I finally did it. I finally resurrected this blog and got it to a place where I feel like it looks pretty, is organized, and will supply readers with much needed newbie friendly tutorials.

Now, you might ask “Why would a website design blog use a template? Can’t you create your own?”

Well, yes – I could create my own, and one day I will create a fully custom wordpress template for this blog but until then, why not use what I consider to be one of the prettiest themes on the net! I almost don’t want to share with you where I got it because it’s so pretty and so unique that I feel like everyone will want it and then I will have to revert to doing something custom again. So even though it is against my better judgment, and because I feel that the designer deserves a big round of applause, check out ZinePress over at Well Medicated.

With that being said there will be some changes going on around here. I plan on offering more website design tutorials based around wordpress. As a website designer I have been using wordpress more and more mainly because my clients seem to be a lot more keen on the admin interface. I also will go back to offering website feedback!

The website feedback section was one of the most popular categories on this blog. I don’t know if people enjoyed watching me rip other websites apart, or they truly were looking for honest critique, but either way – it’s back and it’s better than ever! Why? Because I, myself, have learned a lot in the world of website design and usability. I have moved my field of practice from simple to design to user interface and information architecture. I love to find solutions to usability problems and I would be happy to help you do the same.

So again, this blog is back and open for business. I have cleared out all past comments and really will be starting fresh, so comment, email, whatever you want! I’d love to hear your feedback!

Also, Web Design For Idiots is seeking writers! If you have some web design/ development knowledge, you like to keep up with news in the web world, or you are just jumping into it and would like to chronical your experience and get global feedback, contact me! I’d love to have you as part of our team!

Web Design For Idiots is getting a complete make over. I put together this blog as a test. It was a way for me to get used to wordpress and share that experience with my readers as well as my clients. WordPress has grown from a blogging platform to a full service content management system, and as a web designer, I need to know the ins and outs.

So this little blog has grown and gained readers on a level that I did not expect, and this blog is a reflection of me, and the work that I can do. The unfortunate thing is that the design of this blog is NOT a reflection of me and what I can do. Its just a quickly thrown together design that I did in the matter of a few days – half days at that.

So I am here to announce that Web Design For Idiots will be under development for a while while I come up with a better design. One that reflects my own personal design skills and trends. The website will still be opened, however. So you are welcome to stop by, comment, and use the tutorials as you see fit. If you come by and something seems broken, please email me and let me know, but chances are, you stopped by while I was in the middle of working on things.

So I am taking suggestions and hoping that you folks can help me build a prettier blog. Also, have you recently redesigned your blog? Have a before and after? or did you write a post about the redesign? I would LOVE to see it.

So here is probably the single hardest step in designing a really eye catching and memorable website. Conceptualizing it. Before you start coding, you have to have an idea of what you want your website to look like, where you want the navigation to be, and the overall layout. The average designer working on a basic website will consider this an easy step. There are rules that you can follow to make a website that is very easy to use for the visitor. There is something called F shaped viewing. There was a study done that tracks where viewers immediately look at a website, and how they scan it. The majority of people in this study viewed a website in the same way. Have a look at this image to get a real idea of what an F shaped viewing looks like:

As you can see, no matter the layout of the website, people generally view the top left, center, and right first. On e-commerce sites, the shopping cart is generally in the top right, and page links are across the top, and the categories are on the left side. This is very standard and people are used to it.

This is great knowledge to arm yourself with, however you can not let this stifle you in creativity. Giving yourself guidlines for a good user experience is not a good excuse to have a bland website. I have seen amazingly wonderful websites that have the exact layout that I mentioned, and I have seen horrible websites with that same layout. If you take oscommerce for example, the layout of the stock install is exactly what it should be. (you can see it here). However, here you can see another website using oscommerce and the basic layout but this site has a much better impact using design, graphics, and images. (you can see it here or here).

So, now that you have looked at some examples of what good design can do to a rather bland layout, you will have to figure out how you will make your website stand out. It is all going to be different based on what you are selling, offering, and writing about. That clean look of the ono tea website might not work for you, or that very grunge look of the assault t-shirt line could be over doing it as well. This is where the designers work comes in. You have to feel out what you want the website’s design to portray and start working.

For instance, I am working on designing my graphic design company’s website. The conceptualization part was the hardest for me. My husband and I sat down and tried to figure out what we wanted to portray. With a graphics company, you can go one of two ways, really simplistic with putting a lot of emphasis on typography and the work in your portfolio, or graphic heavy with a lot of emphasis on the website’s design as a part of my portfolio.

We sat and came up with a bunch of concepts which range from simple to color heavy, and finally settled on a concept. We are combining photography with illustration in a nice clean looking design that still has a lot of graphical content. We are working on designing a horizontal layout where instead of scrolling top to bottom, you scroll left to right. Using a jquery plugin to create an animated scrolling experience ads a little more uniqueness to the design and overall layout. With a portfolio website, you can really take a lot of liberties, mainly because you are showing off your “chops”. You are not really concerned with making sure that the person finds the product that they are looking for, and you have a lot less pages to deal with. However, even with the liberties taken with a portfolio website, I will still be working with the same basic layout of navigation at the top, content in the center, and some lists on the left side to work as internal page links, similar to categories.

The moral of the story is, stick with what people know, and people will have a happier user experience, but do not let it stifle your creativity. Push the envelope a little.

Here are some sites that I feel have done an exceptional job and creating an easy to use website, with a very unique design that is unforgetable.

Sequence Branding

B.N. Weiss

We Bleed Design

I’m posting this from my very messy desk with the TV on to my left and my nearly cold coffee at my right hand, in danger of wrecking my faithful little scanner. I’m a real woman. I’m a real, live, 40+, divorced Canadian woman, a writing legend in my own mind.

In June of 1996 I began on the Internet. I was an IRC diva for quite a long time. It was a lot of fun and most of it I really should not write about here. That’s what personal blogs are all about. I wrote for a zine first, a small print publication called The Crying Clown. From there it was all online. At one point I was producing my own newsletter for writers, InkSplatters, sent out through what is now Yahoo Groups. I was a web writer for HerPlanet, BackWash, BellaOnline, Suite 101, WZ-ard.com and other sites, forums and newsletters some still living and some not. I still write Creative Fat Grrl on LockerGnome, a babbly blog more than anything seriously functional. Writing for a network is a different educational experience than writing for yourself. Which is one reason I keep doing it.

I’ve had sites and then blogs of my own. I didn’t begin online in the great time of blogging, I was here before that. So my first sites were put together with just HTML code as I learned and goofed it up. I’ve used software and I’ve cut and pasted code and I’ve hand coded my own pages. I’m not an expert, time alone isn’t enough to make you an expert at web design or development. I have learned however and as I learn I see how much more there is to be explored and discovered. But, don’t look to me expecting I’m a know-it-all. If I ever say that you can be sure I’m just laughing at myself.

I love creative things. I’ve done so many interesting forms of art, just to try them out. I made ASCII art for a few years. I continue to take digital photos of abandoned places here in Ontario, starting in 2006 when I bought my first digi camera. I’m also teaching myself to draw cartoons, some people even like them! This week I re-learned the art of cutting out paper doll chains so I could make them into a graphic for a blog. I really think it’s important to keep the creativity and free writing in blogging. It would be a real shame if the personal journal and creative element of blogging were lost in the rush for SEO and money making.

Anyway, I’m here to help the less experienced blogger with my experiences. I’ve got a stack of great books about web design on my bookshelf and I will be using them (finally) for more than a place to hide my dust bunnies. I seem to collect books with great good intentions and then not get very far. You can also find me writing about web writing and posting writing ideas and prompts on my blog, Word Grrls.

ThatGrrl.ca

I have slightly neglected the content on my blog, however I am happy to say that teh traffic has still been rather steady at about 200+ organic visitors a day.. That is with no traffic exchange gimmicks or anything.

The most commonly searched terms are generally related to FTP, HOSTING, WEB DESIGN and OSCOMMERCE.. Anyways.. I decided to create a web design for idiots forum..

I am offering a free month of “above the fold” advertising for ever person who you refer to my forum. You have to sign up first and create a username. the reason for this is when someone signs up, they will be asked to put the username of the referrer. Your name will go there.. The second rule is that the person who you have referred has to post at least ONCE In the forum..

It has to be on topic and not spammy. They can do this any time, not right when they sign up.. but you wont get your space until they post.

THATS IT.. So if you can get folks to sign up and start talking, i would be VERY happy!!!

So head over here:

http://webdesignforidiots.net/forums

and fill out the form.. then post about it, twitter about it.. just get folks over there and talking. When you start doing it, make sure to email me or PM me on the board to give me your graphics.. 1 month FREE for every ONE MEMBER

That’s right.. You heard it first, right here on WebDesignForIdiots.Net…

Web Design For Idiots Forum is UNDERWAY!

It’s been a while since I have been able to update my blog, but that is then and this is now. I am now officially my own boss and I can officially call me a professional graphic designer and web designer! My only source of income is now my graphic and web design, and since I will be speding most of my time on my computer, I decided to really start taking this blog seriously. I get emails regularly of people asking me to help, and  I love that! I love to help people, hopefully you can tell from my posts and emails.

I decided to install a forum because I know that there are lots of people out there who are knowledgable, and lots more people out there who need help. I know there are LOADS of web design forums out there, some for newbies and some for “pros” but this one will be mostly geared towards newbies. A place for people to come and ask the stupidest questions imaginable. A place to get instant feedback and answers! I place to commisserate on your frustrations and talk it through with others.

I am also going to add a graphics category too. All too often you see people who can code themselves out of a paper bag, but couldnt create a nice looking site to save their lives. This forum will help you understand what makes a website LOOK GOOD and how to do it. It will mostly focus on the adobe line of products as far as support goes, but I would also like to get some people on there who are familiar with the freeware like GIMP!

So if you are someone who thinks that they can help, PLEASE contact me. I am looking for administrators and moderators. It won’t start as an officially paying gig until the website itself starts making some money, HOWEVER you can get fringe benfits which we can talk about later.

So spread the word.. I would love any help I can get.. The location of the forum will be http://webdesignforidiots.net/forums

Don’t mind the mess please. its not quite ready yet.. But do check back often!

So I’ve been having a LOAD of fun reviewing people’s websites. Well, ok, it’s not THAT fun, and I’m not really a mean person who loves to tell people what they have missed when designing their website. Or do i?

Anyways, I am proud to announce the

FIRST EVER WEB DESIGN FOR IDIOTS CONTEST!!!!

It’s YOUR turn to REVIEW THIS BLOG!!!

Sounds simple? Well, it is. These are the rules.

Write a review about my blog that is similar to the reviews that have written here:
Website Reviews!

Email your review to me at reviews@webdesignforidiots.net and put in the subject header: Web Design for Idiots Review

NO NEED TO WRITE A POST ON YOUR BLOG.. I’m not looking for promotion, just honest feedback from my faithful readers

You can review us on anything you like. Look, feel, flow, content, or all of the above.

When you finish writing your review, come back here and comment to let me know that you have sent it over.

The winner will be chosen by myself. They will be reviewed on content, suggestions, and writing style. Posts must be as close to grammatically correct as you can get, and PLEASE work on your spelling I don’t want to decipher some txt languange. I know that I an not the best when it comes to typos, but I wrote 10 reviews and you only have to write one.

Deadline is March 20th 2009

So what do you win?

1st Place gets 500 FREE BUSINESS CARDS designed by me

These are just some examples of business cards that myself and my husband have custom designed for various businesses. Just think, you can have the coolest, most unique business card that reflects your personal style. Don’t worry if you don’t want to turn your blog into a “business” You will be surprised how often you will be handing these out. Say you were at the playground talking to some moms and you were telling them about your blog, well, what’s easier than just handing them a card with your blog on it? Or if you were at the pet store and someone LOVES your cute little dog who just happens to have his own blog!!! These cards will help drive visitors to your website. Advertising a website does not have to be on the internet!

Your blog will also be posted on the net for people to comment and a NoFollow Free link back to your blog will be placed on that post to spark conversation about your own blog

2nd Place gets A BEAUTIFUL 8 x 10 FINE ART PHOTOGRAPH!

BSC Photo is nice enough to offer to our readers their choice of ANY 8 x 10 image from the Fine Art category. The pictures are just beautiful. They are all printed on the highest quality Kodak Endura and Black and White Ilford papers. Your photography will be shipped directly to you in 100% safe packaging.

Your blog will also be posted on the net for people to comment and a NoFollow Free link back to your blog will be placed on that post to spark conversation about your own blog

I really do look forward to hearing from all my readers and what THEY think about my little blog here! So its YOUR TURN and LET ME HAVE IT. I can dish it out, I can take it.

So again, review my site, send it to reviews@webdesignforidiots.net, and wait for the announcement of the winners!!! If you are a winner, you will receive an email prior to the posting of the accouncements 1 week after the deadline.