Web Design 101

Contrary to popular perception, creating a powerful and popular website is not a complex exercise in frustration. Quite the opposite. WebSiteMovers.com has removed the mystery from web design to help you understand the development process and take ownership of your website business objectives.

Here we present a step-by-step, easily interpretable web project 'recipe' to help you prepare and serve a web platform that will rival the best 'dishes' on the internet. So let's get started and Make It!

Step 1 Create The Menu

• Think of your guests to determine the right 'cuisine'. Are they looking for products (e-commerce)? A community (blog/forum)? Do they seek information (content management)? Entertainment (multimedia)? This stage sets the tone for the entire experience.

Step 2 Formal Dining Room Or Kitchen Table?

• Consider the ambience, if you will. Do you want to present in a formal, elegant setting or a more casual environment? This will help you through the front-end design phase of the project.

Step 3 Prepare The List And Go Shopping

• You'll need front-end graphic design for creative and navigation elements, behind the scenes programming for the functional horsepower, any packaged applications you select (shopping cart, CMS, Blog etc.) to power your site, a dedicated project manager and team, and a reliable hosting service. Make sure to create a web marketing strategy (SEO, ad campaigns etc.) as well as an ongoing, scalable operations and support plan for your site.

Step 4 Unpack The Groceries

• Now you will line up all your 'ingredients' and lay them out in the sequence in which they will be utilized. In web-speak, this step is known as the functional specification phase of the project.

Step 5: Prepare The Appetizers

• This is the ultimate first impression, so make it count! Your design theme should be unique, fresh and inviting yet intuitive and impressionable enough to give the audience a taste of what's to come.

Step 6 Prepare The Entree'

• In this step, the focus is on the main features and programmatic functions. Database design, application programming and configuration will be implemented with your design templates, allowing for user navigation and utilization of the various tools used in your site.

Step 7 Prepare Dessert

• The finishing touch. Here you will review and test your creation prior to launch. Pay close attention to the details - how each component from design theme to databases, forms and transactions interact and blend together to enable a delightful and fulfilling user experience.

Step 8 Serve & Enjoy!

• Time to realize the fruits of your labor! A new website launch is an exciting experience, one to be enjoyed by the server as well as the guest. Make sure the hosting server has been properly configured to support your new site and test again after installing the site prior to making it 'live'.

Step 9 Cleaning & Organizing

• The marketing, administration, management and statistical reporting of your website platform should be viewed as an ongoing initiative. You'll want to use a powerful analytics tool to measure site traffic, trends and results.