Developing A Website Part 3
In Part 2 I discussed why using some HTML editors is a bad idea. This time, I’ll discuss what you need to consider when creating your place in cyberspace (did I really just type that?).
I’ve been developing websites for a very long time. I’ve seen a lot of changes; audio and video being added to sites, adding the design of a site using an external file, addition of JavaScript (I told you I’ve been doing this a long time). In all this time two things have remained constant- content and navigation.
How you create your site will determine three things; how a visitor finds your site, how long a visitor stays on your site and whether or not someone will like your site enough to link to it.
Content
I’m sure you’ve heard the term “Content is King”. How true that phrase is. A lot of the “O” in SEO is re-writing content, or adding content to a site. If you don’t have any content on your site, then the search engines can’t figure out where you belong in the vastness of the ‘Net, and you won’t rank well.
Search engines are only one factor in the content game. If you have content that is either lacking, or not relevant then your visitors will not want to stay on your site, and they’ll hit the back button, and find a site that has what they are looking for (known as Bounce Rate).
Structure
Equally important is the structure of the site. The site’s structure consists of two things; navigation and page layout. Knowing a few things about typical browsing and viewing habits of people will help you decide what information to put where on the page.
Let’s start with your navigation. How you link your site together will determine how people browse your site. Your navigation should help guide them, but not restrict them. You want the visitor to be able to find what they are looking for easily, and without frustration. There are two links you should always have in your navigation- a link to the home page, and a contact link.
Let’s talk about the actual page structure. Search engines like content that is in book form. In other words your site should be structured using a combination of header tags (in descending order) and paragraphs that contain your relevant content. This will make it easy for the search engines to “read” your page and understand it’s contents, but it will also do the same for your human visitors as well. Really, humans and search engine bots aren’t that different.
Most importantly, you need to take the above advice, and also consider your target audience. For instance, if you have a site that is geared towards sight-impaired people, you would want to use contrasting colors (text vs. background) with larger than normal font sizes. If you have an ecommerce site, you’ll want to stick with a white/light background.
Now if this looks like too much work, or way to time consuming, then come back next time so I can give you some tips to look for when choosing a web developer.
Tags: Pay-Per-Click, website design
