First, using a lot of web graphics, flash, banners and pictures on your home page may make it look fancy or cool; but it will slow down the loading time extensively. And lets be real here, most people that look at your web page will leave if it doesn’t load in 3 seconds or less. Because most people are naturally impatient. If they click on a banner or link that leads to your home page, they expect to see it the second they click, all of it. Not too many people will sit there and wait for your web graphics, flash intro, banners or 30 pictures to load. Keep in mind that not all visitors computers will load pages as fast as yours may. Set your screen resolution at 800x600, or at least put a notice on your page what resolution your site is best viewed in, because people hate to have to scroll back and forth to read from side to side.

Second, professionalism in the way a home web page looks doesn’t usually include distracting backgrounds (use solid soft colors or white), loud and annoying background music or three inch tall caps that try to convince your visitor to buy now or feel like an idiot and lose out for the rest of their lives. Fonts should be clear and easy to read and in colors that don’t clash with one another or the background. And be careful with text, too much is a turn off, people don’t need to read a book about your service or product. Don’t use colors such as bright red fonts on a blue page, they tend to bleed, blur and make the visitor feel like there is something wrong with their eyes.

Third, navigation should be as easy as looking at the screen. Navigation bars should be clear, in easy to read fonts and usually in alphabetical order, as well as in colors that don’t clash with the rest of your page, make your visitor feel like their starring at the sun or have to squint to read font colors that blend in too much with the background. All contact and information page links should be easy to find as well. The worst thing you can do is make a visitor search for a link by hiding it in a corner somewhere or make them click link after link just to find out how to contact you. Keep you pages clean, clutter free and from appearing as if it is all over the screen.

Last, Ad banners and outside links should be kept to a minimum on the home page of your site, nobody wants to visit a link farm. If you belong to a link exchange or trade links (which is a good idea for the search engines and link popularity), make pages that are just for links or ad banners. One or two banners on your home page is plenty, and are usually placed at the bottom or in a skyscraper on the right hand side of the page. However, if you belong to google adsense, it’s okay, and a good idea, to place those links at the top of the page just under your header, because they produce revenue.

If your home page and other pages are easy to read, clutter free, easy to navigate and don’t take long to download or make your eyes blur out, then you’re probably doing okay. To get some ideas, surf the web and look at other business and product web sites to see what they have done. A good website can eventually produce a very good income. Good Luck!

R.L. Young is the owner of National Wholesalers, a wholesale website to businesses and the public and to help those who would like to have their own home business. Mr. Young began web marketing in the fall of 2002 with many experimentations and much research in web marketing, advertising and sales; including studies with affiliate web sites, and always learning more Visit his site at http://www.natlwholesalers.com

• Building eCommerce Websites that Work - Part 2


• Guidelines for Web Page Optimization


• I Did It: Six Months to a Successful Website


• Live Support from Your Website? Can You Do It for Free?


• Abandonment - Why Visitors Don’t Turn Into Customers


• Seven Daft Things Not To Do To Your Website


• Ten Ways NOT to Set Up a Website-based Service Business


• Setting Up Your First Website


• Five Essential Questions to Answer Before Creating Your First (or second...or third) Website


• 12 Essential Tips to a Professional Business Website