Badly designed websites come in several varieties: One of the worst is a page that is text heavy, which reads like “Moby Dick”. Interminable text goes on and on demanding perseverance to get to the good parts. “Computer eyes” tire way before they get to this point. This is not to say that a page of heavy text is not appropriate for the web! Rather, the web can be a very effective way of delivering information that is printed, and then read. It is said that “reading” webpages is 25% slower than on paper.
Another variety of bad design is graphics heavy: extensive graphics not only take a long time to download, but can obscure your message. Often little ditsy graphics blinking and bouncing across the screen distract the reader. Banners (advertisements?) which have nothing to do with the content similarly overwhelm or obscure the message. Confusing images mislead the browser, confusing where to go in the website for more information, or leaving you in a limbo of irrelevant information. Often graphics take an inordinate time to download, and a long download time yields impatience. The end result: viewers move on.
- The topic, its main idea, and its conclusion
should be immediately visible, locatable, or knowable - Ideas rule structure
main ideas at the “top” of the screen;
supporting and secondary information below - Structure of the content and the website
should be readily recognizable to your visitor - Simple constructions are best;
limit one idea to a group of words, whether sentence, phrase, paragraph - Avoid technical terminology
unless you clearly and intentionally have its purpose in mind and definition available - Data, detail, and complexity
are subjects for subsequent pages and should be logically placed - Each subsequent page’s content
should be apparent by its link, and consistent with its predecessor - Detailed information
can be accessed through links for printing - Edit out the superfluous
no matter how clever if it detracts from your message - Spell check,
then have your pages independently proof-read - Always focus on your message.
Invite feedback with a “mailto” for comments, suggestions, questions to enhance the effectiveness of your website; ignore (don’t respond to or waste your time on) idiotic responses - Formatting:
- Each page should be consistent in design
- Use a table, one row/one column, to center your text in the monitor’s display (80% or so) to create margins left and right
- leave white space between paragraphs to enhance readability
- The use of graphics can:
- reinforce text
- elaborate on text
- highlight text
- replace text
- be meaningless and distracting (not!)
