What a feeling! (What makes a good website and what doesn't).

If you look hard enough, you'll find a checklist for everything on the web and there are masses of lists of 'dos and don'ts' when it comes to designing a website. Amongst all the great ideas, there are some basic elements necessary for a really good website:

• The feeling. This might sound lame but actually it is crucial. Try to think how you feel when you visit a spa or a library. The feelings are different and appropriate to the place (assuming they have got it right!). The same goes for websites and if you want to inspire your website visitors to do something, such as buy your product, they need to feel like doing so. For example, if you run a restaurant, the website needs to make visitors feel:

            * welcome
            * like they can trust that the food will be good/safe to eat
            * hungry (seriously!).

• Usability. We say this a lot. It does not matter how good your product or service is, if visitors can't easily get around your website or find the info they want, they'll go elsewhere. Going back to the point above, if your website makes the visitor feel annoyed, they will leave. Fast. The best way to work out how easy your website is to use is to write down three things that your visitors will want to do, then try doing them yourself. Even better, ask other people to try to do them with you sitting next to them. More than 4 clicks to find contact details? Need to know what you've called a page? Fix it...fast!
• Say what you do, clearly. We are always amazed at the websites we come across that don't actually say what the company or person does. If you don't say what you do, why bother having a website at all. Say it often and say it clearly in as many languages as your customers need.
  

A final point that one of our team reminded us all of - if the website can relate the product/service to the visitor's own life, they will probably return time and again. That's what most of us want for our website, right?