Insights

Web Design Questions and Answers

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Here are some answers to some of the basic questions that get asked about Website Design and websites.

What do Web designers do?

Web designers are responsible for creating attractive and fully functional websites, but there is more to it than just creating a pretty design. A designer has to take into account the customers’ marketplace, their brand, the goal of the site and much much more. In short, a web designer takes the needs of its customer and translates this into a website that is fully supportive of the customer’s goals.

What is meant by Web design?

Web design is the process of creating the look and feel of a website. Many different areas are covered, including the graphic design and layout of each page.  Web design is a lot different from web development, even though they are used interchangeably by many. Web design is seen by most to cover the look and feel of sites, while web development covers the aspects of programming and coding.

What is good Web design?

A well-designed website can make all the difference to the way a business is viewed by its visitors and potential customers, and will help them to take the desired action. This involves creating a great user experience, part of which means optimising the design for mobile devices and their smaller screens and ensuring that it is easy to navigate and to use.

What’s the difference between web design and web development?

Simply put web design covers the look and feel of websites, the aesthetics, as well as their usability, this covering the issue of user experience. Web Developers, on the other hand, make the website actually work, by producing the necessary code, using CSS, JavaScript, PHP and other programming languages to bring the design to life.

How do I start a website?

Creating a website has never been easier, but creating a good website is just as difficult as it always was. It must be remembered that a website is a window to your business or organisation, so it is vital to building it in the right way. There are 4 steps. First, choose and register your domain name, find a web hosting company and set up the design interface, perhaps WordPress. Then comes the hard part, the creation of the design and content, and then the robust, secure web development.

How many types of web design are there?

This question can be answered in two different ways. One from the design angle, i.e. how it is built, and secondly the perspective of why it was built. That is what function was it created to meet. For design, the site can either be static or dynamic. As for the reason the site was created, these include Personal, Brochure, eCommerce, Portal and Informative – Wiki.

Why do we need responsive web design?

All websites now need to use responsive design, for the simple reason that so many people view web pages using mobile devices. Responsive websites are designed so that they automatically scale their content and elements to match the screen size on which they are being viewed. If this is not done, users have to do a lot of extra work to read your content, by for instance scrolling the viewing window from left to right as well as the normal up and down. Also, Google is known to penalise non-responsive websites, giving them a poorer rank in their results.

Is HTML and CSS enough to create a website?

Basic websites can certainly be created using just these two elements, but they are unlikely to be fully responsive. Professional websites, however, require the use of javascript/jQuery and a database programming language like PHP to be interactive, dynamic and fully functional.

Is Web Design graphic design?

Another name for Graphic Design is Communication Design. Designers create images to put across the message needed by their clients. Web designers, on the other hand, create & modify the design of websites, which includes the graphic design part. Graphic designing is often considered to be the more artistic field and is heavily used in the production of printed materials.

What are the different types of website layouts?

There are many different ways to layout a webpage and more are being created all the time to keep up with the technology and trends of the day. Here are some of the most popular- The Zig-Zag Layout. The F Layout. Full-screen Photo. Grid Layout. One-Column Layout. Featured Image Layout. Asymmetrical Layout. Split Screen Layout.

What is a website and its types?

A website is a collection of web pages, each page is built from a collection of related resources, such videos, text and images, the page often being built up using information in a central database. All of these elements are normally held under a common domain name and are published on a single web server.

What are the three types of websites?

There are really far more than three types. But if you had to choose the top three they would be Personal Websites, Business Websites and Community/Informational websites. In reality, there is a website that covers every niche, purpose and need.

Why you need a responsive website?

Sites built to be truly responsive, provide an optimal experience for the user, whatever type of device and screen size they are using, with minimum resizing and scrolling. For 2019 all websites need to use responsive web design as more people are accessing the Internet using mobile devices than desktop and laptop computers, plus non-responsive sites are penalised by Google and are therefore going to be harder to find.

What is important in Web design?

A brand is all-important now, be it your personal brand or a business brand. Web design is therefore important as it impacts how your audience perceives that brand. The impression you make on them can either keep them on your page so that they can learn about your business or leave and turn to a competitor. Good web design helps you keep your visitors on your site’s pages.

What is the difference between website and webpage?

The difference between a website and a web page is that a website consists of a number of web pages, whilst a web page is, as its name suggests, just one page. In essence, a web page is akin to the page of a book, it being a small part of a website, just as a page is of a book.

Which is better Wix or Shopify?

These two systems have been created to meet different needs. Shopify is better for eCommerce sites and has a wider range of apps than Wix, whilst Wix is easier to use if all that is required is a simple website. Wix can be used for smaller online stores, but for better eCommerce functionality, Shopify is a better choice.

Is Wix better than WordPress?

Both Wix and WordPress are easy to use, however of the two, Wix is easier to get used to for beginners and handles its own updates. This makes it easier to keep up to date, something which is essential to ensure the security of a site. WordPress is undoubtedly more powerful and flexible, but it relies heavily on Plugins to extend its functionality well beyond what Wix can offer.

Which website builder is best?

Hiring a web developer/designer makes the need to work out what builder is best redundant, but if you are determined to build a site yourself, the following builders should be considered, each having their own strengths and weaknesses. Squarespace has some excellent Themes, whilst Shopify is considered the best for eCommerce. The format is also considered to be a great choice for Portfolio websites, whilst Wix offers users the precise control some users require.

What about Drupal?

Drupal CMS is a powerful content management platform typically aimed at larger and more complex, content-heavy websites. Setting up a Drupal website takes more initial planning and development than systems like WordPress but can be more easily customised and tuned with the right development skillset.

Do professional Web designers use Dreamweaver?

Dreamweaver has been around since 1997 and was a favorite with a large number of web designers and developers. You can author professional code with Dreamweaver, but as with all such programs it has limitations. To be able to truly build outstanding websites, a web developer has to be proficient in HTML, CSS, JavaScript and scripting languages like PHP.

 

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