"Web design ideas and tips for the construction and creation of ecommerce websites from an experienced web design company."

Website submission hints and tips

In addition to the general website design tips a number of rules which will improve your search engine ranking should also be considered. These generally apply to the invisable coding behind a website such as page title, meta tags, keywords etc.

At Marketing-r-us we can optimise your site for you, ensuring a better ranking within the search engines. Click here to view details of our 'Top Ten' website submission package.

Alternatively, have a look at our hints & tips page for website submission. Here we have listed a few of the alterations we apply to websites before submitting them through our web submission program.

Useful hints and tips when planning your website

Most of our customers opt for a website design by Marketing-r-us, but for those who prefer to write their own website and would like to use our website submission services only, here are some helpful web design tips, which apply to most sites:

• Make paper prototypes
  Start with a blank sheet of good old fashioned paper. Too many over enthusiastic designers have rushed into a new page design only to discover half way through that certain design aspects of the site do not work.
• Get the right dimensions
  Although it is difficult to cater for all of the possible browser settings, it is reasonable to assume that you will cater for most visitors with a site which can be displayed, at 800x600 pixels.
• Make use of templates
  A template of your web design will guarantee code consistancy which otherwise can become a time consuming nightmare.
• Keep it simple
  It's the simple things in life which work the most effective. So why over complicate your website design? Be clear about your sales message, make links obvious, choose images and banners with care and make sure the site is easy to navigate.
• Check browser compatibility
  Rather than designing your site for users of the latest browsers it is advisable to take older browsers in consideration too. This will make your site more accessible.
• Downsize images
  Large images make for slow loading sites. If big images are made to look smaller loading times still remain the same and graphics can be displyed in a destorted way. When using images make sure that they all are downsized to the correct height and width specification and are reduced to 72dpi.
• Use of GIF and JPEG files
  This is not quite as hard as some people think. These general rules apply: when using a natural full colour image use the JPEG format, for images of fewer colour containing large amounts of solid colour, icons, backgrounds and banners use the GIF format.
• Check your loading times
  Not all of your site visitors will have fast broadband connections. Take in to consideration that a 56k dial up internet connection downloads at only 5k per seconds. Make sure your loading times are not excessive particularly your index page.
• Use CSS style sheets
  Make use of stylesheets. They will allow you to update font colours, sizes, links etc in seconds and will ensure that design changes are continuous throughout the site.