Why is it that whenever a website is started everyone’s first thought is about how it will look. An image editor is opened and graphics are thrown onto the screen. The result is then converted into html and css, usually by some WYSIWYG editor that gives it all absolute positioning. Then there are complaints that the footer should be at the bottom not right under the header or that background images are not lining up. All the while the page has absolutely no content!
Everyone loves a nice looking well thought out website design. Not everyone realizes that to be well thought out it needs to focus on the content of the page, bringing attention to the important parts, and hiding less interesting necessities.
The only way to achieve this is to focus on content first. Build the page with basic html tags and absolutely no css. When there is enough quality content that it will gain visitors without a fancy look, it is finally time to move some focus towards the design. Great designs are nice, but remember, it’s only there to complement the content.