Web surfers are basically an impatient bunch and if a website is hard to figure out because the links are not obvious, they will click away never to return. Website navigation is extremely important when it comes to evaluating the effectiveness of a site. The following articles discusses the fundamental principles of designing website navigations.

Site navigation should be simple and make sense to an ordinary person. There is nothing wrong in being creative, but you should notice that all well-designed site have very similar navigation layouts.

Keeping in mind the purpose of the site and the intended audience is crucial when designing navigational elements. Majority of sites either inform about products and services or sell them. Therefore there are some basic guidelines to follow:

Make sure all navigational elements are clearly links by using standard conventions for links such as buttons, menus, underlining the text or changing color on mouse. Another important thing is that you do not use too clever or unclear names for links.

When using non-standard links make sure you tell the visitor that it is a link. For instance, you are developing a website with a map showing some different cities and you would like the visitor to click on the city name and learn more about that city. Remember to inform the users that in order to get more information on that city they have to click the city name.

Remember the “Three Click Rule” which is used by the majority of web designers. Most internet users won’t click more than three links to get to the information they are looking for. Do not forget to make sure that every page on your site can be accessed with the maximum of three clicks.

I do not recommend using a flash movie or other type of splash page on your website. Remember to keep your site design simple but attractive. But if you wish to have one, remember to also use META REFRESH tag to take the visitor automatically to your home page and provide a clickable and easy to spot button so that the visitor is able to skip the entry page and can go directly to your home page, as if you do not do it a great percentage of people will leave your site and never return. Remember that internet users mostly look for information and not entertainment.

 

Navigation Element Locations

Top Menus – a top of the page menu bar is usually located directly below the page header graphic that contains the site logo. The item vary from single links to expanding menus to drop down menus. Each item in the menu can be represented by either graphic or just plain text. Whatever option you choose, you need to make sure that you associate a hyperlink with each and every element so that the visitor can click it and get to the information described by the element.

Left Side Navigation – it is usually a column or text area on the left top area of the page. Similar to the top menu, items here can be either single links or expanding menus.

Right Side Navigation – not used really often, but if used, it is implemented as either a column or text area in the top right section of the website. This area is usually used for advertisement and rarely for site navigation.

Bottom Menus – bottom menus can be either a menu bar or footer. Only text links are used with footers while with menu bars it is either graphics or text links.

 

Important Navigation Elements

Internal Page Links – Every page on the website should be within two or three clicks from the home page. Make sure that the visitor can reach all the important pages with just ONE. The kind of website will influence which links should be displayed in a prominent way.

Login Boxes – they should be clearly displayed on the website. The most common location for these items is top left or right or inside the page header.

Shopping Carts – if you use it on your site make sure that a view cart button is clearly displayed on each page. The most popular location is the top right below the header or inside it.

Order Buttons – these should be fairly large and easily visible. In general, the less clicks it takes to access your sales page, the more orders to will receive.

Breadcrumbs – they tell you where you are on the site using a graphical representation. Their most common location is the top left below the header. Every word links back to the previous page. They are in the form

Home-> Articles-> Marketing

External Links – external links can be used anywhere but are most frequently used inside the text areas on a website. They can link to recommended products, more information on the other sites or to anything else.

Advertisements – most often they are banners or text with a hyperlink. You can place ads anywhere on the page and it includes under the header banner, directly above the footer, right and left margins and inside the text areas. It has been shown that “above the fold” are usually more successful.

(“Above the fold” refers to the area of a page which can be seen without having to scroll).)

Downloadable Items – if you offer downloadable items such as audio, video or pdf files, make sure that you tell the user haw big the file is and whether they need an application to use the file. If they do an application, provide a link to the application. When offering pdf files, do not forget to place a link to the free Acrobat reader.

Site Map – it is a great way to layout your complete website to your visitors. (Search engine spiders are also fond of it).It is simply a list of all the pages of your site with a hyperlink to each page.

Summary

A good navigation system can increase the numbers of pages viewed by each visitor. This in turn can increase signups, customers, sales, members or whatever it is your site is designed to do and make your website more successful.