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How Important is it For Your Webpages to Look Right?

By G. Hilliard

Reading Composition

As humans that are trained to read and write expect to see reading medium laid out the way we are taught. Granted, there are written languages throughout the world that have variations of reading formats that differ from the known Western standard of reading left to right and top to bottom, but when it comes to International transmission of messages via the Internet, even people of multi-lingual backgrounds are taught that the English language and the Western reading style is a standard.

If you are making your own website, regardless of your purpose, there are a few things you’ll need to apply to maintain comfort for your audience when they visit your website.

1) Use the English Language: Mainly as the primary base for your web page language, unless your website is specifically directed to a particular audience culture. Even if you “market” your website to a specific audience, if it is on the Web, it’s going to be seen by anyone. Keep your web pages readable with a universal language.

2) Web page composition: This is tricky because the format of the page will need to accommodate the content of the web page. Since there are so many varieties of web page layouts that can be used to create the over all look of the web site, sticking with a standard composition instead of experimenting would be your best bet. The “standard layout” is something you see most of the time, which makes it easy to find usable components of a website. The “Header” will always be across the top. The “Navigation” should be easy to find either across the bottom of the header or vertically to one of the sides of your web pages. The “Footer’ should always be on the bottom and the “Body” is what you want to have in the center of each web page.

• The “Header” is usually a logo and title for the website which may include a decorative image that is the most predominate feature of your web pages. Think of it as a “branding image” for your web site. It is a good idea to use the same Header for all of your web pages and a hyperlink in your header image to link back to the first page of your web site. One of the main reasons for this is that search engines may pull up one of the pages of your website because it contains a specific set of words. If someone lands on that page they can easily reference your whole website by clicking on it.
• “Navigation or the navigation bar” should be very easy to find with the topic title of each of your pages listed. This particular feature needs to be graphically identifiable by appearance and not to be similar to any other hyperlinks that you may put on your web pages. What ever navigation element you chose to use for your landing (first) web page, you should use the same look in the same location for all your other web pages. Remember, if you invite people in to see your home, put things exactly where they expect to see them or they will be uncomfortable and leave. Think of it this way, If you walk in your neighbor’s home and all of the furniture placed in every room is on the floor in a corner and then you enter the kitchen and you see a lawn chair attached to the middle of the ceiling, would you feel comfortable being there?
• The “Body” is the context or your written message, you want to keep this as close to the middle of your web pages as much as possible. Of course, if you chose to use a sidebar navigation element or have advertisements on one side of your web pages, your body will need to be shifted to make room for this. The best thing to do when you have to split your pages between advertisements and body context is to shift your body to the left of the page and make it two-thirds the size of the space you will dedicate for your ads and navigation element. Remember, people learned to read left to right, so start your context that way to make the context seem more natural for reading. Even though your body context may be mixed between text and pictures, the position of it needs to be in the same place on every page.
• The “Footer” is the lowest part of your web page. If you look on many professionally made web pages, you’ll see the footer contains links to the privacy policy, information about the business, copyright information, FAQs and contact information or link. This information needs to be in the exact location on every single page of your web site. Most people that are designing personal web sites usually just have a copyright symbol, name of the web site, year and maybe a contact link in this location.

3) Use of Pictures: Images make any web site more attractive, but the use of too many could easily make your website look like a woman with way too much make up on. It is a rookie mistake to add an abundant of images to their web pages when they are designing their first web site. Even if you have a photography web site, it is better to categorize your images using a single link and then hyperlink to a page on your website that uses thumbnail images that will hyperlink to a larger image (ex. Landing page: image subject: Animals>hyperlink>web page named “Animals”: thumbnail image listing of animals>hyperlink>larger image of each image when clicked on).

• Another thing you need to understand about images is that it takes much longer to upload on a visitor’s computer than text. You want to economize your web site’s load time so your visitor wont become frustrated and leave before they enter the door. You can see a image’s size by right clicking on it and looking at “properties”. You really want to stay away from images that require a lot of megabytes on your web pages. Try to use links when you can and keep images at a maximum of 3 in the body of your web pages. /li>

4) Advertisements: Be mindful of any advertisement banners you chose to use also. As much necessity it may be for you to use them to make a little extra money, you can easily lose a reader if they become too overbearing. Try to place heavily colored banners and ads on the bottom of your web pages above the footer. The effect of someone staying on your website to read your context should be more important than looking at glaring advertisements.

Conclusion

Designing your on web site is really a trial and error experience. Choosing the right colors, fonts, design elements and even content material will be difficult at first. Don’t be discouraged or expect to get it right on you first attempt. Expect your web pages to go through an evolutionary process as you begin to discover better ways to present things. My solid advice is If you remember to stay with the basic elements that people have been acclimated to seeing, you will have a good place to start.

Original Article written by G Hilliard

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What to Expect From a Content Management System

By D. J. Millard

A Content Management System, or CMS, is a great way to build a website. If you are considering having a website built for you using this system, then this article is written for you. If you are considering building a website for someone else using a CMS for the first time, then you may find some useful suggestions here, but it is really written from the user’s perspective so you may find another of my articles, “Properties of a Good Content Management System” more useful.

What a CMS is and what it isn’t

A CMS is essentially a content editor that allows users to change the content of a website without any special or technical knowledge, with nothing more than a web browser and from anywhere in the world. The system works by using in effect just one or two pages and adding content to them from data stored in a database. Navigation is usually created automatically, and different levels of access can be granted to different groups of users. What a CMS is not is a “web-builder” that allows individuals to “drag and drop” elements into a framework to create a simple website.

What will a CMS allow me to do?

If you have never used a CMS before, you are in for a treat! Simply put, a CMS lets you edit the content of your website yourself. Depending on the permissions you have been granted, you could:

• Add new pages
• Delete existing pages
• Edit pages
• Re-order pages
• Add pictures, sound, video or other content
• Change the look of the website
• Re-order items on a page
• Add or remove news items

In short, a CMS will allow you to make your website your own. You may work for an organization that uses a website, possibly a company Intranet, built using a CMS. If this is the case you will be able to generate your own fresh content whenever it is suitable and without waiting for a technician to get round to it.

You might have to have the content sanctioned by a line manager or other superior before it is published, and you almost certainly will have a set of rules to adhere to when writing content, but apart from organizational restrictions you should find the freedom this system gives you a refreshing change.

Adding text

Many people unfamiliar with content management systems are worried that they might find difficulty in writing for a website, but Google says you should write for human beings, not search engines, so you should write as you would do normally. Most CMS have a fairly sophisticated text editor a bit like a mini word processor that will allow you to type right in the window or paste from another program like Microsoft Word. This is a great advantage as it means you won’t have to duplicate content you have already.

Text can be formatted in the usual way – like bold, italic and underline – and you can change the font face and size, the indentation and also the style, for example Heading 2 or paragraph text, from a drop down menu in most editors. Some will also allow you to insert pictures, and others allow the inclusion of code for things like adverts.

Including Images

One of the things that makes the web such a vibrant place is the graphical capabilities modern browsers have. Pictures and video are commonplace online and if your CMS has the appropriate functionality, you can add these too.

One type of text editor lets you edit images right there in the window. You can alter the size to fit a particular area of the page, change the resolution so that the page loads quicker and even crop away some redundant parts of an image. As a general rule of thumb, no image on your page should exceed 20KB in size, and the total of all your images should not be more than 200 KB per page.

Saving changes

Don’t forget to save any changes you make, otherwise the site will not be updated. Most CMS have an option to save any editing so far but to leave the page open for more, usually called “Apply” and another that saves and closes the page in one operation. When the page is saved you normally get a notification that the database has been updated so you know it is OK.

About the author
D. J. Millard is a Microsoft Certified Trainer based in the UK. He holds a degree in Education and is a college tutor in the south of England. He is also a web developer and publisher, and the Managing Director of Netresult Training http://www.netresulttraining.com

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By Beatrice Thomas | November 25, 2009

When it comes to your website, special attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally to serve its use. Here are five main rules of thumb to observe to make sure your website executes well.

1) Do not use splash pages

Splash pages are the first pages you see when you open a website. They generally have a very beautiful image with words like “welcome” or “click here to enter”. In fact, they are just that — beautiful vases with no real intention. Do not let your visitors have a reason to click on the “back” button! Give them the value of your internet site up front without the splash page.

2) Do not use unreasonable banner ads

Even the least web savvy people have educated themselves to neglect banner ads so you will be wasting valuable web site actual estate. Instead, offer more valueable subject and weave relevant associate links into your message, and let your visitors feel that they desire to buy rather of being pushed to purchase.

3) Have a easy and perfect navigation

You have to offer a easy and very direct navigation menu so that even a young youngster will know how to use it. Stay away from complicated Flash based menus or multi-tiered dropdown menus. If your visitors don’t know how to navigate, they will leave your internet site.

4) Have a clear indication of where the user is

When visitors are deeply engrossed in surfing your website, you will need to make sure they know which part of the web site they are in at that moment. That way, they will be able to surf pertinent information or navigate to any section of the internet site easily. Do not confuse your visitors because confusion means “abandon ship”!

5) Avert applying sound on your site

If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your internet site, reading your subject, you will want to make sure they’re not upset by some audio curling on and on on your internet site. If you assert on adding sound, make certain they have some control over it — loudness or muting controls would work adequately.

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