Custom Website Design - 7 Steps to a More Professional Website If you are trying to sell a product or service on your website, then it is important to make your site as professional as possible. You might think designing that your own website to look like a professional did so is a rather difficult proposition, ... Do I Need a Web Designer? When business owners decide to take business online, the question always comes up, "Do I need a web designer or can I build my own website?" Both options are very viable, but you need to decide what's best for you and your business. Here's some things to ... What To Ask Your Web Designer If you need a web designer, but have no clue about the typical web design process, I am quite certain that you must be feeling a bit overwhelmed about what to expect. As web designers, we oftentimes have a myriad of roles to fill when working with their ...
10 Tips on designing a fast loading web site
The Number 1 rule that every web designer should follow is to create a fast loading web site. You might have a great design but very few people are going to see it if it takes a long time to load. While designing a web site always think about how long it will take to load. Try out our tips to build a great looking web site that also loads fast.
Minimize the use of images - The key to a fast loading web site is to minimize the use of images. Images do enhance a page but don't make 80% of your web site only images. Instead break it down as much as possible to simple HTML. Notice the popular sites like Yahoo, Google, Ebay, Amazon etc., they have very few images because the load time is more important. Very often simple designs are the best.
Optimize images for the web - Once you have decided on the images that you need on your site, make sure that it is optimized for the web. They should be in the gif or jpeg format. You can also minimize the size of the image by choosing the number of colors you need, from the color palette. The less the colors you choose, the less the size of the image. You can also use online tools like Gif Wizard to optimize your images or to get a recommendation on how to cut down the size of an image.
Use Tables creatively - You can get some great looking designs by using tables creatively . Tables load very fast because it is just HTML code. Tables can be used in the homepage, menus or anywhere you like.
Cut down the use of animated gifs - Don't use animated gifs unless it is necessary. Animated gifs take a long time to load and can also be very irritating. But since they catch your attention you could use small animated gifs to draw a visitor's attention to a particular section of your site.
Design simple icons - Instead of using big, bulky images use simple and small icons that add a little color and draw the attention of a visitor.
Use background images instead of big images whenever possible - Use background images whenever possible. This is usually a very useful tip for headers and footers. Instead of using an image of width 580 which is a uniform design you can use just a part of that as a background fill. This reduces the size of the web page as the image is small. The code will look like this :
Try out CSS Styles - Have fun with CSS styles to get some cool text effects. Again, a CSS Style is simple HTML code so it loads very fast. You can create cool rollovers using CSS Styles.
Use Flash sparingly - There seems to be a lot of hype about Flash but I recommend that you minimize the use of Flash on a site. Don't make entire sites using Flash. It may look great but it takes hours to load and can really put off visitors. If you do want to use Flash use it within an HTML site and make sure it loads fast.
Design most of your site in HTML - As much as possible try to design your site using HTML. You can create great designs by just using HTML code. Use tables, CSS Styles and simple fonts to design your site. Minimize the use of animated gifs, Flash, bulky images etc.
Keep checking your load time - Last but not least, before you decide on the final design of your web site, check its load time on NetMechanic. This site gives you a free analysis of your web site which is extremely useful.
About the Author Rachna is the CEO of Entheos, a Web Design firm, with the vision to expand its horizons to encompass new areas of service on the Web. Rachna is a creative Web Designer with capabilities in Flash, Dreamweaver and ASP. She has written over 50 articles and tutorials on Web Designing and Web Promotion.
Web Design News
Web Design Agency in Nottingham Develops New eCommerce Pacakage PR Web (press release), WA - 4 hours ago Nottingham, UK (PRWEB) November 20, 2008 -- WebCatch are a young, up and coming Web Design Company based in Nottingham UK. They are making an astounding ...
Boston Website Design Professionals Are Over Web 2.0 PowerHomeBiz.com (press release) - 2 hours ago For Boston web Design Company Cosmos Creative Services Boston, sticking to one style is not something that they encourage. Senior Designer for Cosmos Mr. ...
Strategic Web Site and Print Design Service. Let Us Help Your Business DSB Direktoratet for samfunnssikkerhet og beredskap, Norway - Nov 19, 2008 We Will Even Publish Your Site To The Web. Get all the top sites and information for Web Design. Today's Top 5 Offers for Web And Design? ...
Web design firm's span reaches from Dnieper to Danbury Danbury News Times, CT - Nov 18, 2008 ... a city in western Ukraine near the country's border with Poland, got the idea to start the firm while working at another Web design outfit in Stamford. ...
