10 ways to create a great website

1. Make it look professional

People do judge a book by its cover. If your site looks unprofessional then it will make your business look small and unreliable.

2. Make your site easy to navigate

Businesses and consumers today have little time to waste. If they can't find what they want quickly on your site they'll move on.

3. Stick to your subject

Don't try to be all things to all people. It’s tempting to add heaps of extra information or features, just because you can. But that doesn’t make a great website and it can deter people from staying around. Keep your goal in mind and stick to a streamlined, tight website that is clearly focussed on your target subject and market.

4. Tell people how to reach you

Customers want to know who you are and how they can contact after they've made a purchase. And they want that information to be easy to find. If it isn't they may question your honesty or credibility and move on to a competitor's web site to make their purchase.

5. Don’t be too clever with your design and layout

Jakob's Law of the Web User Experience states that "users spend most of their time on other websites."

This means that they form their expectations for your site based on what's commonly done on most other sites. If you deviate, your site will be harder to use and users will leave.

6. Every graphic on a web page should be necessary

Each graphic or image should relate to the text on that page, to the message being communicated, and to the audience. Don’t fill up a page with unnecessary images, just because you can – less is more!

7. Keep images small and optimised.

Large images annoy people. If it takes too long to download people will click away before they even read what you have to say.

8. Keep your pages short.

If you minimize the scrolling, chances are, your readers will get your message. Keep the important information ‘above the fold” (ie on the top half of the screen). If you do need to convey a lot of information then it’s better to break it up into smaller ‘chunks’ with links to these chunks from a top level page.

9. Use tables of contents (section pages)

According to Jakob Nielsen only 10% of users will scroll beyond the first screen of text. If that first screen has a table of contents viewers will click on the links to the explanatory text. Check out the Sauced Out site www.saucedout.com.au to see how this works in practice. Every top level section is a table of contents.

10. Keep your site current

Come up with a reason for people to visit and revisit your pages and recommend them to their friends. This could be a series of articles giving tips, a blog about your subject, handy forms and DIY info or anything that will make people bookmark your site to come back later.