Easy Ways to Make Your Website and Advertising Sell

I'm sure you remember those tedious lessons in high school about
how to outline and organize an essay. Most of us just wanted to
write the stupid essay and get it over with, to hell with
organization. Unsurprisingly, the end product was usually
incoherent and unfocused.

Unfortunately for those of you who hated planning essays, the
process of designing a website or ad is quite similar. You have
to do some careful planning beforehand, or else you will end up
with utter chaos.

Organization is the mainstay of effective design, so if you think
you are going to jump headlong into designing an ad or website
and end up with a masterpiece, I'm sorry to disappoint you--it's
not going to happen.

There are solid, unbending rules when it comes to good design.
Here are some tips to help you structure the design of your own
website or advertisement:

1. Know what point you are trying to make: This is the most
important thing your website or ad will portray. It is the thing
you want to stick in people's heads. It is the defining point of
your design.

Try to sum up your main point in a few brief words, or a
sentence, at most. Remember that good design is like a great work
of art-- it is expressive and able to relate in some way to
almost everyone. Once you decide what the focus of your site is,
you have a headline and a design concept.

2. Include sub points in order of importance: Keep the sub
points simple and only cover a few of the most important ideas.
For ads, the sub points should be very brief, but for websites
there is room to be more prolific. If there are many points that
need to be made on the website, include them, so long as they are
imperative to what you are trying to communicate.

3. Don't over-design: Also like a great work of art, good design
includes only the things that need to be there. I'm sure you've
been to sites that are so packed with content, graphics, and
pictures all laid out on a gaudy background, that your eyes
can't stay focused on one thing.

Remember, good details add to the overall effect, they never
detract from it. If you have so much going on in your site or ad
that people don't know where to look first, they will stop
looking, period.

A good design should help the viewer to focus and understand what
you are trying to communicate. If you keep your designs simple
and follow a few basic rules, your viewer will have no problem
understanding what is going on in your site or ad. Good design
for websites and ads are like great works of art in many ways;
however, they are unlike great works of art in that you don't
want people to be confused by them.