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By Ruth McIntyre-Williams
There's a lot of websites out there floating around in cyberspace,
screaming for attention. When you cast your site out into the void, will
you be able to catch viewers and hold on to them? Will they click through
- or click off?
You have the content. You have a message. You need to present it in a
professional and attractive manner quickly, before the viewer hits that
return key. A few basic design skills will help you along.
1. The first important step is to provide a CENTER OF INTEREST to catch
the viewer's eye. This can be your logo, a heading graphic, a gripping
photograph. This should be at the top left or center of your site page.
Say you have an online nursery business. You might splash a stunning photo
of billowing red begonias across the top of your page. Right under it you
could have your logo and business name. Or, you could have the logo and/or
name printed right on the photo, just make sure it's VERY legible. Nothing
spoils a photo more than faint unrecognizable smears on it.
2. From your center of interest object, you need to make sure people
quickly see/read what you think is most important for them to know. Don't
put paragraphs of text. They won't bother with it, and may even leave your
site. Think poster. A web page is like a poster. Present information
briefly and design it so the whole poster can be read quickly. To do this,
you need to have EYE TRAVEL. This means planning graphics, tables, or
short text snips to be placed on the page in such a pattern as to lead
your viewers along the page to see what you want them to see without their
making a conscious effort. Remember people read left to right, top to
bottom. This is natural. Make use of it.
And, don't be afraid of blank space!! Did you hear me? Don't be afraid of
blank space! Give your text and graphics room to breathe!
things apart. Make your table cells big. Put in spacers. A star in a
black sky is more visible than the same star in the Milky Way.
3. Unify your site. Use REPETITION. Keep the same background color/image
from page to page. Put your logo on each page in the same place. Use the
same text color from page to page. If you have those billowing begonias on
your index page, use a begonia flower for all your navigation buttons.
Whatever you choose as navigation buttons, use the same ones on each page.
If you use a text graphic for navigation, repeat that from page to page.
Whatever. Repetition is comfortable. It holds the site
together.
4. Of course, the same thing all the time could be boring to the viewer.
So you do need some VARIETY. In www.finmart.com.my
biz advisory vortal, we have used three distinct background colors for Biz
Issues, Industry Analysis and General Information to identify its
relativity. When you introduce variety
into your design, make it logical. Have a reason for it. All of your
navigation buttons could be flowers, different for each section. Balance
out repetition and variety so that your site is unified, but interesting.
5. Be kind to your viewer. Restrain yourself from obnoxious animation. Use
it sparingly and carefully, if at all. Keep the music minimal, if at all.
Make the font big enough to read easily. Contrast the colors of the font
and of the background so that the text shows up clearly. If you use a
splash page, tell the viewer what to do to get into your site.
Good visual design keeps a viewer at your site. It inspires confidence in
your product. Go to a search engine and bring up sites similar to yours
and critique them. Get ideas. Then use them. Be a designer. Make your site
a Presence on the web.
bio info: Ruth McIntyre-Williams holds a Master of Arts in art, and has
been a computer graphics design specialist for the National Park Service.
She is now retired, and does free-lance graphic design. You can check out
one of her websites at www.clovenstone.com |
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FINMART
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