Why invent the wheel over and over again? We don’t want to discuss this philosophical question. We just want to offer you a collection of fresh tools and trendy code snippets which can help to save some time when designing a new website.

Snippets for Menus, Scrolling, Sliding and Collapsing

1). Responsive Multi-Level Menu
http://tympanus.net/codrops/2013/04/19/responsive-multi-level-menu/
by Mary Lou: “A responsive multi-level menu that shows its submenus in their own context, allowing for a space-saving presentation and usage.”

2). How to create a resizing menu bar
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/how-to-create-a-resizing-menu-bar/
by Antonio Pratas: “Lately some websites, like This is the Brigade and All You, have started featuring a dynamic and animated menu that resizes on scroll down. Minimizing the main navigation to allow more space for the content. In this tutorial, I’ll explain how you can create this menu yourself with HTML5, CSS3 and just a bit of jQuery.”

3). 25 Free Dropdown Menus in HTML5 and CSS3
http://smashinghub.com/25-free-dropdown-menus-in-html5-and-css3.htm
by Ali Qayyum

4). How To Create a Simple Collapsing Header Effect
http://line25.com/tutorials/how-to-create-a-simple-collapsing-header-effect
by Chris Spooner: “A collapsing header effect, where the page header or banner would gradually shorten and disappear upon page scroll.”

5). Build a Single-Page Sliding Navigation Bar with jQuery
http://vandelaydesign.com/blog/web-development/single-page-sliding-nav/
by Jake Rocheleau: “Many web design studios and freelance portfolios will incorporate the popular single page navigation technique. The benefits of such a layout allows visitors to go through all your main content without needing to reload the website. Additionally this helps to keep the interface very simple and easy to maneuver.”

6). Elastic Content Slider
http://tympanus.net/codrops/2013/02/26/elastic-content-slider/
by Mary Lou: “A fluid content slider that will adjust in width and height depending on the size of its parent.”

7). Trendy Responsive jQuery Sliders
http://www.queness.com/post/14074/trendy-responsive-jquery-sliders
by Kevin Liew: “There are hundreds of slider plugins out there, although premium Javascript sliders usually provide more features, however, some free and well-maintained sliders do have outstanding features, vast configurations and well-documented… Here we have 11 Free jQuery Sliders that supports responsive layout, not just that, most of them are featured packed too.”

8). Flexisel – Responsive Carousel jQuery Plugin
http://9bitstudios.github.io/flexisel/
by 9bit Studios

9). Nested Accordion
http://tympanus.net/codrops/2013/03/29/nested-accordion/
by Mary Lou: “A simple, nestable accordion with some examples of nesting levels and a media query.”

10). Retina Web Design – Info, Tools And Techniques
http://www.designresourcebox.com/retina-web-design-info-tools-and-techniques/
by admin: “…why we should design something just for the visitors who own Apple products and a small number of other devices. For those of you who share his opinion, we should do it because it is the proper way, something like cross-browser optimization but not quite like it. ”

11). 10 jQuery Horizonal Scroll Demos & Plugins
http://www.jquery4u.com/plugins/10-jquery-horizonal-scroll-demos-plugins/
by Sam Deering: “…we bring to you 10 jQuery Horizonal Scroll Demos & Plugins useful for those who see things horizontally.”

12). Background Slideshow
http://tympanus.net/codrops/2013/04/17/background-slideshow/
by Mary Lou: “A simple fullscreen background slideshow with auto-play and controls to navigate and pause.”

CSS and CSS3

1). Detect Unmatched CSS Selectors with Helium
http://davidwalsh.name/detect-unmatched-css-selectors
by David Walsh: “One thing I can’t stand is extra code. Whether it’s an extra CSS or JavaScript file that’s been included by the page, bloated HTML, or unoptimized images, we’re making our millions of desktop and mobile visitors pay for our laziness and mistakes.”

2). How to Center Anything With CSS
http://designshack.net/articles/css/how-to-center-anything-with-css/
by Joshua Johnson: “We’re going to follow that up with another CSS layout talk, this time based around a fundamental question that almost every new developer asks: how do you center something?”

3). A Super Simple And Sexy Tooltip [Only CSS]
http://www.gonzoblog.nl/2013/03/27/a-super-simple-and-sexy-tooltip-only-css/
by Jan Rajtoral: “So far I can check, this CSS Tooltip works in all modern browsers, but you can always use modernizr to make this magic also happen in IE6,7 and 8.”

4). How to Create a Responsive Centered Image in CSS3
http://www.sitepoint.com/css3-responsive-centered-image/
by Craig Buckler: “Until recently, image lightboxes would need to implement several equations to determine the viewport and image dimensions then size and center accordingly. Fortunately, we can now rely on CSS3 media queries and transforms to do the hard work for us.”

5). 30+ Hot CSS3 Image Hover Scripts
http://www.tripwiremagazine.com/2013/04/css3-image-hover-scripts.html
by Lars: “CSS image hover scripts makes it simple to add cool dynamic effects on otherwise ‘static’ images whenever the mouse hovers over them.”

6). Hover Effect on Images From Different Directions Using Pure CSS
http://demosthenes.info/blog/639/Hover-Effect-on-Images-From-Different-Directions-Using-Pure-CSS
by Dudley Storey: “…there’s been a UI trend in which moving your mouse over an element from different directions (from above, from below, etc) will cause an overlay transitioned in from the same vector. ”

HTML5 Code Snippets and Tools

1). Markup Framework
http://www.markupframework.org
by New Vintage Media: “The Markup Framework is a collection of layouts, widgets, typographic styles and other UI components to use as a starting point for your own Web designs.”

2). HTML5 code snippets to take your website to the next level
http://www.catswhocode.com/blog/html5-code-snippets-to-take-your-website-to-the-next-level
by Jean-Baptiste Jung: “In this article I have compiled awesome HTML5 code snippets to take your website to the next level.”

3). 10 Best Online HTML5 Tools for Web Designers
http://www.webdesignfact.com/2013/03/10-best-online-html5-tools.html
by admin: “…there are still many who don’t know HTML5 properly. It is currently being enhanced by experts to provide us web designers & developers with awesome new revolutionary website features.”

4). How to use HTML5 audio (part 1)
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/04/how-to-use-html5-audio-part-1/
by Sam Piggott: “The introduction of the HTML5 spec introduced new tags for presenting media on a webpage; the ‘audio’ and ‘video’ tags, rendering the ‘object’ tag no longer fit for video and audio streaming.”

5). How to use the download attribute
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/04/how-to-use-the-download-attribute/
by Sara Vieira: “HTML5 came with all new APIs, new input types and attributes for forms. As is often the case, those major additions often obscure the minor upgrades and I think that this is particularly true of the download attribute.”

6). Making Websites Location Aware With HTML5 Geolocation
http://webdesign.tutsplus.com/tutorials/ux-tutorials/making-websites-location-aware-with-html5-geolocation/
by Aaron Lumsden: “Geolocation API. This allows your site to receive geographic positioning information using JavaScript.”

7). How to use the Fullscreen API
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/how-to-use-the-fullscreen-api/
by Sara Vieira: “…the Fullscreen API provides a native way for the browser to do what was only possible in flash for a long time: display the webpage in fullscreen mode for the user.”

Working with Colors and Images

1). Two new colour tools to try today
http://www.creativebloq.com/design-tools/two-new-colour-tools-try-today-2131973
by admin: “Browser-based tools Pretty IP and Hailpixel Color help you find the colours you need in a simple and intuitive way. How have you coped without them?”

2). 10 Time Saving Online Color Tools for Web Designers
http://line25.com/articles/10-time-saving-online-color-tools-for-web-designers
by Chris Spooner: “Working with colors is a time consuming task for a web designer, for starters you need to pick out a color palette for your designs, then there’s all kinds of code values to remember and convert from hex to RGBa. To speed things up and make the designer’s life much easier a bunch of handy tools are available online. These tools help you pick, choose and convert your color selections with ease for your next web design project.”

3). The 5 best colour search tools for designers
http://www.creativebloq.com/colour/best-tools-3132246
by Luke Clum: “Have you ever felt the lack of a sophisticated and intuitive way to search for colour inspiration? If so, you’ll find a remedy here.”

4). The best image compression tools
http://www.netmagazine.com/features/best-image-compression-tools
by Mike Williams: “Save bandwidth and accelerate your site’s performance with these powerful free tools.”

5). Helpful Tools to Optimize Images for the Web
http://www.onextrapixel.com/2013/04/01/helpful-tools-to-optimize-images-for-the-web/
by Mike Brown: “You can use many ways to achieve a fast loading website. One of these many ways is image optimization. Image optimization is the practice of reducing the file size of an image without necessarily losing its aesthetic features.”

6). 7 Jquery plugins To Deal With Image Cropping
http://www.webdeveloperjuice.com/2010/12/24/7-jquery-plugins-to-deal-with-image-cropping/
by techshadow

7). Dynamic jQuery Image Avatar Cropping Effect
http://blog.teamtreehouse.com/dynamic-jquery-image-avatar-cropping-effect
by Jake Rocheleau: “I can still remember the old digg.com user profiles with dynamic avatar cropping via JavaScript. Their user interface was clean, easy to use, displayed a sample before you cropped, and would auto-update as you changed the selection box. I have always admired this design and have been on the lookout for a great jQuery plugin which can offer similar features with less custom code.”

8). Essential JavaScript: the top five graphical libraries
http://www.netmagazine.com/features/essential-javascript-top-five-graphical-libraries
by Jack Franklin: “Jack Franklin explores five libraries for doing graphical work with JavaScript, covering data visualisation, 3D work and game-building.”

9). Neat jQuery Animation Plugins – 20 Examples
http://www.designresourcebox.com/neat-jquery-animation-plugins-20-examples/
by admin: “If you are looking for a jQuery plugin to animate something on your website, you landed in the right place cause you will find here 29 Jquery animation plugins to help you do that.”

Collections of Web Design Tools and Plugins

1). Unheap – A tidy repository of jQuery plugins
http://www.unheap.com
by admin: “Unheap was assembled in 2010 as an internal team resource. We found other repositories underwhelming and wanted to build a better experience for browsing & staying on top of the latest jQuery plugins. We made the site public on November 2012.”

2). 15 underrated web design tools to check out today
http://www.creativebloq.com/web-design-tips/underrated-web-design-tools-1232782
by Kieran Potts, Sam Hampton-Smith and Tom May: “…we take a look at the more underrated tools that can help you improve client-side browser development and rigorously test everything that you build. Hopefully you’ll find something useful in our feature that you’ve not heard about previously.”

3). 25 Fresh Web Design Resources Tools
http://smashinghub.com/25-fresh-web-design-resources-tools.htm
by Ali Qayyum: “With so many tools being released in vast numbers each day, you might find it hard to select the right tool for the right task. Listed below are the best fresh web design resources tools to make the process of web designing more convenient.”

4). 8 Fresh and Really Useful jQuery Plugins
http://www.webdesignfact.com/2013/04/useful-jquery-plugins.html
by admin

5). 50 Time-Saving Web Design – Developer Tools
http://designmodo.com/web-design-developer-tools/
by Ezequiel Lavaca: “Mock Up Tools, Icons, Textures, Stock Images, Fonts, Feature Detection Tools, Image Galleries, Sliders, and a Sprite Generator.”

6). Essential tools for every web designer
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/04/essential-tools-for-every-web-designer/
by Andy Leverenz: “Luckily enough for us and our fellow design community there are tools available to assist in completing the job quicker and more efficiently. Below, I have outlined a list of tools I recommend for any web designer.”

7). Most Helpful Webapps & Resources for Building Modern Websites
http://blog.teamtreehouse.com/most-helpful-webapps-resources-for-building-modern-websites
by Jake Rocheleau: “…a small collection of websites and webapps to help developers work smarter and faster. You may not find all of these tools useful, but they are worth looking into and doing a bit of research. Plus there are new resources launching online every month.”

8). 30 New Open Source Plugins and Scripts for Dynamic Websites
http://spyrestudios.com/30-new-open-source-plugins-scripts/
by Jake Rocheleau: “…30 amazing JS plugins for web developers. Each is completely free to download and use within your own website projects, and you may customize features as needed. The most popular items also have a Github repo which includes an FAQ wiki and other support questions.”

9). 20 Incredibly useful tools and resources for Web designers
http://thenextweb.com/dd/2013/04/12/25-incredibly-useful-tools-for-web-designers/
by Harrison Weber: “Of course, we’re big fans of getting down to the basics, like putting pencil to paper, but sometimes finding new apps and resources can help you get those creative juices flowing.”

10). 10 Kick Ass jQuery Plugins for your Next Project
http://www.onextrapixel.com/2013/03/22/10-kick-ass-jquery-plugins-for-your-next-project/
by Pete R.: “Sometimes your knowledge of programming can limit your design perspective. You may have this idea of interaction that you want to do for your next project but you decided to let it go because you think it is impossible. Later on, you discovered that someone already wrote a plugin for it and you wish you’d found the plugin before you started the project.”

11). 19 Best Tools to Check Website Performance and Speed
http://seobuzzworld.com/19-best-tools-to-check-website-performance-and-speed/
by admin

 
Please note:
To find the latest links and posts on tools for web design and code snippets, follow our Pinterest board Tools for web design and devs.

Dmitry Savchenko is a passionate software developer and department manager at Itera Research, Inc.
 

Although XHTML still has a decent market share, new markup standards HTML5 and CSS3, as well as RWD (responsive web design) are becoming more and more in demand in the PSD to HTML conversion market in 2013. This is the summary of sales statistics analysis made by HTMLcut’s managers.

HTMLcut.com is a professional HTML/CSS coding company that converts website designs which are uploaded by web designers or site owners into HTML/CSS/JavaScript code or WordPress/CMS themes. Founded in 2008, now HTMLcut is one of the reputed providers of HTML slicing.

HTMLcut’s managers constantly monitor market trends and company’s sales statistics to offer the most demanded services. Although such a type of analysis is not statistically comprehensive and absolutely exact, due to a continuous order flow it is quite representative and significant.

Recent results revealed by HTMLcut have indicated that HTML5 and CSS3 are being ordered in about 2.2 times more often in 2013 than a year ago. The increase in orders on responsive web design is smaller but the interest in it is steady and growing.

To some extent, the above-mentioned difference between numbers for HTML5/CSS3 and RWD may be related to the fact that quite a few clients perceive HTML5/CSS3 as just a more feature-rich and mobile-oriented version of XHTML. In other words, there is no perceived barrier between them. However, increasingly more clients are consciously interested in such specific HTML5 and CSS3 features as extended drawing capabilities, local storage or geolocation.

On the other hand, in case of responsive web design it is a little more difficult to explain to a client why the price is higher in comparison with development of a non-responsive website. Some clients are not sure that RWD is so necessary for their website because of “no one uses responsive websites in our business” and other similar arguments. Probably, this technology requires more time to become usual and generally accepted. Nevertheless, the growth of smartphone and tablet popularity steadily leads to recognition that, at least for some industries, there is no alternative but responsive web design if businesses want to reach their clients and improve ROI of their websites. However, a considerable number of clients still prefer to have separate websites for desktop and mobile users.

Given these trends, HTMLcut puts more focus on HTML5/CSS3 coding and responsive web design services to offer clients the most efficient ways to develop their websites. At the same time, HTMLcut sticks to the principle of the reasonable and balanced approach to any technical solution. Technologies should not be used just for the sake of technologies. And when planning a website development, the main criterion should be advantages for the client’s business and needs of the website visitors.

About HTMLcut.com
HTMLcut.com offers a full range of high quality PSD to HTML coding services by converting .PSD, .AI, .PNG designs into HTML5 / CSS3 / JavaScript code, responsive WordPress, Joomla and Drupal themes, and templates for emails.

There are a lot of recommendations and checklists on how to redesign or improve websites. So, why write yet another post? The answer is very simple: Drastic change. Today web design, front-end development, markup coding standards, SEO, and site promotion are changing so quickly that many recommendations become obsolete in the course of months or even weeks.

In the infographic below we’ve collected questions, many of which reflect recent trends. Of course, it’s difficult to make such a checklist absolutely exhaustive. But comments on its textual version was encouraging and positive, for example, like this one: “A sensational checklist… – it was nice to read substance” (read more). Hope you find it helpful too.

Infographic: The Checklist on Website Redesign

 
Want to embed this infographic on your website? Use the code below:

Flat web design is among the most interesting trends in the modern web design. Truth be told, flat design always was here but sometimes it was trendy, other times it was just one of possible alternatives. The difference of its recent emergence is that this time it looks like Microsoft’s response to Apple’s skeuomorphism. Though new flat designs – at least some of them – are lovely. I mean they are fresh, memorable, with a good conversion rate, and accessible.

Below you’ll find a collection of recent articles on what flat design is, comparison of the flat approach vs. skeuomorphism, opinions on the trend, and examples of websites developed with the help of this technique.

What Flat Design Is About

1). Flat Design: Can You Benefit from the Trend?
http://designmodo.com/flat-design/
by Carrie Cousins: “Flat design can be both beautiful and charming. Without lots of added embellishments, it can be a clean and simple way to communicate a message or promote a product or idea. It’s time to get in on the trend now before the next new wave happens.”

2). Flat Design and Accessibility
http://speckyboy.com/2013/02/05/flat-design-and-accessibility/
by The Shock Family: “…in this article, we will be taking a look at some of the recent accessibility improvements that Flat Design has brought and helping make the internet that little bit more open and accessible to everyone.”

3). Flat is trendy
http://www.thedigitalcube.com/articles/web-design/2/flat-is-trendy
by admin: “The new version of Microsoft’s main software introduce a structural visual change. Not because of the new ‘desktop’ made of tiles, not because of the deletion of the start button but with another deletion: the window shadows have been removed. Images are better than words.”

4). Metro UI interaction design guidelines @Microsoft Tech.Days 2011
http://www.slideshare.net/davidwkchen/metro-ui-interaction-design-guidelines-microsoft-techdays-2011
by David Chen: “Metro UI interaction design guidelines, shared at Microsoft Tech. Days 2011.”

Flat Design vs. Skeuomorphism

1). Flat design vs. skeuomorphism
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/01/flat-design-vs-skeuomorphism/
by Mike Redaelli: “It seems that there has been a line drawn in the sand. A few brave design pioneers have all but denounced skeuomorphic design as yesterday’s news and have voted it off of the proverbial island.”

2). Flat Pixels: The Battle Between Flat Design And Skeuomorphism
http://sachagreif.com/flat-pixels/
by Sacha Greif: “…if you answered ‘the app on the right, of course!’ then I’m sorry to say you got it wrong too! You see, this was a trick question. The correct answer is that both apps are skeuomorphs. Read on to find out why.”

3). Skeuomorphism in User Interface Design, What is It?
http://designmodo.com/skeuomorphism-ui-design/
by Paula Borowska: “In the last few weeks the debate over skeuomorphism has been getting more and more heated. I would like to make two points for you in this post. First, what skeuomorphism actually is – as I’ve seen so many people not fully understand it – and two some examples of it for you to get inspired by.”

Discussions

1). The Flat Design Aesthetic: A Discussion
http://speckyboy.com/2012/12/11/the-flat-design-aesthetic/
by Shawn Adrian: “In this article I’m going to talk about what flat design is, review what other designers are saying about it, and offer some tips on how to achieve it in your own designs.”

2). A Conversation: Is “Flat” the Next Trend in Design?
http://cantina.co/2013/02/11/a-conversation-is-flat-the-next-trend-in-design/
by Mitchel Ahern: “Every so often our consultants have an in-depth in-house email conversation on things that interest us. These conversations are often informative and entertaining, so I’ve been tidying them up and posting them to our blog. This session focuses on emerging design trends resulting, in part, from the higher resolution of new mobile devices.”

3). Is “Flat” UI design better?
http://branch.com/b/is-flat-ui-design-better
Geoff Stearns is talking with Allan Grinshtein, Cemre Güngör, Sasha L, Benjamin Kim, Ian Storm Taylor, Tyler Howarth, Caroline Keem, Piotr Siwiński: “Speaking for web and mobile application UI design, do you think that ‘Flat’ UI aesthetic is inherently better than more skeuomorphic designs? and other questions.”

Examples

1). 20 Great Examples of the Flat Trend in Web Design
http://line25.com/articles/20-great-examples-of-the-flat-trend-in-web-design
by Chris Spooner

2). Examples of ‘Flat’ in Web Design
http://speckyboy.com/2013/01/23/flat-design-in-web-design/
by Speckyboy Editors

3). Design Trends 2013 – Flat and Minimal
http://abduzeedo.com/design-trends-2013-flat-and-minimal
by Abduzeedo

4). Flat Design: 17 Examples Of Flat Web & App UI Designs
http://designwoop.com/2013/02/flat-design-17-examples-of-flat-web-app-ui-designs/
by admin

5). 43 Inspiring Examples of Flat Designs in Web Design
http://www.boostinspiration.com/web-design/flat-web-design/
by Waheed Akhtar

6). 90+ Beautiful Flat Icons of Social Media
http://graphicdesignjunction.com/2013/02/flat-icons-of-social-media/
by Muhammad Faisal

7). Showcase of Skeuomorphism in iPad Interface Design
http://line25.com/articles/showcase-of-skeuomorphism-in-ipad-interface-design
by Chris Spooner

The life cycle of every website includes a lot of phases and operations: design, PSD to HTML/CSS conversion, back-end development, testing, beta stage, official launch, regular operation, gathering of feedbacks and comments, analysis of website and marketing statistics, improvements and updates, and so forth.

Of these one of the most important actions are the “improvements and updates.” It is clear why: to a large extent the operations before them are based on assumptions and suppositions. But after the website launching, its owner can collect information on how the assumptions correspond to the real user experience and owner’s expectations. Moreover, life doesn’t stand still, and new technologies and trends are continuously becoming actual and used as a must.

Below you’ll find a checklist for those who have decided to optimize their website and those who are developing the website from scratch and want to know things that may be essential for the further site improvement.

A Checklist to Answer Before You Start Improving

The goal of this checklist is to help to analyze information collected during your website operation and understand a scope of necessary improvements or updates. Of course, the list below is incomplete. But we have tried to embrace some critical moments. Please note that some questions can be placed in several sections, so the division proposed is conditional to some extent. We assume that the reader knows in general what is behind the question and uses this questionnaire as a cheatsheet.

Design

• Is your website design on modern lines or it looks like a relic of the early days of the web? (see more about web design trends 2013 here)
• Is the design professional? These points are especially crucial for business sites for which design is subconsciously projected onto the service or product quality: obsolete and/or amateur design ==> bad service / product quality.
• Is the design effective? Does the design help to convey the main ideas behind your website and to achieve its goals?
• Is there synergy between your design and content? Does the design support content (and vice versa) or they live their own and unrelated “lives”?
• Is the design pertinent? Is it too bright / dark or contrast or with bizarre fonts unsuitable for your industry and target audience? Maybe the design is associated with undesired or wrong topics / characters / events?
• Does your website make a good impression? Is it memorable (in a positive sense) and unique or you use a hackneyed theme with stock images which are published 3 million times on other websites?
• Is there a feeling of the website/brand personality? Is there a human voice in your design?
• Is your website emotive? Can full-screen / large images or video backgrounds help to make the website more exciting?
• Is the design skeuomorphic? Possibly flat design will be more suitable?

Usability and User Experience

• If the visitor scans your website, can he or she understand what is your website about and which information / options are available on the website?
• Is there a visual guideline how to use the website? Is the website navigation intuitive and consistent?
• Is placement of the website elements and their functioning understandable and similar on different pages or they require the visitor to think or guess?
• Is the website stuffed with cluttered, redundant or even irrelevant information, images or Call-to-Action buttons which confuse visitors? Or every piece of information is to the point, in the right place and for the right reason?
• Is it easy to read the content? Is contrast between fore- and background colors acceptable? Are type face, font size, line height, margins and white space reasonable? These are important in case there are large pieces of textual information on your website or the target audience is people who may have weak eyesight.
• Is your content properly formatted and easy-to-scan (paragraphs of 4-6 lines, sufficient number of sub-headers, lists, and quotes)?
• Are there appropriate images and illustrations which make visual breaks or only a solid flow of text, text and text?
• Is there an overwhelming or annoying use of bold and italic? Is there a lot of center justified text?
• Is the content correct from the point of view of spelling and grammar?
• Do you use unsolicited pop-ups or irritating banners?
• Are there audio or video files which are loaded automatically and the visitor cannot stop or mute them?
• If there are widgets or features, are they easy-to-use and useful for the website visitors?

Marketing

• Is your website for humans or search engines?
• Is the website developed for the right people? Is the design and content engaging and understandable for the target audience?
• Is the website design and content about you and your company or about customers’ needs and problem solving?
• Is it easy to find out what your services or products are about and why your company is the best choice?
• Is the website copy effective? Headlines, slogans, and other texts – Are they just a bunch of words to fill the white space or every word and its position is well thought-out?
• Are your contacts visible well on the website? Are they present on each page or only on the Contact page?
• Is there clear Call-to-Action? Is Call-to-Action overdone, confusing or too blatant?
• Are the Call-to-Action buttons / links effective? For example, their shape, size, color, wording and position can increase the website conversion rate in several times.
• Are forms (for example, on ‘Contact us’ or ‘Order’ pages) easy to deal with? Do they contain a reasonable number (as few as possible) of fields with clear meanings?
• Is there the Help or FAQ section? What about consumer guides, free reports or reviews?
• Does the website provide visitors with appropriate response after important operations (for example, a confirmation message after order sending)?
• Are there testimonials? Are they true words from real people or canned?
• Is your website trustworthy? Are there elements that build trust and credibility?
• How often do you add new content? Is it stale? If so, what is the reason – maybe it is technically difficult or inconvenient to do that?
• Does the website provide necessary legal information and guarantees? (it is especially important for e-commerce, SaaS, and so on)
• Do you use one large website for all your businesses / services / products or there are a central (corporate) website plus a number of specialized websites for the most important services or products which are easily found and accessed by consumers?

PSD to HTML conversion and coding

• Which versions of HTML and CSS are used on your website? What about HTML5 and CSS3? Possibly they are more efficient and reasonable for your website now.
• Is the website HTML / CSS / JavaScript code errorless? Does your website look and function correctly?
• Is your website W3C standards valid? (you can check that on the W3C sites validator.w3.org and jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/)
• Is the website table-based?
• Is the HTML / CSS code understandable and easy to update and modify? Is it clean, structured and commented or there are a lot of code garbage and remains of coding experiments and failed improvements?
• Does your website look and work identically in different popular web browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, IE)?
• Is the website code SEO semantic?
• What about accessibility?
• Is the loading time of your website small?

SEO

• Are page URLs SEO-friendly?
• Are “title” and meta “description” tags appropriate and different for every page?
• Are there a reasonable number of relevant and right keywords and their synonyms in the content?
• Do images have relevant “alt” attributes? Are image names descriptive or look like “img12345.png”?
• Are the website pages adequately interlinked?
• Does the website have sitemaps (both an HTML version and XML one)? Are they fresh?
• Is there a lot of Flash or Javascript on the website? Are they necessary and optimized or used on the principle of “why not”?
• Is there a large number of images? Is it possible to substitute them or their textual elements for webfonts? (webfonts are much more SEO friendly) If not, maybe a rollover “image”-”textual description” or other HTML/CSS/JS techniques which display text on clicking or mouse hover are the solution?
• Are there broken links on your website? What about ‘orphan’ pages?
• Is there duplicate content? How do you solve the pagination problems?
• Is your content unique and of high quality or a spinned, stolen or worthless garbage?
• Are there backlinks to your website from low quality resources? How many backlinks are there with your main exact keywords as an anchor text?
• Is there authorship information on your website?
• Do you use social snippets on your website? What about schema.org microdata?
• Is the website overoptimized (for example, too many keywords)?
• Do you or your SEO company use black SEO tricks?

Functionality and Features

• Does your website have sufficient functionality – search, slideshows, catalogs, online calculators or document generators, just to name a few? Is it competitive enough in comparison with websites of your rivals?
• Is your website interactive? Are there contact or feedback forms on your website? What about online chat?
• Do you use Google/Bing Maps on your website?
• Are there videos? Photo galleries?

Sociability

• Do you have active accounts in the social networks? Do they have a decent (for websites in your niche) number of followers and fans?
• Is the website linked to your active accounts on Facebook or Twitter?
• Is it easy to ‘Like’ or Retweet your content or Pin images?
• Is it possible to subscribe to your e-mail newsletter(s), RSS feed(s) or follow you on Facebook, Twitter or Google+?
• Is there a blog on your website? Is it alive? Is it interesting to your website visitors?

Mobility

• How well is your website displayed on mobile devices and tablets? For example, is it convenient to browse and use it on iPhone or iPad?
• Is layout of your website responsive?
• How do images on your website look on the Retina displays?
• Does your website support such mobile functionality as touch screen operations or geographic location awareness?
• Is there Flash animation? (it doesn’t work on iPhones or iPads)
• Are the design elements large enough to be easy-to-use on touch screens?
• Do you use mouse-overs (rollovers)? (they need a special treatment on touch screen devices)

Updates and Maintenance

• Is it easy to update content, for example, to add a new page or image, change a phrase or modify a page title? Can you do this job without assistance or you need to ask IT staff?
• Is your website scalable? For instance, can it cope with suddenly increased traffic?
• Is your website safe and reliable?
• Can the website be localized for the different markets?
• Does your CMS (content management system) correctly support new versions of necessary plug-ins or there are problems with their compatibility?
• Is it easy to make a backup version of the website?

Make a Decision

The next step is to understand whether the website requires comprehensive improvements (such as complete redesign and re-development or migration to another content management system) or small updates and modifications of some elements are quite enough this time.

Here are some additional tips.

Avoid SEO Losses

Note that redesign of the website structure or CMS migration can be related to some SEO losses. Always consult professionals before starting such critical tasks.

Use a CMS

Content management systems open a variety of possibilities to improve the website efficiency as well as website maintenance due to making the website more convenient for e-commerce operations, paying, blogging, data sharing, and so on. Some CMSs or plug-ins for them effectively help in search engine optimization. There are a number of free but advanced high-end open-source CMSs such as WordPress, Drupal, Joomla!, and Magento, which are very popular now (read more about their strengths and weaknesses in this post).

Social and Communication Channels

Social channels are an effective way to attract additional target traffic and links to your website. They help to be less dependent on Google’s algorithm changes which have dramatically affected the website rankings recently. Your website availability may be improved with such social tools as Twitter widgets and Retweet buttons, Facebook plug-ins (Like button, Comments or Latest Status), or Pinterest Repin buttons. Don’t forget about such simple but still effective instruments as e-mail newsletters, RSS feeds, or online chat to communicate to you readers. Be closer to your clients and give them common possibilities to get to know and share your content and information about you.

Cut Your Website Mobile

Ensure your website can be always at hand. The modern coding technologies and techniques (HTML5, CSS3, etc.) allow developing advanced cross-platform and cross-browser responsive websites, which can adapt to the device display size and resolution, so it’s not necessarily to develop a separate mobile version of the website.

Hiring Providers

If after having the analysis performed you decide to make updates or improvements, you can do them with the help of your company employees or by hiring a provider / freelancer. A lot of tasks in the checklist above can be fulfilled by specialized services: web design agencies, PSD-to-HTML conversion companies, web development firms, SEO/SMO and inbound marketing consultants, just to name a few. On the other hand, there are quite enough providers which offer a set of related services, for example, design, HTML/CSS/Javascript coding, back-end web programming and CMS implementation. The final decision depends on a scope of improvements and other conditions.

Overall

The website improvement is a task that should be done almost on a daily basis, because the web and competitive market environment are changing continuously. By keeping your website up to date you are constantly improving your business effectiveness and customers’ satisfaction. This is a long way but it leads to success.

Appendix: A Little More About Rich Snippets

 
Created by Infographic Design Team