After I wiped the tears away from my eyes and the red dye from my forehead, I began to think about those who build their own websites using a DIY package. I speak to at least one customer every day who says they have tried to build a website but they think it looks unprofessional, is not very user friendly and to be frank, admit to not having a clue how websites should be designed.

So I from now on, I say that DIY should be left to home improvements and everything else should be done by the pros.

Our response is “What does your business do?”

The most important thing to remember is that your website must be clear. Even if you think what you do is really obvious, it doesn’t hurt to say for example ‘We design websites’ as opposed to ‘we can write you a collection of HTML code and other digital assets that are addressed to a common Uniform Resource Locator’…huh?!

Below I have outlined a few things to remember when writing the pages of your website:

Home
Think of this as your magazine cover. This is where you have your 3 seconds to make an impression and avoid the ‘back’ button being used. Things to remember when writing the words for your home page are to BRIEFLY outline what your business does and how your customers will find you beneficial.

Services
What services do you provide, how much do they cost and what can your customers expect?

About us
This is your opportunity to make your customers feel confident that you are the industry expert. What qualifications do you have? What’s your experience and background?

As I said previously, keep the words simple, easy to understand and if all else fails, we have an in-house copywriter who is always happy to help.

• The Shires Group – Auto repair centres in Leamington and Gloucester
• Skyline Contracts – Groundwork in Warwickshire
• QS Charles - Professional Chartered Quantity Surveyor
• Medical Resourcing – Recruitment services for the medical industry
• Jamal Brothers – Skills training provider
• North West Homecare Solutions – Home and Property Maintenance
• Ely’s – Purveyors of fresh fish in Buckinghamshire
• Shaw’s Painters and Decorators – Painter and decorators based in London
• Alison Hansen – Fashion designer and illustrator
• Splash Driving School – North London driving instructors

My favourite creation of my own in the list above would have to be The Shires Group. My favourite of Bhups’ is the website for Alison Hansen, who’s work is fantastic and I’d urge everyone to take a look.

• Aspire Training Associates – Aspire to achieve
• Vet Personnel – Vets and Nurses recruitment
• Logs on Draught - Horse Logging and Tree Surgery
• Clean Room Validation – Glasgow based clean room testing and validation
• Instant Loans Direct – Short term cash loans
• The Conservatory Centre – Cheap conservatories in the Midlands
• Rock Wine Bar – A fine Afro/Caribbean Restaurant in Croydon, London
• Platinum Info Products – Buy self hypnosis products
• Spatial Synergy – Sustainable Solutions
• Soft Landing – Business support services
• Exam Central - Academic tutoring and coaching
• Compass Cleaning Solutions – Home and office cleaning in Heathrow
• Next Generation Teaching – Education recruitment services in Yorkshire
• Arrow Eco Energy – Renewable energy systems
• Spartacus Gardens – Landscaping and Gardening in Warwick
• Total Sports Therapies – Sports therapy in Birmingham
• Events Couture - Event planning in East Anglia

As you can see, we’ve done a lot of work lately, and there’s even more on the horizon.

One of the most popular design trends over the last couple of years has been the “Web 2.0″ style of websites. While “Web 2.0″ can be an ambiguous term, in design it refers to the oversized sans-serif headings, extensive used of gradients, striking elements and rounded corners, among many other things. A lot of popular websites make use Web 2.0 styling, and when used correctly, it can be very easy on the eye.

However, the common theme among these aesthetically pleasing websites is that they follow the basic rules of web design. A couple of these rules are:

• prominent, easy to use navigation
• consistency throughout the website
• consideration towards the F-shaped pattern for web reading
• content should always be the focus of the page, not an afterthought

There are dozens more rules, and all of the best websites follow them. These rules will always be more important than any trend, and any website that follows them will be off to a great start. Making use of current design trends has it’s positives; it shows the user that your website is modern and “cutting edge”, and that you have taken time to create an eye pleasing website.

Trends will always change in web design, and while they can give your website a fresh, modern feel, it’s vital that you don’t forgot about the basic, underlying concepts behind good design.

How not to do it.

Nothing ruins the credibility of a business quite like content in the “Comic Sans” font. Not only is it unprofessional, it’s ugly and outdated. But the font family isn’t your only concern – the size of the text can also make or break your website.  No one wants to use a magnifying glass to read your website, but at the same time, no one wants single words to fill up the entire screen.

A web-safe font for content is also imperative. A web-safe, or “browser-safe” font is one which is a font found on all operating systems by default, and although the embedding of fonts can be done using JavaScript or the @font-face rule , it is best avoided for large blocks of content.

Always ensure that you choose the right font for your business in order to create the right impression.

So the hunt for an alternative started. After a while digging around for a new IDE, I came across a neat little program called Aptana. Whilst it was still in heavy development, I was amazed how quick it was and how rich the PHP functionality was compared to Dreamweaver. I tried it out for a while and eventually ditched Dreamweaver and started using Aptana for all my web design and PHP coding.

I happily used Aptana for quite a while, but when they decided to ditch PHP support for version 2.0 in favour of Eclipse PDT and concentrate more on Ruby development, I was forced to start my search again. The PDT functionality was not a patch on Aptanas PHP support, so I was (as were many Aptana users) rather disappointed with Aptanas decision to do this.

Anyway, so began the search for a new IDE which supported PHP. I tried all sorts from NuSphere to Zend but eventually came across Netbeans. Although PHP support was in its infancy, I was impressed with the functionality in Netbeans and it had far fewer bugs than Aptana 1.5. So I installed, started using it and I’m happy to say that our entire team are now using Netbeans for our PHP and web development. Its PHP functionality is improving all the time, has good support for CSS, JavaScript and HTML. There is the ability to upload your projects via FTP and SFTP and best of all, it’s FREE!

So if you’re looking at changing your IDE, I would recommend giving Netbeans a try.

there's nothing like Christmas in July

Have you ever visited a friend’s house and admired their living room with modern furniture; leather sofa, glass table, cosy fireplace, and feature wall. Suddenly you notice the HUGE Jon Bon Jovi poster hung in the corner with torn edges curling up, the Christmas tree next to the lamp even though its the middle of summer, and the life-size cardboard cut-out of David Beckham leaning against the television. All of a sudden this beautiful, modern room has turned rather tacky.

Think of your website as a living room, its important to stick to a common theme in the design. The use of a modern fonts, crisp colours, and subtle drop shadows can all go to waste if you’re faced with a huge header image not using a similar theme. If you cannot produce well taken photography it might be worth looking into stock photographs for better images that are more suited to the overall design and theme of your website while portraying your business in the right light.

And nobody wants to see a Christmas tree in summer (unless you’re in Australia of course).

Photos courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons license from users We Are CS

How would you like it if I strapped you to a chair and made you listen to the Teletubbies song on loop for over an hour?

If you find you can’t resist putting your favourite Vengaboys song on your website/blog at least have the courtesy to put a prominent stop button somewhere for those that might not share your taste…

#Tinkywinky, Dipsy, Laalaa, Po… Teletubbies Teletubbies, say…#

Most likely the website you are looking at will have been done using elements of Flash, requiring the user to have Flash player installed on their computers. Some sites even go as far as being completely built using Flash, which is not really recommended, reason being it’s not ideal for SEO. Effectively what you have is pretty much a one page website.

Then there’s the fact that large amounts of animation could overwhelm the use; how are they supposed to focus on the information on offer when the vertigo-inducing loop on show is too distracting? That said, using flash subtly in your xhtml website can work to your advantages, perhaps adding a bit of elegance.

So yes, use Flash if you’d like, just don’t overdo the “bling bling”.