David Fiske Affiliate marketing & web development musings from Fiske Towers

The names www.comparesatnav.co.uk and www.satnavreviews.co.uk have been registered and are now ready to work on.

The most important lesson here is plan before you work.

What is the point of doing lots of work now to find out we have to start all over again when we get half way through.

There are several stages to building a money making website:
 

• Plan where the money is coming from
• Plan the design
• Plan the content
• Create the site

My sites usually feature basic design which looks good! At the end of the day, we are trying to build a revenue making machine. We want to focus the eyes on the special offers from our selected merchants. We don't want users to be looking at wizzy designs.

Take www.davidfiske.com for example. The design is nothing special but it looks good. The bright pink jigsaw piece is memorable. You will not forget that easily. But that is all that would distract you. The rest is text. I could have put a nice photograph of a sky at the top, or put a picture down the left hand side of the page. But why? What purpose does it serve?

On a movie website, you would expect a Flash based website that helps portray what the film is about.

Let's have an example. The Simpsons is near and dear to me so we shall use the up-and-coming Simpsons Movie as an example.

The site is designed in Flash and features a lot of animation - which is exactly how the film is produced! Incidentally, the film is out in July 2007.

The site also features a lot of yellow which is most cases would not work. But The Simpsons is an institution. The programme is now a brand - so it works!

In terms of singers, take Girls Aloud. Their website is also built in Flash which is a must for musical artists. The navigation is easy and there is music and video clips for people to listen to / watch. It is an interactive site and allows for fans and web-surfers to learn more about the band and their discography.

But you will find none of that on Google. Apart from a logo that is instantly recognisable (due to Internet popularity), there is a box that lets you search the web. There is nothing on there to distract you. You go on there to search the web. If Google was built in Flash, it would undoubtedly be no where near as popular as it is now.

So where am I going with this? Design is important. But on a money making website, there are a few simple tips:

• Keep it extremely simple. You need to channel your visitors to the retailers you advertise
• Keep it clean. Do not complicate the design with too many colours
• us a standard font throughout the site
• Make it accessible to as many people as possible