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Web Page Design Insights
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Page Design Elements
The look and feel of all pages is determined by three basic design elements.
- Section A large Web page should be grouped into several sections for better viewing.
Cognitive research has concluded that people can identify 7 plus or minus 2
chunks of information a time. With the reduced readability on a computer screen than on paper,
the number of sections on a Web page should be no more than five. Large sections can be
further broken into sub-sections.
- Color, Font and Graphics They are used to distinguish one section from others.
- Text Description This is the main content of most web pages. The amount of
text will impact the look-and-feel of a page as well.
Types of Web Pages
There are only four types of Web pages even the total number of Web pages is estimated
to be trillions.
- Summary Page The purpose of a summary page or an index page is to provide links
to other pages (content pages or other summary pages). The home page of a website and
research results page are normally summary pages. The list of links on the page may be grouped
into sections by categories. Colors and fonts are used to highlight the links and the
categories. Heavy graphics should be avoid on summary pages as their main purpose is to direct
users to other pages. Text description on summary page is always brief and concise.
- Content Page A content page provides rich information to the users. Paragraphs are
natural segments on the content pages. Graphics is an option to enhance user experience. The use of
colors and fonts for content text should be consistent and minimal.
- Interactive Page On an interactive page, user's actions or choices impact what they
will see next whether it's on the same page or next page. A search page is a simple interactive
page while sophisticated interactive pages allow drag-and-drops and other user actions.
- Support Page They are used to help users understand content pages and/or complete tasks on
interactive pages. Word lookup or glossary are ideal candidates for using support pages. The presence
of support pages shouldn't break the current navigation flow since they're not part of the current
navigation context. If the help text is small, we can use "help tip" box on the same page, instead of
a new Web page. While providing online word lookup, we can use a modeless popup window so users can stay
on the current page.
Related Topics
Ecommerce Web Design - Site Navigation and Search Engine Ranking
Web Design Languages
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