This is part two of our article on how to begin the work flow for internet website design. If you haven't seen it already, click "How to Design a Website" to read part one, then return here.

In part one, we discussed site structure and layout considerations. Combined with the steps below, beginning your project the right way means your internet website design project will go much more smoothly.

Fit a Logo

Here, we mean not only "fit" as in, make it fit in the space you have left - which is often challenging! - but we also mean fit in a functional sense.

Don't just plop a graphic down that looks good when isolated. Putting a logo into a web design is like performing surgery - you need the logo to connect and function properly in its place.

When in doubt, just make sure the logo works with the header's background, and keep it simple. Logo fitting is actually one of the hardest parts of planning how to design each internet website, and beginners can find themselves hanging on this problem for days during an otherwise-smooth project.

Even the best Fortune 500 companies will put a tiny logo at the upper-left on a white background, on an otherwise ornate website. You can too.

Color & Branding

You've got your DIV and TABLE elements laid out for all the different page styles. You've fitted a logo, you've prototyped the finished product. Now it's a beautiful composition.

A bland, black-and-white, Lorem Ipsum-filled thing of beauty.

There are fantastic internet websites out there that will help you with ready-made color palettes that you can use verbatim. Whether you're an expert at color theory, or you're not even sure if you can spot a good color theme when you see one, these sites are a goldmine.

Usually, those sites will have advice on which parts of the palette should be used for page background, content background, content foreground, primary accents, and secondary accents.

Yes, deciding how to design your website's color scheme can really can be as easy as surfing for eye candy.

Putting it Together

Don't forget to use empty space. We don't mean fill it! We mean leave it empty, to emphasize your layout's key elements. Don't cram every pixel. Empty space is a wonderful tool for emphasis.

Use CSS liberally. A good web designer can waste many an hour hand-tweaking style attributes midway through a project - use class attributes instead.

Even if you might only use a certain style once, it only takes a few seconds longer to define a class. Yes, it might take you a few minutes to look your classes up later … but that's the cost of elegance, faster site downloads, and building professional habits.

You'll find that when you follow the above guidelines in beginning an internet website design project the right way, you'll save yourself hours, and you'll learn a lot more during each project.