Any website, even the most informative and interesting, will not draw attention of people and will not become popular without convenient and intuitive navigation. Navigation on the website – extremely important stage of its development. The thought-over system of navigation allows the visitor easily and to quickly find any information on the website, without spending excess time for transitions between pages and search of any given links. Also convenient navigation is the important aspect increasing the rating of the website in search engines – therefore how search engines (for example, Google) evaluate content and enclosure of pages of the website, the structure of navigation depends.
Instruction
1. If the website has a large number of various pages with the high level of enclosure and large information volumes, develop a detailed and clear site map through which the user at any time will be able quickly to find the necessary page. Create the navigation chart of the website on the basis of hierarchical structure of your pages – beginning from homepages, and then passing to more minor.
2. You monitor that the structure of the website in the navigation chart was not too confused and complicated. Texts in the navigation menu should be short and clear. You should not replace navigation texts with animation or graphic pictures – it confuses visitors of the website.
3. On each page of the website try to place the system of internal references that the visitor could pass from any page into the previous sections of the website.
4. The design of a system of navigation on the website should correspond to the general design and style of execution of web pages. Have links and the menu of navigation so that they harmoniously fitted into an overall picture of design of the website. If you want the website to be loaded as soon as possible, use simple text references. Nevertheless, graphic links – the menu buttons corresponding on a color gamma to design of the website, and containing the necessary text information look much more esthetically.
5. Using graphic buttons, you decorate the website, however risk to make it unavailable to users which for some reason disconnect all graphics in the browser. If you decided to use graphic buttons in navigation, make sure that they do not increase load time of the website and have no too big weight. If such buttons weigh too much, replace them with simple text references of the menu – they are universal, and are displayed in any browser at any user.
6. Place the navigation panel with links so that the visitor saw it always when visits the website – for example, in the top part of the page. Besides, the navigation bar can be placed at the left or on the right, and on all pages of the website it should be located in the same place. Maintain stability of the navigation panel – having thought over its view and location once, do not change its every time. People should get used to navigation of the website.