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"If your business is not on the internet, then your business will be out of business." Bill Gates said that more than two decades ago. Today there are more than 644 million active websites on the Internet (according to Netcraft) and web designers became a central part of any company’s marketing strategy. This all put web designer in high demand.

The job of a web designer does not end at building websites that look good; you also have to manage all of the things that combine to form a successful business. From planning and execution to marketing and communication, a web designer has to be astute as well as professional at every step taken.

If you want to become a web designer, but you have no idea where to start, this guide is for you. Below you’ll find a step-by-step guide which helps you understand the essential knowledge and skills you’ll need to build a successful career in web design.

When it comes to learning a new discipline, it’s essential to learn foundational principles first. Well-designed websites follow strict rules of UX design — they have good usability and nice visual appeal. A good UX design will make visitors stay on your site while a bad one will make them go somewhere else.

Before trying to create something you need to learn the rules of how websites should be organized. Anyone who wants to become a web designer should learn how to create a clear and robust information architecture. To get this knowledge, start with reading books Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug, The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman and Information Architecture for the World Wide Web: Designing Large-Scale Web Sites by Peter Morville.

To create an eye-catching web design, it’s essential to learn color theory and the basic principles of visual hierarchy. There’s an excellent design activity called Daily UI Challenge that promises that you’ll become a better designer in 100 days.

While many designers approach projects with a "wait for inspiration to happen" kind of attitude, but the fact is that just a little bit of planning can help that inspiration come a lot more quickly. As such, it's important to plan and research well before going into the web designing process. Planning can be further divided into three parts:

Researching about the client’s company
Asking the client what he wants and expects from the web
Pondering upon what his competitors are doing and the related industry trends

Make a sketch of the website in your mind and then put it on the paper (if possible). Although planning is a hectic and less interesting process (and so many designers are inclined to skip it), pre-design planning saves your time, money and resources the best. You can read more about design planning.

It will be hard to work in the web design industry without knowing any of the programming languages. Of course, it’s possible to create a website using website builders like Wix or Squarespace. But you will struggle to know the possibilities of the web when you work only with site builders. Knowing how to code will give you a lot of benefits. For example, you’ll be able to form a much more accurate idea of whether or not your design is technically feasible.

You need to have the necessary skills in HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). HTML sets the structure and content of the page, while CSS defines the styling options. I recommend tutorials by W3schools: tutorial on HTML and tutorial on CSS.

It’s also preferable to learn JavaScript — it’s one of the most in-demand programming languages. It’ll be much easier to create advances websites using JavaScript. Major learning platforms provide access to JavaScript courses for free.

The cycle of a web design project ends at evaluation and analysis of your designed work. Being able to accept and implement feedback effectively is an important trait of the creative professionals. Like all other aforementioned factors, having a good eye in pointing out mistakes in your own work is a quality that success-oriented web designers should possess. The web designers should act as a devil’s advocate and judge the success of their website being in the target audience’s shoes. Furthermore, taking some time to have other people check your work for mistakes will go a long ways as well. You can read more about the importance of feedback in Brandon's article on the subject.

In every industry, becoming fluent with the essential tools is the first step towards the success. You cannot expect to be a successful web designer without knowing the industry standard tools.

But since web design is a broad discipline, web designers have to be familiar with different aspects of design such as:

Graphical design. Despite that graphic design and web design are two separate fields, web designers often need to dive into graphic design to solve a particular design issue. Thus, it’s vital to learn how to use a graphics editor such as Adobe Photoshop. The most common task web designers do in graphics editors is image editing — resizing or cropping images so they fit properly within specific spaces or compressing pictures so they’ll be more suitable for web viewing. Here an excellent tutorial for Photoshop by Tutorials.ws

Prototyping. Prototyping is a cornerstone of web design. When web designers have solid prototyping skills, they don’t have to wait for the final web design to validate their assumptions; instead, they can validate their design decisions within minutes. Check Mockplus, a powerful tool for prototyping. Using Mockplus its possible to create a fully-interactive prototype in minutes.

Coding. Get yourself a good code editor such as Sublime or Atom.

Web designers also need to become familiar with popular CMS (Content Management System) — software that is used to create and manage digital web content. CMS makes a procedure of content management much more comfortable for the site’s owners. While there are dozens of different CMS available on the market today, there are three leading CMS — Wordpress, Joomla, and Drupal.

Part of being an in-demand web designer is being able to do more than just design. Websites have to be structured in a way that makes them friendly not only for users but also for search engine bots. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a process of site’s optimization that has a goal to create better online visibility of a website. Web designers should focus on "natural" (or "organic") promotion by improving site’s performance, optimizing it for multiple platforms and focussing on content — making it relevant and valuable for the target audience. Such activities can help increase site’s rankings with search engines. Read The Complete Beginner’s Guide to SEO and 15 Rules for Dominating Online Search Results for more information on the SEO topic.

The process of web design requires evaluation and analysis of finished work. Designers have to test a website to be sure that pages load quickly and a site is accessible both for desktop and mobile users (responsive design). Today it's much easier to check that. You can use tools like Google Pagespeed Insights.

Experience counts, sometimes even more than your qualifications or skills. Likewise, a web designer’s success depends a lot on your experience in the field. Whether it’s your employer or your potential client, people are interested in knowing how much previous experience you have, which companies have you worked with, and what projects you have worked on. From your perspective, having a broad experience in the field will help you to quickly identify design solutions as they are presented to you in meetings. My advice if you're still studying in school: Don't just wait for college to end in order to start working, it's worth the extra time to start working on web projects right now. The more experience you get under your belt, the quicker you'll move up in the world of web designers.

A well-organized professional is a born champion. No matter which field of profession you belong to, being organized is important for every person to be successful. Likewise, in the case of web designing, your work can get really messy at times, and this may lead you to many problems. So start off with organizing your computer by classifying texts, pictures, graphics, videos and even sound files in separate folders and label them appropriately. Maintaining a things-to-do list may also help the web designers in keeping themselves organized, amplify their time well and finish the job easier than expected.

Web designers, either freelance or salaried employees, should have business mentality when approaching any project. Design in the real world is all about salesmanship, making value assessments, and balancing costs. A successful web designer does not only design the websites for their clients, they create business solutions for them as well. If you are good at understanding an organization’s marketing needs and can get into the minds of the potential visitors, you will certainly have an edge over your competitors. However, if you find managing the business side of design a bit difficult to do, it's worth looking into working with a larger studio that will take on the major responsibilities for you.

Web designing is rarely a one-man show. Whether you work in a big design studio or with a small client, team work is inevitable. While a web designer’s work does not require a large team of professionals (in many cases it can feel like you're working all alone), it's important to understand just how often your ability to work with others and delegate tasks will come into play over the course of a project.

Being a good team player means understanding your role in the larger scheme of things, and being helpful to others - as the old saying goes: two heads are always better than one. Learn to effectively collaborate with others, and watch your work improve!

Web designing is rarely a one-man show. No matter whether you work in a big design department or in a small design studio, teamwork is inevitable. Web designers have to communicate with clients, developers or other designers on a regular basis. That’s why web designers should learn to present their work in the best light.

The world of computer technology changes almost every day, and to keep pace with it, a web designer needs to be technologically in tune with the changes in the industry. Slice out a segment of your work-day or week and dedicate it to learning new things in your field. Find out what's new, what's trending, and what's falling to the wayside. If you don’t want to see your competitors take away your business by appearing to be newer and fresher than you, pay heed to this tip.

Inspiration is vital for all creative people, and web designers are no exception. Web designers should be familiar with the latest web design trends to understand the ever-changing demands of web visitors. It’s recommended to spend 30 minutes each day on watching the best designs.

Here are a few great resources for your inspiration:

Awwwards is a well-known website for web professionals. The site has a nomination ‘Site of the day’ where designers can find really interesting examples of web design.

Dribbble help designers to be familiar with the latest visual trends.

Behance is an excellent resource for in-depth web design case studies.

The best way to learn is to learn from the best. It’s extremely important not only to join web design communities but also be an active member:

Join popular online communities such as Sitepoint or Uxmastery

Follow web experts such as Sara Soueidan, Brad Frost, Jeffrey Zeldman and Jesse James Garrett on Twitter.

To hire a web designer, companies or clients need to be sure that web a designer has all the required skills to do the work. That’s why when companies/clients look for a prospective designer they want to see tangible results of their work, not just to hear that in-depth understanding of design theory. The best way to prove your web design skills is to create a strong portfolio.

The portfolio is the best medium for web designers to showcase their abilities and aesthetics, but more importantly, it shows potential clients that you are current, relevant, and active in the design world of right now, not 5 years ago. Rather than aimlessly boasting about the websites you have done, portfolio gives you a solid evidence to show the world what you are capable of. You'll want a portfolio that covers every aspect of web designing... including layouts, content management, composition, typography, colors, techniques and design rationales. Showing your potential clients the full scope of your work will help you not only to get clients, but it will also help you to justify charging more money as well!

Become a web designer is not as hard as it seems, but it requires time and effort. Many of the skills mentioned in this guide cannot be obtained quickly by reading books or completing online courses. They require a lot of practice. Thus, practice a lot and be patient. Remember that Rome wasn't built in a day.

It’s also crucial to be passionate about your work. Even when you look for your first job, focus on experience, not only money. Take problems and design challenges as opportunities to learn.

If you follow these pieces of advice, one day you will find yourself making world-class websites.

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