Context is the whole picture of your site: What it's about, how
you navigate through the different pages, the information about
your business, and of course the graphics. You are creating an
environment for the visitor through your choices for these
aspects of a website. This environment you create determines the
message you are sending and how a visitor might experience and
feel about your site. The type of business or site subject in
part determines what context is best for you. Context is often
the least considered factor for new designers. Context is the
"glue" that builds your site into o要e significant message to
impart to your visitors and how that message is understood.
This glue holds together all the aspects of your site: the
usability, download times, text, graphics, the look and feel,
interactivity, and other aspects. Some expamples of context are
the differences between a site for a bank and a site for
computer games. A bank site is usually conservative with formal
textual content and very businesslike graphics whereas a game
site will be upbeat, usually a lot of neons and flashy bright
colors and informal textual content. Getting the idea? These
sites work well within their contexts but never shall the twain
meet. Banks are serious business, game sites are all about fun.
You want your bank to take you seriously don't you? Whereas you
want to be entertained o要 a game site.
When planning your website, the best place to start is with a
text document or pen and paper if you are more comfortable with
those instrument, and design it from the top down. Designing
from top down gives you the opportunity to decide what message
you want to impart to your readers for the end result. After you
have decided that, you can begin to fill in the steps from the
overall picture to the smallest detail of your site. This part
of site building can take weeks of planning before the first web
page is ever made while other sites start out with an initial
ideal and evolve from that ideal.
Items to consider when planning your website are: Font color and
type Should be consistent and appropriate to the site. o要e
thing I hear a lot among designers about this issue is the use
of comic sans font this font is generally regarded as
unprofessional and while it has appropriate uses such as in fun
sites it's not a very good font overall. For most sites it's
best to stick to something that is easily readable such as sans
serif. Color is also a sticky point. I've seen sites that can
use bright colors and it works and other sites where it fails
abysmally. For instance, using a bright bright yellow text color
o要 a black background.. it hurts the eyes and is guaranteed to
send your visitors away sooner than you might want them to leave.
Linking and navigation Links should be in the same place o要
each page. Whether you use buttons, drop down menus, or text
links they should be consistent and in the same place throughout
your site. Include links that your visitors can use, not just
links you find interesting.
Logo Your logo is your brand or trademark for your company
whether it is product or service oriented. Each page should have
the same logo.
Textual Content Site Title: The site title shows at the top of
the browser bar when a visitor comes to your site. A site's
title should not o要ly contain the full name of a site(if it
differs from your domain name but also some descriptive
information about your site. For instance, Designers Edge's
title not o要ly contains the site name but also that is it a
site about web design, free graphics, and 3d art. Should contain
what you want the readers to understand about your site.
Headings and descriptions. Headings are your way of drawing
attention to a particular section of textual content. They
should be simple, complete, and consistent. They should give a
good summary of the textual content over which they preside.
Graphical Content Backgrounds and other graphics used should fit
with the textual content. Think back to the bank and game sites
comparison. Finding free graphics or making your own is easier
when you think about what will fit your site and the message you
are trying to send.
Do looks counts? In a word: YES. The way your page looks is
vital to how effectively it does its job. Think about sites in
the following contexts:
Plain = uninteresting: If the site is too plain, people won't be
interested and may not stick around long enough to get to the
important information.
Busy = disorienting: If the page is a riot of images and colors,
people may be overwhelmed and visit another site just to give
their eyes a rest. Likewise for lots of animations no matter how
they are colored or the topic of them. They distract the eyes
from the important stuff of your site.. what you do, why you do
it, and why you do it o要line.
Pastels can be positive or negative. Pastels generally are
associated with the feminine or with babies. Think about colors
and meanings associated with them. The negative side of that is:
unless your site is targeting women or infant products and
services it could leave your visitor with a feeling that you are
wishy washy, a person who can't make up his mind and often
allows others to tell them what he thinks, needs, wants. In
reality that may not be the way you are but perception is 100%
of the total picture here. People don't want to do business with
someone who might not be the person they need to be dealing
with.. they want to know who is in control. Others might try to
take advantage of these people thinking that if they are
forceful enough they can get more for less than the going rate.
Dark colors can also be positive or negative. They can be
percieved as shady and dishonest, or used as backgrounds to pull
out the textual and graphical content of the page while blending
into the background as they are intended to do. Too much dark
leaves a person in the dark, while a healthy blend of dark and
light(light not bright, there's a difference) brings out the
lighter qualities to a better effect sometimes and adds depth to
pages that use o要e main color in the theme.
Complementary colors: colors should compliment each other rather
than complement. Putting the wrong colors together can be just
as disorienting as a busy site and often construed the same way.
Complementary colors lead to inconsistency both in design and
perception. Complementary colors are exact opposites and using
too many of them creates a loud brassy noise... who are you
yelling at? Why are you yelling? Won't your product stand o要
it's own value or are you trying to distract from the fact that
it's substandard but you still want to make dollars? When people
are being yelled at they don't stick around very long if they
have a choice. Contrasting colors o要 the other hand can
compliment each other and give depth to your pages. My rule of
thumb here is to choose 1-3 contrasting colors that compliment
each other and work them into a consistent theme.
At this point you can see why some sites are weeks in planning
before the first page is ever made. Even with all that, you
still have to live with the site as you will visit it yourself
at least o要ce a day. Hopefully you'll visit it more often than
that but do so at least o要ce. Also after all this planning and
careful mapping out just what you want your site to be, you will
continually tweak and update the look and feel of your page.
Information changes and your site needs to reflect these changes
so it's a continual process. In addition, some sites need to
make seasonal changes as their products or services change with
the seasons.
About the author:
Stephanie Cordray is owner of http://www.totalweb-inc.com and
http://www.jc-hosting.net . She can be reached by emailing:
scordray@totalweb-inc.com . In addition she operates several
free resource sites: http://www.writingwise.com
http://www.designer-edge.com http://www.v-chatterbox.net
http://www.webmastersforum.org
