Good Practices When Designing A Website What to do and what not to do

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!

A good tutorial you have there, but there are some points where I wouldn't agree with you.

 

Use a colour not an image for your background.

According to your next point, it's best to use a blue-to-white background. But how can this be accomplished if no images are used? I say, do use simple graphics, but be careful.

 

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.

True. 800x600 used to be common, so 800 pixels had to be the max width. However, since a lot people still use low resolutions, it might be best to use a fluid design with width: 100%

 

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!

Just to add, try as many browsers as you can! Internet Explorer, Oper, Firefox, Netscape, everything that you can think of. Even a slightest part of the code can make the page look different in various browsers.

 

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.

Here, I do not agree with you. If you are not a professional, then it is OK to use a free forum site, but otherwise it's rather unexceptable. Big companies and serious people ought to use forums on their own host. It will be more customizable and makes the creator somewhat more intelligent. Another thing is not using free forums such as phpBB and SMF. While they are free, they give out the wrong impression. It is better to invest $100 if you can!

If you want forums then you can use someone free such as http://www.zifboards.com/

Be careful with free forums. The phpbb forums at Xisto are rally nice, this kind of forums you can use.Some other "free" forums cannot be used for professional use, because they have too many ads, and ads other than yours will probably make your customers go out from your site.
i would rather suggest, startup with Xisto and an independant forum like phpbb, and keep countinuously make backups of your forum. And if your site starts being very successful, you will simply upgrade your account to a paid hosting, and simply move your forum to you new site.

I'm surprised nobody mentioned this, but don't have a text that hurts to look at or blends in with the background. This is especially true when you have a background image of different colors. Also, when using a background image, I find it easier to have a no repeat, fixed background with scrolling text so that when you scroll down you won't see a repeat of the picture or the end of the picture and a giant white space.Also, try and make your pages eye-catching. If your page doesn't look pleasing to the eye, it tends to lead many people to the "back" button on their browser.

Of course, that is the most important rule! I hate to see pages with repeating backgrounds, especially if it is a smaller image which shows up so many times. And when you add text to the colourful background.. *vomit*. Just keep the background simple and if possible in one colour, and choose a colour for the text so that it can be easily seen. And avoid too bright colours such as yellow, light green etc.

I agree with yellow. Every time I see a page with yellow text, my eyes are like, "it burns us, it burnssss ussss!". For me, a general rule of thumb is that if you must use some kind of yellow, stick with a goldenrod color of some sort. It's easier on the eyes than just plain, blinding yellow is, and for a black/white/grey picture background on my website I'm building, it came off as a rather nice effect. Matched my buttons and everything. ;p

 

Another good rule of thumb is not to use funky-looking fonts. For the love of God, just don't do it! It makes your site come off as looking unprofessional and thus is not taken seriously. The only time I find this acceptable is if you are building an elegant-looking layout of sorts and you need a font title. Just don't use wedding fonts, they're hardly legible, so I usually stick to something like "Scriptina" or the like.

Edited July 30, 2006 by mpinsky (see edit history)

Well if we are adding suggestions, I have also heard not to use wild looking text/fonts. Stick with something pleasing to the eye, not abstract like comic sans, which isn't very professional looking. Even though I am making a game site, where I want it to be fun, I've found that the odd looking fonts are just not good to look at over and over. Personally, I like Veranda, but thats just me.

I cannot just say that do not use yellow. But I can say that do not use yellow together with white or something like that.

It is always the combination of colours that you use, that make or break a site. And these days, if you are a newbie designer, I would say that stick with pastel colours. To get a good set of colours that go well with each other, you could try the Colour Scheme Generator provided at http://www.wellstyled.com/.

I agree with not having background sounds.Also, don't have quirky little sounds when you scroll over certain things and stuff... it's very annoying.If you want music, put a player on your page, or have a downloadable song. Integrated sound is awful.

I haven't read all the replys and original post content but I would have to disagree somewhat on static web pages. Many look just great, perhaps with some slightly fancier little effects on the menu's and such it could look nicer. Some if not many static sites still look very nice :DI'm personally not a fan of flash, It is nice when you have the option of either though, it's very considerate and I would say a good practice for sure.

I agree about the Flash thing. Though I actually enjoy Flash, there are times when I'm in a hurry to get to the content and am not in the mood to watch whatever Flash intro you want to shove in my face, especially if that intro really sucks.

Also, I think it's useful to have a liquid layout. Perhaps not entirely liquid, but at least make it liquid enough so that when users resize their browsers a little, it won't look clunky with horizontal scrollbars and that users with an 800 x 600 resolution will have no more problems viewing your site than users with 1400 x 1200 resolution.

Background music is indeed VERY annoying--it slows down the site a lot. Besides, the webmaster's taste of music may not be the visitor's taste of music. Just because you like rap doesn't mean everyone else in the world has the same taste in sound.

Here, I do not agree with you. If you are not a professional, then it is OK to use a free forum site, but otherwise it's rather unexceptable. Big companies and serious people ought to use forums on their own host. It will be more customizable and makes the creator somewhat more intelligent. Another thing is not using free forums such as phpBB and SMF. While they are free, they give out the wrong impression. It is better to invest $100 if you can!

I think it's less about the wrong impression. Not all visitors prowl around and try to see what forum type you're using. (I, for one, don't bother) However, using something like vBulletin has a lot more features than phpBB or SMF. Users don't particularly care if your forum was free or paid for, but they will care if it has the functions that they want and need. If they want subforums and discover that your umodded version of phpBB doesn't have it, they're going to be annoyed an leave. If you can somehow mod phpBB to have every function your visitors need, good for you, you invested the time and effort into a free product so that it now has the quality of a paid one.

According to your next point, it's best to use a blue-to-white background. But how can this be accomplished if no images are used? I say, do use simple graphics, but be careful.

I think he means not using photos as the background. As in, if you take a photo of a tree, decide it looks nice, and decide to paste it as the background. I've seen people do this before, and then they decide to use black text over the scattery tree-filled background. It totally kills me. ><

So, it seems that, the good practices should be "draw something nice". And I see that, for each of us, "something nice" is "someghing I am happy to see, someting I feel comfortable".Unfortunately, I would say that there is no real answer, execept "artist's freedom"!Why are some artists successful and some others are not ? Why do you like a painting, and somebody does not like it ? I must confess that, on my own sites, I do exactly what has been told here not to be done. I like black fonts on a yellow background. I love putting photographs as background. Unfortunately, it makes myself happy, but maybe I am the only guy happy with this ? Maybe that's why almost nobody comes and visits my site ?So, to summerize, you should first thint about "who will have to visit my site" ? If the people visiting your site love italic fonts on pink background, you should give them what they want. This is probably the reason why some professional website designers are successful, and some others are not.And, unfortunately, I'm afraid that this topic is in the artistic field, so probably you will not be successful until you go to an art schools and learn how to design nice things.RegardsYordan

Alot of succesful web designers I would assume, do to some extent cater to the audience they are attempting to target, or to the requirements of a client etc...I build mine the way I like it, I don't mind advice or critism but if I like something the way it is and it works, then it stays.

What you just mentioned is one of the most common problems People create things THEY like, without thinking about other people. Some do it on purpose (like you), and some just think that everyone will like their design. I believe that all web designers (including me) start the second way. I used to create really ugly sites just because I thought they were really cool. It took me over a year to realize what people really like. Fortunately, I've managed to skip the group which deliberately creates sites only they like, and now I can create a template that 70 percent of the visitors will like.

Heh heh, the trick to me is that I don't care , I only built mine for the purpose of learning PHP/Mysql and anything else I find necessary on the way and finding out common ways of implementing certain features such as user login system, forum, shoutbox, news, files, tutorials etc...If I was trying to really sell something, make money from advertisements (on a more serious level) and such then I would re-consider how to design the site.

Edited August 7, 2006 by Chesso (see edit history)