Definition:
A Web designer is someone who designs Web pages. A Web designer is more focused on the look and feel of a website than how it works, and often uses WYSIWYG editors rather than diving into the HTML directly. 

Web designers have the following skills:

• Some HTML
• CSS
• Design
• Project management

Companies looking for Web designers are looking for people with a good aesthetic sense that can build and maintain websites that look good.

Web designers won't be asked to build Web programs or applications or maintain databases for data driven websites.

Web Designer is Used as a Catchall

Some people use the term Web Designer to refer to anyone who does anything on a website. Most freelancers refer to themselves as Web designers.

Be sure to read the job description carefully for any job you are applying for to make sure you meet the requirements.

source: about.com

The word design means lots of different things to different people. But nearly everyone you meet says that it's obvious what design is. They are often surprised to find that other people mean something different by design than they do. Find out what other Web designers mean by the word design and tell us what you think it means.

Web Design is the process of transforming conceptual ideas and requirements into a working website. Web Design is not limited to being graphical design, information design, usability design or any other "design" in particular. Web development for a particular website also belongs in the category of Web Design, since it has great impact on almost every aspect of a website.

—Guest Tseug

Design Is...
Design can be a noun or a verb - something "that is" or something "that is being done". To me, design is all about vision. If you do not have vision for something, you are designing to fail. Design blocks have nothing to do with your ability as a designer. It has everything to do with your vision. Instead of saying "Oh, I have a design block" you should say "I have a vision block." What is blocking your vision? Is it fear? Good design always requires informed and clear vision that is easily communicated through colors, shapes, typography, imagery, and layout.
—Guest Ryan B

Design is......
A process of creating an object/anything else where we use our creativeness to make the object beautiful. Like in creating web pages we should be artistic and creative to produce a good output.
—Guest mhary

Design is to me...
A combination of passion, skills, and ideas converted into a finished product.
—Guest Jany

The eye of the beholder
I don't believe I could add even one more word to better the article. We always have to remember "design is in the eyes of the beholder" Thank you for the insight.
—mrmagoo144

Design defined
In this case, design means to use something already in existence (html) coombined with creative thought and planning, to create a functional series of events that will direct someone to do something ,,,, and he rambled on and on...
—Guest Jim Bowden

Design - defined!
Design - when referring to a process - is the process that transforms a business idea or vision into a tangible end product. Design - when used as a verb - is all of the activities that are performed - research, analysis, synthesis, concept development and product specifications - to develop a concept into a product. And Design - when used as a noun - refers to an end product and its characteristics; its utility, materials, economics, dimensions, shape, appearance and style. And Design nowadays also incorporates principles of sustainability and reuse (the "cradle to cradle" idea) into products and production methods.
—dh2724

Design is...
An artful and purposeful presentation that provides meaning or comprehension beyond the initial content or message.
—Guest Sarah

Creative Construction
Planning and construction of an object or artwork in a unique manner, to imaginatively create a finished work which properly portrays the original concept.
—Andy.Brown

Definition of design
Means the parameters of the existence of the concept or being.
—Guest Snerfu

Thoughtful agreement
The word design means accepting, intend, thoughtful and an agreement
—Guest Gony

source: about.com

When building a website there is a process that most designers use. This process covers all the steps from deciding on a website to building it and putting them live.

While all of the steps are important, the amount of time you spend on them is up to you. Some designers prefer to plan a lot before building while others spend little or no time on marketing. But if you know what the steps are you can decide which ones you don't need.

1. What is the PURPOSE of the Site?
Knowing the purpose of the site will help you set goals for the site as well as help determine your target audience.

Goals are useful for most websites as it helps you measure how the site is performing, and whether it is worth expanding and improving the site.

And knowing the target audience for a site can help you with design elements as well as appropriate content. A site targeting seniors is going to have a completely different feel from one targeting toddlers.

2. Start PLANNING the site design
Many people think this is where you jump into your web editor and start building, but the best sites start with a plan and start that plan even before the first wireframe is built.

Your design plan should include:

• Details about the information architecture
• The planned structure of the site
• A site map of the pages to be designed and built
• And technical details like: if scripts or Ajax will be used, whether there will be a server-side language like PHP in use, if you need a shopping cart and so on.

3. DESIGN Starts After Planning
This is where most of us start to have fun - with the design phase of the project. While you can jump right into your editor now, I recommend you still remain outside of it and do your design in a graphics program or even on paper first.

You will want to think about:

• Wireframes and the layout of your designs
• Color including creating a color scheme for the site and how those colors work together in harmony.
• You should also plan on a theme for your site including decorative images and icons, including a site favicon.

4. Gather or Create the Site CONTENT
Content is what people come to your site for. This can include text, images, and multimedia. By getting at least some of the content ready ahead of time, you can more easily start building the site.

You should look for:

• Text – this can be articles, blog posts, lists, reviews, or anything that you want to write about on your site.
• Graphics – there are lots of places to find images for web pages including photos you've taken and free images. Be sure you're using the right format for your images.
• Multimedia – Remember that multimedia can have a negative impact on your site. Make sure that you're adding sound and video to your sites appropriately. Multimedia isn't appropriate for all target audiences.

5. Now You Can Start BUILDING the Site
If you've done a good job planning and designing your site, then building the HTML and CSS will be easier. And for many of us, this is the best part.

You will use lots of different technologies to build your site:

• HTML – this is the basis of your website, and if you learn nothing else, you should learn HTML.
• CSS – Once you know HTML, CSS helps you create the design you planned. And CSS is easy to learn.
• CGI
• JavaScript
• PHP
• Databases

6. Then You Should Always TEST the Site
Testing your website is critical both throughout the building phase and after you've gotten it built. While you're building it, you should preview your pages periodically to make sure your HTML and CSS are working correctly.

Then you want to make sure:

• The site meets the goals set out in step one. Does this site fulfill it's purpose?
• The technical features (HTML, CSS, scripts, and so on) work correctly. Troubleshoot any problems efficiently, and remember to validate.
• The design works in significant browsers.

7. UPLOAD the Site to Your Hosting Provider
In most cases, you will need to upload your pages to a hosting provider to test them effectively. But if you have done all your initial testing offline, you will want to upload them to your hosting provider.

I have found that it's a good idea to have a "launch party#8221; and upload all the files for a website at one time, even if I've been adding them to the site periodically. This makes sure that the site has the most current versions of the pages when you launch.

8. MARKETING Brings People to Your Site
Some people feel that they don't need to do marketing for their website. But if you want people to visit, there are many ways to get the word out, and you don't have to spend a lot of money.

The most common way to get people to a website is through SEO or search engine optimization. This relies on organic search results and by optimizing your site for search, you help more readers find you. I offer a free SEO class to help you get started.

9. And Finally You Will Need to MAINTAIN Your Website
The best websites are changing all the time. The owners pay attention to them and add new content as well as keeping the existing content up-to-date. Plus, eventually you will probably want to do a redesign, to keep the design up-to-date as well.

The important parts of maintenance are:

• Link checking – fixing broken links is tedious, but it needs to be done. The easiest way is with a link checker.
• Content maintenance – you should be adding updates to your website all the time. This is why blogs are so important, as they make it easy to add new content. You should also be re-reading existing content periodically, and updating old pieces.
• Redesigns – While it's much better to do iterative design and just keep improving your site with little changes, redesigns are an important part of maintenance. If you decide to do a major redesign, you should start over with the steps in this process to make sure your redesign is as good as your initial design.

source: about.com

Give visitors the information they're looking for

Provide high-quality content on your pages, especially your homepage. This is the single most important thing to do. If your pages contain useful information, their content will attract many visitors and entice webmasters to link to your site. In creating a helpful, information-rich site, write pages that clearly and accurately describe your topic. Think about the words users would type to find your pages and include those words on your site.

Make sure that other sites link to yours
Links help our crawlers find your site and can give your site greater visibility in our search results. When returning results for a search, Google uses sophisticated text-matching techniques to display pages that are both important and relevant to each search. Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote by page A for page B. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and help to make other pages "important."

Keep in mind that our algorithms can distinguish natural links from unnatural links. Natural links to your site develop as part of the dynamic nature of the web when other sites find your content valuable and think it would be helpful for their visitors. Unnatural links to your site are placed there specifically to make your site look more popular to search engines. Some of these types of links (such as link schemes and doorway pages) are covered in our Webmaster Guidelines.

Only natural links are useful for the indexing and ranking of your site.

Make your site easily accessible
Build your site with a logical link structure. Every page should be reachable from at least one static text link.

Use a text browser, such as Lynx, to examine your site. Most spiders see your site much as Lynx would. If features such as JavaScript, cookies, session IDs, frames, DHTML, or Macromedia Flash keep you from seeing your entire site in a text browser, then spiders may have trouble crawling it.

Things to avoid

Don't fill your page with lists of keywords, attempt to "cloak" pages, or put up "crawler only" pages. If your site contains pages, links, or text that you don't intend visitors to see, Google considers those links and pages deceptive and may ignore your site.

Don't feel obligated to purchase a search engine optimization service. Some companies claim to "guarantee" high ranking for your site in Google's search results. While legitimate consulting firms can improve your site's flow and content, others employ deceptive tactics in an attempt to fool search engines. Be careful; if your domain is affiliated with one of these deceptive services, it could be banned from our index.

Don't use images to display important names, content, or links. Our crawler doesn't recognize text contained in graphics. Use ALT attributes if the main content and keywords on your page can't be formatted in regular HTML.

Don't create multiple copies of a page under different URLs. Many sites offer text-only or printer-friendly versions of pages that contain the same content as the corresponding graphic-rich pages. To ensure that your preferred page is included in our search results, you'll need to block duplicates from our spiders using a robots.txt file. For information about using a robots.txt file, please visitour information on blocking Googlebot.

source: www.google.com