4. No clear instructions on the home page on how to get the information you want out of the site. Web surfers want to surf with speed, not study in a library.
5. Home pages that make you click on something to "enter" (called portal pages). What's the point? You've already entered. Why in the world would you care to enter twice?
6. Confusing site organization, difficult navigation, dead links.
7. Boring writing. Not much can be done about this one. Creative writing isn't available at any price, in any medium - ask the publishers.

Good Design Consists of:

1. Text that is easy to read. Don't be afraid to use a large bold font against a light colored background. You can use any font with any background. There are no rules or laws here.
2. Avoid gimmicks. Construct your pages to download fast. Consider having a section just for photos and name it so that people will expect that portion of your site to download slowly. And for goodness sake, don't make people download a plug-in just so that they can read your page.
3. A clear statement on the home page explaining what the site is all about.
4. Something on the home page that makes it clear what the other pages are all about too.
5. A home page that is a home page - none of that "enter" nonesense.
6. An organized site that has some kind of structure that can be easily understood.
7. Entertainment value. This is where good writing skills come in. Think of your site as if it were a novel or a hit record. Somebody has to grab our interest immediately and then hold it by entertaining us. There's no better way than with your personality through your writing, and nobody can do that for you better than you can.

The bottom line is that web site design professionals usually prevent your own personality from shining through your web site. It's much better to be yourself and create something that they would call amateurish then it is to pay for something that they use a form and a program to create for all their clients. Think outside the box. And then create your own box.

About the Author
Peter Cross is a singer/songwriter/producer who was among the first to put music on the internet in downloadable format in 1996. To this day, he is one of the only musicians who has created and designed his own music web site in html, and at 104 pages filled with entertaining content, it's one of the largest. Check it out at: http://www.starcrost.com

Note: These articles do not represent the advice or opinions of Apollo Hosting. They represent the thoughts, advice and opinions of the individual authors.