One of my favorite things to do in my spare time is build websites. Sounds a bit strange doesn’t it? Well, actually NO, because when you need a website for a client you will have one ready or you can sell you site as a template online. There are a few key things to know about building good sites. Many of my clients always want something that looks “Cool”, but when functionality suffers this is not good. You want a site that can function on the front end and that is easy to use on the backend. Think about who will see your site, and how they will use it. What will they see, what will keep them there? Here is a quick list of items to think about when designing your site.
- Do your colors coordinate and are they visually appealing, not discrating?
- Do your links look like links or regular text, will your visitor know to “click”?
- Is your logo in the upper left corner? If not, put it there!
- Is you navigation easy to use or does it have confusing sublinks that go to more sublinks.
- Do you have a site map, in the event the site is huge and your customers want to find something?
- If you have a large content site, do you have a search feature with options?
- Are your fonts and font colors easy to read?
- Do you have a newsletter signup form? If so, is it in a very accessible place on your site.
- Do you have broken links on your site?
- Are your pages too busy and loaded with too much content?
- Have you taken the time to create nice page layout?
- Do you have more graphics than text on your site? If so, this is not good for SEO!
- Do your site visitors navigate deeper into your site or do they run after the first page.
- Does your site communicate your product or service, is there consistancy?
- Does your site look the same in most browsers? If not it needs better optimization.
- If you are selling a product do you have clear links to your privacy policies and other important legal data?
- Is your contact information easy to access or do your site visitors have to hunt for it?
