Websites are continually springing up at an exponential rate. They are a means to provide all sorts of information to readers and potential customers for a business. Because there are so many sites on the World Wide Web, there are some important things to pay attention to when carrying out web design.

The purpose of a website is to be seen and read by the greatest number of people possible; therefore you need to decide who will most likely read the site before you even start to code it. What type of web surfers will be visiting the site and what kind of information will they be looking for? Is the site intended to sell products and services and if so, what type? How old will the typical reader be? Just like an author of articles and books, you need to figure out your intended audience. If you market the site poorly, it will be swallowed up in cyberspace and seen by only a small amount of surfers.

When designing a website, browser compatibility is an important thing to pay attention to. Internet Explorer does not match up with anything beyond XHTML 1.0 Strict or CSS 1. Many web users use this browser, so you will need to make sure that the site fits the format. Resolution is also limited on IE, so be economic with the graphics as well. Alternative browsers don’t have these restrictions, so they will display websites with advanced designs more easily. You have to decide how many people you want to find your site and if advanced coding will hinder the site’s exposure. The only surefire way to determine if the site will properly appear on any given platform is to test it on that platform.

When performing web design, some people forget that there is more to a site than how it looks. Remember that a website will involve quite a bit of text because it is a method for providing information. Ensure that the text is well-written and that it is search engine optimized. Optimization leads to a higher ranking on a search engine’s results page. Make the site easy to navigate as well. If the navigation is convoluted and confusing, surfers will click away from the site, never to return. Basically, make the website user friendly.

Coding and compatibility are obviously important concerns of web designers, but those reading the site will most likely not care about these issues. Just like someone reading a book or magazine is looking for entertainment or information, a web surfer is looking for an end result without considering programming issues. Remember for whom the site is being designed and the rest will follow.

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