Your website's design can determine the success of your website. However, if you site is poorly designed, that will determine how your site fails. People currently online aren’t using the Internet for the first time, they know what they want, they know how to search and they won't settle for shoddy results. If you have a poorly designed website, it can drive away valuable users from your site and kill your online efforts.

Considerations in Website Design

First, you should consider the presentation of your site. Today's Internet savvy consumer can immediately spot the difference between a professionally designed site and an amateur one. Depending on how you want to present yourself and your business online will determine the specific look and feel of your website design.

Next, beyond the mere aesthetics of website design, consumers (and all users for that matter) will get frustrated with a site that has poor usability. If people find your site through a web search, but they then can't find their way around your site, they'll leave -- probably for the last time. Good usability isn't an option, it's essential.

Finally, it's important to keep in mind the audience for your site. Knowing your audience will influence most of the decisions that you make about your website's design. When you determine your niche market, you'll be able to focus on how to make your site more successful within your core demographic.

These three things -- presentation, usability and audience -- will lay the cornerstone for successful website design.

Search Engine Spiders and Navigation in Website Design

The design of your website will determine how well search engine spiders and people can navigate through your site. When the search engine spiders can easily crawl your site, you can organically rank for your content. This means the people will find your website through a search engine, without you having to pay for links.

However, designing solely for search engine spiders isn't the answer, because they don't actually convert to business. They drive the people to your site who will convert to business. Considering the search engines while designing is important, but it's vital that you keep the end user primary in your concerns.

A good site design will determine how easy it is for the users to navigate your site. Remember: If the search engines struggle to find things on your site and the users can't find what they're looking for, your site will miss its opportunity to be competitive.

Putting it All Together: Successful Website Design

It's no longer ok to put up a website that has a ton of information on a page with no thought for design. Once you've designed your site with the presentation, usability and audience in mind and have included an SEO-friendly site architecture, have an optimized URL structure and make your site easy to navigate for users and search engine spiders, then you'll gain a competitive edge.