Clarity, consistency and compelling. That should be the aim of a well designed website with a professional feel. The only ambiguity on the site should stand out as being a deliberate design more than a flaw.
Navigation within the site should be effortless and in the standard web format. Most important however, it’s what’s on the site that counts. In other words, content needs to be worthwhile and presented in the most attractive manner to the target audience.
Clarity also defines a good web design. Every page has to be crystal clear about its purpose and instructions, if necessary, and interlinked to the rest of the site in a convenient format.
There are ten tips to achieving a well designed website. The first one deals with the basic purpose and nature of the site. More than bowling the viewers over with stunning visual appeal, it is more important that the look of your site is in line with the nature of content. Think about the kind of impression you want your site to create and how viewers should feel when they visit your site.
The next step involves research of similar sites to get a good idea of all the requirements your site should have. Take note of the positive qualities of other websites as well as the negative, to enable you to incorporate the former and keep out the latter
Research equips you to take on the next step of planning your website. Draw a sitemap with all the pages the site will have.
User friendliness comes next and this factor is of utmost importance. The most attractive of websites fail in their purpose if users find it difficult to navigate. Logic should determine the site design and navigation format. Avoid gimmicks like image-based cursor over links which can be confusing, if not irritating. Ease of navigation is more important than visual appeal, and the latter can always be incorporated into the basic format.
