How to Create a Web Design
The purpose of web design is to find a presentation method for delivering that information in a way that is easily readable by users. Web design employs multiple components, including web structure planning, graphical design, page layout design, markup, and styling.
When creating a web design, consider the purpose of the website, the kind of users that will be visiting the website, and the types of viewing styles and features they are used to seeing.
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Instructions
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Plan your website structure. This will save time and reduce the amount of changes you will have to make later on. This means planning out each page that will be part of the website, what content will be displayed on each page, and what page will link (connect) to what page.
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Create the pages that will belong in your website. This can be done by hand by creating the html (mark-up coding) files in a plain text editor, or by specifying the pages in a content management system. Choose the method that you are most comfortable with.
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Design a banner to head each page of your website. Most banners span the width of the layout, which is often 800 pixels, 1024 pixels or the width of the browser. This can be done in your preferred image editor. A banner is not required, but it is a good idea to give the user some indication of the website's purpose, which a banner does well. Save your banner in a GIF, JPEG, or PNG format.
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Place the banner at the top of each page. Again, the method for doing this depends on the method you chose for managing the markup. By hand, you would enter an image tag that links to where you saved the banner. Place this tag in a "div" at the top of the body section in the markup.
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Create the navigation. Navigation contains links to other pages, enabling users to move around your website. Use the link design you created in the planning stage to populate links for your navigation. Make sure that a user can navigate to each page without hitting a dead end. Be sure to use helpful words for your links so that a user does not have to guess where a certain link leads.
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Create the page content. Indicate near the top of the page what a user should know about the page, what the user can expect to learn on the page, or any instructions that the user may need for completing a task on the page. Remember that while you know what the site is about and how to use its features, a first-time user has very little knowledge of the site and could use any and all help you can offer.
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Use the home page as a virtual tour guide, directing the user to particular areas of interest or describing how to find different types of information by following the links in the navigation. Do not make a user guess how to get to the information they are looking for.
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