Author: Tim K

Web design Santee is no longer about writing ingenious lines of code. Designers have to think beyond the layout part. They have to consider search engine optimization, mobile-friendliness, load speed and so much more. If you are planning on working on your first website, there are a couple of things you must consider looking at. In this article, we will be taking a look at the top qualities that distinguish the best websites from the rest.

Solid domain name
The domain name is the address of your website. If visitors are not able to remember or type it correctly, they will get lost and that will lead to lost business. The .com addresses are the most common. You must resist the urge of adding hyphens if your preferred .com domain name has already been taken. You just need to be a little creative. The rule of thumb here is to pick a domain name that is easy to remember and type.

Clear identity
As a web designer Santee, your main task has to be creating a clear identity. The last thing you want is to have a website with an obscure title or logo. Designs that are cluttered with ads will distract your audience. The point you have to remember is that you don’t need a lot of buzzwords to create an impression. Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. Cut to the chase and get to the point.

Visible contact info
After agreeing with what you are selling, buyers will want to contact you. If your contact details are obscure, you will lose business. Your contact information should be easy to find and use. Make sure your contact forms are working properly and that the telephone and email contacts you provide are working. Visitors should be able to find your contact information on every page. That makes it easy for them to reach you.

Good navigation
The navigation of your website is basically the GPS of your website. It is what helps visitors find their way around your site. A great web design Santee will have a clean and straightforward navigation.

Great content
The only reason why people keep coming back to your website is because of the great content on it. If your content is written in poor grammar or if it is copied or of no benefit to the audience, chances of getting repeat visitors will be reduced to zero. Your content is also what impact search engine optimization. Make sure you add authority links and link to your social media profiles.

Testimonials
Last but not least, you need to create room for testimonials. Testimonials help win the hearts of new customers. Incorporate them in your web design Santee.

A lot more goes into web development but the above are the most important. As a web designer Santee, you need to keep up with the trends in order to remain relevant.

Web design Santee

Web designer Santee can help you achieve just anything in web development. The one thing you need to understand, however, is that not every designer out there will help you hit the goals you are aiming for. It is for this reason that you need to be very careful when deciding on the person to work with. Below are some of the top qualities that a good designer should have.

Comes highly recommended
You cannot trust the information on the website of a web designer. You have to dig deeper. The first thing you must do is to talk to people who have worked with the designer before. Were they satisfied with the services rendered? Would they recommend the designer to anybody else? Start with friends then go through online reviews. The more positive reviews a designer has in web design Santee the better.

Takes time to understand your needs
It is one thing to find an experienced designer and completely different story to work with a designer who pushes you around. You are the person with the idea. You just need someone to make those ideas a reality. The web designer Santee you work with must have good communication skills and strive to learn more about your needs before starting work on your project. Steer clear of designers who are never allowed to answer your questions.

Keeps up with the trends
What used to be a great idea a few years ago in the realm of web development is inapplicable today. Rules keep on changing and it is up to your web designer to keep up with them. The designer you use must be familiar with all modern day design rules such as creating a responsive web design Santee and using the right keyword density for the purpose of SEO. The more up-to-date he is with the trends the better.

Has worked on similar projects
If you want to create a web shop, you want to use a web designer who has created web shops before. The reason for this is because designing an ecommerce website is completely different from designing a blog. Each has different requirements. For example, with an ecommerce website, you will need a database. You can get away without a database when creating a blog.

Offers more than web design
The designer should not just offer web development services. You don’t want to have to use different companies to complete a single project. The best designer will offer a collection of services. For example, in addition to web design Santee, he will help with logo design, content writing and online marketing.

Falls within your budget
Last but not least, make sure that you are hiring a web designer Santee that is within your budget. Pay attention to his service fees before giving him the go-ahead.

Web designer Santee

Web design Santee often requires that you keep up with the trends. You cannot be an island. Some of the strategies that proved great a few years ago have already been banned by Google or are no long applicable. In addition to keeping up with the trends, you will also need to pay attention to the rules of web design. In this post, we will be looking at the main unspoken rules that you need to follow.

Simplicity is everything
In an effort to stand out from the crowd, it is tempting to a web designer Santee to use complicated web elements. One thing you need to remember is that web development is all about your audience and now how unique you want your website to be. A great web design is one that is simple, easy to manage and neat. Visitors should not have a hard time navigating the website. If they do, they will click away and you will lose valuable leads.

Easy to navigate and read
This point is closely related to the previous one but it is worth looking at as an independent point. When designing your website, you need to ensure that it is easy to read and also easy to navigate. The whole purpose of having a website is for it to be useful to the audience. This will only be possible if it is easy to navigate and also easy to read. Being easy to navigate means that visitors should be able to find certain elements such as the search bar where they are used to finding it on other websites; on the top right side. For navigability, you need to ensure that the text is easy to read and understand. The web designer Santee must also ensure that the color schemes do not cause any obstruction.

Consistency is a must
The last thing you want is for your visitors to feel like they are on a completely new website every time they open a different page on your website. Your web layout and color schemes need to remain the same throughout. You don’t want to lose clients simply because they think they landed on a page created by hackers, do you?

Web design Santee must never be rushed. You need to create a foolproof plan before implementing it. In addition to that, you will need to work with a team of designers who understand what needs to be done. Keeping up with the trends in web design is also important.

Web design Santee

Web design Santee will either make or damage your website. Often times, people make the mistake of creating web designs for themselves other than for their audiences. This is the number one mistake you must avoid at all costs. Your audiences must always come first. Whether you are working on a new website or just need to improve the existing one, the following points will help you achieve the best possible results.

Avoid annoying features
Popups will distract your audiences and push away others. As much as people feel popups are the best tools for boosting subscriptions, they are not. They upset your audience. There are many more annoying features you should eliminate as a web designer Santee. They include auto-play music/videos, requirement to sign-up before accessing the content, having to view advertisement before getting to the desired page and so on. Eliminating the annoying features will do wonders in improving the impact of your website. Never force people into doing things.

Remove poor navigation
How easy it is for your audience to find their way around your website has a huge impact on the success of your website. It is always good to conduct usability tests before unleashing a new web design Santee to the public. If it is hard to browse through your content, you need to redesign your website. You must also never disable the ‘Back’ button in the browser. If you prevent people from going back to the page they last visited, you will lose them forever.

Pick colors with care
Colors add life to your website. However, you must not use just any color scheme. As a web designer Santee, you have to remember that a good number of the public suffer from sight-related problems. Using the wrong colors will make your website unreadable and that will cost you.

Make contact ever-present
The idea of having a website is to funnel new customers to your business. This will not be possible if your audience can’t find the contact information. The contact information should be a click away on every page. In addition to having a contact us page, you should provide your contact information and address on every page.

Invest in great content
Last but not least, you have to invest in great content. That is the only way you will be able to give your audiences a reason to come back. You content should also be presented in a manner that is easy to consume. Make use of bullet points, use simple language and make use of white spaces.

These are just the key rules you need to adhere to as a web designer Santee if you wish to create an impactful website. You should also keep learning more on web development and keep up with the trends.

Web design Santee

Web designer Santee knows that a website must have added functions in order to reach the target audience and meet its objective. Decades ago, the only way of adding more functionality was to code the desired functions into the web design. This is no longer the case. You can add simply any function you need using a plugin. If you are using WordPress as your CMS, you will find that your work as a web designer will be easier thanks to the thousands of plugins that are available. But how do you choose the plugin to install?

Criteria for picking the best plugin
It is very important to have the best plugin installed on your website. The reason for this is because a bad plugin can easily turn your site into a waking nightmare. The wrong plugin can make your website vulnerable to hacking or even cause your site to crash unexpectedly. To find the best plugin to add to your web design Santee, here are some things you should look at.

• Number of downloads. The more downloads a plugin has the higher the chance that it is a stable and reliable plugin. Steer clear of plugins with just a handful of downloads.
• Plugin ratings. The best thing about WordPress plugins is that they are rated by real users. The higher the ratings are the better.
• Strength of support. How much support does the plugin get? A good plugin should be updated regularly and you should be able to get technical support easily.

You will find the above information on the download page of each plugin that you are considering. You should also not forget to consider the credibility of the author of the plugin.

What the plugin should do
While still deciding on the plugin to download, you need to think of what the right plugin should be able to do. A web designer Santee has to consider how the plugin will make his website work. Before you start searching for plugins, define your goals. These goals will help narrow down your search to the ultimate plugin.

Compare
Last but not least, before settling on a plugin, you need to look at what other similar plugins have to offer. The features of each plugin will be found on the download page. You also need to consider what people are saying about the plugin.

The right plugin will improve you web design Santee. Don’t be in a hurry to install one. Be sure that the plugin you are considering is what will give you what you need and in the best way possible. You also need to note that the paid plugins are not always the best.

Web designer Santee

Web design Santee alone will not give you the ranking or traffic you need. What brings more people to your website is your web content. Although creating great content is a choice, investing more time and work required in creating great content will yield great results. Great content will boost your SEO rankings, gain more leads/traffic and boost sales. But how do you create great content? This post strives to help you do exactly that.

Create original content
The first step in creating great content is to create original content. Copying the content on other websites will only serve you for so long. Google and other search engines monitors for duplicate content. If you plagiarize, you risk getting your website banned. Copied content is also repulsive to visitors. As a web designer Santee, you have to make sure that the content you post is not only of great content but also original. Don’t be afraid to hire professional writers to help with content creation. The two rules you need to remember is that you get what you pay for and if something is not useful, it is not worth saying.

Create strong headlines
People are not interested in huge blocks of text. They want content that is easy to digest. In addition to using bullets, white spaces and smaller paragraphs, you must invest in strong headlines. 80% of the people who get to your content will only read the headlines. If the headlines are not interesting, they will click away. The headline of your content is the most important part of your article.

Make the content actionable
Is the content helpful to your target audience? This is the question you need to ask. The easiest way to get high bounce rates is to create content that is irrelevant. You may have the facts but if the facts are inapplicable to your target audience, the content is not worthy placing on your web design Santee. Your content should solve a problem or give advice. If not so, the content should entertain.

Be accurate
There is nothing worse than your audience finding out that you were wrong in your claims or you lied to them. Always note that hundreds of people will read your content and one of those readers will be well versed in what you are talking about. Be accurate in reporting and sourcing of information. You also need to be careful who you link to.

Add images and video
To further enhance your content and your web design Santee, you should add images and videos in your content whenever possible. Images and videos add engagement. Images will enhance the reading experience of your audience.

Make regular updates
If yours is not a blog where you need to post new content several times a week, you should make regular updates. Nobody wants to spend time reading stale content.

The above are the important things you need to do to create great content. As a web designer Santee, you must not be afraid to outsource content writing to the professionals.

Web design Santee

Web design Santee calls for educated decisions. You cannot copy everything that your competitor is doing in web design and expect to get away with it. Success in web development calls for uniqueness. But getting the inspiration you need is hard. If you need a little help in web design, you need to use a platform that offers the support you need. WordPress is one of those platforms. Here are the main reasons why you should consider building your website in WordPress.

Countless themes
As a web designer Santee, the hardest step is that of deciding on the layout to use. Most designers get stuck in this stage. As a result, some even choose to copy layouts used by their competitors. With WordPress, this doesn’t need to be the case. There are so many unique theme out there that you can use for the layout of your website. What is even better is the fact that you can tweak the themes further to match your ideas. There are both free and premium themes available.

Loads of plugins
Even with the layout in mind, deciding on the features to add on your website can be hard. At times, to add certain features, you are required to redesign your website. You also have to spend a lot of time in coding. WordPress plugins are there to save you time when adding features to your website. There is a good chance you will find the plugin that offers the function that you need. There are more than 10,000 plugins for you to choose from. Whether you need photo slideshows or social media sharing, you will find a plugin for that.

Easy to update
One thing you will notice once you create your web design Santee in WordPress is that updating your website will be easy. The core software will be updated for you automatically. That includes the plugins and the themes. Second, adding content on your website is very easy. No coding is needed.

High ranking
If you have been keen on search engine optimization, you may have learnt that Google loves WordPress website. This is because these websites are updated frequently and their content is well structured. As a result, you will notice that your WordPress website will rank quickly when compared to the static website.

Huge support community
WordPress has a huge support community that you can turn to for any help. It is for this reason that more people use WordPress in web development.

As a web designer Santee, you want to use a platform that makes your work easier. WordPress is that platform. All you have to do is create an account on WordPress, buy a domain name and get a reliable hosting service.

Web design Santee

Web design Santee calls for more than using the best CMSs available on the market. Yes everyone can create a website but not everyone can create a website that meets its purpose. If you plan on becoming the best web designer, there are a couple of skills you will have to acquire. Here are the top skills that every web designer Santee must have.

Design software
Whether you are building websites completely on WordPress or coding it from scratch on a notepad, you will still need to use design software. To start with, you will need a good tool to edit your images. You cannot use images as they are. You have to resize and also refine them to get the best appeal. Web design tools, on the other hand, will make it easy for you to fix errors in your code and also make coding easier and faster.

Understand HTML and CSS
Although the web development platforms like WordPress have eliminated the need for coding, for you to be a great web designer Santee, you will have to learn more about HTML and CSS. These are the main languages used in web design. There will come a time when you will have to fine-tune your themes. Your options will be limited if you don’t know anything about HTML and CSS. You should also make the effort of learning more about JAVASCRIPT. The skill will be a valuable bonus.

Time management
Being a web designer means you will be your own boss. When there is no one breathing down your neck, it is very easy to take unnecessary breaks and postpone things. That is why you need to have great time management skills. Whether you want to go freelance or want to work for a design company, to succeed in web design Santee, you must have great time management skills. You need to master the art of prioritizing as well as learn how to track your work.

Communication
You will have to communicate with clients to understand what they are looking for. That is why mustering great communication skills is necessary. If you are not able to communicate clearly with your clients, you will find yourself dealing with loads of revisions and also loosing great clients. Be a good listener and learn how to explain technical terms in an easy to understand way.

Online marketing
Yes your job as a web designer Santee is to create remarkable websites but these websites must also be optimized for online marketing: SEO, social media and among others. This means you need to gain a few skills on online marketing.

These are the key skills you will need to be a successful web designer. Even so, you still need to keep researching. Trends in web design Santee keep on changing. It is your duty to keep up with the changes else you will lag behind.

Web design Santee

Web design Santee determines how attractive your online business is. You have to think of your website as your business premises. If it doesn’t look professional and welcoming, it will cost you clients.  Although creating a web design is much easier today than it used to be a decade ago, there are still a few rules you have to follow.

Simplicity is the key
Putting together too many design elements will only succeed in confusing your audience. This is not something you want to deal with. Having too much on one page will only frustrate your visitors. Frustrated visitors will click away from your site. Simplicity is beautiful. This is something you should strive for as a web designer Santee. Your web pages need to be simple. This will make them easier to use.

Navigation has to be intuitive
There are only a few things that are more frustrating than visitors not being able to find their way around your website. The design of your website needs to be intuitive. Visitors should not guess where the contact page is or other content. They should find all the information they need with ease. This is the key to keeping them longer on your website and getting your point forward. Are the pages well-organized? This is the question you should ask before implementing your web design Santee.

Consistency is paramount
The last thing you want is for your visitors to feel like they are on a new website each time they open a new page. Your web design needs to be consistent. The colors, font types and sizes and the overall design should be the same on all pages. Consistency throughout your website will make navigation easier.

Colors are fundamental
Your choice of colors can make or break your website. There are so many websites out there that are too painful to be on. The colors make it hard for you to read the text and links. This is not something you want for your website. The colors you pick should not clash and they must also have a strong contrast between the background and the text.

Being responsive is a must
Did you know that having a responsive web design Santee will improve your search engine rankings? This is because the likes of Google are giving ranking priority to websites with mobile friendly designs. If your website cannot be viewed correctly on different screens, you will not only impact your ranking poorly but also lose potential clients.

Browser compatibility is necessary
People don’t use the same browsers to access the net. You have to understand that your visitors will have browser preferences. You should then develop a website for multiple browsers.

Errors are unacceptable
Last but not least, as a web designer Santee, you have to make sure there are no errors on your website. A great website can be tarnished by tiny errors. Keep testing your website and fix all the errors. Pay attention to broken links, typos as well as images that don’t load properly.

Web design Santee

Web design Santee needs to adhere to the standards. This doesn’t mean you copy everything your competitor is doing but rather adhere to the industry standards. There are certain elements that visitors expect to find at the same spot. For example, when searching for the ‘search box’, users assume that it is will be on the top part of the web page. Adhering to the standards can make the experience of your visitors better. Here are a few standards you should consider using.

Logo placement
When designing a website, you have to start by designing your business logo. This is because a great website must have the logo and the web elements should match with the logo colors. With the logo in hand, you need to note that most websites have their logo on the top left. As a web designer Santee, you also need to note that the logo is also clickable. Often, clicking on the logo will redirect to the ‘Home Page’.

Contact
Your website must have the contact information. If visitors like what you are offering, how will they contact you? The contact information has to be visible and usable. On more than 44% of the websites, the contact button is usually on the top right side of the web pages. Although this placement is common, it is not the standard. You should, however, consider using it.

Main navigation
Your users should be able to find their way around your website. That is why every web design Santee should include a clear navigation. On more than 88% of the websites, the main navigation is usually located across the top of all web pages. This is the standard. Having your main navigation anywhere else will only confuse your visitors.

Homepage slideshow
Have you noticed that most websites have a homepage slideshow? This helps showcase their main products or services without taking up a lot of space. But where should you place this? On 32% of websites, the slideshow is usually on the top part of the homepage. It is made up of a series of images and text messages. You need to consider the use of a homepage slideshow as a web designer Santee.

Call to action
People still want to be told what to do. This is where the call-to-action comes in. 78% of websites have visually prominent call-to-actions.

Social media icons
Your website must have social media icons in the footer. This makes it easy for visitors to connect with you on social media.

Web design Santee