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A BALANCE BETWEEN VISUAL APPEAL & FUNCTION
With the increased use of broadband, many designers have begun to lean heavily on visually stunning formats such as flash, or high resolution graphics. However, without balance, a web site build totally in flash will be overlooked by search engine spiders, as spiders only read code and not embedded elements. This will cause a site to load slowly. Build your key menus and navigational controls in flash or with a 'clean' visual appeal, and have a separate navigation bar towards the top or bottom of the page in plain text with links.
KNOWING YOUR TARGET
You must understand the type of internet viewer you wish to attract. Your web site's credibility should attract your target audience. Determine who your potential consumers are, what they like, how do they think. Design based on what they would find interesting and helpful, not on what you may prefer. This will help viewers stay longer and make them more likely to become customers.
COMPANY REPRESENTATION
Know thyself...It's also important to understand what your company represents, and how this should impact your site design. If you like dark and stylish visual elements, but your web site is about being a balloon artist...you will be misrepresented, and your viewers will find you uncredible. Take a fresh look at your company to see what you are saying about yourself.
FAST LOADING
It is a fact that the average time a viewer decides to stay on a site is 8 SECONDS or less!!! Always keep your total page size for broadband users under 250k and under 100k for dial up users. "Know Your Target". If your products and services are more attractive to a dial up user, keep it simple, and vice versa.
SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION
Your source code and meta tags are king. You want actual text, not images for your search terms in the first 80 lines of code. You also need your meta tags, keywords, and descriptions to be present. Although back links are still the most effective means of page rank, they don't help you much if your page is not enhanced with proper text, meta tags and keywords phrases.
Many designers today spend most of their time in one of two "camps." Either visually stunning, or navigationally strong with no visual appeal. Be both and enjoy great success.
Author: K Mckee
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