Banners and buttons are very important parts of all university Web pages. While they do add visual interest to your page, they aren't just randomly placed graphics that break up text. Among their many uses, they help to convey information, communicate a benefit or product, identify a user's location, and help solidify the university brand. Banners and buttons can be diverse and powerful assets to a Web page—they help to establish and connect elements of the page, just as office signage helps to convey information such as directions, locations, and other important information. UAB Marketing has official color palettes online to help you build banners and buttons specific to your Joomla site.

The Joomla template uses the area just below the logo and QuickLinks area as the main banner area. The main green horizontal navigation bar will appear on all sites just below any banner graphic placed in this area. Graphics placed here should be created at a width of 972 pixels, with varying heights. You can see some examples below of banners created for several different UAB entities.

Buttons will need to be created for the specific size of the UAB Joomla template area where they'll be placed. Buttons should be easy to read, containing specific and concise information. Icons should be used with caution. Icons can often be hard to define when reduced down to button sized elements. Unless they are icons widely used by the greater Internet community—like those used by news organizations and social networking sites—they can often go unrecognized. Adding text to icons is a simple way to make buttons containing graphics and icons more easily understood.