Web Design Rules

By: ‘http://www.articlegeek.com/authors/4292.php’>Nicholas
LaPolla

“Content is King! If you want a website to generate back-links
and have quality content the search engines love, be sure to make
it readable by both people and search engines. Search engines are
working to give people quality results. Thus, they are looking for
sites with quality content. So – by building site content for
people, not only are you getting back to basics (information
dissemination to people via the Internet), you are creating a site
search engines will love. So, build sites for people – and the
search engines will come.

When creating a new website or redesigning an existing site,
there are four critical rules which should be followed to make the
site effective, functional, loved by search engines – and
successful.

1. Easy to Read

When building a website, the first thing you need to be sure of
is that your website is easy to read. When you write content,
remember that most web site visitors don’t read every word of a
page – in fact, they only scan pages to find what they want.

Break up Your Content

Break up your pages and use headers between major ideas so
people scanning your site can find what they want quickly. Use
meaningful headers between each paragraph or major idea – this
helps with SEO. Headers should be created with the H1 through H4
tags for SEO. Always use good writing structure. Additionally,
avoid long paragraphs that run on. You should break up any long
paragraphs.

Color and Fonts

To help readability, use high contrast colors between font and
background. Black text against a white background may seem stark,
but it is very readable. To make a website easy on the eyes, try an
off-white background and a dark gray (almost black) text color.

Things to avoid with content color:

• Avoid vibrant background colors like purple or yellow. Such
  back colors make text difficult to read.
• Avoid using an image behind your text.
• Avoid using bright text colors on bright backgrounds.

Fonts Matter

One simple statement covers the font issue:
Simple fonts are the best; the more fancy the font, the harder it
is to read.

Since many browsers only have the standard font set, use
standard fonts. In reality, there is no “standard”, but there are
certain fonts that are installed on most browsers. These include
Arial, Verdana, Tahoma and Times New Roman. Your readers will see
something different than you see if you use other fonts.

Standard Compliant Browser for Development

When developing and testing your site, use a Standards compliant
browser like FireFox. If you develop your site to be standards
compliant, it will work in most browsers, including MS Internet
Explorer (IE). It is recommended that you test your site using the
latest and last browser versions of IE (IE6 and IE7). To run
multiple versions of IE on the same machine, TredoSoft.com has a
free installer that will install multiple versions of IE. It works
great!

Keywords in Content

Of course, when writing content, not only should it be formatted
to be readable, but it must also be consumable by not only people,
but by search engines. One way to make the subject of the content
known to search engines is to use the keywords that people use to
search for your site in your content. Be sure to use keywords in
your header tags, your first paragraph and throughout your text.
The keyword density should be between 4% and 7% – but any more than
that could 1) be hard to read and still make sense and 2) be
considered spam by search engines and banned. Keywords should also
be used in your TITLE tags and your Meta description.

2. Simplify Navigation

The menus and links make up the navigation that the visitor uses
to get from page to page in a site. Always plan a site around how
people will get from page to page. A visitor to your site should be
able to get to what they want within three clicks of their
mouse.

Multiple navigation points makes it easy to find things. Repeat
the top menu and at the bottom. Also create a left or right
menu.

Using links within your text to other areas on your site. You
can create links so that they are good for search engine
optimization (SEO). There are generally two ways to create links
within your text:

1. The wrong way: “For search engine optimization techniques,
   click here.”
2. The right way: “Good techniques for search engine optimization
   are important to use.”

Using link text (anchor text) that describes what the link is
about is the best way. Search engine web crawlers (programs that
automatically index the contents of websites) visit your site, they
“read” links. Spiders can index descriptive links into a subject or
keyword category. Spiders have nothing to work with when reading a
“click here” until it reaches the linked page.

This is Cross Linking – use it as much as possible when it makes
sense to do so when writing your content.

3. Consistent Design

At most, one or two layouts should be used in your site design.
As a reader browses your site, they should be able to get used to
looking in the same place for your navigation, for your
sub-navigation and for your content. That’s all there is to say
about that.

4. Lower Page Weight is Better

Page weight is the total size of a page on your site in bytes –
code, text and images. Your site’s page weight makes a big
difference to your viewers. Lighter page weight is better for your
readers because the page will download faster. The faster a page
downloads, the faster they will get to the content.

What is Means to be Light

• No large images.
• Fewer images are better.
• Optimize images for the web at no more than 72 dpi
• Use as small an image dimension as possible for the given
  design.
• Use a table td bgcolor attribute or a background-color style
  attribute for solid color backgrounds.
• Make gradients horizontal or vertical (not diagonal) so that
  you can use a small image “strip” and repeat it.

How “Heavy” Should a Web Page be?

Certain studies show that 64K is a good maximum webpage size.
64K is a maximum, however it is still, in my opinion, really big!
The smaller the page, the better. 25K is good, 15K is even better.
There is a balance between design and function. It is a good idea
to focus more on function.

Try putting pages on your web host server as you build your site
so you can test it as you go. For pages online, you can test the
page weight at www.quasarcr.com/pageweight/ to be sure you are on
track.

Ways to make pages lighter:

• Use linked style sheets
• Use DIVs instead of TABLEs where possible
• Use simple repeating backgrounds for effect

Summary

Visitors to your website should be able to find what they are
looking for within about three clicks. Search engines should be
able to navigate easily through your site. Making a site easy to
read with consistent page design, and easy to navigate will make it
easy to find information. When people can find information, they
are more likely to refer your site or link to it – which is exactly
what you want to encourage. You will be on the way to building a
readable and hopefully successful website that is loved by search
engines if you follow these principals.

Author Bio
Nicholas LaPolla has been a web applications developer for 11
years. He created AcmeWebResources.com to help others build or
improve, market, and monitize their websites with a focus on
web design, website seo /
internet marketing, and working to make money online.

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