Visitors to web pages will always appreciate friendly, intuitive navigational devices. The ability to find ones way around a Web site is a major reason why visitors will return to a site and recommend it to others (provided they find the content useful as well). It is extremely important to good Web site design that some system of site navigation be employed as a courtesy for visitors to a site.
Some tips and considerations to think about are:
- The first page the viewer sees should immediately convey information
about the subject and content of the site with obvious links to major
areas. Try to prevent visitors from having to scroll down on that first
page!
- Try to keep your sequence of links general to specific—the
first page should, ideally, contain no more than 6 (six) links:
About This Site Toolbox What’s New Tutorials Relevant Links Contact Us
or
• About This Site
• Toolbox
• Tutorials
• Links
• What’s New
• Contact Us
- An alternative to the above would be 4 (four) major links each
with up to 7 (seven) “sub” links:
- Annotate your links, if possible. It is a courtesy to the visitor
to let them in on where a link will take them and what they will find
there:
• Toolbox
Descriptions of free software with links to where you can download them to your computer.
- Keep any possible destination in a Web site no more than 3 (three)
links away
- Incorporate links to the major areas on every page so that a visitor
can “jump” to any area from any page (including the
Home page):
about toolbox tutorials links home
or
[ about ] [ toolbox ] [ tutorials ] [ links ] [ home ]
or
about | toolbox | tutorials | links | home
- Put those links at both the top and bottom of every page of
the Web site
- Never let any page be a dead end, always include links to get
out—don’t assume the visitor knows how to use the browsers
back button
- Consider including a site map or site index (especially if
your web site begins to grow quite large). Many visitors appreciate
the opportunity to look up things alphabetically or by subject
- Lastly, think about what your visitors may be most interested in and make that an obvious link
These tips are meant to be guidelines, your particular site may demand variations, so use your best judgment and remember that visitors to your Web site are not as intimately familiar with the layout as you are.
 Tables |
 Top
of Page |
Interface
 |