Site Design Archives

A Home Page for Each Category & Folder

Does each category and folder of your site have a “home” page? This might not be a problem for all of you but if you are a DIY website owner you might have forgotten to do this. Folders Without an Index Page If you create a folder (say an image folder or one with your […]

Do You Really Need All Those Plugins?

Blogging software, content management systems and ecommerce software already (generally) require more processing on the web server and by the user’s browser due to their programming compared to a static HTML site. What is more important to you? Keeping up with the Jones by using all those plugins just because every one else is doing it or creating a site people want to visit because it loads fast, is not cluttered, provides what they want to see and doesn’t stall because of some 3rd party plugin or feature being unavailable.

Should I Create a Sitemap or HTML Site Map?

There seems to be a big confusion between Sitemaps and a HTML site map for those new to websites. We are going to run through what each is and what they are used for today to try and undo the confusion. First of all, notice the spelling of each. Sitemaps vs site map. Sitemaps are […]

Website Testing

Whether you author a blog, own a website, are a web designer or are a web developer website testing is a must. This testing goes beyond initial testing when the blog or website is launched, it needs to be an on going maintenance task. The website or blog does not have to be live to […]

Browser Specific Design

Creating a browser specific design which uses browser specific tags, scripts and stylesheet selectors will create problems for your visitors who are not using the “right” browser. Today we have Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari and the new kid on the block, Google Chrome all fighting to be the most popular browser used by Internet users. […]

404 Error

Have you ever clicked a link to only end up at a page that says that the page does not exist? This is a 404 error which means the link you clicked (or typed) is incorrect, the website was revised/renovated and no redirects were put in place or that the website owner has deleted the […]

Website ROI

Your website is an investment in your business and as such, you would want a return on that investment. We’ll look at website ROI in this article and why it is good business sense to invest time and money into your website. First, let’s look at ROI (return on investment). ROI (Return on Investment) ROI […]

How all Your Web Pages Fit Together

To better understand how all the different web pages fit together on your ecommerce website (or any website actually) let’s look at different scenarios of how someone can enter your website. Remember that a person can enter your website on any page that is indexed by the search engines, they won’t always arrive to your […]

Custom Error Pages

Have you ever visited a website where you clicked a link and were taken to a none descript error page? Maybe you clicked a link on another website or in the search engine results and ended up at an error page. This is because the website you are visiting (or trying to visit) does not […]

Website Navigation

Website navigation is important to the sucess of your website visitor’s experience to your website. The website’s navigation system is like a road map to all the different areas and information contained within the website. Using a consistent navigation scheme from page to page helps the website visitor learn your website navigation system. Types of […]

Search Engine Friendly Design

When looking into having a website created for your business or how you can improve your existing website’s results through the search engines you will often hear and see the buzz words “Search engine friendly”. Creating a search engine friendly website has two main parts: Search engine friendly website design. Search engine optimization. A third […]

Disable Right Click

Some websites use a script to disable the right click function of the mouse (the right mouse button). Let’s look at whether it is really worth using a disable right click function. PopUp Windows When someone has set up their browser to ignore/disable popups (hand up!) and you have used a script to disable right […]

Using Javascript on Websites

Using Javascript on websites is not a new thing. Javascript has been around for quite a while. It gained a bad reputation in the past because hackers would (and still do) include malicous scripts on web pages. Now Javascript is being used beyond the typical applications in the past with the advent of Web 2.0. […]

Effective Colour Contrast

Have you taken a serious look at the colour scheme your website uses? Are all parts of your web page visible to everyone? Some times when we pick a colour scheme for our website we forget that there are people with poor vision and colour deficiencies. Even website visitors with “normal” vision can have difficulties […]

Does Your Website Have to be Accessible?

Accessible websites have come to the forefront of people’s minds with legal actions being taken against websites that are not accessible. As a website owner you may think this doesn’t affect your small business, association or non profit website but it does. Let’s take a look at accessible websites beyond the buzz word accessible, the […]