If you want to let your web site have a professional look, the first thing you should keep in mind is to provide contents.

Many people seem to think, a web site should first of all be flashy, glittering - then the visitors will look for its contents. A professional web site designer, however, will point out in reply that it is hard and tiring to read the details from a web site that is flashy and glittering. Result: seasoned Internet visitors will eschew such web sites right from the start. To them, a web site full of superficial gimmicks probably will have not enough contents worth looking for.

Just imagine: When a visitor comes upon your web site, it will rarely be because he/she came INTENTIONALLY. Oftentimes it will be that visitors happened *somehow* upon your web site, rather by way of incident. You have just a few seconds to grab their attention. One click, and they are gone - forever, probably.

The best way to make them stay (and, ideally, to dig down into your web site) is to present some interesting information to them. In most cases, conveying that information can be done only by written text. (OK, you can use some knack to spice up the text. But in general it is TEXT what you need. Only professional photographers, music producers, circus artists, etc. will have a real need for sizable photos, audio's or video's.)

Anything beyond that just tends to distract your visitors. Speaking technically, it's nothing more than a waste of bandwidth, causing long load times. In extreme cases your visitors might even be annoyed. If, after having waited for a long time, they get poor content that is nearly illegible because all the screen is full of flashing touting, rotating messages and vibrating banners.