Tuesday, November 8, 2011

How to Create a Web Design that Complements your Content

If a web design doesn't support the content it is presenting, then it is failing at the most basic level. The most successful web designs meld seamlessly with the written, graphic and audiovisual content on the page, giving a harmonious effect that is much more striking and appealing than other sites.

Your site layout and content need to share the same purpose and need to work together to achieve this purpose. If you can create a web design that complements your main message then you are well on your way to building a strong and effective online presence. You should use your layout and graphics to emphasise the most important content on every page of your site. This can be done with contrasting, shading, typography and the effective use of colour and symbols.

You should also consider carefully the best way to present your content through your web design. Not all content is best delivered through text, whether it is formatted in bullet points or paragraphs. When creating a site for children, for example, you could consider creating an interactive audiovisual introduction to your site.

If much of your content will be delivered through text, then typography will be an important factor in the presentation of your site. There are thousands of different typefaces to choose from, so there is no excuse for not finding one that complements your content perfectly. The font that you use in your web design can greatly affect the tone of the content that your users read. Quite serious text, for example, might be read in a funny, joking and even offensive way if put in the wrong typeface.

Monday, October 31, 2011

Common Web Design Mistakes That Can Make Your Website Impair

Designing a website may seem interesting to experiment with innovative ideas, but truly speaking there are a lot many things that has to be taken care. Online market is very competitive these days and to succeed in this domain your website has to reach the perfection.

For this, there are few common mistakes that have to be avoided. The first mistake that most of the designers do is not clearly outlining the nature of the business and the services provided online. The purpose of the website must be clear to the browsers right that the first page, which is likely to encounter. If it takes more than few seconds to understand about the website, you may lose potential customers within seconds.

Second mistake that is often committed by inexperience web designers is the use of tacky and conflicting color schemes. Using flashy and multiple themes make your website look amateur. Besides, such uses color schemes distracts the users from the content and creates disinterest of the viewers. Hence, use color in moderate.

Third mistake is not taking content seriously. Content is the king of a web site and has to be used to clearly define the business. Make small and multiple paragraphs. Secondly, the texts must be readable to the users, so avoid using excessively small font size. Using blinking or scrolling texts is also not good sign of a professional web design.

These were just a few to mention. There are similar many more web design mistakes that instantly dip value of a website. Avoid those and get an ideal website to grab potential customers.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Are You Following The Right Web Design Principles?

For creating an effective website, web design has a major role. A true web design makes a website useful and attractive to the viewers. Besides, it also determines the rate of traffic hits your site. Hence, it is important that the right web design principles are followed. These principles guide you to focus on the primary objective and frame a platform for viewers where they can get their required information effortlessly.

The basic principle to obtain such website is to keep the web design as simple as possible. Do not clutter the webpage with extra effects, like bulk of large images, graphics, colorful fonts and vivid background. Over done web designs takes ages to load and also distract viewers’ attention from the primary focus. Besides minimizing the extra effects, also increase the uses of white space in the page. White space gives the sense of spaciousness and keeps the viewers focused on the content. Browser computability is another important aspect that cannot be ignored. While designing a website it is important that your site is browser compatible. It should look good in every browse, presently in use.

Decoration is the secondary factor and need to taken in consideration only if the primary objective is fulfilled. The primary objective of any website is to attract the viewers’ attention towards the services and items the website provides. Remember, viewers will strike your site to get information and not get entertained with your web design. Hence, adopt the principle of simplicity and get an ideal web design.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Why Are Font Choices so Important in Web Design?

If you have done any research into web design or even just talked to a designer, you may have come across the minefield of a design issue that is typography. The finicky attitude web designers take to choosing font types and sizes can be baffling for many people, as typography is often the last on their list of specifications, if it is included at all. Indeed, font choices seem at first to be a small issue, compared to larger features such as layout, background and imagery.

Font is vitally important to the success of a web design, however, because of its subtlety and unobtrusiveness. Most sites still include a much higher proportion of text than image content, meaning that the font you choose will cover the majority of your site.

Although it is recognised that viewers generally take note of visual elements before reading the text on a web design, the main heading on a web page is usually the first element we consciously analyse, and is key in determining whether we stay on the page or move on to the next tab. The font choice used on a site has a subtle, but pervasive effect on how the viewer reads the content.

Besides this effect, typography choices also have a significant effect on the versatility and accessibility of a web design. Websites are read and decoded not only by humans but also by web browsers and all manner of viewing devices.

Some fonts are carefully developed for specific use in web designs, ensuring that they are clearly readable at a variety of sizes and on a multitude of screens. Using these well-designed fonts is therefore important to improving your web design.

Friday, July 29, 2011

Why you need web design professionals?

Your website appearance and its ability of being user-friendly play a great role to make a better online business. It is very important that how you present your product or services online to your clients or customers. The more you are presentable with your website the more clients you will grab. Certainly, here your web design capabilities have to be enough strong to compete with tough online marketing.

Designing a website is not worth until and unless you do not get better remarks. This is only possible if you are doing it in a professional way. When you are on your way to make your website attractive and more user-friendly, of course you would look for perfection. At this point of time you must get a professional help. Many people prefer to design their website using their own skills, but truly speaking doing it yourself might not work as better as professional website design.

Often people find hiring a web designer quite expensive and beyond their budget. However, it is always advisable to approach professionals for web design. Let us take a look why you need to get professional help.

  • Web design firm offers a number of diverse, finished web sites to their customers for review. So that they can get a better idea of how it will actually works for their website.
  • Professionals from web design firm outline a plan of action for creating an effective site, start to finish.
  • Such firms conduct research regarding your competition in the market and then proceed for further processing.
  • They basically focus on highlighting the features, benefits and value of your product or services provided by your website.
  • Many web design firms offer design along with required services such as hosting and domain name registration. Ideally, all web design companies are full-service firm, which offer search engine optimization services along with basic hosting and domain registration according to your needs.
Focus on determining other key lines of business by doing research, so that the process of site expansion becomes seamless as your business grows. When you get to experience such ease and overwhelming response of your clients, all your expenses becomes a real worth.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Defining Web Design

The term 'web design' describes the process of creating websites, or more generally, designing content to be held online. Any website designer will tell you that the discipline is highly specialised and presents very different challenges compared to more traditional design practices. But what exactly does web design really involve and how is it different from other areas of design?

Generally web design involves the design of a website, including the presentation of information and user interface, but not including the programming of the 'back-end' of a website. As such, website design focuses primarily on the visual presentation of a web page and layout of a web page. Although there are plenty of exceptions to this rule, and many web designers who believe it is necessary to be able to control the entire production of a website, including programming.

The web design process is largely identical to any other design process, as it involves meeting the needs of a client with a design that successfully blends aesthetic form and functionality. A successful website design can be judged in the same way as print design, or even fashion design is: by asking whether the final product accomplishes its purpose (whether that be covering the body or making a sale online) and is attractive to its intended audience.

Web design varies from other disciplines of design, however, as the web is a relatively new medium and is developing with increasing rapidity. Web design constantly has to adapt to demanding new browsers, smaller and smaller viewing devices, and developing marketing opportunities such as social media. Web design is a unique and exciting practice and offers great opportunities in business innovation.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

What are the top web design trends for 2011?


The world of web design is constantly developing and each New Year brings both challenges and opportunities for web designers and developers alike. Keeping up with advances in technological devices and software products often requires rethinking of traditional formats of web design. From 2011 and onward, web design must not only consider display compatibility for desktop and lap top computers, but also must take into account the particular demands of smart phones, iPads, Blackberries, tablets and other mobile broadband devices. For this reason, many of the top web design trends to emerge in 2011 reflect an awareness of the need for functionality across a range of various display options.
One of the key trends in web design for 2011 is a tactic that never goes out of style – keeping it simple. Simplicity has become even more imperative as people are increasingly viewing websites on smaller screened devices. Brief text in a clear font, on a plainly coloured backdrop, will always be easy on the eye. That doesn't mean that your web site should only use black and white, but try to limit your colour scheme to no more than three colours in varying shades. This is not simply a suggestion for 2011, but a good rule of thumb year in year out.
As we've already seen, 2011 web design must be compatible with multiple view ports. Building a website primed for mobile devices is crucial for this year and beyond and has contributed to the popularity of single-page website layouts. These web designs take a minimal approach and remove everything that is superfluous, leaving only information that is absolutely necessary. This allows site visitors to immediately view everything that is available on the website before they click to open links to any of the items they are interested in which takes them to more specific and detailed pages.
Another trend in web design that is related to the increased popularity of mobile platforms is the preparation of two versions of a website where the mobile version displays an option to visit the original version of the website. It's been predicted that smart phones will overtake computers in sales for 2011, so if your website is not optimised for mobile viewing options this year, you in serious trouble.
Finally, websites prepared in 2011 must reflect the trend toward touch screen devices. Some desktop computers, as well as all smart phones and tablets operate exclusively with touch screens so current web designs are shifting away from mouse-based navigational systems and becoming more fingertip friendly.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

How to design a REALLY BAD website

5 top offenders when it comes to BAD website design.

1. Slow Load
There is nothing more infuriating than a flashy home page that takes forever to load. Who’s got time to sit there and watch it load line by line or wait for the fuzzy picture to become sharper? Personally I’ve got better things to do than donate my time to a company that doesn’t think my time is valuable. So all those web design bells and whistles may well be wasted if it can’t load efficiently.

2. Font Size
Nothing makes me feel older than leaning forward to my laptop and squinting to read font. And hear this, I don’t like feeling older. You shouldn’t have to work hard to decipher a message so please keep your font size readable by the unaided human eye. If you think you need to make your font smaller to fit your text in then you’ve probably got too much text! Conversely, ENOURMOUS font size can look like you don’t have much to say. Yes it’s a fine balance but one that need to be struck.

3. Contact Details
Do you know I was checking out a website the other day for a product I really really wanted but do you think I could easily find their contact details? Yes eventually I found them but not without frustrating navigation where I almost gave up. And then their contact phone number was only expressed in those numeric and alpha combinations (e.g. 1300 RINGME) and though I’m quite capable of dialling from this format it made me think about those who perhaps are not (e.g. elderly). Contact details are important not just as a means of contacting a company but also to validate and legitimise their location and existence.

4. Pulling Up a Blank
Yay! I’ve googled, I’ve found a website that looks like it is what I want, and I’m navigating and have found a page that looks like it is exactly what I’m after, I navigate there and get the message “No Information Available”. Please don’t tease me and waste my time. If you don’t have it, you don’t have it and if it’s not ready yet, then don’t ad it to your website until it is!


5. No Go Logo
Please don’t stick with that dated logo just because your Grandma and Uncle Jim came up with the idea just before she departed this earth. Your logo needs to be eye catching and pleasing and in sync with your branding and website design. An unintentionally 70’s style logo just doesn’t work with that slick, professional financial planning website you’ve just signed off on.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

How to choose the best web design for your eCommerce website

Have you recently decided to turn your hobby into a money-making business and are looking for a low-cost method of marketing your product? Maybe you run an established retail company and want to turn your web traffic into profits by establishing an additional online store?

Either way, you’re going to need to start considering which will be the best style of web design to guarantee that your new ecommerce website is a flying success.

As with any web design, there are two main choices when establishing an online presence for your ecommerce business. Many web design companies offer cheap and basic templates for online store sites. Although these may seem to be the most economical option for getting your online business immediately up and running, you should also consider custom web design companies that will produce an online store that has exactly the right colour scheme, graphic style and purchase features to put forth a professional and unique image of your company. After all, don’t you want your potential customers to feel that they can trust you and your products? The last thing you would want is for them to instantly judge your business as cheap and generic which is exactly the impression template web design can lend to a page.

When choosing a web design for your ecommerce website, it is also important to select one that can be easily modified to accommodate future developments of your business, which is another advantage of choosing customised web design. Your ecommerce website design should include the capacity to present unlimited products, categories and subcategories, real-time delivery charges and diverse payment methods. You should also be sure that it includes information pages such as ‘About Us’ and ‘Terms and Conditions’, as well as plugins to enable shoppers to share favourite products on social networking sites and blogs.

Of course this is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what kinds of features are currently available in ecommerce web design and nothing beats consulting a professional web design company to ensure that you are making the best choice for your business needs.

Infinite IT Solutions are a quality website design, development and online marketing company that have been producing quality custom designed ecommerce websites for the past ten years. Check out our portfolio to see what we can do for your business.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Logo Design

Consciously or unconsciously, a company logo represents so much about a company. Conscious judgements about a company and their abilities may be made when a prospective client views a poorly designed logo. But judgements may also be deeper seated and lie in unconscious negative associations. A good logo designer will have an in depth understanding of the emotions that various colours, shapes and designs will project and will take the time to understand a company and their visions and design a logo accordingly.

A company logo should not only form a cohesive part of a website but also be part of a larger business concept that takes into account all marketing materials including stationary and signage. In terms of web design, it is important that the logo and web design complement each other. It is surely false economy to put money into a new website design without also considering if your also requires updating.

We’ve all seen well-designed websites, slick and professional with beautiful imagery but where the logo is very ‘70’s’ and clearly the client has insisted that it remain the same. Consciously or not it sends a message to consumer that they are not progressive and are cheap, stubborn, short sighted or all of the above! Yes this could be perceived as a money-spinner but if you are going to sink the money into a great website then the same consideration should also be given to your logo.