100% LOADED

As of today, I have spent the last 10 years or so in the role of what you might call “web designer”. It all began in 1997 as Mosaic was on it’s way out and someone introduced me to this new program called a “browser”, which I was told, was something you used to get on the “World Wide Web“.

Since then, many things have changed in the world of the web, except maybe one thing: it has, and will always take more than design to make a great website.

If you want to become a “web designer”, first consider the following:

• Good websites are a balance of form and function. An ugly site will turn off as many people as a beautiful, but useless one.
• A website should be a solution to a problem. The problems that the internet can solve range from selling a product, to distributing information, and even something as simple as having a place to keep all those digital pictures you take. Make sure your site does something.
• If you build it, they will not necessarily come. Sites with no use or purpose will help nothing and no one.
• A website is not the solution for everything. Building a site to solve a problem nobody has or to push information no one cares for is futile.
• Doomed is a site without a plan. Launching a website without a clear plan of action or a viable business plan will most likely fail and result in great frustration and loss.
• Your site is sooo last season. Like any creative endeavor, designing websites will create fashions and trends. Try to lead. It’s ok to follow. Don’t get left behind.
• Sites do not live forever. Both the quality of the idea and it’s execution will determine how long a site will be useful, and your beautiful graphics will inevitably be ruined by someone doing “support” later.

But before this list runs on for another 30 items or so, the point is this: Designing a great website does not end when you close Photoshop. It certainly does not begin with looking at other sites you are considering ripping off.

A great website is the product of among many things a careful process that includes visual design, information architecture, a consideration of user experience, solid software (maybe hardware) engineering, and good business sense.

You might say, a website has to be developed, not just designed.

So, do you still want to be a web designer?

Consider instead aspiring to become a “Web Developer”—a term that is more and more describing a person with the perfect mix of both artistic and programming ability.

This is the path I am taking from now on.