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Arthur Browning
Web Templates Blog
Design Interviews Blog
Contemporary Art Gallery Magazine
Arthur Browning began his career teaching technical writing in a small Midwestern university for 15 years. He later edited and published a national professional journal for some ten years. He is now an investor. His interests include art collecting, web marketing, writing.
December 22, 2007
1. Getting started on a new Web site without setting a budget or setting a budget without measurable outcomes.
To avoid getting lost in cyberspace ask yourself:
- What will it take to make this project a success?
- What is this project worth to me?
2. Not planning your Web site around content; trusting aesthetics as a substitute.
To avoid a Web site with glamour and no substance ask yourself:
- What do I hope the new look of my Web site will help me achieve?
- How will my aesthetic choices help me achieve my goals?
3. Not considering search engine visibility and optimization (SEO).
To avoid an invisible Web site ask yourself:
- In what way will my new Web site be more visible to search engines than my old one?
- Have I researched keywords on Google and WordTracker.
- Have I written page titles, descriptions, and headings based on my findings?
4. Not monitoring your Web designer’s progress and budget expenditures.
To avoid overspending ask yourself:
- Will I get what I want if I don’t regularly monitor my new Web design and establish a reporting schedule for my freelance Web designer?
5. Choosing a Web designer based on price without considering quality workmanship and the designer’s track record.
To avoid hiring an unqualified designer ask yourself:
- Which is more affordable, a Web site that costs $500 but gets no results or a $5000 Web site that helps sell my products and services?
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Harvey A. Ramer is a well-known New York State Internet specialist, Web designer, graphic designer and owner of Web design consultancy, Design Delineations. He has a degree in Visual Communications and has worked for several years as a Web designer for corporate, non-profit and private clients. He listens actively to client requests and meets or exceeds client expectations. If this article left you wanting more, Harvey Ramer has also written a short e-Book called A No-Nonsense Guide to Creating Your Web Site Design Plan that you may find helpful and maintains a blog.
December 9, 2007
Thanks to easy availability of software and service provider, it is not difficult to start a website. If you have ever dropped some food particles in a pond full of fishes, you?d have seen the hustle among them rushing in to wherever their foods float. It?s a near-similar scene in website launching.
Just drop a faint hint that you need a website, and there will be no dearth of ?experts? coming to your ?rescue?. There are just too many web designers, content writers (like me) and search-engine-optimizers, each of whom claiming he knows all there is to know. The crowd is so thick that you?ll soon be sucked into a vortex of suggestions and opinions, and before you know what it is that you really want, you?d have in all probability written your advance check to one or more experts for your website.
Lest you start thinking that I?m a typical skeptic, let me come clean. It?s not that you don?t need a web designer, a content writer or a search-engine-optimizer. But before you need any of them, you need to know what your website will be. In other words, the first step before you start a website is to understand why you need it anyway, and how you are going to give it the shape that fulfills your requirement for it.
Sounds confusing? But it is not. Too many websites start without a good amount of homework only to fail unnoticed and unceremoniously. If you feel your website must have a well-formulated direction to thrive and grow, you?ll appreciate the need for what I call ?pre-research? before you plunge into actually starting your website.
Okay, so where do you start? I?ve with me a video action guide (rest assured, it?s FREE of cost) that will take you through the steps of knowing why you need a website and what steps you ought to take to make it a success. What does the guide say? Here they are in brief.
Why you need a website?
In most cases, the short answer is you want to earn money by offering product or service through your website. It?s lot simple said than done. Why? Since your earning can only come from expenses made by visitors who will come to your site, isn?t it natural that your website is able to attract them in the first place? Which means your website must have something in it so that visitors feel compelled to come, and then again feel compelled to buy your product or service.
That something is ?content? that makes up your website, and the underlying concept is called ?pre-selling?. It means your content should be such that it is able to convince your prospective buyer that he would stand to benefit by buying your product or service. Clearly therefore, content ? sufficient amount of it ? comes first before any attempt to even think of monetization. Here we go to the next step.
What will be your contents?
Let?s appreciate that the fundamental reality of people using the net is that they are constantly looking for information. If you cannot provide it, someone else will, and people will go to other websites, not yours.
Once you recognize the need of lot of contents, comes the next step ? what your contents will be? Remember, your target is to attract large number of visitors, while at the same time, your content has to reflect your core expertise, your niche ability. You therefore need to unearth keywords or key-phrases that not only belong to your core ability, but also have enough popularity (and therefore, profitability) among web-searchers.
Develop your site concept
Once you?ve brainstormed your keywords (yes I call it brainstorming, because it?s not only finding keywords as many excellent tools like Keyword Discovery or Wordtracker offer you, it?s about making a connect between keywords, profitability and relevance for your site), you need to advance to the next step ? developing your site concept.
A host of issues comes here. You have to define your site structure like an inverted tree. The home page will have the most relevant keyword, branching thereafter to next level of say 8 to 12 pages, each of which will further branch off to several pages, and so on. While each page has a unique keyword, the focus will be to maintain relevance with next higher level. If needed, you may have to brainstorm your keywords again so that your site structure gets a wholesome shape.
Work out monetization plan
You may wonder, why this now! The point is your website has to earn money at the end of the day. So even though you do not launch any monetization effort until you?ve sufficient content, you need to have clear idea as to how your content will deliver cash as and when the time comes.
There can be many ways of monetization, for example, selling product/service, being affiliate, hawking site-space to advertisers, email marketing, and so on. Depending on which ones you choose, your site structure will accordingly re-orient/modify. Remember, content always precedes monetization for the simple reason that it is the content that attracts your visitors and then compels them to part with money.
Conclusion
If you?re overawed and feel deterred by whatever is told above, I?ve only this to say ? Get Real. If you do not have endless supply of money to splurge on costly ads, the only way is to plan things out. Let?s recall the famous equation:
Actual Income = Total Income ? All Expenditure
But suppose you do have pots of money for ads. In that case too, you need planning, for ads will only fetch your visitors to your website?s doorstep, not compel him to do you favor. For that once again, you need to plan your website.
Coming back to where I started, if you are intent that your website must succeed, begin by seeing the free video action guide now to get going. You?ll be glad you did.
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Partha Bhattacharya runs an educative blog on search engine marketing. He suggests referring successful case-studies, which will help you achieve success with your website.
November 29, 2007
You can use your internet browser to view the HTML source code of most web pages. This means that if you see a page you like, you can look at the underlying code and copy the designer?s technique. Copying someone else?s tried and true methods is not plagiarism — it is just a good way to improve your skills.
If you are using the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser, simply navigate to a page that you are interested in. Now, at the top of your browser window, you should see a menu bar with a set of commands, similar to the following:
File Edit View Tools Help
Click on the View command, and a vertical menu should drop down from it, with the number of choices, looking something like this:
Toolbars
Status Bar
Explorer Bar
Go To
Stop
Refresh
Text Size
Encoding
Source
Privacy Report
Full Screen
Now, click on the Source command, and a copy of Microsoft Notepad should pop up containing all the text of the page.
Because Notepad does not have an auto-wrap feature, you may see some very long lines of HTML code. Also, depending upon the web page you choose to look at, you may see some good clean easy to read HTML Code, or you may see a real mess.
In any case, you will discover that most web pages have two main sections, the head and the body. If you locate the body of the page you will see that it has most of the HTML tags that beginners are typically interested in; for example table tags, paragraph tags, and text formatting tags.
However, as you get more advanced you will discover that web pages are often dependent for their formatting on other external pages called ?CSS Style Pages?. If you want to look at one of these pages, it may be necessary to reconstruct its web address from information in the primary page you are looking at. This will be a topic of a future article.
Finally, if you are using another browser (Mozilla Firefox for example), the commands to view page source are slightly different. Click on the View menu, then select Page Source. Firefox displays the page source in a proprietary non-Notepad window.
copyright 2006 Sam Mela
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Sam Mela worked as a Senior Software Developer for Sony Ericsson Corporation. He now writes articles about almost anything, and tutors math and computer languages. His web site is www.SamMela.com.
November 10, 2007
At this point, you are ready to get a domain name, get web hosting, and build a web site.
If you have never built a web site, even the very thought of it can be daunting, but do not let that stop you. Remember, without your own web site, you do not really have your own business.
Follow these steps:
1) Search online for a web host. Email me and I will send you the one I use. Although it may be tempting to find the absolutely cheapest one on the market, you do tend to get what you pay for in web hosting. Think about it this way: if you are only paying $3 per month for hosting, how much support can they feasibly offer you if you have questions? Just keep that in mind. If you are not familiar with html, you probably should go with a web host that provides a site builder or web templates–with those you just basically type into a form what you want to appear on the web site and then hit ?enter?. If you are familiar with html, or if you want to learn, Frontpage or Dreamweaver is probably a good bet. My understanding is that Dreamweaver has a 30 day free trial you can use to see if you like it; search online for the current web address for that. I personally use Frontpage and it is great for my needs.
2) Choose a domain name. You can probably get one through the web hosting company you choose for a reasonable price. Many of the companies will give you one free if you pay for a year upfront; they will usually give you a discount if you pay in advance, also. Keep these things in mind: if you are going to be giving out your web site address offline a lot, you want to go with something that is all one word, like: secretsofinternetsuccess dot com. If you are less concerned about people typing it in, but want better search engine results long term, you are better off placing a dash between each word like this: secrets-of-internet-success dot com.
In Step 12: what to put on your web site.
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This has been part 11 in an extensive series on building your own internet marketing business. To subscribe to receive the entire series via email, click here: Step by Step to Internet Success
To read more about how to start an online business, click here and download my free book: Internet Success
Sean Mize is a successful offline and online entrepreneur and marketer, and has written extensively on the topic of online business creation and success.
October 30, 2007
When working with templates for single shot images it is best to have a nice looking page for the image to be in. Rather than just have an image enlarge on a blank sheet with information typed below it, setting the image in a beautifully enclosed page that contains links to your Website is much more impressive.
There is a way to quick way to insert the images into the template and have them aligned with all sides of the template. Simply insert the image as usual into your template, this is the enlarged image that comes up when you pick the small icon image of it on the carpet page. When the image is inserted it will stretch out the boundaries of your template to the size of the image (which is of course way to large for the template).
Remember that you have designed the template to fit on the monitor screen so you want the template to remain that size and not the new size that the inserted image has stretched your template to. To get around this it is wise to insert a table of links into the template you have designed for the images. When you insert any image that stretches out the template boarders the table will not follow but remain the same size because it is not part of the boarder, it is placed in separately. The size of the table tells you where to push the image back to then the template boarder will follow suite.
When you are adjusting the image be aware that when you touch the lower right-hand corner the diagonal arrows appear that permit you to push the image in or out to make it small or large. You do not have the move the arrows along a diagonal line when pushing in or out. You can simply move the arrows straight to the right (usually) to fit up to the edge of the border. This is a much easier way to handle the scaling up and down of image to get them to be aligned with the border. Having to move the arrows along a diagonal is difficult.
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I was born and raised on the south side of Chicago in Hyde Park Township, near the University of Chicago. As I child I was always drawing and painting. My father owned an art supply company, Favor Ruhl & Watson, where I was able to get all that I needed to progress in my work.
I have always enjoyed portraiture and landscape painting. In High School (Naperville Central High School) I took Drafting from Mr. Pierce. I quickly grasped the principles of perspective and drafting and hence made a career with both Fine Art and Architectural Renderings.
In the mid 1970’s I joined the US Navy and was stationed on board the USS Midway, CV-41. The Midway was home ported in Yokosuka, Japan (A suburb of Tokyo). While in service I traveled all over Asia including such countries as Korea, China, Philippines, Singapore, Pakistan, Hong Kong, and Japan. While in Japan I learned Japanese. I speak German and Spanish as well.
October 22, 2007
Websites are authored by a Webmaster, or a publisher, or, more often than not, by a plain ?Joe? or ?Jane? who want to share something, or say something, or make money. All splendid motives.
I scrutinize Websites like a nosey voyeur, surfing the ‘Net with no rationale or plan, stopping here or there for something that catches my eye. Sometimes I pause to admire a color combination, or a clever layout. Other times I am intrigued with a photograph or a drawn image. I may spend several minutes rummaging though the site even if I?m not interested in the theme. But, if you catch me up in the content of your project, I may stay for an hour or more. And, I might even buy something!
When I was a kid, I often hunted for Indian arrowheads. When I found one, I?d admire my find and wonder about the person who meticulously chipped it out. Who was he? What was he like? When did he do it? Well, it?s the same for me with Websites.
If you have a Website - one with great content - I may not have seen it yet, but if I do run into it, you?ll hold my attention for a long time and I?ll be curious about your site and you. Am I the norm? I doubt that. I?d like to think there?s a lot of us out here like that.
Gimmicks may catch our eye on that landing page, but substance will get us to hang around. Pretty pictures may stop us in our surfing tracks, but plenty of compelling information will hold our interest for some time. A flashy presentation may get us to take a second look, but valuable, well-written content will get us to camp out on your Website. That?s right. You?ll win us over with lots of priceless content.
In the early days of the Internet, I was bothered by misspelled words, lousy sentence structure and the redundancy of the same word being used over and over again. Those things shouldn?t happen with the tools we now have at our fingertips, but they do. They may be a turnoff for some people, but I?ve grown accustomed to those kinds of errors. Now, I?m put off more by content ?without teeth?. Nothing turns me off like meaningless, rambling, or excessive text, and there?s oodles of it out there.
Do you have one or more Websites? Is the content rich in information? Is it compelling? Is it valuable to the reader? Will it make the visitor stay on your site for a while? If not, get busy with repairs.
Take your time. This is not a race. It?s a challenge to produce accurate, concise, gripping data that your visitors can find worthy and valuable. Get content with your content.
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The author tells how he is a successful Website publisher in his Ecommerce For Families site. For more information, see www.ecommerce4families.com/websitepublisher.html
October 21, 2007
When you are creating Website and working with Web pages it is important that you take notes and mark all of the articles and files that you make. Mark these on paper so that you can develop a check-off list.
For the beginner it can become very confusing to sort out all of the links assigned to different files. Make sure that when you move files around that you also remove the link that is behind. These links are invisible and you do not see them when you clear the file.
You will notice them only when it is too late and you have a chain of broken links to deal with. You do not want broken links on your site because there are difficult to find and fix. You want to spend your time on the site enhancing it not fixing it.
Just be sure that each time after you move or delete a file that you check the blank spot that it was in for any traces of a link. The link will show in the link line. Your software will notify you that if you delete this file the following links will be affected. Stop at that point and check each link that is listed. You will be surprised to find links to files that you had not idea about.
It is always best to stop and read any alerts and if you are not sure it is best to pick cancel to avoid long term errors.
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I was born and raised on the south side of Chicago in Hyde Park Township, near the University of Chicago. As I child I was always drawing and painting. My father owned an art supply company, Favor Ruhl & Watson, where I was able to get all that I needed to progress in my work.
I have always enjoyed portraiture and landscape painting. In High School (Naperville Central High School) I took Drafting from Mr. Pierce. I quickly grasped the principles of perspective and drafting and hence made a career with both Fine Art and Architectural Renderings.
In the mid 1970’s I joined the US Navy and was stationed on board the USS Midway, CV-41. The Midway was home ported in Yokosuka, Japan (A suburb of Tokyo). While in service I traveled all over Asia including such countries as Korea, China, Philippines, Singapore, Pakistan, Hong Kong, and Japan. While in Japan I learned Japanese. I speak German and Spanish as well.
I imagine many know exactly what they want their website to do for them. For those that do not, like myself, I believe sitting down and writing out your website?s goal will go a long way to achieving success.
You may be familiar with the SMART goal-setting model. This basically asks that your goal be: Specific; Measurable; Achievable; Realistic and Time-framed. Alternatively ask yourself:
? What specifically is the goal of my website and why do I want this? I didn?t have a clue really what mine was all about; all I had was a vague idea on what I wanted it to look like, that?s important isn?t it?
? How focused and centred am I? To achieve any goal you must be focused and centred ? I did a million and one things and didn?t concentrate on what I really wanted to achieve, because quite frankly, I didn?t have a clear idea on what I wanted to achieve;
? Look at your goal through new eyes ? for example you might ask yourself ?What will I gain by having this website?? Then ask, ?What will I gain by not having this website?? Ask someone who is experienced in your niche area, and who has a successful website, for some feedback on yours. Remember, you might not like what you?re going to hear, but it might be what you need to hear;
? What skill must I already have already to pull off my goal? What will I need to get in order to make my website concept work; and
? What is the importance of calculating your website?s end goal? Without an action plan you can follow you?ll soon lose track of the steps you need to take. Start small and work your way up. If you look at everything you need to do in a limited timeframe you may become overwhelmed and with overwhelm, procrastination may step in.
A few things you might like to include in your website goal-setting are:
Website purpose
Your Brand or intellectual property
Design
Budget
Marketing
Advertising
Staff
Skills
Training
As you continue with your goal-setting become aware of any self talk. Is it positive self-talk such as ?what a great idea this is of yours!? Or more like negative self-talk such as ?this is never going to work, what on earth were you thinking??
If this applies to you, you might like to note what you hear in a journal. This has always worked exceptionally well for me and might for you too.
First, rule up two columns. On one side write down your internal self talk whether positive or negative. In the other column, if you have an internal critic write down what your solution to the problem is and will be.
On the other hand if you have supportive positive self talk you might like to give gratitude for all the positive things that happen in your life as you begin to achieve your goal. One of the greatest motivators is success so even with a seemingly minor goal that?s achieved it deserves validation including a big pat on the back.
The last thing I will leave you with however is this, be prepared for setbacks. Not everything works out according to plan, allow for some flexibility.
As Confucius once said a long time ago:
?When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don?t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps?
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Copyright requirements are that it remains with Michaela Scherr and for the link to be ‘click able’ or ‘live’ at http://www.michaelascherr.com
Michaela is an Intuitive and Transformational Coach totally committed to helping others create positive change in their lives. She is also the author of Quick Click! Internet Tips! An e-book written to help those new to the internet and websites familiarise themselves easily with the online world.
October 14, 2007
Everybody tells you that your business should have a website but so far no-one has convinced you. They tell you it will help your sales but don’t say how, they tell you it will increase your profits but don’t say how, they tell you it will be the best advertising and marketing you could do but don’t tell you why. I’ll attempt to provide some answers to those questions and more.
Advertising
Your website is constantly advertising you. It is larger than any print advertisement and can convey more information than any radio or television advert and unlike traditional advertising where you try to force yourself into somebody’s consciousness, and generally fail, your web site will be visited by people who are already interested in finding out about your business and your products or services.
Sales
Internet sales are cheap, they are conducted by computers who don’t need to be paid or earn commission. A properly thought out and designed business website is like having a 24hr a day salesman who can deal with multiple customers simultaneously, who never takes holidays or has any time off and whom you have total control over.
Information
You can use your website to provide articles and helpful tips about your speciality or reviews of your products. If people come to your website looking for the information that you provide, they are likely to look at other parts of your site giving you the chance to impress them with your products or services. By becoming a resource for information you entice people on to your website who would not otherwise have come. This can only be a good thing as people who are searching for the information you have may well also be looking for the product or service that you provide.
You can also use your site to provide information about your business such as background, history, policies and any other information that prospective customers may want to know. This allows them to easily and quickly find out about you, shows that you have nothing to hide, allows you to boast of your achievements and promotes their trust in you.
Customer Research
Customers like to research products before they buy, especially online. A shopper generally has an idea of what they want by function or purpose rather than specific item or service e.g. a web designer instead of a particular web design business. They will start by making a search for items that fulfil that function by putting a general search term into a search engine such as Google e.g. web designer. This will inevitably produce several million results so they will look at the first few and compare them by features, price, popularity etc. If it’s a service or complex and expensive product they are looking for, they may well then conduct some even more general research to enable them to make a better informed decision. They then carry out more searches to narrow down the options to the one they want. Only then will they actually decide to buy a specific product. The next step is to find who is providing that service or product at the right price, in the right place, with the right quality and service. If you are one of the sources that they have used and your website was helpful and informative during the search and decision process without overbearing marketing hype, you have built up a level of trust from their previous experience of you and you stand a much better chance of them coming back to you for the eventual purchase.
Open 24hrs
Your website is always available to provide information to the public, publicise your brand and deal with your customers. It can take messages, make sales and gather marketing data while you sleep.
Your competition
If you competition has no website then by launching one yourself you have an obvious advantage over them; internet users can find you but not them. If your competitors have their own websites and you have none, they have this advantage over you.
Marketing
Websites gather data about their visitors all the time. Data such as what country are they in, what time do they use your website, how long do they stay on your website and which pages do they look at. Any customer that registers with your site either for a newsletter or through a purchase gives you further information and the ability to advertise directly to them by post or email.
Support
Your website can take some of the load from your customer service by providing problem solving pages related to your products, sales terms and conditions including returns and refund policies and further information about what to do in the event of any problems. Providing solutions to the most common questions allows people to find the answer they want when they want it without you having to spend time answering the same question time and again to different people. It also shows that you are thoughtful, helpful and aware of what your customers need.
Up To Date
It is far easier and quicker to keep your website up to date than traditional print media such as catalogues and brochures. Any changes that you need can be done very quickly and published instantly.
Profit
A well planned and designed business website should more than repay the investment through increased sales and efficiency. The benefits from all of the above factors will make you more efficient, easier to conduct business with and enable you to maximise you takings whilst minimising costs.
Summary
There are numerous benefits to having your own website but the greatest is the ability to combine all of those benefits into one package which is always available anywhere in the world. Nobody can guarantee that you will instantly become rich from adding a website to your strategy but not having one guarantees that you lose one possible channel for success.
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