Avoid Losing Thousands of Dollars From Your Website

Imagine this scenario.

You’ve just released a new product onto the web. You’ve sent out all the marketing material and you’ve signed up as many affiliates as possible and sit back, grab your favorite beverage and wait for the dollars to roll in.

You wait, and you wait.. Nothing.. Not a single sale..

You then think "I'll give it another hour and two and see if anything happens then". You know your affiliates have been promoting your product, you’ve been getting the emails, but no sales have occurred..

You start to think maybe something is wrong with your site. So you decide to click on a link in one of your affiliates email and you get the dreaded "404 - File not Found error".

Then you suddenly realize that the link you gave all your affiliates was wrong. You told them to visit yourdomain.com/specialoffer.html but the real location is yourdomain.com/special-offer.html

So you dash into your site with your FTP tool and quickly rename the page to the new name, and within minutes sales start coming in..

Phew.. But how many lost sales? How many thousands of dollars have you just lost??

It freighting, and it can happen so easily..

Wouldn’t it have be good to have some sort of safe guard in place, that sent you an email when the error first occurred with the very first visitor.

Well, there is such a tool. Im going to show you how to implement it for FREE and very easy to setup.

To make this work we need to modify our sites .htaccess file (this file lives in the root directory of your hosting account).

If you don’t have a .htaccess simply make one using notepad (For more information on this see http://www.websitesecrets101.com/3/creating-a-custom-404-error-page/ )

Then add the following line to bottom of the file.

ErrorDocument 404 /404error.php

Save the file and update your server.

Now we need to make the 404error.php file..

Simply open Notepad on your PC and paste in the following code :

<br />&lt;?php&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;$email = "you@yourisp.com";&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;$host='http://'.$_SERVER["HTTP_HOST"];<br /> $url = $host.$_SERVER["REQUEST_URI"];<br />$referrer = trim($_SERVER["HTTP_REFERER"]);&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;if ($url != 'favico.ico' and $url != 'robots.txt')<br /> {<br /> if ($referrer == '')<br /> $referrer = 'An Unknown source OR<br /> someone who directly keyed in the link<br /> ';<br /> else<br /> $referrer="&lt;a href="$referrer"&gt;$referrer&lt;/a&gt;";<br /> $subject = '404 Error on '.$host;<br /> $message = 'Hi&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;A visitor from '.$referrer.' tried unsuccessfully to access<br /> '.$url.'<br /> You may want to try and fix this error';&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;$headers = 'MIME-Version: 1.0'.”rn”;<br /> $headers .= 'Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1'.”rn”;<br /> $headers .= 'From: 404 Watcher'.”rn”;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;mail($email,$subject,$message,$headers);<br /> }<br /> header(”HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found”);<br /> header(’Location: ‘.$host);<br /> ?&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;

Make sure that you change the line that starts with $email to have your email address. No one on the web will see that email address. It is the address that you want all the errors sent to.

Save the file and copy 404error.php file up to your web site’s root document.

Now try it out. Try typing in a filename that does not exist like yourdomain.com/garbage.html and see what happens.

The user will get redirected to the home page of the site and an email containing the error message will be sent to you.

Its now up to you to fix any errors that might occur and saves yourself thousands of lost dollars in lost sales..

What is a Web Designer, Anyway

As a web designer, I get all kinds of requests for information other than web design, and as a web designer I'm not really suppose to be able to do things outside of the web design area. I believe there are a few misconceptions about what exactly a web designer does. In this article I am going to nail down exactly what a web designer is and what they should be able to do. First I'll touch of the differences between a web designer and a web developer. A web designer is someone who creates the visual design and layout of a web page. A web developer is someone who does the behind-the-scenes programming of a website. For example a web developer creates the code for database websites.

Web designer's definition:

They give business/organizations a web presence by building them a website. Web designers are professionals who organize information, create page layouts, while communicating the business's information/opinions in a website. Web designers create another medium for the business to expand into. Creating a website enables the business to attract new customers, showcase its services/products, and to do business across countries (as opposed to one location).

What things do web designer's do?

That's a really good question. It is definitely hard to nail down what every designer must do in order to call themselves a web designer. A good web designer should be able to do both the design and the development, unfortunately for you the consumer, it doesn't always work that way.

Your web designer must be able to perform the following:

* Understand and keep current will all new emerging technology
*Layout web pages using HTML, XHTML, XML , and other programming languages
*Program HTML (hand code), JavaScript and CSS
*Translate your ideas, needs and expectations into a web page
*Design navigation elements (such as navigation bars)
*Create graphics in Photoshop or any other professional imaging software
* Effectively participate in a web development team
* Have an understanding on how to create Flash (authoring software used to create animation programs)
*Understand and implement web standards
* Have an understanding of Search Engine Optimization
* Have a basic understanding of typography, graphics and color theory
* Understand needs of users and of usability testing
* Have ability to analyze a target market
* Understand cross browser problems and how to fix them

A great web designer also has knowledge of coding languages such as:

* C++
* Python
* Java
* JavaScript
* Cold fusion
* SQL
* PHP

Sometimes it might be difficult for a web designer to have all those different programming languages under their belt. It is like knowing English, French, Chinese and German. Quite complicated. The more languages they know the better. Well that should help you on your search for a good web designer!

5 Easy Ways to Improve Your Website's Legibility

Websites that make their customers work to read them are not the best way to get business. Miniscule fonts, text in colors that make it hard to see against the background, and lines that are piled on top of each other are problems, but they’re easy to correct. Let’s jump right in and look at five easy fixes:

1. Format your text using CSS, not Font tags.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are the way to go – use one style sheet and control how text looks on your entire site. Make a change to the style sheet and your whole site is updated. It makes life a lot simpler.

2. Make the font size big enough to read.

Consider your target audience. Even if they are a group of teenage girls looking for new shoes, it’s very rarely a good idea to use tiny type. It doesn’t have to be enormous, but up to a point, larger type is better. 11-pt Verdana is nearly always a better choice than 8-pt Verdana.

3. Make the text contrast with its background.

The more contrast, the better. Black-on-white or white-on-black are examples of the highest contrast you can achieve. Use colors if you like, but if you squint at the page and your text more or less vanishes, there’s not enough contrast.

4. Give the lines room to breathe.

Don’t stack lines on top of each other. Use the line-spacing feature in CSS and give them some space; I’ll typically set line-spacing to 130% or 140% of the height of a typical line.

5. Break text up into chunks.

No matter how good a writer you are, people don’t want to read endless pages of text. Break it up by using headlines that reflect the subject of the paragraph(s) to follow so people can scan down to the parts that really interest them, or use bulleted lists to change the pace of the writing and slow down the scanning.

And finally (not one of the 5 Easy Ways to Improve Legibility but still quite important) check your spelling. Few things are more irritating on a web page than spelling errors – they simply make you look like you don’t care enough to get it right. Use that ubiquitous spellcheck tool.

Making your website’s content more legible is easy. It doesn’t take a lot of time, just common sense. The payoff will be text that’s more readable, customers that stick around long enough to get your message, and improved credibility with your visitors.

Web Design - Engineer Your Business

When it comes to web design for your business website, what picture do you conjure up in your mind? Talented artistic people working hard to create a visual masterpiece, using sophisticated graphic design software? Well, you're not entirely wrong, only about 99% off.

Most people think of "web design" as almost a synonym for "graphic design". This is really a very unfortunate association, mainly because it lowers your expectations, and grossly understates what you should expect from your business website. Now consider the expression "structural design". Conjures up a completely different perspective, doesn't it? The fact of the matter is that you need a structural designer for your online business presence far more than you need a pretty face for it, in the same way that you need an architect and structural engineer to design your business office, and a business manager to build your business, far more than you need a painter to make it look good, or an advertising business to help create a positive public perception.

Every aspect of your business is important in some way or other, it's just that some aspects are more important. The problem of course is that you would never build your business premises from cardboard and then just paint it nicely so that it looks great from the front. Of course, the first customer that walked in would balk at the lack of depth of your business, and walk very quickly back out again.

It is exactly the same when building your online business presence. Absolutely, your business website should look great. After all, if it is not attractive and professional, people are going to be just as wary of dealing with you. That said, your website needs robust and solid structural design if you want potential customers to come in, look around, pick up and test your merchandise, have a cup of coffee, chat to your salesman, and make an informed and satisfactory purchase.

The days of an online brochure with a nice contact form and slick design doing the job for you are long gone. For someone to buy your business, they want to query your product database for the perfect product option. They want to search your store for relevant advice and product information, chat to other people in the market and interact with you as the business proprietor. If opening the door makes your business premises fall down, that's as far as anybody will get.

So what does that mean when selecting a "web designer"? Simply, it means don't look at how pretty their work is as 100% of your decision criteria -- you are not looking for a graphic designer. These are some of the things a "web structural designer" should be able to bring to an effective online business:

* A solid foundation -- your business website should at a minimum include an easy-to-use content management system and database.

* User registration and management facilities -- if you don't know who your customers are, you cannot communicate regularly with them

* Product database -- this is your storeroom, without which you simply have nice pictures on a cardboard cutout as your product display.

* E-commerce capabilities -- your customers should be able to buy from you online as easily as they can offline, otherwise they may as well visit a store close to them.

* Customer communication tools -- newsletter functionality, online surveys and feedback forms are all effective and important ways of making the one-way internet medium into a two-way communication environment.

* Automated online promotion capabilities -- this is a newer feature that most probably would not think of. The tasks associated with submitting your pages to search engines, optimizing your urls to be search-engine friendly, and many other SEO tweaks are increasingly time-consuming aspects of keeping business websites up to date. Many of these tasks, such as Google Sitemaps submission, url creation based on the title and content of the page, and relevant meta tag generation, to name a few, can all be automated into the design of your website's core programming. Including them up front will save you countless hours and money trying to accomplish these tasks manually.

At the end of the day, your business website should look good. Much more importantly, it should be the most structurally sound and efficient aspect of your business if you make full use of it's potential. Make sure your designer is coming from a systems engineering and programming design perspective, not just a graphic design paradigm, and you'll have a business website that not only looks good, but also works tirelessly as hard as you do.

Vector Logo Design Vs Raster Logo Design

Raster graphics are images that are defined in terms of a generally rectangular grid of pixels, or picture elements. Each pixel is one small square of colour, which, when combined with other pixels side by side, merge together to form one solid image to the eye.

Raster formats
There have been a number of formats developed over the years to store raster graphics. Some of the most popular formats are discussed below, each with their advantages and disadvantages.

BMP - Bitmap Graphics (Avoid wherever possible)

Easy to create with the built-in Windows Paint program.
Long history, therefore good, universal support.
No compression means the format is lossless.
Creates huge files since no file compression is used.
No transparency.

GIF - Graphics Interchange Format (Good for the web, on images of less than 256 colours, for example simple geometric shapes e.g. bullets for lists)

Creates small files as good compression is used.
Universally supported across platforms.
Transparency supported.
Animation supported.
Palette of colours limited to 256 per image.
Transparency is only 1-bit, therefore no translucency.

JPG - Joint Photographic Expert Group (Good for the web, for images like photographs where colour depth is important but lossless formats produce large file sizes)

Lossy compression format produces relatively small files.
Universally supported across platforms.
Artifacts visible at high compression rates.
No transparency.

PNG - Portable Network Graphics (Great for the web, but be careful if using transparency. Good trade-off of quality and compression)
Both lossy and lossless compression available.
Both 1-bit and full alpha channel transparency available.
Small file sizes produced.
Poor support in some web browsers for full channel transparency.
Compression not as great as lossy formats.

Vector Graphics
Where raster graphics are defined in terms of individual pixels, vector graphics are actually stored as mathematical rules - widths, heights, curves, proportions, ratios. Where raster graphics have a set height and width and look pixelated when stretched beyond these boundaries, vector graphics render themselves to the space given to them, such that they are resolution independent. login in to http://prowebb.com to view image exmaples of raster vs vector.

Vector based logos is not based on pixels any longer. It is based on points set at proportional distances, joined with lines and curves, and filled with a solid black colour. When drawing curves in vector graphics programs, a number of points are defined and dragged such that a smooth curve is plotted. This curve is independent of dimensions but is saved as in proportions and ratios such that it will scale to any resolution.

Vector artwork can be modified and stretched without havinng to worry about loss of quality, clarity or sharpness. Because of their mathematical origins, Vector Graphics are readily scalable without distortion.

Vector graphics formats
Again, a number of formats exist for storing vector graphics, each with their advantages. It is important to note that, by their very definition, vector graphics are SMALL in comparison to raster graphics when it comes to file size. Since they are not saving information on each and every pixel, but rather rules for rendering, file size is cut immensely. The universally accepted format for vector graphics, particularly when it comes to company logos and sending files to print, is EPS - Encapsulated PostScript. PostScript is a format developed by Adobe to describe pages to a printer, plotter, or screen. Rather than storing straight data it stores instructions for the makeup of the page. Fonts are stored as individual character vector objects, for example, so they can be printed at as high a resolution as the printer can print. Macromedia's Flash technology is an excellent example of vector graphics working at their finest - whatever the window size, vector elements of the Flash movie appear crisply anti-aliased, and individual frames can even be printed in high resolution due to the vector-based nature.

Popular raster graphics programs

Adobe Photoshop
Jasc Paint Shop Pro
Macromedia Fireworks (tailored to web design)
The GIMP

Popular vector graphics programs

Adobe Illustrator
CorelDraw
Macromedia Freehand
Macromedia Fireworks (tailored to web design)

Popular vector graphics animation programs
Macromedia Flash

A good question. At first glance, vector graphics seem to overcome all the difficulties of raster graphics. They can be resized to any size without loss of quality, and pixelation just doesn't occur. File size is also greatly reduced. However, each format has an individual purpose. A photograph cannot be expressed as a vector graphic because it simply isn't vector data. A sunset cannot be defined mathematically, at the risk of starting a philosophical argument on the world around us. The real world is not vector-based. The table in front of you has an infinite pixel depth, infinite variations in colours, infinite variations in relief and texture. Vector graphics are reserved for images such as typefaces, lines, curves. Complex vector images can be created but they have been created specifically in vectors. Photographs and complex raster effects like lens flares are defined with pixel-by-pixel lighting and colour effects, not with vectors.

Logos for businesses should always be created as a vector. Why? For maximum usage. It's all very well creating a great raster logo with lens flares and bevels and gradients but what happens when it needs to be on a huge banner in a hall? Or, at the other extreme, printed on headed notepaper. Raster effects just are not practical when it comes to corporate identities. With vector-based logos, the image will scale to any size and any application; raster graphics would require re-rendering each time a new size was required, not to mention problems with transparency across print and computer platforms.

Leveraging Website Exit Strategies to Maximize Profit

If you sell on the internet for any amount of time, it is essential to keep track of your visitor's actions as they navigate your website. A quick look at the average website's statistics will show the internet marketer's greatest challenge - many, if not most, website visitors don't buy at their first visit. Some leave as soon as they hit your index page, while others simply abandon their shopping cart at the checkout.

You don't have to constantly tweak your website content and sales copy to draw in those extra sales. Your website is not going to be perfect. There are no special words that will convert every customer or transfix stragglers. Obsessively making changes is only going to slow the growth of your business - and revenue -- down. There's an easier way to convert these visitors and generate larger orders. Adding several snippets and tools, all of which are completely automated, can substantially increase your sales. (Wouldn't you rather be watching your bank account, rather than your website stats?)

Exit Pop-ups - Still Tried and True

Exit pop-ups still work, even though an entire industry has been invented to get rid of them. Even the websites that sell pop-up blocking software use this exit strategy. A popup that is generated when your visitor clicks the “back” button on their browser is most effective. Use it as a negotiating tool. Offer them a last-chance, better price. Offer them a freebie. Give them the chance to come back to your website by telling them about your free newsletter or e-course. Just make sure you offer them something.

Offer Financing Options - and larger-ticket products

Those late night infomercials on television really make sales - simply by breaking down what seems like a hefty sum into a manageable, monthly payment. Bundle several of your products and create an option for monthly billing. Not only will your customers buy more in the long run, but your shopping cart company will handle the logistics. You'll get a recurring income, and your customers will have a more manageable payment option.

Sell from your “thank you page”

Once your customers have ordered from your website, it's a great time to point out other products, services, and sites that they may be interested in. After all, they've already trusted you once, and they still have their credit card in hand. Leverage your “thank you page” to include your affiliate codes, links to your other sites, and recommended products once they've ordered.

Sell from your confirmation page

If you offer free ebooks, courses, or newsletters, why not take the time to set up a confirmation page that leads your customers to your paid products? They have to wait a few minutes to get your opt-in email anyway. Let them know that they have a few minutes to wait, and invite them to learn more about your products. (“While you're waiting for your free report, why not learn more about an exciting opportunity in ____?” is a great way to transition the reader to a long sales letter.) The longer they read, the more likely they'll buy, so it's a good idea to create some enticing long sales copy for this purpose.

Web Design Basics

Professional web design has become vital during recent years. A few years ago, it was estimated that a visitor to a web site took about 8 seconds to decide to stay on that web site or click the "Back" button. That was then, this is now: Your web site has only about 4 seconds to make an impression on the visitor. That is not much time at all! Today, people want instant results. Few people even wait to see the entire web design before making their decision. If your web design does not grab their attention immediately, they won't stick around. And if your web site does not offer something of benefit, they won't bookmark it and they won't come back (more on that later).

So, with that in mind, let's discuss some practical ways to grab the attention of web site visitors. Then, in a future article, we will talk a little about keeping their attention with good web site content. Remember, people spend most of their time on the Internet reading. They read search results, news items, how-to articles and forums. A professional web design company will take this into account. But that is for later. First, we have to keep visitors attention (remember the 4 second rule).

Get to the Point. We live in a fast-paced society and we are used to instant results: Microwave meals in 5 minutes, lose 5 pounds in 5 days, 30 minute oil changes, see results from fitness equipment in 20 minutes a day, and on and on.

The Internet is no different and it actually may be less forgiving of web sites that don't deliver results quickly.

The 4 second rule that we spoke of earlier does not mean that your entire web page must load in 4 seconds. Rather, it means that a visitor to your web site has to at least see something interesting within that 4 second window. So, to test your site, while it is loading, ask yourself:

• How much time passes before I see anything?
• What is the first thing I see on the web page?
• How much time passes before I can read some text?
• How long would it take a visitor to determine what the web site is about?

Try this suggestion yourself and then try to enlist the help of some of your friends. The more people you have to test your web site, the more thorough your results will be.

Ideally, the site should load top to bottom and left to right. However, your design should adhere to the reading habits of your target audience. Some countries read from right to left so, make sure you know your audience. Also, the most eye-catching elements should load first. Once these load, they will grab the visitor's attention. Then, the rest of the page can finish loading.

What Graphics Format Should I Use? This is probably one of the most overlooked aspects of web design. How many times have you visited a web site and cringed at the slow loading pictures. I'll bet you did not stick around to see everything load.

In most cases, web sites that have this problem were created by someone who bought a Web Design How-To book, created a web page that says "Hello World" and now think they are an expert. Or, possibly they are learning web design and created this slow loading site as a favor for a friend or family member. At any rate, hiring a professional web design company will prevent bad design from happening to you. In the meantime, here are some very basic guidelines regarding those very important web site graphics:

More about the .JPG file format: .JPG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) format allows images to contain up to 16 million colors. It also supports Variable Compression, which allows you to reduce the size of the image at the cost of some of the detail. In order to take full advantage of this feature, you will need a graphics program which will allow you to preview the image after you have compressed it. Some of the more popular graphics programs are Photoshop, Fireworks and Corel Draw.

JPG is not a good format for images with only a few colors or for text created as an image. The finished image will be of poor quality.

More about the .GIF file format: .GIF (Graphics Interchange Format) support up to 256 colors. It also supports "transparency" which allows you to specify the background of the image to be invisible, thereby letting the web page colors show through.

Graphics in this format are also "looseless", meaning the final quality is not adversly affected by compressing.

Boiling it Down. For the most part, here is a good way to determine what format you should use for the graphics on your web site:

• If your graphic has many colors (such as a photo) use .JPG as the format, However, make sure that the file size is not so large that it prevents the web page from loading quickly. Find a good balance between image quality and file size.
• If your graphic has only a few colors (such as a chart) use .GIF as the format.

Of course, this is somewhat oversimplifying the very important role of graphics in your web site design. If you hire a professional web design company to create your web presence, he or she should follow these guidelines during the design process. You should make sure that the rough drafts you receive from the designer adhere to good design standards.

Make Them Want More. Of course, no matter how well organized your web site is and how effective it is at grabbing the visitor's attention, they have to view your web site as important. You have to give them reasons to stay and browse your site, to bookmark your site so they can refer to it again and to tell others about your site so you can build new visitors.

We will consider how to tackle this aspect of quality web site design in an upcoming article. That article will focus on three main ways to keep visitors coming back:

1. Offer something of value
1. Newsletter
2. Free tips
3. Monthly coupons
2. Good, quality marketing copy
1. Put effort into the words of your web site.
2. Remember, the Internet is made up of web pages and for the most part, pages are meant to be read.
3. Easy to use web site navigation.
1. If visitors can't get around easily on your web site, they won't stay very long.

Flash Animation

Flash movies are great favorites of Web designers, as they can have moving pictures, games, and interactive displays on pages that download in a reasonable amount of time. But what is a flash player? It is a plug-in that helps your browser play flash movies. Anyone who has visited websites with games, cartoons or interactive activities all on the same web page has knowingly or unknowingly used flash.

You can do quite a few things with flash. A flash-built web page might have cool buttons, or menu bars that change as you make choices. It could let you play a game, or do a drawing. It is even possible to have fully interactive web pages that look more like video games than the web.

The use of flash is very common on company websites. Design and media companies in particular prefer the use of flash because they want to impress visitors. Many newspaper and magazine websites also use flash to make interactive maps of places that are in the news.

Flash is the program used by web designers to make the pages, games and special files – or 'movies' - that this program creates. The movies are added to web pages just like pictures or other extras, like Java. When the page is sent from a web server to a browser, the movie file is sent too. The flash player, a special program, reads these movie files and displays them properly inside the web pages.

Although not a standard part of the world wide web, ever since flash was launched in 1995 it has become the most common way to add cool extras to websites. Many computers are sold with the flash player already installed. In fact, over 97% of Internet users have already got flash on their computers.

Flash gets a new version at frequent intervals, and you may need the latest version of the flash player in order to see pages created using it.

As flash animations have reasonably small file sizes, larger and more complex animations can be put online and downloaded reasonably quickly. They can also have interactive ability built into them, which is extremely popular for online games and special effects on web pages. The problem with flash is that it can make sites hard to look at and slow to download if it used too frequently.

Graphic Designers

Graphics are needed to enliven a given space. But to create impact they must be designed and used sensibly. Graphic design is not just about creating good looking stuff, but creating impact and communicating sense. Not such an easy job. Graphic designers are fully equipped and qualified people to perform this task. They can create graphics, modify, restructure, arrange and rearrange them to communicate the required message. This could involve arranging print and graphics for pages of a document, creating an interesting logo or mast head, catalogue, company calendars, year planners, invitations, postures, advertisements, banners, publications, designing a website and so on.

Depending on the purpose of a graphic to be created, audience and medium, designers think of different ideas and concepts to communicate the message in the best possible way. The final development also depends on the medium to be used such as print, film or electronic. Layouts are created by hand or computer to put the idea on paper. Use of computers in graphic designing has become a must. Graphic designers should keep updating their skills and knowledge on latest software.

Graphic designers need to be creative with a constant supply of fresh and unique ideas, able to work under tight deadlines and should keep updating with new technology and demands. It is a customer relations job and their needs should be respected first. Some clients demand lot of rework until they get what they had in mind. Satisfying a client is a tough job and needs patience.

There are some qualities which graphic designers must have. Some people are innately capable and can become polished after getting trained, while others are interested and can acquire skills. There is also a category of graphic designers who are not very competent even after full fledged training. There are many long and short term graphic design courses for people to get trained. Some take students only after they qualify a basic skills test. A full-time bachelor’s degree with advanced short courses gives one an edge. However, experience is the biggest teacher. Graphic designers are much in demand with the ever increasing needs of the Internet, website designing, animation and animated films. It is one the most attractive occupations in present times.

Choosing Your Ideal Web Design Firm

You're trying to run your business, please your customers, supervise employees, and now you have to find a great website builder, too? The process can seem so overwhelming that many business owners simply put it off until they fall too far behind the times. Then they rush and find a designer who may, or may not, meet their needs.

The key, however, is taking the process one step at a time. Choosing the right website builder for your design needs is essential, but first you have to set aside some time for self-evaluation and planning.

Consider Your Needs

What are you really looking for in a web designer? Do you just need a logo or do you need a full service website package? Maybe you put together a website already and need a content management company to come in and update your site regularly. Whatever your needs, define them as you begin your search so that you can communicate your needs clearly with your prospects.

Plan Your Budget

Choosing a web design firm often comes down to money in the end. You may not be able to afford the very best firm in the industry, but that doesn't mean you have to choose the worst either. Before searching for a web design firm, decide exactly how much you would like to spend and how much you can spend. Your plan should provide you with the ideal cost and with what you would be willing to pay if the perfect company's services cost a little more.

Create a Timeline

How long do you have to put this site together? If you only have two weeks, then you need to find a company who can effectively deliver the product in two weeks. You may have to sacrifice features to finish so quickly, but you need a company who can deliver on time.

If you have months to put together a site, then choose the best company for the job. If you have the time to create a sensational site, and if you have the money to back it up, create the best site possible. Just know that if you say you have months and then change your mind, your design firm will not be able to finish everything immediately.

Determine Their Specialty

Web design firms generally specialize in certain technologies, and you need to be able to determine whether their specialties will meet your needs. Always ask for three examples of their technology. Anyone can tell you that they can do something, but that doesn’t mean they have done it. You don’t want your web design firm to be learning how to bid on Google AdWords or figuring out Flash Video while trying to complete your site on time. Let them prove their expertise with specific examples from their portfolio.

Always Contact References

Look at a web design firm's portfolio carefully. Ask for references and then contact them. Talking to past clients is the best way to discover exactly how a project turned out. Although the company may be able to provide you with testimonials, talking to another business owner will always provide you with a more detailed, honest description of the project's success or failure.

Make Your Decision

After you have evaluated your needs, created a budget, set a timeline, and contacted references, you are ready to make your decision. Remember that you should always meet with the contact person in person if possible or have a phone conversation so that you can determine whether your personalities mesh. You'll be spending a lot of time working with this company, and you want them to be the best, but you should also make sure you find someone you can get along with so that the process is enjoyable

Change Your Web Site for Explosive Sales, p2

Are you making this mistake with your web site? Too many web site owners look at their site as an online brochure. They use it as little more than a place to store their product or service list. A different way has emerged. Now your web site can be used as an effective marketing tool. Used in the right way, it can spear-head many successful marketing campaigns for you in the near future.

Did you know that many of your prospects (even locally) will type your business name or web site name in Google to see what you offer? Often they are looking to see what you offer compared to your competitor. Recently, Calif. based USC Annenberg School said from 2005 research, 78.6 Americans go online. An almost equally large percentage 72.3 say that the search engines provide whatever information they are looking for.

Find out what it takes to put the right sales language, content on your site and bring more targeted visitors (visitors looking for what you have to offer.) Know the robots of the various search engines examine web sites daily looking for good key word food, free information, and content.

To begin to effectively use your web site to attract leads and customers; use it to let prospective clients know who you are. Offer valuable content related to your expertise. Educate, inform them, improve their lives, and their bottom line to attract them back over and over like bees to honey. Soon you will become Top-Pick over your competition.

Here's the checklist to revise your web site for explosive sales:

_____5. Revise brochure style home page.

I know your bio, your achievements, your service list are all important to you. Relax, don't get rid of them; but do put them on your About Us or even Contact page. Put on your home page what your visitor came to your site looking for benefits -- answers, solutions. Let them see benefits in the form of valuable content that answers their concerns. Put benefits in your headlines, bullets and even links to draw your prospects into your site.

_____6. Post testimonials from clients and customers.

Most everyone wants to know who else has had a good experience with your product or service. Testimonials act as a referral and even an endorsement. The compliments from another customer help melt away your prospect's fears and doubts about trusting you.

_____7. Seek to educate your visitors by adding valuable content to your site.

I know every one's not a teacher. But think about it since you are a professional you have valuable knowledge and information to offer your web visitors. Find an easy media to educate inform and generally help your visitors from your web site. Consider articles, tapes, ebooks, short reports and briefs to post on your web site.

_____8. Create a clear call to action on each page.

Many website owners lose countless opportunities to make a sale or capture a lead because they fail to ask something of their visitors. Call your visitors to a specific action. At the end of every page use the power of the direct command whether it's simply directing them to contact you for further information or a directive to browse further into your site.

_____9. Use proven traffic building strategies that get people to your site.

Include free search engine traffic, writing and submitting short articles to directories, other Web sites and newsletters, link exchanges, an easy blog page for your prospects and customers to interact with you and get questions answered, and many more internet marketing strategies.

____10. Focus your efforts in improving your web site.

Test your improvements and track the results so you can pin point faster what's working. Then limit your innovations and focus your efforts. Most of the time, changes, and improvements are good. In this case, figure out what's working for you and stick with it. If you are getting traffic from article writing, continue to write them. If you are getting consistent sign-ups from your newsletter, improve your letter and grow your subscriber lists. Do not drift far from your original plan. Keep your main efforts centered on getting better results from methods that have already worked for you.

3 Free Money Saving Resources To Build Your Website

There are a multitude of websites which will allow you to build a website by simply using their online sitebuilder software.

While this may be an excellent option for quickly getting a website online, it may prove to be expensive option with monthly recurring fees to keep your website live.

A great free alternative to getting started building websites would be to create your new website using a free WSYIWIG editor. This stands for What You See Is What You Get and is an excellent way to be introduced to the world of constructing and creating websites.

So let’s get started by showing you how to get your first website online.

1. Download A Free Editor

You can get a free copy of a great piece of software called Nvu, (pronounced N-View). This is open source software, which basically means that it is freely available without cost to anyone. Nvu provides lots of advanced features, but is simple enough for most first-time users to get a site online. Even though it is free, it can grow with you as you become for comfortable with the software and add more sophisticated elements to your website. Download your copy at nvu.com

Once you’ve downloaded your html editor, you should also download the free FREE PDF user guide to familiarize you with the different elements of this software. The link may be hard to find sometimes so access it here. nvudev.org/guide/1.0PR/nvuug10.pdf

2. Templates Make The Task Easier

Once you’ve had time to take a look at the software, you’ll be ready to build your website. Since you’re probably looking for the easy way to get your site online in the shortest time frame, you may want to consider using website templates.

Utilizing website templates allows you to quickly use a pre-made design which you can choose and replace their text with your own to produce a great looking website. Be sure to look for a simple design layout as more sophisticated templates may be difficult at first to use with the nvu html editor. A good site to start with would be Open Source Web Design over at oswd.org. They have a collection of web designs that anyone can download free of charge.

At this point, you’ve got your free html editor from nvu, a couple of great looking templates from owsd.org that you like and you’re in the process of designing your website. Once you’ve got your site finalized, you will need a home to publish your website so that everyone can see it.

3. Sign Up For Free Hosting

As promised, here is another free option you can use. A free web hosting service can get your new website on the web for all the world to see. However, keep in mind that when using a free services, your website will be supported by advertising to allow you to get in for free.

A good option I can recommend is BatCave.net They offer you a generous hosting packaging along with a super-simple control panel. This makes it a snap to upload your files and get your new website live on the web in a snap.

As you can see, there are several ways to get a site online without using an online sitebuilder. By using the above free tools and resources, your only investment will be time, but you will also have gained a new skill, which will prove to be valuable in this internet age.

Common Mistakes: Home Page Design

Issue
What pitfalls should companies avoid on their Web, Intranet or portal home pages?

Response
The home page of a Web site, Intranet or portal is the most important page. It should tell site visitors, what they can do precisely deeper in the site or at least inform them, what they may be able to expect. However, in most cases, the home page is just a compromise to satisfy internal politics and neglecting site visitors’ needs. To set up an effective home page that matches corporate objectives and user’s expectations the following pitfalls should be avoided:

1) Too much information instead of links: Many home pages provide detailed information such as complete news, company description, etc. or are overloaded with images. Site visitors do not want to read information on the home page nor guessing what might be hidden behind an image. They want to find a link to start navigating to the information, which they came for. Providing detailed information on the home page limits the space available for valuable links. Further, it increases the risk that site visitors do not even start navigating the site, as they do not find their specific entry point to start their specific action or scenario. There are two types of pages, which apply to any Web applications such as Web sites, Intranets and portals. Those are navigation pages and destination pages. Navigation pages allow site visitors discovering the options to navigate. Destination pages provide the information, which site visitors are looking for. The home page is the ultimate navigation page. It needs to provide as much as possible links to the various Web sections. The Web strategy determines the links from the home page to the site sections. There are two major linking approaches:

- Individual link, which relates to one link for a complete Web section.
- Category links, which is one link to a complete Web section, followed by links to further detail this section (sub-category links). Provide category links for strategic Web sections that you want your target audience to browse and navigate to (for example for IT companies provide category and sub-category links to product and service overviews, customer engagements, download section). Use individual links for Web sections that target secondary audiences (for example company profile or recruitment).

2) Animations / animated links: Even though that usability research clearly shows that animations such as rotating banners, animated text, etc. distracts site visitors, it is still used on many business sites. In most cases, marketing managers request Web designer to implement animations although designers know that animations are more destructive than increasing site effectiveness. Web designers need to clearly explain the differences between offline and online media. In offline marketing, publicity needs to attract the attention of prospects. For example, if you are walking on a street, advertising such as ad posters must attract your attention, as you are not walking down a street to discover ads. In online media, site visitors already decided to go to a Web site with a specific goal in mind (e.g. finding contact, product or support information, etc.). Hence, the Web site does not need to attract the visitor’s attention. There are successful concepts to replace animations such as the so-called hooks. Hooks are static images or graphics with a minimum of text to tell site visitors what they can expect by clicking on them. Hooks are not limited to the home page but can be used on all navigation pages. Effective hooks target the page audience (best practice sites: www.cisco.com, www.ups.com/content/gb/en/index.jsx ). Place hooks on the home page that target the prime Web audience, on subsequent navigation pages, refine hooks accordingly to the page audience.

3) Not telling what site users can do on the site: Site visitors do not go unintentionally to a Web site. They have a specific action in mind such as finding pricing information, applying for a job, downloading the annual report, etc. Using action verbs such as download, apply, compare, discover, etc. facilitates site visitors to find immediately the link to start their scenario. Action verbs define further links (for example a link named “product” can be misleading as it does not tell what kind of “actions” will be available such as downloading, comparing, ordering, test driving, etc.). Complementing links with action verbs helps to reduce site visitor frustration and to increase site effectiveness.

4) Missing the home page basics: There are a few usability practices, which Web designer should implement on the home page such as:

- Home page length less than two screens at a resolution of 800x600, best would be to fit within one screen. Place strategic links on the first screen (upper half of the home page, if the home page exceeds one screen), as site visitors generally do not scroll on navigation pages and hence would miss the important links.
- Links to site support tools such as site map or site search. About 30 percent of site visitors prefer finding their information using site search. Therefore it is crucial that Web sites provide search functionality (e.g. the search box) directly from the home page.
- Link to privacy policy from the text navigation at the bottom and link to the company profile (navigation bar and text navigation bar). - Company logo available in the upper left corner. However, it should not provide an active link on the home page but from any other pages within the site.
- Navigation consistency with the rest of the site. Ensure that the navigation on the home page is consistent with the rest of the site to avoid user confusion.

Logos

Logos are symbols that represent a company, a product or a brand. Logos are a unique way of pictorially representing what can be said in a few words or a sentence. They can range from a simple symbol, like a dot, to a complicated maze of colors and patterns. The basic idea of a logo is to etch a lasting impression on the mind, since colors and patterns are retained much longer than names or other words. Logos are thus absolutely essential for branding.

Every business organization has a logo. The main purpose is to attract attention, and to leave an impression. For instance, the “Swoosh” is famous as being Nike’s symbol across the world, as well as Adidas’ “Three Stripes.” McDonald’s Golden Arch and Yahoo’s “Y!” are other popular logos. A logo need not necessarily contain the brand’s name (like Kellogg’s or Pfizer), although this would be an added advantage. Logos help to differentiate one company from another, or one brand from another. In most cases, logos represent what the organization stands for.

Artists, graphic artists, admen and other professionals do logo designing. Logos can be categorized as: combination (icon and text); logotype/wordmark/lettermark (text or abbreviated text) and Icon (symbol / brandmark). A good logo should be unique, functional, effective regardless of the size, attractive regardless of the color, and flexible enough to retain its shape when printed on certain materials that tend to crease or fold. It should also represent the brand/company image well. Logo artists should abide by the principles of color, space, form, clarity and consistency while designing logos.

It is advisable to use as few colors as possible, or use spot colors. The use of gradients for distinguishing is also not desirable. Vector graphics is one technology that can be effectively used for logo designing. Designers should be aware of copyrights and trademarks, and should be very careful not to copy any other logo. Using a person’s face, clip-art, third-party fonts, imagery or photographs, and culturally suggestive imagery should be avoided as much as possible.

Accessible Web Design - Why Should You Make Your Website Accessible

Accessible web design refers to the creation of web pages that are accessible to all users, including users with disabilities. Accessible web design is built in aid of many disabled people including those who are visually impaired (poor eye sight, colour blindness), motor impaired (Parkinson’s disease, cerebral palsy) and hearing impaired (deaf).

Accessible web design UK

The UK passed a law called “The disability discrimination act” in 1992 making it illegal to discriminate those with disabilities. Although the law does not refer to Internet users and website accessibility, many larger companies are starting to use technology to cater for those with special needs.

With the advance of technology many new products have been created to assist disabled people. The different products available vary from speech recognition software for those who are motor impaired and have difficulties using a mouse, to software that can read web pages or selected parts of the page using synthesised speech.

The importance of accessible web design lays in the fact that a lot of these helpful products will not be fully effective unless the websites are designed to be accessible.

Why should you make your website accessible?

Using accessible web design London based companies and others around the UK have found that rewards outweigh the costs. Companies using accessible web design have the knowledge and comfort that they are providing useful alternatives for people with special requirements. They also have the added benefits of increasing their potential customer base, as customers with disabilities will be more receptive to companies that cater to their needs.

We have established the importance of accessible web design across the globe but the most important factor is how daily tasks we take for granted, can be carried out with relative ease giving the user peace of mind and independence. With the Internet being the most used information resource for people from all walks of life it has become necessary to provide people with disabilities the equal opportunities of accessing information and people at the touch of a button.

Fast becoming an integral part of building a website, accessible web design UK, and globally is a must for all website owners who wish to bridge the gap between web design and web functionality.

Interactive Media: Good or Bad

Interactive media is emerging as a prominent feature of websites these days. From AJAX to Flash to streaming movies, they all provide a rich user experience that having text and images alone cannot match. When applied correctly, these types of media can be invaluable in terms of engaging users; however, media files do to take up valuable page real-estate and aren’t exactly at the top of any search marketing company’s recommendations list.

Search Marketing

Most search marketing companies have it ingrained in their minds that media on a site is considered a negative feature because search engine spiders can’t index the content. It is true that when most spiders are crawling through a website’s pages and notice Flash or a media file, they will simply skip over them. If they can’t find your content, there goes the relevance that could otherwise have influenced your rankings.

However, search marketing firms have to begin recognizing that there is more to an online strategy than getting top rankings and the initial click-thru. The other part, maybe the most important part, of the strategy has to be user experience. Wouldn’t it be more beneficial to a site owner to have 500 visitors who view 10 pages per visit while average 3 minutes on the site rather than 2,000 visitors of which 90% exit as soon as they hit the home page?

Metrics alone can paint a picture of success that conversions and ROI do not match, and in the end, any online strategy should be oriented to increasing revenue. This does not mean that site owners should drown their sites with Flash and AJAX, rather, they should use these media types thoughtfully, in order to strike the right balance between getting users to their site in the first place, then keeping them there to close the deal. Successful car salesmen don’t work the parking lot, they make it attractive for buyers to come into the showroom and not leave without a new set of car keys.

An example of using media thoughtfully would be to externalize Flash and use a simple line of JavaScript to display it. Another way would be to develop your site’s entire search functionality in AJAX but also create search-criteria specific, static HTML pages for the search engine spiders, to help promote a deeper crawl through your site. In the end, the focus should be just as much on the user as it is on the spider; otherwise you will build a website with amazing visibility that nobody goes to – not because it’s not relevant, but because it’s not enjoyable – and as any marketer will tell you: emotive connections facilitate all sales.

Tracking with Web Analytics

How many site owners actually know how much ROI they are receiving from their interactive media? Specifically, how long are users watching the digital marketing file? How many presentation slides did users make it through before exiting? How many users made it through to the AJAX developed product search funnel?

It is important that you establish key performance indicators before you launch your site and that you implement web analytics in conjunction with interactive media. By doing this, site owners can work with development teams to ensure that they add conversion triggers inside of the media’s code so that it can communicate with the analytics tracking software.

Web Analytics companies are seeing the need for site owners to track media metrics, therefore, organizations such as WebSideStory have released software such as HBX 3.5 to do this effectively.

Cost

There are many costs associated with having media on your website. In addition to having content writers creating text based content, site owners potentially have to pay for things such as: design/development for Flash, optimizing audio and video, programming/QA for AJAX, and increased monthly bandwidth charges (media files have greater size than text and images).

With the help of web analytics, site owners can monetize the value of having interactive media on their websites. Some analytics packages are advanced enough to correlate their users’ behavior with interactive media with the conversions such as form completions or purchases. I recommend that all site owners take advantage of this so that budgeted dollars toward media aren’t wasted.

Future

I predict that the interactive media sensation will continue to grow and this type of functionality will become a standard feature of many websites. Users will begin preferring AJAX-based sites for which browsers don’t have to completely reload pages. Companies will one day offer all of their text articles through video and audio files, and the development of Flash will become so simplified that any user will have the ability to embed files into their website within minutes.

In order to stay up-to-date, search engines will release spiders that will be more intelligent and able to easily index content found within Flash and media files. We found indications that Google’s spider is already that intelligent when we saw occurrences of excerpted text from within Flash files on Google’s results page listings.

By employing a media-conscious search marketing strategy and relying on web analytics to help make educated decisions, all companies can take advantage of increasing the quality of their end users’ website experiences while also keeping their ROI in line.

Content Management Systems & The Future of Web Design

In recent years, website development has massively increased in popularity. With new concepts, standards and technology, comes the demand for more independent and functional solutions – increasingly, this demand has been targeted towards the Content Management System (CMS).

A typical example of a website owner is an entrepreneur who doesn’t have the time (or possibly money) to chase web designers to make minor site adjustments, or the technical know-how to make the necessary changes themselves. Up to date and regularly refreshed content is now a must to ensure visitor loyalty – no-one will read the same articles or news items every day. The solution? A Content Management System.

With content management becoming more and more affordable, the more in demand it will become, hence any web design companies who cannot offer this service may find themselves missing out on potential clients. Of course there will always be the need for web designers, but the introduction of the content management system actually decreases the amount of work required per project, allowing increased time spent on generating further business.

So what does a typical CMS allow?

- Add/remove/edit pages.

- Update content within each page.

- Add images or documents where needed.

- Update contact information.

- Show updated listings (e.g. News Items, Articles, Catalogues).

+ Many extra features not listed here.

In conclusion - If you offer web design services and do not have Content Management Systems available to your visitors, this might be the time to consider this ever growing popular service for your company; there is a shifting demand for this ever-popular freedom online.

Custom Web Site Design or Website Templates - The Big Debate

A lot of custom web site designers are really critical of commercial website templates. I have seen snide comments on Forums and Blogs along the lines of 'This site has template written all over it'. There are two main reasons not to like templates, and then some ways to mitigate these problems.

Let's explore these.

Templates are not original
There is something to be said for creating your own, all original work. But there is a difference between being somewhat artistic and being an artist with the capability of bringing together all the elements of a website headers, judicious use of graphics, menus and layout into a cohesive and pleasing whole. Not to talk about creating a website with a definite wow factor and one that loads fast to boot.

I discovered soon in my website design career that I am just not quite artistic enough to really create the effect that I was looking for. My first websites were all created from scratch by hand and I spent hours and hours on choosing the right colours, selecting the graphics, optimizing the graphics and designing the menus with the right rollover effects.

The most frustrating thing was that after my masterpiece was designed, it still fell far short of some of the other websites that I regularly came across in my travels on the Internet.

Now, professionally designed website templates are, as the name implies, designed by professional graphic designers. They might not be professional website designers as such since these templates often have certain intrinsic flaws, however, most of the time the look and feel created by the template, especially its graphical elements, work together in a way that is difficult to achieve for someone without either years of practice or formal training (not to talk of intrinsic artistic capabilities and talent!)

But let's look at the second reason why people don't like templates:

Templates are often badly designed from a website design perspective
Website templates might look nice on the outside, but any experienced website designer will tell you that under the hood they suffer from the following problems:

1. In most cases they do not make use of Cascading Style Sheets to control layout, fonts or colours. Some of them nominally make use of an external css file but most of the times style commands abound inside the html code, often negating the benefit of the external style sheet.

2. Probably the biggest problem and biggest bugbear of web design purists is that most of these templates are heavily tables based. While tables undeniably make it easy to quickly position text and graphics it does go against the grain of good website design. Tables are supposed to contain content, not website design elements.

3. The last big problem is that they are rigid. Often a content block is a specific size and if your content does not fit into that, it is your problem! Because the content and the presentation are not separated it is very easy to break the template if you want to make extensive changes to your website content.

So how can these persuasive negatives related to the use of templates be overcome?
Firstly, the fact that there might be another site out there somewhere that might have the same look should not really be a deterrent. There are over 8 billion pages on the Internet, according to Google. Admittedly there are fewer websites than pages but even at 16 pages on average per website, we might have close on 500 Million possible websites. What are the chances? But there are things that can be done to minimise the screaming template effect:

1. The stock photos and graphics used on the template can often be replaced by photos of the company or person that the website is being designed for. Even just using other stock photos or graphics can make a big difference.

2. Company logos can be incorporated into relevant places

3. Sometimes the whole colour scheme can be changed by making use of tools such as Photoshop or Fireworks.

Secondly, the bad design elements of the template can be addressed in the following way:

After all the effort that I put into designing my websites from scratch I soon ran into the problem of maintenance. Successful websites need content. They need lots of content and they need content to be added in a constant stream. The only tool that can help you do this is some form of Content Management System.

There are several of these available commercially or under the GPL license; people have their own favourites. The point is that most Content Management Systems work on the principle of separating the content from the presentation, and therefore work on some sort of template system themselves.

The best solution therefore is to convert the commercial website template into the CMS template format. I often convert commercial website templates, after suitable modifications to the graphics to personalise it, into my favourite CMS Joomla's, template format. During the process I retain the graphics but move all the styling into an external style sheet; I get rid of the tables and make use of CSS positioning. And because you are using a CMS you can easily add menus, new pages and all the other bits and pieces of content that you want without breaking the layout

Web Designing Tips For New Web Designers

Introduction to Web Design

Websites are such useful tools. They are great for sharing information, selling products, and staying in touch and up to date with family and friends. As a web designer with some “hard knocks” experience under my belt I would like to share some tips for getting started that should make the process a little easier and a little less confusing. The basics that you need to know about putting together a website are keep it simple, keep it relevant, and keep it accessible.

Keep It Simple

Keep it simple is one of the most overused clichés in the business world but, in this case, it is an absolutely necessary cliché. By telling you to keep your website simple I am in no way advocating that you make it dull, uninteresting, and boring. Not at all, in fact, I am saying quite the opposite. If a website is too cluttered with visuals it will not be easy to navigate. If a person cannot find what it is they are looking for than they will not come back to your site, even if what they need is on your site. Make sure that your design has a specific focus. There should be a homepage that easily directs people to the specific section of your site that they need to get to. The last time I was exposed to the information I read that the average attention span of Americans is slightly less than two minutes. It becomes even shorter when they are browsing the Internet because there is so much to look at. If they cannot find what they want on your site immediately, there are hundreds of other places they can look. Also, don’t put a lot of Flash stuff on your site; the extra time it takes up will make viewers impatient.

Keep It Relevant

It is amazing the number of websites that are dedicated to one subject but then just throw all kinds of other stuff in there. If someone is looking to buy quilts they don’t really want to have to wade through vacation pictures to get to the quilt page. Also, if someone is looking for a specific topic, subject, or item and they see something else when they get to your homepage, they won’t stick around long enough to realize that they are at the right spot. They will leave and find another site to browse. That ties in with the simplicity of your site as well. Irrelevant material makes a website complicated. Even things like random ‘jokes of the day’ or comic strips, while funny I’m sure, will drive more people away than bring them in.

Keep It Accessible

There are two things to consider when dealing with accessibility issues, outside accessibility and inside accessibility. These two, if mastered, will drive people to your site and keep them coming back over and over. These two, if disregarded, will leave you with a nice, clean, unused site that does nothing more than take up cyberspace.

Outside Accessibility

In order for people to get to your site they have to be able to find it. Sure, you can hand out business cards and email the URL to all your friends, but that is not where the majority of your traffic comes from. You have to make sure that your site can be found by searching the major search engines. In order to do this, you have to have content that will register hits when web browsers perform a search. For instance, if you are selling woven baskets you, obviously, want to make sure that your site mentions, in a readable way, that you are selling woven baskets. You would also want to make sure that your site mentions that you are selling crafts as there are people who would be interested in buying your baskets but would search for “crafts for sale”. These are called keywords and you want to make sure that you have enough of them to register when a search is performed.

Web Designing: Is your Website Doing Business

Web designing is an important factor for people doing business online. Online business is happening everywhere and almost everybody is doing it these days. However simply having a beautiful website will not deliver you what you are looking for. Web designing is the amalgamation of different components. A recent study conducted by a leading research agency shows that these days more and more people come to internet for business purpose. To deliver results to customers you must have a website that caters to all their requirements.

Designing a website is a complex process involving many elements. However if a professional undertakes this work it becomes very simple for you. There are many professionals who will do the work for you for a certain amount of fee. It is advisable to leave the designing part to a professional. Before embarking on designing the website make sure that you know what exactly you are looking for. This will help you in giving a clear picture of your requirements to the pro.

Hiring a pro to do your work is a fantastic way of going about designing a website. Decide on a theme. It may be anything a color, a photograph, a logo or an image. Make use of it throughout the website. Keep a constant tab on the progress of the work done on your website. Your website must be very appealing and visually pleasing for the visitors. Take note that your site contains images and visuals which moves, flashes and talks to visitors online. This is a sure shot way of grabbing attention. Ensure that the contents in your site are regularly updated.

Have plenty of templates in your website. Templates are cheap and look very good in a website. A photograph speaks a thousand words. Add proper photographs in the right places. Photo editor can be used to make the required alterations in the photographs. You must take note that the photographs used in the site complements with the goods in which your company is dealing. Make use of proper color coordination to make your site visually appealing.

Include a site map in your website. Using site map is the surest way of keeping a website organized. Your website must be easily accessible to the visitors. With so much of competition in this field no one will go for a time consuming search to get what they are looking for. Make sure everything is properly displayed in the proper places. Another important factor which you must take note of is the target audience of your site. This is vital in determining the look of your site.

It is important look after your site properly. Check regularly to see if the information in your site is regularly updated or not. Test out to see if the links in your site are properly working or not. There is nothing more annoying than broken links to a visitor of a website

How Will A Content Management System Improve The Effectiveness Of My Website

The downfall of many websites is that their content is allowed to become out-of-date. This disappoints visitors, who are looking for more than the old information they find. It is also frustrating for the website owner, who may not have the resources to enable more regular updates.

The facility to update a website’s content directly, without any reliance on a web development partner, is an essential tool for many business owners. Good use of a Content Management System (CMS) brings clear business benefits by improving a website’s effectiveness. How would you benefit by using a CMS to update your website?

What Is A Content Management System?

Unlike much IT terminology, the definition of "content management system" is fairly intuitive: it is a system that enables you, the website owner, to update your website’s content. Most importantly, a CMS makes it possible to change the content on your website without the involvement of your web designer.

How Could I Use A Content Management System On My Website?

The ability to manage the content on your website gives you the freedom to publish a variety of information. Typical uses for a CMS include publishing:

• News, announcements and press releases
• Articles and newsletters
• Product details
• Special offers
• Testimonials and case studies
• Vacancies and personnel profiles
• Useful links
• Online resources and downloads

How Will I Know Whether A Content Management System Will Benefit Me?

Various "symptoms" suggest that you will benefit from using a CMS:

• Do you regularly ask your web designer to update text / images on your website?
• Are you reliant on your web designer to keep your website in sync with activities elsewhere in your business, such as new product launches, price changes or marketing campaigns?
• Do you find that the cost of paying your website designer to maintain your website is getting too high?
• Are you frustrated that some of the content on your website is out-of-date or inaccurate?
• Do you ever miss business opportunities by not being able to add timely or topical content in response to changes in your market?

If you answer "Yes" to one or more of these questions, you should use a CMS to update your website.

What Are The Business Benefits Of A Content Management System?

You will benefit by implementing a CMS for a number of reasons:

Lower website maintenance costs
The immediate benefit is financial. Updating your own website, rather than paying a website designer to make changes on your behalf, will save you money.

Using a CMS usually incurs a fixed charge which does not vary with the number of changes you make. Therefore, the more you use your CMS, the lower the "per change" cost. When a website designer makes changes on your behalf, they will charge for each change and so the "per change" cost is never reduced.

Using a Content Management System can reduce on on-going website costs.

Timely and topical content
A CMS enables you to make immediate changes to your website. Furthermore, many CMS’s provide you with the option of specifying a start and an end date for content, which means you can control exactly when something appears on your website.

You might want to show certain content at a particular time of year, such as Christmas or Valentine’s Day, or at a time that coincides with a particular event (the World Cup or a general election, for instance).

Perhaps you have a series of events that run regularly throughout the year: a CMS could automatically remove the details of each event from your website as soon as it becomes out-of-date. This means you would not need to remember to update your website a specific times as the CMS would look after this for you.

Using a Content Management System enables you to add timely and topical content to your website.

Greater flexibility
Once content is added to your CMS, it can be used in a number of places on your website. This means you can be more inventive with your website and present relevant content to your visitors in various ways.

For example, you may have a News page, which includes all the news stories you have published, but also wish to show the three most recent news stories in a side panel on your Home page. Each time you add a fresh story to your website, the list of three most recent stories and the full list on the News page is updated automatically.

Using a Content Management System means you can display content on your website more creatively, which will engage visitors and make your website more rewarding.

Search engine success
Regularly adding fresh content to your website will attract search engines. New content, which includes keywords and phrases relevant to your market, you will improve your chances of search engine exposure and this will produce a higher number of website visitors.

Using a Content Management System to add topical content to your website will raise your site’s profile in search engines, which will encourage a higher number of visits to your website.

Ignorance is bliss
A CMS removes the need for you to understand the technicalities of creating web pages, while still enabling you to add rich content to your website such as formatted text, tables, images and links. By hiding this complexity, a CMS lets you focus on the content without needing to worry about its layout or appearance.

If you were to update your website without using a CMS, you would need to purchase some suitable web editing software for your computer and develop specific web design skills.

Using a Content Management System means you can update your website without needing to install specialist software on your computer or learn new technical skills.

How up-to-date is your website? Are you missing out on the benefits of using a CMS to add fresh, innovative content to your site? Are you paying your website designer to make updates on your behalf and you would prefer to be self-sufficient?

A Content Management System is an essential tool for many business owners and it can improve a website’s effectiveness by offering visitors timely, engaging content. Perhaps a Content Management System will help you transform your website... so your customers regard it as a valuable and vibrant source of information and you can depend on it as a regular source of business enquiries.

Iceberg Internet provides content management systems for various clients. Contact us on at http://www.iceberginternet.co.uk for more information or to discuss your content management requirements.

Javascript Popup Is For All

Javascript popup windows are currently one of the best methods for web advertising and catching the web surfers attention. We will discuss in this article here the impact of javascript popups on various groups of people on the web :

1.Advertisers :- The advertiser benefits the most because his message gets through to the end user. As simple as that. The advertisers can create different types of pop-up windows which will have the advertising message displayed on it. These popups are not only effective with popup blocker(s) but are also effective with general website audience because they are eye-catchy by nature.

2.The Search Engines :- Various search engines like Google, Yahoo, Alexa and Msn provide their toolbars with popup blocking feature. Such toolbars were introduced because many website advertisers took undue advantage of the popup method to create tons of popups for their websites and webpages. Unfortunately the search engine companies cannot make popup blockers for such type of Javascript Popups because removing Javascript and Dhtml can make the website look improper and ugly. Still Microsoft released Windows Xp service pack 2 (XPSP2) which has one such option which can block Javascript Popups.

3.General Users :- It is good for the general users that the Javascript Popup windows have replaced the old popups. The conventional popups were very annoying and could hang your browser or operating system for some time. These new Javascript Popups are not actually new windows but an imitation of the old Popup windows in the same browser window itself and can be closed easily on a single click.

4.Developers :- The developers have a new challenge to create new and different types of Javascript and Dhtml Popups. The types of popup Ads that can be created with the use of these Javascripts popups is left to the imagination of a web developer. The developers have created various softwares and scripts to create such type of popups even if the user does not know any programming language or have any knowledge of Java-script coding. Some such solutions that fall under this category to create Javascript popups are :

a) Software to create javascript popup window.

b) Subscription to webscript to create popup windows.

c) Using a webscript from browser running javascript popup window creator file.

What is so good about these applications is that you can create eye catchy beautiful pop-ups by just choosing the popup style which you like of the available options with the application, generating the code and pasting it in your document. The style may vary from conventional pop-up windows to advanced Javascript popups for optin ads, limited time offer ads or jumpy pop-up ads to catch the webpage visitors attention.

Google, The Oracle, The Web Designer and The Time Lord

As a web designer I would prefer to spend the majority of my time being creative and drawing pretty pictures. But due to the competitive nature of our society, and consequently of the Internet, I found myself spending an inordinate amount of time jostling for position with all the other people on the planet who are doing the same thing as I am.

Being a successful businessman as well as a web designer means securing a top ten search engine ranking with Google, Yahoo and MSN. It is not enough to sit at home and create inspiring designs for new websites – you also need to sell your services to the world.

Google has become the modern day equivalent of the Oracle at Delphi. If you wanted an answer to a question in ancient Greece you would visit the Oracle. Nowadays we ask Google. But how do we know that we can trust the answers we are given?

There is a tendency to think that Google’s answers equate to facts. But we must remember that Google’s answers are more like opinions that are based on certain beliefs, and that Google’s beliefs may not be ones that we share.

Say, for example, that you were looking for a web design company in Wiltshire (UK) and you went to Google and asked it to look for ‘web design Wiltshire’. Because it would find so many results, it would need to prioritise them according to some kind of system.

The method that Google currently employs is the ‘He Who Shouts Loudest’ method. Whoever can make the most noise about their website and generate the highest number of relevant links to their site will usually end up in the Google top ten. But will that help us to find the right website designer for you?

It’s difficult to see how this could be any other way; after all the search engines need to use some kind of evaluation system to determine who gets the coveted top slot in the search engine results, but I often wonder how things might turn out if Google used different criteria when it decides which answers to give us.

Imagine, for example a search engine that ranked websites based on creative originality or their ability to make us laugh or smile. Of course such search engines are highly unlikely because creativity, smiling and laughter are attributes we associate with being human and with having consciousness. Google of course does not have consciousness – it is a program, a machine, a robot. It knows nothing about intuition and it certainly can’t read your mind.

But imagine if you will, what form a search engine may take in the future. Might it be possible to have a sentient, intuitive search engine that could tell exactly what we were looking for, even if we could not accurately describe it? Think Dr. Who meets Google meets all-seeing-eye.

Could it be possible? I hope so. Then I could stop wasting time on search engine optimisation and get back to drawing pictures.

Ecommerce Design

If you are looking to expand your business, an ecommerce store can be a very good investment. However, just building a website alone will not attract the customers you desire. In order for your site to be effective, it needs to be designed properly. One of the most important factors related to ecommerce design is search engine optimization. For your website to be noticed by potential customers, they have to actually be able to locate it online. The majority of people today use search engines when seeking information. For any given search term, you are likely to get several results. However, most people do not browse beyond the first three pages of search results. If they cannot locate your site via the search engines, you cannot increase your sales and clientele. Having a high ranking among the search engines should be a top priority for ecommerce design.

An important point related to ecommerce design is to honestly describe your product or service. For example, if you are selling the popular weight loss product called Hoodia, you want to be very clear when marketing it online. Be sure to include weight loss product or appetite suppressant in your description. You do not want to describe it as a natural way to improve your health. Customers reading this description may feel deceived or even upset if they click on your site and discover you are selling a weight loss product. The best advice is to always be honest and upfront about what you are marketing. By gaining customers trust first, they are more likely to purchase your products.

While ecommerce design will most likely require the use of specific keywords to market your product, this technique alone will not draw tons of traffic to your website. Today the search engine spiders are much more efficient in detecting actual content from keyword stuffed pages or articles. In order to achieve and maintain a good ranking among all of the major search engines, your site needs to include quality content that is well written. Most people browsing the Internet are looking for information. If your site cannot provide answers to the questions they are seeking, they will look elsewhere.

Be sure to provide sufficient information regarding the product or service you are selling. Try to think about what questions potential customers might have about your product or service. It is a good idea to include a FAQ section within your ecommerce site. On this page you can list answer to the most frequently asked questions about your product. Be sure to include a way for customers to contact you if they have further questions. It is a good idea to have more than one method of contact. The more information you provide regarding your company such as physical address, email, and phone number, the more likely customers are to feel comfortable in placing an order with you.

Another good ecommerce design technique is to actively sell your product. If you have an item to sell, be upfront and forward about it. Let customers know the benefits of your product and why it is superior to other similar products available. Your website should include an easy to locate buy now or order now button. If customers cannot easily find how to purchase your product they are not likely to spend a lot of time searching for this information. If they become frustrated and look elsewhere, you have just lost a potential customer.

If you are somewhat familiar with ecommerce design, you have probably heard the popular phrase “content is king” before. What this means is that in order to attract customers to your website and rank high with the major search engines, you need to have quality written content. However, having quality content is only the first step. The number of pages your ecommerce site contains will also greatly affect the amount of visitors to your site. In general the more pages you have, the more likely you are to receive a high amount of traffic on a daily basis.

An important tip to remember when writing content for your site is that the information must be both useful and unique. There are many online sites that allow you to download content articles for free but these articles most likely are being used at a number of other sites online. If your content is identical to that on another site, the search engines are not likely to rate your site too favorably. You should either take the time to write unique content of your own or hire a freelance writer to do the job for you. If you decide to hire someone else to write your content, make sure you have full rights to all of the articles that you purchase.

Web Designing Tips For New Web Designers

Introduction to Web Design

Websites are such useful tools. They are great for sharing information, selling products, and staying in touch and up to date with family and friends. As a web designer with some “hard knocks” experience under my belt I would like to share some tips for getting started that should make the process a little easier and a little less confusing. The basics that you need to know about putting together a website are keep it simple, keep it relevant, and keep it accessible.

Keep It Simple

Keep it simple is one of the most overused clichés in the business world but, in this case, it is an absolutely necessary cliché. By telling you to keep your website simple I am in no way advocating that you make it dull, uninteresting, and boring. Not at all, in fact, I am saying quite the opposite. If a website is too cluttered with visuals it will not be easy to navigate. If a person cannot find what it is they are looking for than they will not come back to your site, even if what they need is on your site. Make sure that your design has a specific focus. There should be a homepage that easily directs people to the specific section of your site that they need to get to. The last time I was exposed to the information I read that the average attention span of Americans is slightly less than two minutes. It becomes even shorter when they are browsing the Internet because there is so much to look at. If they cannot find what they want on your site immediately, there are hundreds of other places they can look. Also, don’t put a lot of Flash stuff on your site; the extra time it takes up will make viewers impatient.

Keep It Relevant

It is amazing the number of websites that are dedicated to one subject but then just throw all kinds of other stuff in there. If someone is looking to buy quilts they don’t really want to have to wade through vacation pictures to get to the quilt page. Also, if someone is looking for a specific topic, subject, or item and they see something else when they get to your homepage, they won’t stick around long enough to realize that they are at the right spot. They will leave and find another site to browse. That ties in with the simplicity of your site as well. Irrelevant material makes a website complicated. Even things like random ‘jokes of the day’ or comic strips, while funny I’m sure, will drive more people away than bring them in.

Keep It Accessible

There are two things to consider when dealing with accessibility issues, outside accessibility and inside accessibility. These two, if mastered, will drive people to your site and keep them coming back over and over. These two, if disregarded, will leave you with a nice, clean, unused site that does nothing more than take up cyberspace.

Outside Accessibility

In order for people to get to your site they have to be able to find it. Sure, you can hand out business cards and email the URL to all your friends, but that is not where the majority of your traffic comes from. You have to make sure that your site can be found by searching the major search engines. In order to do this, you have to have content that will register hits when web browsers perform a search. For instance, if you are selling woven baskets you, obviously, want to make sure that your site mentions, in a readable way, that you are selling woven baskets. You would also want to make sure that your site mentions that you are selling crafts as there are people who would be interested in buying your baskets but would search for “crafts for sale”. These are called keywords and you want to make sure that you have enough of them to register when a search is performed.

Inside Accessibility

This merely ties back in with keeping it simple. If someone goes to your site where you sell all different kinds of arts and crafts, but they are only interested in buying Popsicle stick bird feeders, you need to have an easy way for them to find what they are looking for. Otherwise, they will just go somewhere else. It is always a good idea to have a search option for within your site to accommodate easy browsing.

Web Designing: Is your Website Doing Business

Web designing is an important factor for people doing business online. Online business is happening everywhere and almost everybody is doing it these days. However simply having a beautiful website will not deliver you what you are looking for. Web designing is the amalgamation of different components. A recent study conducted by a leading research agency shows that these days more and more people come to internet for business purpose. To deliver results to customers you must have a website that caters to all their requirements.

Designing a website is a complex process involving many elements. However if a professional undertakes this work it becomes very simple for you. There are many professionals who will do the work for you for a certain amount of fee. It is advisable to leave the designing part to a professional. Before embarking on designing the website make sure that you know what exactly you are looking for. This will help you in giving a clear picture of your requirements to the pro.

Hiring a pro to do your work is a fantastic way of going about designing a website. Decide on a theme. It may be anything a color, a photograph, a logo or an image. Make use of it throughout the website. Keep a constant tab on the progress of the work done on your website. Your website must be very appealing and visually pleasing for the visitors. Take note that your site contains images and visuals which moves, flashes and talks to visitors online. This is a sure shot way of grabbing attention. Ensure that the contents in your site are regularly updated.

Have plenty of templates in your website. Templates are cheap and look very good in a website. A photograph speaks a thousand words. Add proper photographs in the right places. Photo editor can be used to make the required alterations in the photographs. You must take note that the photographs used in the site complements with the goods in which your company is dealing. Make use of proper color coordination to make your site visually appealing.

Include a site map in your website. Using site map is the surest way of keeping a website organized. Your website must be easily accessible to the visitors. With so much of competition in this field no one will go for a time consuming search to get what they are looking for. Make sure everything is properly displayed in the proper places. Another important factor which you must take note of is the target audience of your site. This is vital in determining the look of your site.

It is important look after your site properly. Check regularly to see if the information in your site is regularly updated or not. Test out to see if the links in your site are properly working or not. There is nothing more annoying than broken links to a visitor of a website.

How Will A Content Management System Improve The Effectiveness Of My Website

The downfall of many websites is that their content is allowed to become out-of-date. This disappoints visitors, who are looking for more than the old information they find. It is also frustrating for the website owner, who may not have the resources to enable more regular updates.

The facility to update a website’s content directly, without any reliance on a web development partner, is an essential tool for many business owners. Good use of a Content Management System (CMS) brings clear business benefits by improving a website’s effectiveness. How would you benefit by using a CMS to update your website?

What Is A Content Management System?

Unlike much IT terminology, the definition of "content management system" is fairly intuitive: it is a system that enables you, the website owner, to update your website’s content. Most importantly, a CMS makes it possible to change the content on your website without the involvement of your web designer.

How Could I Use A Content Management System On My Website?

The ability to manage the content on your website gives you the freedom to publish a variety of information. Typical uses for a CMS include publishing:

• News, announcements and press releases
• Articles and newsletters
• Product details
• Special offers
• Testimonials and case studies
• Vacancies and personnel profiles
• Useful links
• Online resources and downloads

How Will I Know Whether A Content Management System Will Benefit Me?

Various "symptoms" suggest that you will benefit from using a CMS:

• Do you regularly ask your web designer to update text / images on your website?
• Are you reliant on your web designer to keep your website in sync with activities elsewhere in your business, such as new product launches, price changes or marketing campaigns?
• Do you find that the cost of paying your website designer to maintain your website is getting too high?
• Are you frustrated that some of the content on your website is out-of-date or inaccurate?
• Do you ever miss business opportunities by not being able to add timely or topical content in response to changes in your market?

If you answer "Yes" to one or more of these questions, you should use a CMS to update your website.

What Are The Business Benefits Of A Content Management System?

You will benefit by implementing a CMS for a number of reasons:

Lower website maintenance costs
The immediate benefit is financial. Updating your own website, rather than paying a website designer to make changes on your behalf, will save you money.

Using a CMS usually incurs a fixed charge which does not vary with the number of changes you make. Therefore, the more you use your CMS, the lower the "per change" cost. When a website designer makes changes on your behalf, they will charge for each change and so the "per change" cost is never reduced.

Using a Content Management System can reduce on on-going website costs.

Timely and topical content
A CMS enables you to make immediate changes to your website. Furthermore, many CMS’s provide you with the option of specifying a start and an end date for content, which means you can control exactly when something appears on your website.

You might want to show certain content at a particular time of year, such as Christmas or Valentine’s Day, or at a time that coincides with a particular event (the World Cup or a general election, for instance).

Perhaps you have a series of events that run regularly throughout the year: a CMS could automatically remove the details of each event from your website as soon as it becomes out-of-date. This means you would not need to remember to update your website a specific times as the CMS would look after this for you.

Using a Content Management System enables you to add timely and topical content to your website.

Greater flexibility
Once content is added to your CMS, it can be used in a number of places on your website. This means you can be more inventive with your website and present relevant content to your visitors in various ways.

For example, you may have a News page, which includes all the news stories you have published, but also wish to show the three most recent news stories in a side panel on your Home page. Each time you add a fresh story to your website, the list of three most recent stories and the full list on the News page is updated automatically.

Using a Content Management System means you can display content on your website more creatively, which will engage visitors and make your website more rewarding.

Search engine success
Regularly adding fresh content to your website will attract search engines. New content, which includes keywords and phrases relevant to your market, you will improve your chances of search engine exposure and this will produce a higher number of website visitors.

Using a Content Management System to add topical content to your website will raise your site’s profile in search engines, which will encourage a higher number of visits to your website.

Ignorance is bliss
A CMS removes the need for you to understand the technicalities of creating web pages, while still enabling you to add rich content to your website such as formatted text, tables, images and links. By hiding this complexity, a CMS lets you focus on the content without needing to worry about its layout or appearance.

If you were to update your website without using a CMS, you would need to purchase some suitable web editing software for your computer and develop specific web design skills.

Using a Content Management System means you can update your website without needing to install specialist software on your computer or learn new technical skills.

How up-to-date is your website? Are you missing out on the benefits of using a CMS to add fresh, innovative content to your site? Are you paying your website designer to make updates on your behalf and you would prefer to be self-sufficient?

A Content Management System is an essential tool for many business owners and it can improve a website’s effectiveness by offering visitors timely, engaging content. Perhaps a Content Management System will help you transform your website... so your customers regard it as a valuable and vibrant source of information and you can depend on it as a regular source of business enquiries.

Iceberg Internet provides content management systems for various clients. Contact us on at http://www.iceberginternet.co.uk for more information or to discuss your content management requirements.