We've all com across terrible websites before and hit the back button as quickly as possible. But what makes these sites any terrible?
Keep the following in mind when designing.
JavaScript and Flash can be great tools, but only if used properly. Don't put trails after the curser, fireworks or other animations flying around the page or the dreaded Flash intro. If you must use an intro, Flash or otherwise, then put a 'skip intro' button. You may wish to show of your Flash skills, but we don;t want to watch! :-) Keep your page dynamic. Having warned you against all these animations etc, I still think that a static page is boring. Even if it's just a rectangle in the menu highlighting as you move over it or a marquee (use <marquee>your text</marquee>), try to have something dynamic. There's no need to use passwords etc unless private data is exchanged. Don't annoy visitors with them! You need a clear title. Come up with something short and snappy. It should be self-explanatory. Avoid background sounds at all costs! It's considered by many to be the mark of a newbie! Use a colour not an image for your background. Images can block out some of the text and putting another image on the page (on top of the bg) will look terrible. For some reason, blue seems to be the trend in professional websites at the moment. Blue fading into white, that is. If it's what people like, you may as well use it! Pages that are too busy can be intimidating; pages that are too empty are boring. Most people nowadays have at least 104x768 resolution. Try to fit your page to that resolution. Also, reme,ber that some browsers such as the extremely popular AOL 9.0 have a small viewing area for webpages. It's about 8/10 of he width of the screen but height varies according to resolution. Preview in your browser, NOT your HTML builder. The HTML builder's toolbars'll distort the size that you'd be viewing it in where you seeing it through a browser. Remember that companies are always trying to 'streamline' browsers; this'll give you more space. Users don't like to scroll down!
Often, many websites will not supply contact details. Try to form a community of sorts; forums, e-mail and Wikis are great ways to do this. People don't like talking to a machine; they want to be in contact with YOU. This is a really import part of running a website.
Domain name is important; if you must use a free host then don't expect to be taken as seriously as a proper paid-for domain. If you use a free host then I suggest that you use one taht puts NO ads on your site such as http://www.atspace.com/ and http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/.'>http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/. Free host will give you something called a subdomainl this'll be yoursite.freehostservicename.com or similar. Paid hosts will give you mcuh more options including a you@yourwebsite.com e-mail - that looks much more pro - a http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ domain, the ability to have subdomain and more. For exaplme, say I ran a newspaper called 'The News' (imaginitive I know!) I could opt for free hosting and get http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ and people'd email me at the-news@aol.com or similar OR I could opt for paid hosting and have to cough up every month but get http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/, be contacted at http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ or editor@the.news.com, have a Teamspeak server and more control over my site.
If you want forums then you can use someone free such as http://www.zifboards.com/ or you could write your own. Writing your won is far better, but it's almost impossible! To be honest, even big companies sometimes use free forums so just stick with them! It'll be mcuh easier, even though you'll ned up with something like http://z7.invisionfree.com/Your_forum/index.php.
And there you have it!
