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web design principles
(this material was first presented at the Australian Publisher's Association "Best of the Web" forum, November 26, 1999. Thanks to Richard Everist and Melinda Tuckfield for comments and criticism.)
This is a list of ideas, asides, and considerations relating to web design. They are a result of my experience in writing, publishing, and maintaining web sites, as well as using the web as an academic. They are not an exclusive list and are a set of opinions.
- simplicity
- good design lasts, and is simple. those users who come for design are here to look, and borrow, not to use or purchase. good and simple design on the web has a shelf life of maybe a year. this isn't design, it is technology. this isn't technology, it is our designers affair with technology. simplicity might equal usability but protestantism probably isn't the answer. do not assume that your visitors know your corporate structure, or your definitions. (frames are bad.)
- permanence
- structure and location should be constant. people can't find things, or return to them, if they keep moving. design should be stable, in the site and over time. urls should remain constant, this is particularly important for indexing and all those links in to your site that bring people, for free. this also applies to internal structure. if your site has three links from a page called (for example) products, services, and help and if the path to the default products page is http://mysite.com.au/products/ then i ought to expect and be able to predict that http://mysite.com.au/services/ while take me to the default services page. users now know and predict urls. this is no different to users knowing that page 13 always follows page 12. if your site stays still long enough it will be indexed by search engines and linked from other sites, a community of users forms around your content and this needs to be nurtured, not bought.
- mutability
- the web changes, quickly. your site should reflect change. this doesn't mean gratuitious change, nor new pages in new locations, but timely and relevant content at all times. people will use your content how they see fit, but if the content is relevant to their needs then how good it looks becomes minor. this is why 'how good it looks' is about usability and not special effects.
- indexing
- index your site so that visitors can search for what they want, not what you think they want. make sure you use proper and appropriate meta-tags for all pages, this will help your own index engine, as well as internet search engines. think of a search engine as not being a glorified auto-index but a mechanism for letting your readings redefine the structure of your site according to their interests. register your site with search engines.
- community
- know what your visitors do. where they come from, where they visit, how long they stay for. all this information is contained in your server's logs. use it. don't use it for unsolicitied marketing (your email address accompanies every web request you make, as well as your machine's IP number, operating system, it is even possible to record what monitor resolution and colour depth you have when you visit). use it to make your site easier to use, and to help users find information. let people contribute, ask, share. they will.
- marketing
- if your content is relevant and useful to people then they will find it and use it. you do not need to buy these users. banner and 'click through' advertising is not very successful, and the amazon.com associate program has redefined how one advertises on the www anyway. it is not very productive, or cost effective, to compete against such strategies. it is not enough to publish existing content. as content producers your income is produced in the transfer of information into knowledge. this takes the form of brokering information (soliciting and gatekeeping), defining appropriate structures for knowledge, and disseminating this knowledge. online publication leverages these in the context of online processes of communication and accessibility. currently the most successful sites operate as 'mini' portals around an organisations activities.
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