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When pursuing the sport of fishing how you dress can be one of the most important factors. Really! Just try stepping to the gunnels of a multi-million dollar sport fishing yacht dressed in cutoff jeans and flip flops. (Most captains will gladly tell you that they will wait while you dash to the changing room.)  You will be lucky to be granted permission to board the vessel.

While appearance is important, function also plays a huge role.  Exposed, bare feet are a huge risk in the heart of a Marlin battle when flying gaffs, sharp-pointed tag sticks and knives are at play. Hard-soled shoes will scuff decks and drive both the captain and crew irate.  Quick wicking and loose fitting angler shirts will not only look the part but keep you comfortable for a long day on the water.

Well you knew I would get there eventually…Yes, your website needs to be properly attired as well.  How do you dress a website for success you ask?  Websites sport a design called a template.  The template is a base for your website that provides functional organization and proper aesthetics. Traditional templates are generally composed of four primary components:

1) The banner or header area of the template is that large piece of real estate that stretches across the top. Think of this as that area on the back of a sportfishing yacht where the name and home port are displayed.  On your website this area serves the same function.  It is the first thing a visitor’s eye will be drawn to and traditionally will provide your website’s name and/or slogan.  There may even be a pretty image there that supports the theme of your website.

2) Next up, and of equal or greater importance is the navigational menu. Not unlike the compass on a boat, the menu tells the site visitor not only where they can go but also provides a course by which to get there.  Menus can be horizontally oriented across the bottom of the banner area or vertically oriented down the left or right side of the template.  Horizontal menus are by their nature limited to the number of pages they can display by page name lengths and the width of the template while vertical menus allow more flexibility in page name length and the number of pages displayed. The Menu Navigation module in the Soholaunch website builder makes Management of your menu super simple!

3) The area across the bottom of the template is called the footer.  You can usually find a stray attorney lurking in this area as the copyright information and other links such as privacy policy are often displayed here. Also found in this area is the web master and company contact information.

4) What’s left?  Well the content area.  That acreage in the middle of everything where you get to shout your information to the world.  Factors such as overall template width and menu orientation will directly affect how much space is available for your content area.  If your website is going to utilize the Soholaunch Website Builder shopping cart, make sure your content area is at least 650 pixels wide so that there is plenty of room for product descriptions to display.

Don’t worry about height for your content area as developers usually employ technology similar to the fishing float. The height of the content area will increase magically as your content increases similar to making your bait sink deeper by sliding the float a little higher on the fishing line.

Now that you understand the geography of a template here are a couple more things to consider:

1) Keep things simple: generally simpler templates result in a site that has a clean look, is easy to navigate, and is just heaps more appealing.  Beware of incorporating big flash video presentations to your template.  These flash components can slow down page loads and frustrate visitors on lower speed connections.

2) Overall template size can be as important to a template as boat size to a fisherman.  A boat that is too large can be difficult to maneuver while fighting large game fish.  Too small, and the fish gains an advantage while angler and crew struggle with tight quarters.  Templates used to be designed to 800 x 600 pixel dimensions because that was the most prevalent monitor screen size.  With the advent of lighter and larger monitors those dimensions have scaled up to a standard 1024 x 768 pixels. Any size larger than that can leave important information hidden off-screen and requiring the site visitor to scroll which can result in information never even being seen.

There is also increasing demand for sites that view and navigate well on smaller mobile phone screens.  These sites are labeled mobile compliant and new technology exists which detects whether your visitor is viewing on a mobile device, and if so, automatically redirects them to a mobile compliant version of your website.

So whether you are dressing for a day on the water in pursuit of big game fish or creating a website to represent your venture to the world, appearance matters! If you spend a little, time, money and/or effort in dressing your website properly with the proper template the reward will be happier site visitors and ultimately more fi$h in your wallet! Keep in mind that ready-to-use templates designed for Soholaunch are available in abundance at http://addons.soholaunch.com . If you do not find a template to suit you there, please contact Soholaunch for a quote on a custom template that matches your dreams!

If you find this post interesting, humorous, or even offensive please post a comment below. I am sure many readers can either echo these concepts or add valuable input based on their fishing or website building experience. Also, watch for my next post on The Art of Fishing when I discuss "Proper Bait Storage & Preparation”.