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4 Easy Steps to being A Good Web Designer

Acquire Content
Everything starts with content, it’s not good enough to say that ‘this will go here’ and ‘that will go there’ you must deal with the specifics of the content from the beginning. The content is the rudder, it determines the course. Good web designers have to learn to wrangle content.

Edit Content
Ultimately webpages are documents which must be read, the best webpages are those that are clear in message and purpose, that clarity doesn’t come from an animated menu or a flashing light bulb, it comes from well written and structured content. No amount of photoshop can help a badly written and structured site, therefore good web designers are good editors.

Markup Content
Markup the content in HTML, set out the site in the structure derived from your editing process, no scripting yet, this is just laying out the pages before the book is bound. Read the site, roleplay the site, pretend to be your gran (or better yet get your gran) going through the site. Good web designers are empathic, and it goes without saying that good web designers know how to markup a document properly.

Design Interface
A book is an interface, a postcard is an interface, a web page is an interface. Remember that the interface exists as a means to an end, it is not the end itself. If you’ve followed the first 3 steps regarding content this will be clear to you and your heart will sing with joy at the prospect of what you can achieve. You are responsible for communicating a message, your skill can be the difference between a person learning something new or giving up out of frustration. Good web designers know that with great power comes great responsibility, gwasshoppah.

Wax on, wax off. Wax on, wax off.

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