Today most people of all ages are constantly online, the term that is commonly used to denote the state of being engrossed within the World Wide Web. There, they can find anything that they wish to access. Whether it is for entertainment, educational or business purposes, there is simply no end to the amount of information that can be accessed with just a few clicks of a button on the Internet. It has now become the number one place to visit for everyone's needs. This triggered the practice of promoting one's self, business, products or services through websites. To further maximize the benefit of the website, what is needed is good web design.

Essentially, web design has turned into a fairly common term, except maybe for those who have been living under a rock. The general knowledge that people have of the process is that it pertains to the visual aspects of a website. This is quickly followed with the idea that if the design of a website is not good, then the website owner is probably not a reliable authority on the services that they offer. This is why it is very important for a website to look polished and complete with the necessary details. This will enable it to gather more traffic and become more successful within the very competitive online environment.

A common mistake that people make is the interchanging use of the terms web design and web development. While the two are actually connected, they do not exactly pertain to the same thing. To clarify, the former deals with the front-end part of the website. This involves the interface that the users will interact with during their navigation on the website. On the other hand, web development deals with the back-end of the website, focusing mainly on the non-design aspect of web creation which includes writing mark-up and coding.

Web design opened up a lot of career opportunities for those who were able to grasp the concept of its process. Basically, there are two main professions; the web designer and web developer. There are then several divisions that are derived from the different tasks in creating a website. As a result, several web creating professions came to be; graphic designers, Internet marketing specialists, SEO writers, Internet copywriters and user experience designers.

There is, however, a more practical definition for web design. Instead of just being plainly about the overall look of a website, it is actually a practice that involves several skills and disciplines. It includes both the creation and maintenance of the website. There are different areas among which it can be branched out which are namely, interface design, web graphic design, user experience design, authoring, and search engine optimization.