Website Development Essentials

Website Planning and Design

• A website should have a responsive layout to adjust to different screens.
• Determine the goals for your website, such as what you want to accomplish and what you want your visitors to do.
• Identify your target audience and understand their interests to provide valuable information.
• Create a list of keywords to use throughout your site to improve search engine rankings.

Planning Process

• Set your purpose and goals, including identifying your website's purpose and defining your target audience.
• Create a budget for website expenses, including web design, programming, and web hosting.
• Assign roles to company stakeholders, web developers, content writers, HTML/CSS professionals, and web and graphic designers.
• Create a content strategy, deciding what kind of content to display on your website.

Basic Principles of Web Design

• Website purpose: accommodate the needs of the user with a simple, clear intention on all pages.
• Simplicity: a simple design is best for user experience and usability.
• Navigation: a clear navigation system is key to retaining visitors.
• F-Shaped Pattern Reading: most visitors scan text in an F-shaped pattern, focusing on the top and left area of the screen.
• Visual Hierarchy: arrange elements in order of importance using size, color, imagery, contrast, typography, whitespace, texture, and style.
• Content: use compelling language and great content to attract and influence visitors.
• Grid-Based Layout: use grids to structure your design and keep content organized.
• Load Time: ensure your website loads quickly, as visitors expect sites to load in 2 seconds or less.
• Mobile-Friendly: design for mobile devices, as more people are using them to browse the web.

Responsive Web Design

• Use HTML and CSS to automatically resize, hide, shrink, or enlarge a website for different devices.
• Responsive images scale nicely to fit any browser size.

Web Standards and W3C Recommendations

• W3C is an international community that develops web standards to ensure websites look and work the same in all browsers.
• W3C's mission is to lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing standards, protocols, and guidelines.

Types of Websites

• Static website: a basic type of website with fixed HTML codes, easy to create, and information does not change.
• Dynamic website: a collection of dynamic web pages whose content changes dynamically, accessing content from a database or Content Management System (CMS).
• Examples of dynamic websites: online communities, social media, e-commerce, coupon, auction, and affiliate marketing websites.

Website Design Usability

• Usability is a part of design, ensuring a visitor can use your site easily.
• Website design affects how a user interacts with a website, conveying emotions, and providing a clear path through the site.
• Common usability problems in website design include poor navigation, slow loading speed, and poor contrast between text and background.

Learn the key elements of building a successful website, including responsive layout, goal setting, target audience, and call-to-action.