The Front Porch

Good navigation starts with the very first page that visitors see. This may be either the home page itself, a "splash" page, or (unfortunately) something that for want of a better term I'll call a "utility page."

Some Web designers are obsessed with the fact that a Web page cannot appear the same to every visitor. In an attempt to get around this fact of life, they design parallel Web sites, each designed to look good to a particular subset of Web surfers. This is a fine thing to do, as long as the selection of different sites is transparent to the user. You can have two versions of your site, one designed for Netscape and one for Explorer, or perhaps one designed for those with newer browsers, and one for the Luddites. A bit of Javascript ascertains which browser a particular visitor has, and directs them to the appropriate version. If done properly, this can be quite nice.

Some designers, however, opt to give visitors a choice, perhaps between framed and non-framed versions, or between "high-bandwidth" and "text-only" versions. There's nothing wrong with this either, as long as the choice is integrated into your site design.

The abomination that I call a "utility page" works this way: When a visitor arrives at your main URL, they are presented with an unattractive plain-text page that offers a choice of different versions of the site. Sometimes such pages recommend one browser over the other. Some designers carry this to ridiculous extremes, like the one who instructed users to ensure that they have a particular browser version, make their window full size, and adjust their screen resolution before entering the site. It ain't gonna happen, dudes.

The first page that visitors see is your front door, and it should look good. If you want to offer a choice of different versions of a site, those choices should be made from the home page. It's silly to spend time and money making your whole site look good, and then set it up so that the first impression visitors get is a plain white page with plain text, requiring them to click. It looks amateurish, and it will drive away a certain percentage of visitors.

So will a "splash" or "entry" page, but some designers feel that it's worth it for the chance to make a flashy entrance. Many designers want that priceless first impression to be a big flashy graphic. It's impractical to put it on the home page, so they put the flash on a page by itself. This page is the first thing a visitor sees, and leads to the actual home page. A properly-designed splash page automatically loads the home page after a few seconds (using the META REFRESH tag), and also has a clickable element that will take a visitor to the home page if he or she chooses to click before the few seconds have elapsed.

Think long and hard before you include a splash page in your site. If your business is graphic design, animation, or something else that requires you to show off your graphic chops, then a splash page is appropriate. For most business sites, it isn't. Some visitors will bail, and others will resent the delay. Remember that most people don't go to a business site to be entertained - they go for information.

Nav 101
Nav 101
The Foyer