There are several web design tools on the market today, and finding the right ones can be a challenge to a newcomer. While I use many web design tools, here are my 3 favourites:

Dreamweaver

With over 3.5 million users, Dreamweaver is undoubtedly the most popular and one of the best Website development tools in the market today. Dreamweaver has a wysiwyg (what you see is what you get) editor as well as a code view to improve your productivity.

You do not have to be a professional HTML programmer in order to develop a great website with Dreamweaver. You can use Dreamweaver to design forms as well as link to a database that uses popular technologies like PHP, ASP, .NET, and XHTML. Dreamweaver has CSS, server side includes, templates, and many others functions.

If you’re looking to develop professional websites, then Dreamweaver is THE tool for you. Improved CSS, XML and Flash video handling, and various productivity enhancements are just some of the features that are included in Dreamweaver. And while web developers still need to know css and html, Dreamweaver will allow them to take that basic knowledge to the next level.

Flash

When it comes to website animations, and multimedia applications, Flash is the de-facto standard that’s used by nearly every industry professional.

What makes Flash so useful is that it allows users to make animations (some that rival traditional cartoons) while keeping file sizes small. Small file sizes are vital to making sure your website loads quickly, which means increased traffic.

Flash was designed primarily to be an animation tool, but with each new version, the program evolved to become more powerful and feature-rich, while remaining loyal to its animation roots.

Simply put: if you want to create dynamic web pages with exciting effects, then Flash is the perfect program to get the job done.

Adobe Photoshop

Adobe’s Photoshop was one of the first image-editing programs to come onto the market. It quickly rose to become the number one image-editing program among professional designers and photographers. And while there have been numerous competitors that have come on the scene, no one has yet been able to dethrone Photoshop.

The main reasons for Photoshop’s success lies in its power and versatility. Adobe took the tricks and techniques used by professional photographers for decades, and ported them over to the digital platform. This digital workflow system made it a huge time saver for professionals who needed to create great looking images.

However, while Photoshop’s roots lie in photography, the program quickly evolved to become web-friendly. Adobe has included tools specifically designed for the web-designer — tools that allow them to make sharp graphics and images geared specifically toward the online world. Almost every button, banner, photograph and graphic you see on the web today has gone through Photoshop.

Learning how to use Photoshop is relatively easy, mastering Photoshop, however, can take years because the program has virtually unlimited potential.

Creating a great design for your site with these tools will be a bit on the expensive side, as none of them come with low price tags, but these tools will help give you the best looking site on the web in no time at all.

Practically nobody would build a store at the mall or downtown making the place uninviting and difficult. So it’s surprising that so many people skimp on their web sites with their online business.

Your web site is the first impression people get about your business and the products or services you provide. And regardless of how awesome those products and services are, people will pass you by if your web site isn’t professional looking and easy to navigate.

I understand how expensive it can be to start up any kind of business and the temptation to cut corners is great, but if you don’t know anything about web design, you might consider hiring a professional designer to put your site together.

So how do you find a competent web designer?

Word of mouth
The first thing to do is to ask for referrals. Just like asking around to find a good plumber, find some businesses with successful web sites and ask who their designer is. Compile a list of several top names, because web designers all have different areas of expertise. Some are great at making clean sites, some specialize in fancy graphics and animations while others only focus on the programming part.

A great designer should have a combination of design skills, technical skills and marketing skills as the web site needs to be clean, easy to use as well as promote your business.

And remember that, while it’s always best to meet someone face to face when doing business, don’t let the fact that someone who works out of town discourage you if they’re good. Many successful web sites have been created without the parties ever having met in person. That’s the beauty of the net.

Interview
Once you have a list of likely candidates, contact them and ask for a portfolio of web sites they’ve created. This is the best way to get a feel for how a designer works and to see if they’d be a good match for creating the site you have in mind.

Also, when looking through these web sites, there are several points you need to ask yourself:
- Is it easy to find your way around the site?
- Is the navigation system clear and easy to use?
- Can you easily access all of the pages and are there any broken links?
- Is the contact information easy to find?
- What about the content? Is there enough information about the company including location, what they provide and policies?
- How about the text? Is it easy to read? Are they using ‘artsy’ fonts or something more business appropriate?
- How fast do the pages load? This is especially crucial for your business. Even though many people are now using broadband connections, most don’t want to wait more than a few seconds for pages to come up.
- Pay attention to the colors the designer uses. Too many colors and too many different fonts are confusing, unprofessional and usually are the mark of an amateur.

Answering these questions, as well as taking some time to thoroughly investigate a web designer’s portfolio can help you narrow down your search. Also, when looking through a designer’s portfolio, pay attention to see if the sites all look the same. There’s no reason to hire someone if you’re simply going to get a web site that looks like someone else’s.

Are all web designers created equal?
One thing to watch out for is people whose primary design skills lie in print media and graphic design. Many of these folks, while talented, don’t understand what it takes to make a good web site. There’s a lot more involved than just knowing how to use programs like Dreamweaver, Front Page or Go Live. A good web designer will be able to assist you with every element of the creation of your web site. They should know the ins and outs of good web design, web hosting, creating optimized graphics for the web, database creation, Internet marketing and promotion and maintenance of your site.

Never be afraid to ask as many questions as you want and don’t ever be satisfied until you get the answers. Good designers are always willing to help a client get the best web site for the money spent and most are experienced in dealing with people who aren’t web experts. Also, ask about a guarantee. Professionals are concerned with their client’s satisfaction.

What about communication?
Another thing to consider when choosing a web designer is their response time. Get someone who is readily available and can be counted on to get back to you in a timely manner if there are questions or problems.

Once you’ve narrowed down your list to a few good candidates, ask each one for some references that you can contact. Ask these references about their experience working with the designer. This is probably the best way to gauge how well the designer will work for you.

I know this seems like an awful lot of work, but when you’re spending thousands of dollars to get your site up and running, you must make sure your money is being well spent. Follow these guidelines and there’s little room for failure in finding a competent, professional web designer who is easy to work with and will do a professional job.

In vogue for web site design where statistics are concerned, are keeping your numbers relatively private, and putting the focus on the quality of your site. Learn more about common web statistics terms mean, and learn how to see what they mean for your site.

A hit, for example, is generated by each object that loads on your pages and registers with a web browser. That means if you have 5 graphics on a page, each one of them will register a hit. More important is a web page view, or page view for short. That measurement tells you that the page loaded successfully in your visitors browser. If you have an informational site, it may be important to have more page views - no one wants to have a resource site that people immediately click away from, for example. Conversely, if most of your blog readers follow you by your feed, you’ll only get a page view registered for each time they access your feed, no matter how many entries they read.

In these cases, it’s even more important to count the visitors. The visitors are counted by the number of times a unique address, computer or person visits your site. Sometimes, the address that would normally determine one visitor is shared, so when visitors go by unique IP address, as they are called, it isn’t always accurate.

It may under-estimate how many visitors, in the case where an Internet Service Provider such as AOL, may use the same IP address to represent all the visitors from one particular area. It may over-estimate how many visitors are coming to your site in the case of an auto-surf program or purchased visitors that aren’t generated by re-directed expired domains or manual surf exchanges. Your web visitor log or statistics program may register thousands of visitors from thousands of IP addresses, and yet none of them view your site.

A more reliable way to measure is by a program that places cookies on a remote user’s computer to track their visit, however some visitors don’t like them as much and may block them. The Google Web Analytics program uses cookies to track visitors, and is free.

If you have visitors that you think will have a problem with cookies, add the purpose of the cookie to your site’s privacy policy. Before you use a program that includes cookies, weigh the probability that more sophisticated users will block them, or not use your site, against how valuable having that data will be in helping you server your clients better.