How not to?

I have written on this topic before, but this time, it is going to be more interesting. These are most common mistakes people do while designing a web-site. The content is inspired from Digit.

Clutter is good.
Never believe me(or anyone else) when I say this. Clutter can easily kill a good idea. Always remember, simplicity is the most effective way of getting a point across. Place too much links, ads and pictures on your site, and people will have no choice but to find another site. Visit Rediff to see what I am talking about.

Popups are also good.
Again, do not believe anyone who says this. Do not think about pop-ups unless you are designing a porn site(which you should not). Just bring your imagination, and now well, just imagine, you are reading this blog and at once from nowhere, a popup offering something free appears. Won’t you be irritated? Most people are! After 2 or 3 instances like this, will you ever come back? Of course, no one will come even if I put best content. And these days, browsers block pop-ups efficiently, so it becomes a pointless exercise anyway. A nice example would be Indiatimes. Just see how much ads they have.

Horizontal Scrolling.
Users are so habitual of scrolling vertically(if they were not, you would have horizontal wheels on mouse!) that horizontal scrolling seems very rare, except for large pictures. So, site should be optimized for at least 800 x 600 or 1024 x 768.

Four Second Rule.
If one cannot figure out what the site is about within four seconds of looking at loaded web page, the site has failed to make an impression on the user. Make sure that the content has primary focus on your site.

That’s it for this time. Here are some useful sites that give you a great point to start web designing:

• Web Design Library


• Web Developer’s Handbook


• Use IT

Bye.