Many business owners don’t realise that a well designed site can generate sales in the same way a bad design can lose you customers and business. Indeed I would say webmasters need to get their site operating at 100% of its potential before worrying about seo or other marketing methods, if not your throwing money down the drain.
Navigation is key because web users have a shorter attention span than most and if they can’t find the main sections on your site quickly they will leave fast. Don’t let your design get in the way of your menu as it should stand out with a colour scheme that is easy to read.
Flash animation can be fun when it’s used in the right circumstances, it can make a boring article exciting, however you should never build an entire site in it. For a start google can’t understand it so you won’t get much free search engine traffic. Also the millions of people who now use iphones won’t have access to your site.
Overloading visitors with too much content is almost as bad as too little. So often when on a product detail page I’m assaulted with 10 pages of technical data when all I wanted was the dimensions. Clearly segment your data because customers don’t have time to wade through all the information to find what they need.
Many webmasters only test their sites design in the browser they use but this is a serious mistake. Not only do you need to test in different browsers but the different versions of each. For example older versions of internet explorer render some designs very differently than the latest one. You really have to test them all to know.
My last tip is to make sure your design and theme is consistent across all pages. There’s nothing more unprofessional than a site which changes font or colour depending on which page you’re on. Remember if you want people to buy from your store or make an enquiry they need to trust that you are a professional and well designed site is part of that.
If you’re a webmaster looking for design advice visit my new blog sometime.