Navigation tools work better when placed at the top of the page. You can help send them in the right direction by making your navigation easy to find and use by placing it at the top of the page. Generally speaking, multiple columns will more than likely be ignored by users. One-column formats perform better than multi-column formats. It is better not to convey too much information to visitors. It is more advantageous to leave a portion of the site free of any text rather than to put something in every corner of the page. Sites with too much information tend to overwhelm users and they ignore a large part of the content. Simplicity has its merits in given situations. A suggestion is to allow an amount of white space for readers to rest their eyes.