Building Web Sites All-in-One For Dummies

From Building Web Sites All-in-One For Dummies, 2nd Edition by Claudia Snell, Doug Sahlin

Building a successful Web site involves using helpful design tips, referring to a site sample map to see how information is organized, and following specific design steps from start to finish.

Building Your Web Site: Top Ten Web Design Tips

Displaying information on a Web site is its own art. Keep these design tips in mind to build your own original, clear, and user-friendly Web site:

Create reusable graphics.
Use templates whenever possible.
Use CSS (cascading style sheets) in place of the <font> tag.
Resize and optimize graphics before adding them to a web page.
Do not resize graphics using the <img> tag.
Do not use Flash introductions; they’re no longer in style.
Avoid using long paragraphs.
Use Heading styles to break up a page.
Break up large amounts of text with graphic images.
Keep the home page short and simple.

Building Web Sites Sample Map

Building a successful Web site involves keeping the front end (user information) and back end (files that make your Web site work) creative and consistent while deciding on what content goes in each section of your site. This figure shows the major parts of a site:

Design Flow Chart for Building Web Sites

From concept to completion, building Web sites involves a series of design steps. Here is the order of design — from meeting and assessing your clients’ needs to delivering and launching their site.