The layout of a website is very important. The three main factors that go into a web layout are:
Flow
Visitors aren’t likely to stick around or come back to a website if it isn’t apparent where things are or how to find them.
Overly busy websites can be confusing, while a website that is too simple could bore visitors away. Naturally, both cases loose some degree of traffic.
Solutions
The busy website can of course have content or advertising removed, spread out, or divided up into more pages. Also, the most important content should be most prominent— this begins the process of giving your website contrast, which (being easier on the eyes) prevents visitors from being repelled. Not everything can stand as the main focal point on a page. That’s one reason a website has multiple pages.
The simple website, lacking content, would of course be easy to present a main focal point on, which is a great advantage. Then the flow of the layout can easily be improved with a simple call-to-action and some aesthetics.
Minimally however, the first content visitors see must provide the purpose of the website, product(s), service(s) and/or company being advertised. The idea is to take control of the visitor, before he/she starts searching aimlessly. Once your visitors have to search to find out what they’re doing on your website, they’re about as good as gone, because let’s face it. Are they going to search? No. If anyone actually did it would be because a friend was already raving about the product, service, etc. This is just word-of-mouth marketing at work and it doesn’t mean your website is helping much.
Aesthetic Quality
A slopping, mismatched or bland looking website, although it may not drive away return traffic, isn’t likely to impress and attract much in the way of new traffic.
A bland or dated looking website may still get visitors if it’s layout is good and the content is easy to follow. However, even if it’s repulsed visitors keep coming back just for it’s content, they just might ditch it for the next competitor website (if it is more aesthetic) just get away from the eye sore.
It is also commonly conceived that the aesthetic quality of a website gages the companies level of professionalism. For instance an out-dated design could easily portray a company that is falling behind and just not doing so well.
With a good design, not only will a website retain more of it’s traffic, some visitors will be more inclined to LOOK for reasons to get use out of it, even if it is not immediately obvious why they should.
Of course a website also has to be “aesthetic” specifically to the visitors targeted by the website. You obviously wouldn’t want a flowery, wispy looking website for a construction company.
Flexibility/Fit
Different visitors will have different monitor sizes and not everyone will keep their browser window maximized. Further, most people don’t like having to scroll horizontally, especially to read a single paragraph. This makes it important to have either a flexible layout or one that fits the average monitor, so that only vertical scrolling is neccassary.
There are basically three options when it comes to web layout in terms of how it adjusts to a browser window.
Fixed layout
A fixed layout is rigid in that it’s elements (the various parts of it) don’t shift in relation to each other. So it acts much like a layout printed on a piece of paper, except where the text varies in length.
Advantages: There’s no risk of having elements shift into awkward arrangements. You’ll always have a good idea what your page is going to look like.
Disadvantages: Whether its centered or left side justified, there will be a lot of space surrounding the page layout on a large screen with a maximized window, or the page will be cut off on a smaller screen, requiring horizontal scrolling.
Compromise: 600px (pixels) is a good width for the average monitor as of this writing (may soon be 700px). Although this doesn’t fill much space on a larger sized monitor, it usually looks fine when it’s centered. Or, side columns could be added out side of the main 600px area, so long as their content isn’t too significant or in need of regular access (since it will require horizontal scrolling for those with smaller monitors).
Liquid layout
The elements in a liquid layout shift and/or re-size to fit on the page as much as possible, greatly reducing horizontal scrolling. The elements can also be made to spread out, filling up more space when the screen or browser window is bigger.
Advantages: No matter how big the visitor’s monitor is, the page can be filled with content from left to right and (if built properly) it will still fit great and look good on smaller monitors as well.
Disadvantages: Liquid layouts tend to be trickier to master, and can actually limit some amount of creative liberty. Also, if the browser window is sized too small and/or the layout isn’t built right, the elements can shift into awkward arrangements or require horizontal scrolling (defeating the purpose of a liquid layout).
Compromise: In all practicality, it is really only necessary to enable the layout to reduce to that wonderful standard width, 600px. This fortunately allows for a good amount of working space, and any monitor smaller than that is pretty much expected to require horizontal scrolling or a specialized layout, such as that optimized for a mobile device.
Frame Sets
A frame Set Layout is essentially multiple web pages displayed simultaneously in a set layout of “frames”. The frames can have borders, so it is obvious where the are, or it can have no borders, appearing seamless, to present a more creative and interesting layout. These pages can interact with each other and the page in one frames can be changed without changing the conent in the other frames.
Advantages: Frames can be very useful and allow for much control over the behavior and layout of a website. As a bonus, less load time is required for a frame set, because only one frame has to load at a time (when jumping from one page to another). This is great for complex sites with a lot of functionality available to it’s members.
Disadvantages: Probably the main reason frame sets are not in common use anymore (except in complex sites) is that they are not search engine friendly. A search engine can find and catalog each of the pages that make up any given frame set layout, but only as individual pages. Therefore, when found by a viewer the search engine will provide one of the peices of the layout, without any links to the other peices. Sure, the web master can include all the links and any other data requred into every single page in an attempt to work around this problem; but at that point, the purpose of the frame set is defeated.
The second major problem with frame sets is that, since the layout only displays properly when one is viewing the frame set itself (as opposed to its individual pages) a marketer can only direct people to the frame set (which is usually the home page). If the marketer wants to direct prospects to a page on a particular product, tough luck.
Compromise: Don’t use frame sets except in complex sites and only where there is members-only access. Use includes (a.k.a. server side includes or ssi) for things such as navigation menus and content that is frequently used site wide.
Tags: aesthics, fixed layout, flexibility, flow, frames, frameset, liquid layout
