Website Usability - Easily Locating Links

One of the main functions of website usability, is the ability to place and easily locate links in your website.

Without links on your website, there is no ability to navigate, and for all practical purposes, you have a dead site.

Webmasters include links into every page of a website to cross reference articles, change topics, and basically navigate to whatever area of the site or other site they desire.

Links are vital in a website and are just as important as your content. It is not possible for visitors to your site, to connect to any other document on your website, or the internet without them.

There are basically two types of links on a website. Internal, within your website, and external to other sites on the internet.

Internal Links:

Internal links function like a book, and connect other pages of your website together. A book has pages to navigate through, and like a book your website also contains separate pages, called web pages, to navigate through.

Your website's home page, functions like a book index, where a reader can choose which "page" they want to look at by clicking on an internal link.

External Links:

An external link connects a web page from your website, to another website's web page on the internet. It functions like a connection between two different pages, in two different books.

Without external links, your website would be in a world of its own, literally. No purchases could take place, no billings would occur, no commerce or communication could exist.

Since the inception of the internet, webmasters have been using a standard of sorts to place links on web pages.

Internal links are commonly placed either in the left hand column, or at the top of the web page.

This is done because research, through the years, has determined that these areas are the first that are noticed by an internet visitor. Webmasters naturally designed their web pages to capture the attention of their audience and make their links prominent in these areas.

Occasionally the bottom of the page is used for internal links, however if you notice, they are usually not as prominent. This is done to avoid design redundancy, yet avail the webmaster an alternate, backup link.

External links are commonly found in the right hand margins or included in the content of the web page.

Many believe that the placement of external links, in the content of the web page, is done primarily for explanatory purposes, and as a reference to outside web information.

On the other hand, others believe that because our reading is performed from the left, the right side of the web page should be allocated to external website links.

In any event, easily locating links on the web page is standardized relative to these explanations.

The one exception is Google AdSense and other similar text advertisements.

These external links are usually allocated to the center and right side of the page.

Easily locating links on your website are based on these general practices, however, these are not rules set in granite for website designers.

Deviations from the norm can sometimes create an interesting surfing experience.

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