Web design has evolved a lot over years and design techniques that were considered cool and effective a few years back have lost their sheen. However, there are some web design professionals who are yet to discard stale design techniques that do not impress web users anymore. A newbie designer should learn about these obsolete site design methods and steer clear of them to succeed and stay ahead in website designing segment. While making a web site and implementing specific design measures in it, a designer needs to focus on aspects like SEO, upgrade-ability and user friendliness. In recent times, effective social media integration has also become important for success in web design.
- Ease of use is a key factor in website design and a site with quality content but poor navigation and content presentation may leave users uninterested. Web designers need to keep in mind that tables are meant for tabular data and they should not be used excessively for web page data presentation. Before arrival of CSS, this used to be a norm but nowadays using tables to present data is no longer in vogue. Search engine crawlers prefer data contained within <div> tags than tabular data by default. In large web sites, maintaining and updating tabular data can become a problem.
- Animations are used in web sites to interest viewers and keep them glued but its overuse can be counterproductive. Animations in advertisements can turn out to be irritating in some cases. As far as Flash animations are concerned, they can be cool for first time site visitors. However, for users with slower connections, lengthy animations can be a big turn off. A majority of web users these days prefer access to information they need without much eye candy. It is also applicable for marquees.
- Images need to be used in web design but using them for navigation is really a stale practice. It not only affects a site’s loading time but sends across a message that its design is not up to date. Using text based navigation is more user-friendly and it helps sites load faster. A web designer also needs to be aware of advantages and limitations of various web compatible file formats before using them in client websites. JPEG and GIF images should not be used for same purpose in a website.
- It is undeniable that social media integration is crucial for success in web design but excess of it can be detrimental. Using a lot of social media buttons in a website may not always work. Not every social media site can be as popular as Twitter and Facebook. Adding too many buttons at end of each article in a web site does not look nice either.
- Web designers need to be careful while using music and video in web sites. They should use a video format that does not require users to download a plug-in to view it. It makes sense to make a version of a website sans media elements for mobile web users and users with slower connections.
Author Bio: WebGuru India is a website design company based in India, offering high-quality and cost-effective website design and website development solutions to people worldwide. The company has authored several articles on web design, logo design, Flash design, SEO services etc, providing updated information on technological developments and advancements.
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WYSIWYG! I'm a simple person trying to live the simplest life possible - it seems to be the most difficult thing to achieve! I'm an internet enthusiast and I've been a webmaster since early 2007. I like: blogging, developing sites using open source software, social media, computer games, '80s music, comedy & horror, animals, crunching on M&Ms peanut and Smarties!
