Building an Innovative and Effective Website, by making full use of available technologies, is crucial for the future success of your current or future online business. There are literally 1000's of great ideas out there, but finding the right ones and applying them to your website, is where the real trick lies.

Applying the best tips, tools and other design principles to your website, can bring you untold success on the internet. At the same time, using powerful and innovative ideas in the design and development stages of your website, will level the playing field for your business, and raise it's competitive edge on the internet.

 In today's world, a web site is virtually mandatory for any successful business. But there are web sites that will win you customers, and there are web sites that will lose you customers. Good design has a lot to do with which category your web site will fall into. But what is it that makes good or bad web site design? In my personal opinion, a good web site is one that's simple, informative and gives me a reason to come back frequently. That's what you should get from a good web designer/writer team. Bad sites, on the other hand, are complicated to use, slow loading, confusing or just plain annoying. Here's a list of my personal top 7 turn-offs as far as web site design is concerned:

1. Pay-Per-Click Advertising One of the most cost effective and efficient means of advertising is on the Internet. Pay-per-click advertising, for instance, allows you to place ads on behalf of your business for as little as 5¢ per lead.

The best thing about this type of advertising is that you only pay a fee when someone clicks on your ad. That's right! You only have to pay once the customer clicks on your link and enters your web site. Pretty cool!

Tips to brand your website

Include your logo in all pages. Position it at the top left or each page. Complement your logo with a tagline or catchy sentence that summarizes your business purpose. For example "Always low prices" is the tagline for Wal-Mart. Create a favicon. A favicon is that small graphic that appears next to the URL in the address bar. Have a consistent look and feel in all your pages. Use a color scheme and layout that are clearly recognized across your site. Have an About Us section, that includes all relevant information about you and your business. Include a copyright statement at the bottom of each page.

 Whether a business has just got off the ground or has been established for years, start-up and long running companies are looking to the internet to expand their sales as well as service to customers. Many new websites are going up and with so many people opting to go with the cheapest route or the quickest design process, sometimes the quality of a website gets left behind. Lets face it, you wouldn't want a possible client coming into your office, looking around at a mess, so why would you send them to your virtual office looking like one?

Don't knock it; "Keep It Simple, Stupid" is a great rule to live by. Nobody likes a website to "yell" at them, with blaring colors and flashing lights. Too many buttons will turn customers off. I had this problem with my homepage at http://www.antion.com. A colleague of mine, who makes a lot of money, pointed out the cluttered look of my site. I had worked so closely on every detail of the page; that I couldn't see it for what it was anymore.

 When it comes to marketing your website, you should really work on the design of your site and optimize it so it makes you the maximum amount of money per visitor as possible. The design of your website is very important and plays a huge role in your website's success or failure. Consider the following tips when designing your website:

Secret #1 - Clear Writing

It is very important when you write copy, or have copy written by a professional, that it be very clear and to the point. You do not want visitors to have to guess what your site is about, you want to make it clear up front.