Designing a website takes time, patience and a little bit of know-how. It can be easy if you already know what goes into great design, such as SEO and useful navigation. Read on to find some great tips and tricks which will help you build the website of your dreams!

If you’re working on web design use the right graphics for the job. Remember, bitmap images are huge and usually don’t work well, PNGs work fine. For screenshots, text buttons, and other non-photographic images, use PNG if the image has more than 256 colors, and GIF if not. For photos, you can use JPEG images.

For multimedia presentations, take advantage of the new HTML5 standard. Although HTML5 isn’t quite as robust for animation and games as Flash, it has the advantage of working stably on mobile phone browsers, including those contained in Apple hardware. HTML5 is also quite a bit leaner than Flash, so load times will improve, as well.

Be wary of web hosting companies who claim that they offer unlimited bandwidth to their customers. Usually there is something that is written in the small print that is far different than that. In many cases people end up having problems when it comes to fair use policies.

Separate your topics. If you have several topics of discussion on your site, put them on different pages. This helps alleviate any confusion that your customers may experience, as well as giving search engines a broader and more clear view of your site, potentially bumping you up higher in their rankings.

If you believe your site may be accessed via mobile devices, you will want to keep your designs simple. The use of flash, excessive images, and complicated menus will not translate well to a mobile platform. Keep your page clean and simple, or create a specific mobile site for your users.

If you plan on having a commercial site, you should seriously consider buying your own web hosting. Most free host sites force you to display their advertisements, which is counter-intuitive if you are attempting to sell something as well. Purchase your own hosting to avoid this advertising hassle, so that you can choose your own ads.

You should always make sure to implement a way that users can submit feedback to you about your website. This way, if something is missing or they don’t understand how to use your page, you can fix it accordingly. If your visitors feel like they are a part of your site, they will want to return.

When designing your site, try to come up with three or four keywords that you expect users to input into search engines as they try to find your page. These keywords should then be repeated frequently throughout the title, page body and description meta tag. This will make it easier for users to locate your site on the web.

Now that you’ve read the ideas in this article, you should be able to go forth and design a website which will rival those of your competition. Keep learning to find new techniques to increase your traffic, add new content and boost your page to the top of your market!