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Organizing Your Website Materials First!

 

 

(Photos, Documents and Movies).

Simple is better,  text when possible, stay on topic, quality over "flash" will get you a winning site.

 

  There seems to be a lot of confusion with folders names and general website design layout. This is not "How to build pages" (that should come later) but rather, how to arrange your photos and information, to get it ready for publishing, and end the confusion.

Let me just say that good design, is good design, no matter what media you choose. If you write a book you will see readily where to put your photographs with website it is folder instead of chapters, Web pages are just like any other pages except they will allow you to do things completely wrong.

  

Below is an example of how a website is divided into folders or directories. You material should be arranged into the topics and folders named to match your subjects.

As in below this site can grow as needed by inserting a folder.
 

The basics;

  1. Organize everything is a SIMPLE name format. Photos, documents, and links. Examples of this are all around you in books, catalogs, and magazines. Don't try to reinvent the wheel here, it is just a waist of time, and it confuses everyone, especially search engines.

  2. As you start you should see a pattern. Those patterns will become your chapters  or folder names. It is not necessary (and is just wrong) to name anything a long file names. A name like http://www.goldenretieverdogs.net/goldenretiever/my_
    dog_sparkey_at_2005_dogshow .jpg     is silly. You see it all the time on the web. But it is wrong for so many reasons that it is imposable to list them all here. Corrected (and much better) it would look like this;  http://www.goldenretieverdogs.net/dog shows/sparky-05.jpg In this example I am assuming that you will have a lot of "dog show" photos and documents to put into this subfolder It should not be the only thing in the folder, if it is it should be grouped with something else like "2005" or "Sparkey". At this point it should be starting to be obvious that collection the data in an organized fashion is THE MOST IMPORTANT thing you can do, to get your materials ready for publishing.
    The Example on the right shows how a website looks to a designer. You can see that it look just like you "path statement"

  3. Keep it simple. Try to name everything short and to-the-point. Don't be cute. Try to give your web designer your material (on CD don't try to e-mail big files, they won't make it across the web) a cd that matches your intended web design as close as possible.

Don't Forget;

  1. Doorway pages;  Keyword rich quality information.

  2. XML Sitemap For google

  3. Website Validation

  4. Use of sub-domains. (limited by some ISPs). to group off topic material.

  5. Reserve script (java and flash) for 2nd or 3 page in your site. Hugh Hefner never put the centerfold on the cover of PlayBoy, neither should you.

Example of great sites;

 

 

   Web and domain structurer example.

 

Note; Each folder has  a default or Index.htm page.

 

 

I hope by now you are seeing the pattern. Arrange you stuff by folders and help you web designer help you. They do not know your business, but you must understand theirs just enough to put your material into categorizes so they and the customer you are trying to reach can understand your products and services.

 

A side note;

My website is not wonderful, it just happened over the last 10 years but I am making an effort to do what I preach.

Some folder names are automatically generated like _Private, New_Folder please disregard them.
DMM Rev 4-1-2008 All Rights Reserved.