Contrary to the beliefs of some, advertising for web and print are very
different. Converting print ads for use on the web is very tricky. What
has been very successful on paper may have no impact at all on the
screen. When I am asked "How do I convert my print ads to web?" my
answer is simple: don't! Web and print are so vastly different that I
believe you should never build your web pages based on a print ad.
There are certain rules that web design must follow that simply don't
apply to print. One of my colleagues, Tim Pattison, broke these rules
down very concisely recently:
<ul>
<li>Usability</li>
<li>Browser compatibility</li>
<li>Designing within the constraints of
(X)HTML</li>
<li>Accessibility</li>
</ul>
These are the four rules that web design must follow. I will explain
these rules in detail later. For now though we need to talk about
copywriting. As I said in my last newsletter Web Site
Templates and Their Benefits, the most important part of your
website is content. Search engines and disabled users don't care how
your site looks. They only care about the information your site
presents. The reason I'm coming back to this is to explain that writing
web copy is an entirely different ball game from writing print copy.
Quite possibly the best resource for writing web copy is the book "Web
Copy That Sells" by Maria Veloso. It outlines the differences between
the two and gives great techniques to writing for the web. I will be
revisiting this topic in my newsletters to come, so make sure you visit
often.
The four rules exclusive to web design: usability, browser
compatibility, design within the constraints of (x)html, and
accessibility, are the four horsemen of doom for the uneducated,
inexperienced designer. They are some of the most overlooked aspects of
web design, and yet some of the most important.
<ul>
<li>Usability: Unlike print ads, web
sites are interactive. Users must be able to easily find their way
around, and they need a clear path to the information they are trying
to find. If you are selling a product, there needs to be a clear,
concise, distraction free path from the home page all the way to the
check out page. </li>
<li>Browser compatibility: In a
perfect world you could design your web site once and it would look
perfect and stay perfect in all browsers. Unfortunately, we live in the
real world where some browsers support a set of standards and others
simply don't. Actually, the most popular browser in the world has for
years lived by their own rules. While MS Internet Explorer still holds
the majority of the market share, Mozzilla, Netscape, and Opera have
acquired a considerable percentage of the browser market. In fact, it's
high enough of a percentage to make Microsoft revise their plans to
release IE 7.0. While competition is healthy, it makes for headaches
for web designers. It is not uncommon to have your site looking perfect
in one browser only to find that your entire design explodes when
viewed with another.</li>
<li>Designing within the constraints of (x)html:
When you lay out a print ad, you place the images where they belong on
the page, draw out any shapes, lay out the colors, and place the text.
Then you print it out and make copies. Every copy you hand out looks
exactly the same, and there's nothing magic about the way things stay
on the page. In web design, everything is held in place by code. You
could easily have a four to one ratio of code to content. If you are
not familiar with the coding involved in keeping your site looking like
it's supposed to, it can be very frustrating laying out your
design.</li>
<li>Accessibility: Back to our perfect
world - not only would browsers be perfect, but all our viewers would
look through the same eyes. Unfortunately, some people aren't blessed
with good eyesight or motor skills like you and I. We need to consider
that for those who have disabilities, a poorly laid out website can be
completely useless. You could ignore that audience, but you would be
doing yourself a disservice. And let's not forget, our biggest and most
important group of users is completely blind: search engine spiders.
They read your website the same way a blind person does. If the layout
of your site isn't logical, a spider may leave and not bother coming
back for a long time.</li>
</ul>
Considering these things, I think it is always best to design your web
site separate from your print advertising. Always write fresh copy for
the web, and remember that it's not enough to write great copy once.
You need to update your site regularly to keep the search engines
interested.
About the Author
J Hancock is the president and
founder of HighTide Web Services. We are proud to be a fast growing,
California based web services firm, offering high quality web site
templates from some of the best designers out there, as well as
excellent and affordable web hösting
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