Wireframes are your friend

When designing a website, it's very important to think before you leap. Preplanning and testing a site should be a requirement when working on a site in order for it to succeed. Sometimes the graphics and the colour can get in the way. In order to test a site's layout properly and have the person not think about the design aspect while doing so, wireframes should be used. Just planning out the layout of the site, placement of everything, showing where everything will go using nothing but black and white colors, and boxes with text. This article at Muiomuio.com shows the technique and how this designer goes about it. It's an interesting look into wire frames, and just might help get you started.