How to improve my web design?

[MarbleHost.com]

I've been seeing a lot of threads (not just here) lately asking for advice on how to improve web design in some form or another, and thought that I would take the time to add my two cents based on my own experiences with clients.

1. First and foremost, one needs to realize that everything requires constant striving for improvement. Do not stop looking for ways to update and upgrade your website.

2. Simplicity can speak kilometers to a meter of bundled complication. Strive for clarity, ease of use, and aesthetic value. Often times, you may find that less is more in these areas. Be precise about your site's features and cut out anything that doesn't actually help your user.

3. Scour your userbase for any signs of fans and customers that would be happy to help design for the site pro bono or for very little. Often times, you may find that a simple but interesting contest can be run to generate samples, with the prize winner having their design portion displayed and used as well as a sample prize of your product.

4. Try to brainstorm as many features as possible before designing to cut down on design costs. The more you know in the beginning means a much lower chance of colliding code, and often times can mean a reduced design time overall.

5. Research the competition. What do your peers offer that you do not? What do you offer that your peers do not? Compare and contrast, and you may find simple things to add to set you out and above the rest.

6. Above all else, pay attention to your user. If possible, survey them and solicit them for comments/suggestions/complaints. After all, your site might look good to you and have all of the features that you think it would need to interact with your product, but what if your users think otherwise? You won't know unless you ask them, usually.

If you have anything to add, feel free!

[anthonyvn]

Very practical experiences thanks for the post!

[antwon]

good information here... thanks for sharing them... this can help me in improving my work on web designing... learned a lot today... thanks

[bermuda]

Great article. There clearly should be a difference between designing websites for people or for the search engines, and also between web designing and developing.

Some websites are great, informative and user friendly while others might just be developed for having better search engines traffic.

[mavines]

I would advice another paragraph here:

7. Something at the site must catch customer's eyes. This is really essential. Show something that attracts customer at least for... 5 seconds )) This should be enough to make your sites memorable among others...

[hostingITrust]

I would say you should leave the your company website design to the professionals. That what they do and are usually very good at it. You can tell them what you want and what you wish to achive.

[ASP-Hosting.ca]

I would say you should leave the your company website design to the professionals. That what they do and are usually very good at it. You can tell them what you want and what you wish to achive.

I agree. Also different industry segments will require different approach to web design. If a simple design works for one site, this doesn't mean it will work well for another.

[tiktik]

I would say you should leave the your company website design to the professionals. That what they do and are usually very good at it. You can tell them what you want and what you wish to achive.

I also agree on that.

[tomherry]

Very useful article. Nice try to tell everybody.
thanks...........

[seoman]

Nice information there

However one should also try to make his/her website search engine friendly. Search engine optimization will bring natural visitors/clicks towards your website. Therefore make sure that your website is adhering to basic SEO norms. You should ensure that your website is getting crawled by various search engine crawlers in order to gain search engine rankings on Google and Yahoo.

Web Design combined with SEO can help you in gaining higher rankings on search engines. If your web design consists of too many javascripts then search engines will not like it.

[DionDev]

what i do is i bookmark sites with designs i like

then i incorporate some elements of each design into my site

i also hand-draw most of my layouts on a piece of paper before i start on them in photohsop

[12beatme]

Check these awesome sites and you'll learn from them:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/
http://woork.blogspot.com/
http://ndesign-studio.com/

[DionDev]

Check these awesome sites and you'll learn from them:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/
http://woork.blogspot.com/
http://ndesign-studio.com/

theyre ok, the ndesign one is the most appealing

[A2Hosting]

I definitely like rule #1. You always have to strive to have that fresh content on your site.

[karankaran]

www.zimplit.org take a look over it !!