Tips to design your links

Hi Everybody,
It is a fact that links have always been a vital part in the internet navigational process. Depending on the links and also on the content of the site that the link leads to, internet users decide on the worthiness of coming back to that site or not.

One cannot fail to notice the latest trends imposed by web 2.0, the emergence of a new writing genre designed to cater for the new needs and tastes of internet users and also the transformation process that search engines undergo.

Broadly speaking, users go from page to page selecting only the most important information or just the information that is easier to spot; they need to be able to make a quick assessment of the page content, get the information they are seeking and go to another page.

Usually, web authors employ hypertext links to create or reinforce concepts: a list of related links can serve as the focus of a site. The problem posed by links has little to do with the web but is rather related to the concept of hypertext. A collection of links does not have the same effect on the reader and is not as legible as conventional linear text.

In the case of linear text, readers have to work harder in seek of needed information. Links also become a technical problem, because most web pages have a certain rank on search engines due to links. Links are to be used as a reinforcement of, not a substitute for content.

What is worth mentioning when tackling the link issue is that designers are supposed to use relevant link labels, give consistent click-ability cues and also differentiate links that have been clicked from those that haven't.

1. Use relevant link description

2. Be aware that textual links do have certain main characteristics like: underlining and color

3. Use different colors for visited and unvisited links

4. Colors for text are to be avoided