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Step 3: Design your Site Navigation System
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Designing your navigation systems simply means creating an interface where your visitors will know:
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Where they are on your site
Where else they can go
How they can go there
How they can go to your home page, if they landed somewhere else
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There are many ways to go about navigation as you have probably observed when you visit websites. However, there are certain principles that you must remember when designing your navigation system.
There are basically two types of navigation: 1) Location Indicators and 2) Navigational Links.
Location Indicators let users know where they are in the site. In this site, for example, you know that you are in the page "Process of Building a Business Site part 2" because it is clearly indicated in the top page.
Navigational links let the users go around the site and let them know what are the sections available on the site.
For both types of navigation to be effective, keep these tips in mind:
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Be consistent. Your navigation links must be consistent throughout the site. If you used text links on the home page, use text links throughout.
Be clear. For navigational links, your visitor must know exactly where they are. The words used in conjunction with the links must also be descriptive of what the page is all about.
Be predictable. Put your navigation links where users expect to find them: top or left are the most expected places to find the navigation links. They should be in the same place throughout the site.
Be obvious. Your visitor should know immediately that your links are navigational links. When you are trying to offer a product or service, you want your audience to find exactly what they are looking for.
Remember, text is still the best. But if you insist on using images, use only those universally accepted images. Which, by the way, is not easy to find.
Be short. Do not put too many links in your home page. It can be distracting to your visitor. Try to limit your major links to 10.
Be redundant. Your navigational links must be repeated on all the pages of your site. There must always be a link to your home page on every page.
For sites with more than 10 pages, a sitemap is recommended. This not only helps your visitors, but helps in your findability as well. More on this on building a search-engine friendly site.
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Step 4. Design the look and feel of your site.
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This is one of the most important steps in building a site. Your site is your storefront. Your visitors judge you by the way your site looks.
If you decided to have a professional design your site, achieving a professional and well-designed look should not be a problem. However, if you decide to do the site yourself, you must spend a bit of time researching and studying good websites and how they look. There are several references on good website designs, both hardcopy books and on the Net. Equip yourself with these books to further your knowledge.
Review the Understanding Web Pages for tips on how to design web pages.
On top of these general design principles, keep the following in mind when designing your business site:
1. Your site design must reflect your business nature. For example, if you are selling maternity clothes and baby stuff, your site must have the feel of a maternity store: pastel colors, light, airy, with graphics of babies and expectant mothers. Similarly, if your site offers business consulting, your site must look professional, polished and serious: heavier colors, straightforward design, minimal but powerful graphics.
2. Your site must look trustworthy. This is particularly important if you are trying to get people to part with their money. On the Net, your site represents you. You will not be there to assure people that their credit card number will be safe with you.
With this in mind, your site must do the talking for you. It must look as if it's profesionally designed even if it is designed by you. Pay close attention to the graphics, colors and fonts you use. Ultimately, a site's look depends on the site owner's taste. But as a general guideline, a professional site should look clean, airy, with sufficient white spaces and with few graphics: cnn.com is a good example of a professional-looking site.
3. Your site must be secure if you intend to accept payments. Aside from having a professional look, you should also convey the message that your site is secure and can be trusted to accept payments. These days, this is no longer difficult to achieve as readily accessible technologies are available. The important thing is to be able to convey that you are using these technologies.
4. Your site must load fast. When you design your site, do away with complexity. A complex design often takes too long to download. A simple, fast site has more chances of being viewed.
5. Your site must be responsive to customer inquiries. Nothing is more irritating to a visitor who took the time to email you then not to get a response, even from an autoresponder. If you have a contact link, make sure that you respond as promptly as possible.
You can also go one notch higher by offering live chat in your site. This assures clients that you are trustworthy. Try installing LiveChat in your site. To download a free version,
Click Here
6. Your site must be search-engine friendly. All sites, whether big or small, benefit from findability. Majority of people using the Web use the search engines to find what they need. This is an important aspect of building a site, so an entire section, "Building a search-engine friendly website" is devoted to this.
Click here to continue.
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