Article Directory Website Design: Clean Up Your Content!

Article directories have taken the internet by storm. That is a good thing, as it allows authors to distribute their content and allows publishers to grab content for their website, but unfortunately, many article directories are offering a huge disservice to authors and publishers due to poorly designed directories. Listen up article directory owners; let’s think about some ways to serve our visitors in our article directory designing!

Style Elements

I have stumbled across many article directory websites where there are a number of mixed alignings, ten different color combinations, excessive bold and italicized fonts, and numerous style “enhancements”. While these different design elements can be good, there comes a time when, as the webmaster, we need to be okay with simplifying the visual end. When a visitor enters your directory, or website for that matter, their eyes cannot help but to expect unity and clarity. If they are presented with a jumbled, disorganized mess, they will do one of two things. They will either (1) quickly jerk the mouse to the back button or (2) continue to browse your site but grow frustrated from the chaotic presentation and then eventually leave. You obviously want to prevent both of those things from happening.

When applying style elements such as colors, size, and images, we need to make sure these things help bring the visitor in contact with the content and message of the website. There comes a time when a line is crossed between beneficial and distracting. I have visited some article directories in which images and graphics push the navigation bar down the page. You do not want to have your visitor scroll down the page to have to find where click to other portions of your site. Make it easy on your visitor to get around your directory. Keep your navigation bar towards the top of your site. If your visitor does not know how to get around your article directory they will get frustrated and leave. Bring your visitor in contact with the content!

To expound more on the use of font colors and styling, remember to maintain consistency. Choose three or four colors to create a color scheme for your article directory. Stick with this color scheme. This provides unity in your content and makes the visitors viewing experience a lot more pleasurable. Continually ask yourself the question, “Is my article directory home page easy to read? Is it organized? Is the directory inviting?”

Advertisements and Images

As the webmaster of your article directory or web content site, it is obvious and understandable that it is a must to push your ads and affiliate programs so you can generate income. However, do keep in mind while placing your ads that you want your visitor to receive your web site’s content. Your visitor wants to find valuable information. That is why they visit your website. They do not come for the ads! Understanding that, make sure your ads relate and apply to your directory’s content. It is vital that your ads do not block your website’s content. Integrate your ads so they do not intrude on your website content.

Before you start plastering your article directory with ads and “cool” styling, keep it mind that your website’s content is first and for most. Overall, people are coming for your content—they could care less if you used pastel pink or neon green!

Article Directory Website Design: Understanding the Essential Basics

If you have done any article directory surfing, you have probably noticed all types of article directory designs. You may have run across those that are visually impressive and enjoyable to look at it. They make you stop and ask yourself the following questions: "How can I make an attractive design like that?" Then you have probably run across those site that have inflicted pain onto your eyeballs and you have probably questioned yourself, "How do I avoid that?" So many people do not understand the essential basics to creating a visually pleasing website design. Let us take a look at these four important and basic subjects of design.

*Contrast

Most of us understand the concept of contrast, yet when you look at different website designs, we often see this concept ignored. Contrast needs to be highly considered when creating any type of website. Ultimately, you want the visitor to come in contact with the content and information of the website. Your visitor does not want to have *dig* through your website to find the information for which he or she is looking. If your content is hidden, people will miss the purpose of your website and simply give up trying to find the information or article they need. Reader's eyes want a visible and clear presentation.

To put contrast in exercise, highly and carefully consider the colors you are using for your website design. The type of contrast you are looking for is black text on a white background. While that may seem boring, it is most important that your background contrasts with your text so your text is clearly visible and seen. Another mistake you will often see is the overuse of graphics and images. Use graphics wisely! Too many graphics can clutter your website and make your content buried. A graphic-laden page does not necessarily mean it will be more visually pleasing.

Contrast is a simple and effective way to visually enhance your website. Remember, that you want to bring the content to your reader. You do not want your reader to have todig for it.

*Alignment

The second concept, alignment, is also extremely vital to the website presentation. Good alignment brings about unity and order. Bad alignment brings about chaos and disorder. Knowing that we want to bring content and contextual components to our visitor, we need to present that content in an orderly fashion. The basic principle for alignment is this: do not mix alignment styles. For example, if you have left aligned text, do not create a centered heading. You want your design to flow. That brings us to our next concept, repetition.

*Repetition

While providing your website visitor with clear, visible orderly content, you can also create a stronger sense of unity in the website through repetition. Repetition on a website basically means that you use the same design elements throughout the design. That means you want to use the same logo, graphics, bullets, fonts, and colors. A common misconception by amateur designers is that the more color on the page you have, the more visually pleasing it is. Experience and good judgement show that this is simply not true. Stick to four similar contrasting colors. Stay consistent with your fonts. Stay consistent with your graphics. Repetition will further the sense of the unity in your document.

*Proximity

Proximity ties in with presenting easy-to-find content to your website visitor. Proximity is not a hard principle to follow and it will greatly increase your website's readability. To follow the concept of proximity, put elements together that should be together. For example, if you are talking about a book, you do not want to have the book title at the top of the page, the author at the bottom of the page, and the publisher of the book on a completely different page. To re-emphasize, you want your visitor to find what they are looking for easily. Proximity best assists your viewers in finding exactly what they need, when they need it.

Following these basic design principles will allow you to make a sharp and attractive website. Remember, you want the content to find the visitor. You do not want the visitor to have to dig through the design to find the content that they need. When the content finds the visitor, you want it to be unified, clear, and visible. Exercise these four basic concepts, and you will have yourself a very visually pleasing design.