1. October 2001
New web design book makes it easy to build effective and
powerful sites
By Jeff Meredith
If you're not a codehead, books on web design can be intimidating.
But that doesn't mean you have to settle for the 'For Dummies' series,
simplicity and lowered expectations.
Anne-Marie Concepcion's Professional Web Site Design From Start to
Finish takes the outsider to a new level of web savvy and it doesn't
assume you know the latest in jargon. Rather, Concepcion reaches out
to traditional print designers and business owners who want to
approach web design in a pragmatic and goal-oriented way.
Concepcion calls this smart web design. "A lot of my clients got caught
up in the technical details without looking at the whole picture," said
Concepcion, who has produced web sites through her Chicago-based
Seneca Design & Consulting firm since 1996. "The technical details
were not as important as creating a coherent site that met the client's
goals."
From creating new revenue streams and increasing name/brand
recognition to just enjoying the warm feeling of winning awards for a
site, clients' aspirations vary. Concepcion makes it clear that a dialogue
must take place before any work is done. Serious thought must be
given to a site's design message, its potential audience and its content
and site architecture. "If you want to create a Web site that works, you
need to ensure that form follows function. The purpose of the site
should guide its form (its design) - not the other way around," she
notes in the book.
Concepcion's book marks the entrance of How Design Books, an F&W
imprint, into the web design market. As a writer for the former Digital
Chicago magazine and a web columnist for Publish, she had been
approached before about doing books, but the timetable and terms
were never accommodating enough.

2. For her first book, Concepcion didn't have to put her business on hold-
between signing a contract and completing her first manuscript (work
done during the summer of 2000), a total of four months elapsed. To
keep the book current in the face of a production cycle lag, Concepcion
was allowed to return to it later with added perspective.
"They let me rip it apart and update everything," said Concepcion.
"The book is up to date as of April of this year and it came out in
August."
Concepcion hails from a print design background - she founded Seneca
in 1987 and part of her motivation in writing was to enable those
designers with little online experience to take the leap into a new
medium.
"A lot of the print designers I worked with were terrified of the web,"
said Concepcion. "It was an encouragement for print designers to go
ahead and get in on the web and keep in mind that they bring a lot of
value to the table."
Adapting isn't easy, but having Concepcion as a guide helps. In a
section titled "Why all the Confusion?" ("The world's largest sidebar,"
jokes Concepcion in addressing its original length of 3,000-4,000
words), she addresses the problem of browser and platform
differences - unfamiliar terrain for the print world. HTML's evolution
and the tendency of Microsoft and Netscape to introduce their own
tags with browser upgrades (unsupported by their competitor) are
touched upon, with Concepcion approaching the strategies designers
can employ to cope.
"There are a lot of designers who have no idea why there are so many
competing standards," said Concepcion. "I don't think what I have is
the right answer, but I don't think there is a right answer. What I'm
trying to say in the book is you have to (provide) your clients your
measured opinion of what is the best way to do this."
What Concepcion does advocate is preparing to reach the widest
possible audience by creating sites that degrade elegantly - visitors
with browsers that don't support newer tags still have to be
accommodated, and the same least common denominator logic applies

3. to fonts and window size (640x480 pixels still applying, even as 17-
inch monitors become more prevalent).
This is not to say that Concepcion only presents the web's limitations.
In a portion of the book called "Adding Goodies," she examines
advancements that have made the web interactive, from Flash and
Shockwave to Java applets. And a section devoted to building search
engine-friendly web pages - from crafting tags to "tricked out"
doorway pages - demonstrates that she has common client goals in
mind.
Along the way, she's also grounding them in reality, urging a
meticulous brand of skepticism to achieve success on the web.
"I get a lot of pressure from web site clients about their (search
engine) rankings," said Concepcion. "(One mentioned) a company that
guarantees (they) can get into the top ten rankings. I said, 'Why don't
you ask them for the names of five clients?'"
Professional Web Site Design is available in bookstores and at
Amazon.com. The retail price is $35.