Whether your website is intended for e-commerce or as a promotional site for your business, a good web design is one that is user-centered. For this reason, even before you sit down to plan your web design, you must first identify the kind of users you will have. Know and understand what they want from your website so that you will be able to customize your design for them.

Planning your web design

After identifying the purpose of your website and the specific audience you are targeting, you can now begin to create a rough sketch of the structure of your design to include layout and content. A good idea in planning is the use of wireframes. These allow you to include all the items you want to put into your design. Made of labeled boxes, a wireframe is easy to correct, adjust, rearrange or change. Creating a web design involves a lot of revisions during the design process itself and the testing period. The wireframe also allows some kind of flexibility where changes are necessary.

Preparing your website layout

With your users in mind, keep your layout simple, pleasing to the eyes, readable, accessible and usable.

The simpler a website is, the more user-friendly it is. Complex navigational links only confuse users since most of them only want to click buttons and mouses and sometimes type on keyboards.

The right font size and type makes it easy for visitors look for the information they need. Font size and type should be consistently used throughout the website for uniformity. Unless your website is a fancy one, try to use professional looking font types like Arial, Verdana or Sans-serif. Provide proper spacing between lines to project a semblance of orderliness.

Pleasing every user with the right colors is next to impossible, but you can never go wrong with neutral colors and earth tones with a dash of contrasting shades. For instance, darker shades do make a good contrast with lighter backgrounds and vice versa.

Choosing your graphic design

The graphics of a website enhances its aesthetic appearance that can boost the reputation of the business. It is an effective tool in emphasizing logos and promoting brand name. Graphics encompasses layout and typography by combining colors, text and images to produce a pleasing result. Depending on the purpose of the website, however, graphical enhancements must be used in moderation because some graphics tend to distract users. For instance, too much animation, excessively bold colors or flashing objects may cause users to click away to other sites.

Creating content

Relevant and fresh information is what users are looking for. Learning and understanding what users need and what it takes to satisfy these needs will help you create quality content. When written interestingly, content helps establish credibility. Give more emphasis to the benefits that users get from your product and your website rather than delve on the features. Provide unique write-ups for your product to make you stand out among your competitors.

Content should be located in the right places. It must be equally distributed to all the web pages. Avoid concentrating content in one page as this may bore users. Marketing pitches or calls to action should be positioned in conspicuous places, not in obscure corners.

Testing your new web design

Ask a number of prospective users, friends and colleagues in the industry to test the accessibility and usability of your new design. Sit down with them as they test your design from different computers and browsers to determine what is lacking and what should be improved. Conduct more tests, and some more tests until your website runs perfectly.