One of my favorite lines in the movie The Blind Side is when Sandra Bullock (referring to UT Orange) says, “But I will not wear that gaudy orange, I will not. It is not in my color wheel and I’m not gonna wear it.” And that gets me thinking about web design.

Most people, male and female, have a general idea of what’s in their “color wheel” – what their favorite colors are, whether they are comfortable pairing, say, a purple blazer over emerald green slacks, or whether they are soothed by the sight of a closet full of khaki and blue. The same goes for interior decorating, the color of our cars, the television ads that catch our eye… all sorts of things. The bottom line is that, generally, we pay more attention than we know to color and style.

But websites haven’t been around nearly as long as those other things, and I’ve noticed that sometimes people can’t define exactly what it is they like about certain websites. Is it the color scheme that’s most attractive, or the “flow” and ease of use, or the crisp-and-clean lines, or a feeling of excitement that there’s a lot of information and interactivity going on here?

As a website designer, I ask clients to provide a few examples of websites they like. Sometimes they will supply distinct details of what sort of look they want — color, type of background, location of logo and other features — but I’ve also noticed that sometimes it’s hard to define what it is you love about certain sites (and, equally important, what drives you away from other sites).

If you are thinking about getting a new website, or upgrading an existing one, it’s a good idea to do a little analysis on the sites you visit frequently, or ones that have caught your attention. Even if one of your favorite websites is for a restaurant, and your business is something entirely different, ask yourself what it is you like about the site.

Some things to pay attention to include color, depth (a flat, clean look vs. 3-D and layered), squared or rounded corners and borders, visually vibrant or information-rich, even what kind of background is behind the site (you might prefer a colorful and interesting background – or you might not want to distract your site’s visitors from the content).

Of course, there will be many other questions to be asked and analysis to be done before we design and build your new website… but the clearer you are about what you want and don’t want, the closer we will be to creating a site you will absolutely love!

And, incidentally, if you happen to like UT orange, we have no objections at all to using it in your website.

As a designer I refer to functionality on a daily basis. I truly believe in having a well designed website, however, if it doesn’t have functionality it is just a pretty image on a computer screen.

SOO.. Let’s define functionality.

Functionality is defined in the dictionary as the “quality or state of being functional.”

Functional is defined as being “used to contribute to the development or maintenance of a larger whole.”

A Function can be described as a purposeful action.

Ask yourself this question, “What should be my website’s purpose be?”

Your answer should be that you want to reach your audience efficiently and market your company/organization well.

To be able to bring that purpose into fruition there needs to be an understanding that a well designed website is more than exciting colors and graphics.  It is a high-level dynamic mixture of a strong content management system with branding, color schemes, composition, clean design, meaningful and easy to update extensions, and good content. That mixture is used to achieve a website that is designed well because of it’s level of functionality and of course some good aesthetics.

You see there are a lot of templates site and graphic designers out there that can provide a image that looks dynamic, but in the end it flops.  We make sure that behind the scenes it is working for you … not against you. Each client that we work with is a customized experience. We review the needed functions and pick the right extensions and design elements to achieve their marketing purpose.

At Bear Web Design we use slide shows, photo galleries, blogs, action buttons, search modules, calendars, forms, Google maps, social media integration, multi-level menu systems, video players, and all sorts of other extensions that have to be integrated into the overall design to be the “larger whole” – to achieve that sought after purpose. (Do you see the functionality ooozzzing out!?)

Hopefully you can see that we take web design seriously and design websites that are more than just a image on a screen, but a functional marketing tool that can grow as your company grows.