Website Tips
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...January 23, 2008 Filed Under: General 619 words
1. Clean Design. Make sure your website is easy to follow. Have a navigation that is easily accessible from every page. Don’t make your blog area too wide, but don’t make it too small, either. Don’t have too small of a font size. Don’t have your own pages open in new windows (that’s annoying). Don’t have so much animation that the point of the page is lost. Don’t have pointless pages, either. Pop-ups are a no-no. Especially if you haven’t warned of a pop-up (that includes comment boxes!).
2. Originality. This doesn’t mean that you can’t use a few goodies from other websites–if you do so, make sure you do it with permission and give proper credit. Find your own style instead of trying to do what other people have done.
3. Test Your Links. Navigate around your website to be sure there aren’t broken images/links. If it’s a bigger website, you may want to use software to do this. Also check links to affiliates, etc. Although it’s not your problem their website is down, it adds tackiness to your own.
4. Contact Info. Make sure you have an e-mail address listed or a contact form so that visitors can contact you with questions, comments, etc. If you don’t want to receive e-mail, have a guestbook, tagboard, or commenting enabled on your blog.
5. Show Maturity. This doesn’t mean you can’t have fun! Some basic advice, though, is to not always use a gazillion exclamation marks, don’t use flashing backgrounds that overbear or clash with text, don’t SHOUT ALL THE TIME (All caps), and try to run your writing through a spelling checker if you’re not great at spelling.
6. Question the Necessity. Do you need that video? Do you need that MP3 file? Does your layout image need to be such a big file? If not, delete, put on a separate page, and compress. There’s nothing anyone hates more than a page that takes forever to load, especially when it has things that the visitor doesn’t want to see. If I go to a website to view videos (YouTube), I’ll wait the extra few minutes for loading. If I go to a website to read a blog, I won’t wait the extra minutes. If it takes more than 30 seconds to load (I have Cable internet), I’m GONE!
7. Organize. I can’t tell you how important this is. It goes hand in hand with clean design. Don’t use frames, use tables or div layers. Don’t have me on a clicking spree to find what I want. Have your disclaimer separate from your goodies page. If I go to a page for brushes, and click the word brushes, I expect to see brushes. Not a page telling me that I have to give credit and then click here for the brushes. Also, don’t make your pages too long. If you have so many things that I have to scroll more than once, divide it into separate pages/categories. If you choose to do categories, have anchor links at the top of the page.
Sponsor: Don’t buy a domain before you are aware of the online storage capacity that cheap hosting service is going to give. Of course with dsl, there will be no limit to uploading, often free software setups like internet phone has difficulty in working.
Layout by Anya © 2008 | Credits to Mimi and Bouncy-Bubbles.Net.