»» What gives a site a professional appearance?

• Your site should contain useful and interesting content, presented in an appealing manner with a quick download time. Your sites overall appearance (backgrounds, fonts, etc.) should remain the same from page to page. Use only web-safe colors and fonts.
• Your site should load fast with a clear navigation system, unbroken graphics and links that work.
• Your site should use appropriate graphics. Don't put in too many, and make sure to optimize the ones you do use to improve load times.
• Your site should have content that changes frequently, encouraging return visitors.
• Your site should have easily accessible contact information and you should give a quick response when people request information or report trouble.
• Your site should have a newsletter that allows visitors to keep in touch and tells them about new changes but does not harvest those E-mail addresses for spam purposes.
• Your site should offer lots of free stuff and members-only specials.
• Your site should not annoy visitors with too many animated graphics, unwanted popups or music with no "off" button.
• Your HTML should be clean.
• Your website should be cross browser compatible and accessible to those using text only browsers.

Here are some "red flags" to an unprofessional web appearance.

• Poor browser compatibility
• Animated bullets
• Too many graphic and/or line dividers
• Multiple banners and buttons
• Poor use of frames
• Poor use of tables
• Too much advertising
• Large Welcome banners
• No Meta tags
• Under construction signs
• Scrolling text in the status bar
• Large scrolling text across the page
• Poor use of mouse over effects