You take a look at the home pages of two different agents' websites. Each home page is packed with content, with links that lead to more content. But one page is like a dream to navigate and the other, well, ever wind your way through a labyrinth?

So, how come one high-content site is easy to use and another one isn't? The answer likely lies in the agent's inability to adequately "pigeonhole" pieces of data on his home page. It's the pigeonholing of text, graphics, gradations of shade, lines, shapes, forms, and photos, in a logical fashion, that creates order and symmetry on a page. That is what makes a web page look easy to use.

There are two major elements to help make a website look easy to use.

1. The use of vertical, and especially horizontal, bars or simple lines, or boxes, to break up columns. See them used effectively in this Orange County Real Estate site. Using such lines automatically causes the brain to know that one item ends and another begins. It is an easy but effective way to avoid the appearance of content mishmash.

2. After bars or lines, simple "white space," or blank space can be used profusely to separate all of the elements on web pages. Look at how using nothing more than white space, combined with horizontal lines, logically and cleanly divides the elements on the San Diego site of Bob Wilson. Look at his interior pages, and see how the white space draws your eye into a desired point of attention.

When untrained agents, and even many designers, see white, or empty space on a page, they think of it as something essential to fill up entirely with stuff.

That is not necessarily the case. White space, especially when used with boxes around text, and with the use of small vertical and horizontal lines, can segment a web page magically so that it looks easy to navigate.

Think in Terms of Modules

When you get a website from a template or turn key website maker, the pages it contains are already designed in an orderly manner -- data on them is pigeonholed where it best fits and where it looks the best. But the mischief comes in when you start adding content to your pages. That is the time when you need to organize your items into separate, distinct segments, or boxes, or pigeonholes of data. Such modules make a website look easy to use.

For example, let's look at the "team" page of Wynne Achatz, team leader, Owner/Associate Broker with Real Estate One Westrick Associates, Marine City, Michigan, and see how that page is organized.

First, notice that it tells you what it is -- "Wynne and the Team." Many agent sites don't even have a headline on their home page to inform people that, yes, the consumer arrived at what they were searching for. Note that Wynne's team page carries through with the red rose theme that began on her home page; she even made sure that the box/line around the text is red.

Notice, too, how white space here is effectively used to frame the text. And see how the text itself forms a secondary frame around the photo of Wynne?

Look, too, at how white space frames and draws the eye to the simple buttons announcing the next three items that Wynne wants you to know about her:

1. "Wynne's credential." Listing her credentials lends to Wynne's positions as an authority on this issue.
2. "Testimonials." Wynne includes photos of those making the testimonials, which means to consumers that it is far more likely that she did not just make up the testimonials as some agents sometimes do.
3. "Family Time." Showing family photos might not mean so much on the fast-paced left and right coasts of the U.S., but in the Midwest, family means a lot to people. That's why Wynne takes time to show that she's a solid family lady, giving her even more credibility with buyers and sellers who are comparing home town agents online.

After Wynne has cleverly positioned the info that she wants you to know about her, so that it appears first on the team page, she brings in the photos and bios of not merely her team, but her "Full Service Team."

There's a whole raft of them, which makes Wynne even more substantial as a choice of real estate Realtor/broker. You don't think so? Then ask yourself, how many other broker/owners in her area, nay, in the country, have a website like hers?

Did choosing and using those elements in those exact places require some creative thinking? You bet it did. A relevant graphic or photo is worth the proverbial thousand words. And that's what you need to apply to your site: forethought!

Even if you hire someone to work on your site for you; you can still supersede their creativity (or lack of it) and tell them what to put where, without copying someone else's copyrighted work. You need to ensure your pages are logical, but moreover, look easy to use.

Don't leave that up to someone else.

Published: July 22, 2005

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.

Bill Koelzer is a Web marketing consultant to web-proficient agents nationwide. He is co-author, with Barbara Cox, Ph.D., of the Prentice-Hall books, Internet Marketing in Real Estate and Internet Marketing. Bill is also webmaster of Orange County Real Estate, among the most-awarded known Realtor® sites. Visit his website, Koelzer.com or e-mail him at .