LTU Web Design

On the next 106 & Park: will.i.am, Lil Wayne, Wu-Tang, web standards…

He calls himself m0serious, a.k.a. the Poetic Prophet, the SEO Rapper—though he rhymes about more than search. I honestly thought this would be a mildly amusing web spoof, but it’s actually quite good. I even showed this to my class earlier this evening, and they gave it their props.

If you’ve gotten this far and still aren’t sure whether to click play, then read on (thank you, Tasty Blog Snack):

Your site design is the first thing people see
it should be reflective of you and the industry
easy to look at with a nice navigation
when you can’t find what you want it causes frustration

a clear call to action to increase the temptation
use appealing graphics they create motivation
if you have animation
use with moderation
cause search engines can’t index the information

display the logos of all your associations
highlight your contact info that’s an obligation
create a clean design you can use some decoration
but to try to prevent any client hesitation

every page that they click should provide and explanation
should be easy to understand like having a conversation
when you design the style go ahead and use your imagination

but make sure you use correct color combinations
do some investigation, look at other organizations
but don’t duplicate or you might face a litigation
design done, congratulations but it’s time to start construction

follow these instructions when you move into production
your photoshop functions then slice that design
do your layout with divs make sure that it’s aligned
please don’t use tables even though they work fine
when it come to indexing they give searches a hard time

make it easy for the spiders to crawl what you provide
remove font type, font color and font size
no background colors, keep your coding real neat

tag your look and feel on a separate style sheet
better results with xml and css
now you making progress, a lil closer to success
describe your doctype so the browser can relate
make sure you do it great or it won’t validate

check in all browsers, I do it directly
gotta make sure that it renders correctly
some use IE, some others use Flock
some use AOL, I use Firefox

title everything including links and images
don’t use italics, use emphasis
don’t use bold, please use strong
if you use bold that’s old and wrong

when you use CSS, you page will load quicker
client satisfied like they eating on a snicker
they stuck on your page like you made it with a sticker
and then they convert now that’s the real kicker
make you a lil richer, your site a lil slicker

design and code right man I hope you get the picture
what I’m telling you is true man it should be a scripture
if it’s built right you’ll be the pick of the litter
everyone will want to follow you like twitter
competition will get bitter and you’ll shine like glitter

if you trying to grow your company will get bigger
design and code right man can you get with it

This is basically what I teach all semester in a nutshell, only far more melodic. That, and this video has been viewed (as of this evening) nearly 100,000 times. I, on the other hand, have not!

Thanks to Karen J., one of my students (and subject of an upcoming post on social media and reputation) who sent this to me earlier today. A little levity was welcome after my last three posts. And much respect to you, Mr. Lewis—I needed this.