Homogeneity Website Design

So called modern design:

Some 'modern' things drive me absolutely crazy. I.e. small thin fonts in bright grey on a white background, boxes where You don't see the borders ....
Some of this sites I would really like to use but do not because I can hardly read them I calm down thinking 'o.k. they do not want one more user. Good bye forever'.

@Rudi, yes... I agree. Some favor design flair over actual readability, but the look I'm referring to is the general look of the typical squarespace sites. They all look very nice, but they also all look very similar and I've seen that same minimal look catching on everywhere. I'd personally like to see more designers experimenting a bit more instead of aping what all the "cool" kids are doing.

Skip, the current trend is towards responsive design, i.e. design that works equally well on a cell phone, a 42" HD big screen and everything in between including tablets and laptops. Websites have to resize and degrade gracefully. Every site design is at least three site designs.

The most reliable way to accomplish responsive design is to put content in resizable boxes that slip underneath one another as the space is reduced. Flat graphics work best at the moment, but as designers learn how to work with continually shifting layouts we'll start to see more aesthetic innovation.


Dan Turner
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online

Dan,

Wix, Weebly, or Wordpress? Opinions anyone?

I have heard Wordpress is "easier" for the bots to navigate.

Bluehost? or another hosting site? Opinions anyone?

Dave

David, Nikon or Oil Paint? In both instances it's easy to get "something", but is it what you need/want? Businesses selling DIY sites are quick to say "Have your site up and running in 5 minutes." That simply means a URL with your name on it, completely without content.

A website invariably comes down to how you're going to use it and what parts you're willing to do. Getting under the hood and making font decisions and moving columns around requires a different commitment than writing a blog and linking images.


Dan Turner
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online

Dan,

What are you using? How was your experience putting it up?

Dave

.

For myself that does my own website than I try and leave my site layout as clean or default as can. It's all I can do to keep up with content tweaks, keywords, etc to worry about site aesthetics. Even here on FAA than I've keep the default settings.

This also keeps me more compatible to mobile devices as can use these platforms as widgets that were designed for mobile devices, even if the whole site isn't. At least that's the theory.

Certainly an area I'll have to revisit, but for now I'm just overwhelmed at how to fill in the blanks with my batch of products on the 'established' choices to think about laying everything out better. Just figuring out a way to keep track of the keywords you use... let alone figuring out if they're effective keywords. What links I have on images if I break them. What places I've priced originals at. How do you guys figure out all that stuff?

-- mary ellen anderson

For my art photography I created a site on Wordpress software but on a self-hosted account. I will not use Wordpress .com because their TOS prohibit most forms of marketing.

Bluehost appears to be quite popular. Years ago they had a bad rep for hosting a lot of spammers but I understand that is no longer the case. What's good to know about that "situation" is that they survived and have been in business for a long time. I used to recommend HostGator - but their recent buyout has created some "problems." We have two smaller accounts there but, because of those problems, are talking with AIT (.com) about moving after the holidays.

One word of caution: If you need to buy a domain name - do NOT host with the company from whom you buy the domain. There have been (too) many horror stories about people (in business) doing that and having problems moving to another host.


------------------------------------
~ Bill
~ US Pictures .com

I have a Wordpress site hosted on Bluehost. I am happy with it. There are tons of free themes available for Wordpress. They can be tweaked and customized. There are also many free plug-ins for Wordpress. I recently installed a security plug-in to help me deal with hackers and bad bots. I really like Wordpress but there was a bit of a learning curve in the beginning. It all depends on how much time you are willing to spend on it.

Dave Gordon
http://dgportfolio.net

Bill,

Thanks for helping me flesh out keeping the domain name company and the hosting company
separate. I use GoDaddy for the domain and Bluehost for the site. I will use
Wordpress on Bluehost.

David,

Your site's aesthetics are very much what I was looking for. Did you use a free theme?
And where do I get the free plug-ins?

Thanks,

Dave

David, David G's site is WP's TwentyTen theme; free. Most of the plugins you would use are also free. Google what you need for plugin reviews and comparisons, then search and install them from WPs plugin menu.

Building a site can be fairly straight-forward, NASA-level hard and everything in between. There is a lot of online help. If a tutorial doesn't resonate with you, move quickly to another on the same subject. There are generally several solutions to the same problem.

If you are new to building sites, check out some beginner WP sites to get an overview and hammer out a plan.


Dan Turner
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online

Hi David,

As Dan mentioned above, I use the free Twenty Ten theme. In order to use WordPress, your hosting company needs to support PHP and mySQL, the server side scripting program and database that Wordpress uses. Probably nowadays most hosting companies support PHP but in the past that was not always the case and its always good to check. Also might be important is the type of server. I am on a linux server which I have heard is more robust to hacking than windows servers. I like Bluehost because their support is very good, they have tools and scripts that make it easy to install Wordpress, block unwanted IP's and bots, etc. Before I used Wordpress, I used to hand code my site with html and a bit of javascript which was rather tedious. Hope this helps.

Dave Gordon
http://dgportfolio.net

Dan and David,

Was planning all along to use Bluehost. I have heard their service is good. I have called them with questions
earlier this year.

Free Twenty Ten theme. That it is. David sometime in January I will look you up to see what widgets you
recommend, if that is okay? Dan, I should look you up then as well.

I will build my site in early to mid January. It is now going to the top of my list of things to do.

I have been taking it easy work wise for the last few days. I expect to have an easy work schedule into the
very beginning of January. No finished art works till into January. I have one on the drawing board and
quite a few entering the thought process.

Thanks,

Dave

I use and recommend bluehost. They are head and shoulders above 1and1 and godaddy.

My websites are all Joomla based, its a little bit more powerful, albeit a bit more complicated than Wordpress, and I am familiar with it.

David, while you're in the planning stages, take some time to look at other artists sites. Make notes about what you like, how the art is presented, ease of navigation, etc. Look at your top picks on a phone. Do they work? At this stage of the game don't even consider building a site that isn't mobile friendly.

If you're using FireFox, you can generally find out how the site is built (html, Wordpress, Joomla, etc) and what template is being used by right-clicking and selecting "View Page Info." If you have Firebug installed (free FF extension) you can examine all the CSS and experiment with the settings. The changes you make will appear live in your browser.


Dan Turner
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online