Develop A Better Website – Learn From The Pros

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One surefire way to develop a better website is to watch and emulate what the professionals are doing with their sites and blogs.  Fortunately, the pros almost always follow a formula that’s easy to understand.  Here are a few of the more important guidelines…

• Simple & Clean – Eliminate the clutter.  It’s easy to get carried away with website design, but the truth of the matter is that the cleanest, simplest websites are almost always the best.  By providing just the essentials and nothing more, a website is giving visitors space to breathe. 
• Easy To Navigate – Nothing serves as more of a turnoff to visitors than tricky or difficult navigation.  A website or blog menu is not the place to experiment with flashy new graphical techniques.  Pros make menus that are clear and located exactly where visitors expect them to be.
• Readability – It’s important to use standards-based typography and plenty of whitespace.  This means no fancy cursive writing that will undoubtedly distract readers away from the message at hand.  Also, research has proven that using plenty of whitespace keeps readers reading.  This means keeping the paragraph length to a minimum and using sub-headlines to break up the page.
• Accurate Titles & Descriptions – Never promise a visitor one thing and give them another.  While making this mistake is usually not intentional, losing focus of what the reader is expecting can and does happen.  Professional web developers know that giving visitors exactly what they expect is important to building trust. 
• Accessibility – Another benefit of using clean design is that it usually promotes better accessibility.  It’s a good idea to brush up on the latest web accessibility standards to ensure compliance.  By doing this, you’ll be assured that every visitor to your site will actually be able to receive the message it conveys.
• Attractiveness – Keeping a keen eye toward the design process is critical to developing better sites.  Visitors don’t always demand or expect the very latest in graphic design, but they do require a visually appealing, attractive design and layout.  Anything less will serve as a distraction.
• Appropriate Color Palettes – Although beauty is ultimately in the eye of the beholder, in most professional web site instances, it’s best to keep the color palette as neutral as possible.  For example, white backgrounds with black or dark gray text are always easier to read than the occasional dark purple background with fire red text.

Visit a handful of your favorite professional websites.  More often than not, you’ll be able to observe the guidelines above at work.  That’s because web pros know that they work.

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Tags: web development, Website Development, website tips