The world of website design has seen various changes through the years. Easily, the biggest shift in design came when SEO started to really take a foothold. Web sites became more about content and advancing on search engines then the designs themselves. Designers had to learn a whole new ball game. Through the years I think this has brough about a good change.

In the beginning, SEO experts and designers clashed over what was important when constructing a site. Less images, more links was the way to healthy SEO. This of course left designers with limited options in design. Things became more simple, and the layouts changed.

This day and age, I think we’ve reached a healthy medium. SEO standards have gotten better, and images aren’t the bane of SEO like they once were. I think design has improved because of SEO for a couple of reason. First, sites aren’t nearly as much of a time sink as they once were. Design is more about navigation, and interface than standing out with amazing images and color structure.

Make sure your website scales well: So, you’ve worked tirelessly on your website and it’s finally finished. Everything looks great, that is until you let your friend look at it on his/her monitor.  Then everything goes to hell. Unfortunately making your site scale to all monitors, and monitor configurations perfectly is impossible. But you can always make it better.

First, try and keep your width to 800 or less. Rarely, do sites even need to be wider than that anyway. But just a friendly reminder, as people don’t mind scrolling up and down as much as they do side-to-side. Your code can greatly help this problem as well.

The more browser testing, the better: If you used Dreamweaver as your design program, then you can never have too many browsers in your test list. In fact, there really isn’t a negative to have more browsers. Unless you think it’s going to take you along time to test all of them. But the time is worth it to make sure your site is compatible no matter what browser someone is using.

Ok, so you look around the internet and see all of these cool menus with effects attached to it. I’m guessing you immediately think that it’s Flash, but more than likely it isn’t. There’s a code base that if utilized to its full extent can provide you with some pretty cool features to add to your site.

The latest example that I created was for a site called PS3Trophies.co.uk. If you browse around the interactive menu on the top of the screen, this gives you an idea of what JQuery can do.  If you look at the core of JQuery, you’ll find some pretty complex code.  Luckily, you don’t have to deal with most of it. In fact if you find a good tutorial, or find someone who doesn’t mind sharing you can create something in JQuery very easily.

A good start is to visit jquery.com. Here you’ll find some tutorials, tips, and more about what the JQuery script can do. Once you have the code you need, the rest is just adjusting your CSS, and HTML.

Has anyone used JQuery for their sites? If so, have you found it simple to use with tutorials?

Compress, Compress, Compress: When you’re adding images to your website, you need to keep one thing in mind. The size of your site should be treated like an inventory, or budget. You only have a certain amount of space to use, as you don’t want your site to become too large from a file size point of view. If an individual page is taking 8-10 seconds to load on a broadband connection, then it’s too big.

If you did take an inventory of your site, you’d see that images is what bogs things down for you. To stop this from happening, you need to decrease your image’s file size as much as possible. The best program to do this in is Photoshop. When you export an image, you’re given options that can greatly help decrease an image’s file size. You can save it in a certain format that provides smaller sizes, or decrease the quality.

Flash can be your friend, but on in certain situations: When web designers caught on to everything that Flash was capable of, there was a huge revolution for the program. Animated, and stylized menus that could play embedded movies and the list goes on. The only problem is that while people love style, they love speed more so.  When deciding on whether to use Flash or not,
ask yourself one question…

Is my site content based, or artistically based?

If the function of the site you’re creating is about informing your visitors, or selling your content then leave Flash alone. Or if you do use it, make it minimal. Your wanting people to access your site faster so the content of your site draws them in.

“All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” - Pablo Picasso

Picasso’s quote is a simple one,  but one that is a complex problem that is becomes more difficult to solve as we grow older. As the world unfolds before our eyes, so does the wonder and majesty of what’s around us. Once the magic is gone, you’ll find that it’s harder to think outside of the box.

If you’re involved in web design, it’s important that you keep that ‘outside the box’ mentality. Creativity is one of the essential skill sets you’ll need as you grow in your design. It can be hard though. You’re more than likely juggling finances, your site’s SEO, research. It can be overwhelming to try and be creative with so much mental baggage going on.

Unlike most aspects of web design, creativity can be the hardest or easiest problem to tackle. Most of it depends on how much time you’re willing to dedicate to the creative process. The next step being what are you doing to help the creative juices flow.

Getting the creative side of your mind going isn’t like the intellectual portion. You can’t just exercise your brain and make it become creative. There’s almost an invisible force that’s at work when one is hit with a creative idea. The overall key to getting yourself ready is to free your mind.

Try meditating, or if the silence makes your think even harder try and play with your kids. If you don’t have kids then get lost in an activity where your mind is free to wander. One exercise that helps me is to open up Photoshop and just create something. I make myself not to think of anything in particular and let the tools, and brushes speak for themselves.

Next time you come across the need for a creative idea, don’t force it. Let your mind be nurtured, and I’ll gurantee you’ll be happy with the outcome.

Never use image backgrounds: The only time that anyone should ever see an image background on anything related to you, is if it’s on MySpace. Even then if your using your MySpace account as a business portal, then don’t use background images.

There’s a couple of reasons why background images are a no-no, with no positives to gain from them. First, background images generally scream ‘tacky’, and give off a lower-quality feel to a site.

What’s even more of a grievous offense, is that background images for a site slow down the loading of your site. Which should always be a top priority when coming up with a design.

Some, will tell you that there are times that image backgrounds are ok. I think that with the right use of color, and using images for separate sections of your site is much more effective.

Put a menu, and home button on every page: This might seem like an obvious tip, but you’d be surprised how many times I’ve visited a site with little to no options for navigation. These places, you click on a link and you’re at the page and only have your back button to rely on to get anywhere.

This is counter-intuitive, and can be a real detraction for users. So, make sure that every page you have has a mneu for navigation where users want to go. Then, make sure you have a visible option to return to your home page.

Find a balance between information on one page, and number of clicks for navigation: So much of what you need to do to have a successful website is based on balance. Finding a balance between style, and simplicity, ads and space etc.

When it comes to your website, you want to try and keep people from having to click around as much as possible. The less people have to find where they need to go, the more apt they are to stay and view your content. If someone is having to click around 6-7 times just to get one piece of informations there’s a good chance they’ll just go somewhere else.

Of course there’s a flip side, as you can run into stuffing information onto a single page. People might hate having to click through links, but they hate scrolling through a page just as much. A good rule is to try and fit as much information as you can onto two screens. Your users should only have to scroll the mouse wheel down and up one time.

Keep Your Text Lines Succinct And Columns Narrow: The way that the human eye works, everything is based on perception. We perceive information a certain way based on how it’s present to us. For example, some like to listen to absorb information while others like to see it.

When people are trying to look at the information on your site, it’s vital that it’s easy for them to take in. Something that is overlooked from time-to-time is the size of the columns that your information is displayed on. If you’re the owner of a blog this tip is of grave importance.

No one likes lines of text that take up half of their web browsers. There’s a reason that newspapers, and magazines have narrow columns with minimal words per line. It’s easier on people’s eyes to keep up with shorter and minimal lines of text.

Create A Few Template Ideas: Jumping into an idea is never a good thing. Designing websites is no exception to this rule. You’ll want to take your time and make sure you have multiple ideas from which to draw inspiration from.

When coming up with your ideas, you can write them out or create a template in a image editor. I personally use photoshop, that way I have the most extensive tool at my disposal.

Include Ads While Being User-centric: This tip is all about striking a balance between making money and having people keep visiting your website. As your website grows, you’ll undoubtedly keep trying to come up with ways to monetize your success.

Putting ads on your site is just about the only way to go for most people when turning a profit. When you start putting ads up on your site, always keep your user in mind. Make sure your ads are prevalent to the content of your site. Also, don’t go overboard with your ad placements either. While having more ads means more money, that doesn’t mean people are going to visit your site and stay.

When trying to turn a profit with your website, nearly all of your money will be made from advertising. Unless you’re using your site to sell a vast amount of products. Generally though, advertising is going to be your major source of income.

When deciding on your advertising strategy it can be hard not to get dollar sign lit eyes. When this happens you can easily lose focus of what it means to have a nice website. Nothing is more apparent of this, than pop-up ads. I’m still puzzled as to why they’re still in existence. They are intrusive, and I would stack them up there with telemarketers pre-cell phone era.

Pop-up ads made more sense during the early era of the internet. People were a lot less apt to navigate away from pop-ups, and were more naive to the web. Now, they garner either sighs or giggles. Ad clicks won’t be generated by flashing bright colors, and making the user’s browser open up a new window. It will most certainly lead to the user going somewhere else, and never returning to your site.

When trying to come up with a good advertising strategy, try and be creative. Stay ahead of the curve and think up interesting, and dare I say fun ways to reach your target market.

Take advantage of all of your pages: When creating your website, there shouldn’t be any wasted space. There’s no need for it, it does no benefit for you or your users. So, when designing your site keep in mind of the entire space of your layout.

If you create a new section, see how that’s going to effect the rest of your layout. If it leaves a monstrous gap somewhere else you might want to rethink what you’re doing.

Keep It Classy: You want to know the easiest way to find a trustworthy car dealership? Take a look at how they’re advertising their car lot. If they’re using inflatable wacky arm dolls, then it’s safe to say you’re looking at a pretty sleazy joint. If you find a place that presents their deals in a coherent and eye pleasing manner, you’ve found a place worth checking out.

This idea translates into the online world. If someone opens your site, and the first thing they see is a scrolling marquee with 50 different blinking colors, they’re going to click the big red ‘X’. So, keep it simple and make sure you’re engaging your users on a real level. You need to give your users some credit in knowing what they want.