Web Design Essentials

August 19, 2009 by Ed McLaughlin 

In today’s world, an 11-year old can design a website. That’s good news – it means that everyone has access to the tools necessary to build a site. And those tools keep getting better and better.

The bad news is that greater access doesn’t translate into better design.

When I was in graduate school, I was the first person in my class to incorporate graphics from the Internet into PowerPoint (insert laughter here). At the time, that was a big deal. I stood out from the crowd (for a few days, anyway) not because I did something great, but because I was first. Once everyone realized they had the tools necessary to raise their game, that’s exactly what they did.

You need to do the same thing with your website.

Remember – the purpose of your site is to:

  • Sell (visitor buys; relevant only to ecommerce companies)
  • Interact (visitor provides you with an email address or requests additional information)
  • Promote (your site tells story, which helps the visitor envision how you could solve a problem important to them)

With that in mind, the following rules are unbreakable:

  1. Keep it simple. Don’t use the site as an information dumping ground. Minimize copy; don’t create fifteen pages when five will do. If you can put your site onto single page, do it.
  2. Make it clean. Don’t clutter; maximize white space.
  3. Have an even tone. Don’t swing from one voice to another. Know your story and stick with it.
  4. Sexy is nice, but unnecessary. The availability of design tools makes it easy for folks to get carried away with cleverness (flash, etc). If clever interferes with your story, you’ll send visitors elsewhere to find solutions to their problems.
  5. Have a vision. Don’t even think about making decisions by committee. Doing so guarantees you’ll end up with something watered down and useless. Leave that to the large companies.

Need inspiration? My favorite source for design is Smashing Magazine. There you’ll find showcases, how-tos, and tons of freebies. And five minutes on their site is all it takes for you to realize how high the bar has been raised.

Don’t fall too far behind.

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