1. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start".The question: What do I do first? "Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384

2. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start".The answer might well be this simple:Planning Session"Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 3. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". All good websites come from a good plan. Sounds redundant, but its true. If you want to create a good and solid website, you need a good and solid plan. I know its hard to do, and I know you want to keep poking and playing with this exciting program, but it is time to take a break away from your computer and turn to the old paper and pencil. Thats right, were going back in time to when people actually wrote things down. "Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 4. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". On a piece of notebook paper, or whatever is lying around, describe your site. Take five to twenty minutes to come up with a purpose for your site, or better yet, call it your Mission Statement."Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 5. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Answer the following questions: What am I going to do with this? Who is going to read this? What kinds of information will I be posting? Why am I doing this? Who am I doing this for? How often am I going to be posting and adding information? "Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 6. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start".Now, compile this information into a paragraph so it looks like this:"Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 7. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". This website will be dedicated to X, Y, and Z, and cover the topics of A, B, and C. The audience will be __________ ________________ _______. I will be adding posts every _____________ about ________ _______ ______________. I am doing this because _____________ _____________ __________________.From: http://codex.wordpress.org/First_Steps_With_WordPress"Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 8. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start".Usability 4 basic principles Make it as simple as it needs to be. But no simpler." -- Albert Einstein"Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 9. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Your website is easy to navigate Pages must download quickly Information should be easy to retrieve Restrictions must not be placed on users There are lots of other ways that websites can place restrictions on its users, ultimately damaging their usability - can you think of any more? Just think back to the last time a website really infuriated you - what annoying thing did it do to make you feel that way?"Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 10. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Your website has to be easy to navigate Users have gradually become accustomed to particular layouts and phrases on the Internet, for example: Logo is in the top-left corner and links back to the homepage The term About us is used for organisation information Navigation is in the same place on each page and directly adjacent to the content Anything flashing or placed above the top logo is often an advertisement The term Shopping cart or Shopping basket is used for items you might wish to purchaseThere are numerous other conventions like these that enhance your website's usability - can you think of some more? Dont underestimate the importance of these conventions - as the Internet evolves we're getting more and more used to things being a certain way. Break these conventions and you may be left with nothing but a website with poor usability and a lot of dissatisfied site visitors."Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 11. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Pages must download quickly Just a few seconds is about the maximum time web users will wait for a page to download 3. So it's essential for optimal usability that your website downloads quickly. To speed up the download time of your website we recommend you read our article about how to speed up the download time of your web pages. There are websites that will test the website load times, and also report back on things that can be done to make the site faster. http://www.gtmetrix.com Works well for that."Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 12. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Information should be easy to retrieve We read web pages in a different manner to the way we read printed matter. We generally don't read pages word-for-word - instead we scan6. When we scan web pages certain items stand out:Headings Link text Bold text Bulleted lists Did you notice that images were left out of that list? Contrary to the way in which we read printed matter, we see text before we see images7 on the Internet. For optimal website usability, don't place important information in images as it might go unnoticed."Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 13. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Restrictions mustnt be placed on users Don't prevent your site visitors from navigating through the Internet in the way that they want to. For example: Every time a link is opened in a new window the back button is disabled. Approximately 60% of web users employ the back button as their primary means of navigation 8 so do be wary of forcing links to open in new windows. Don't use frames to structure your website. Frames can cause a number of usability problems, namely: Disabling the back button (see above) Bookmarking not possible Impossible to e-mail the link to someone else Problems with printing Users feel trapped if external links open in the same window Search engine optimisation issuesThere are lots of other ways that websites can place restrictions on its users, ultimately damaging their usability - can you think of any more? Just think back to the last time a website really infuriated you - what annoying thing did it do to make you feel that way?"Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384 14. "Help your Website Everyday Have A Right Start". Links: http://LibreOffice.org software used to create the slides shownhttp://goo.gl/hj3Ulk Web usability is about designing and structuring your website so site visitors complete your goals for them quickly and efficiently. A usable website can reap huge benefits on to your website and your business. - by www.webcredible.co.ukhttp://goo.gl/nwv9ND -A Comprehensive Website Planning Guide by Ben Siegel for Smashing Magazine.com (a number of resources here)."Help your Website Everyday - Have A Right Start" vDomainHosting, Inc 360-447-7384