$200 Websites

by on Mar.06, 2012, under Web Design

$200 Websites

Let’s use a little common sense.

Websites do not cost $200 to build. I recently talked with a business owner who had decided to use a web company (from somewhere far away) that was going to build his site for $200. Along with the low price, there were lots of promises of high page rank and page one results on Google searches and of course all of this was only going to cost $200 per month, forever.

Of course, first I have to acknowledge that I failed to show this business owner the value of the site I had proposed building for him. I’m going to have to learn from this and do better in the future – no doubt. I also have to admit that the site I had proposed cost considerably more than the $200 he thought he was paying for his site. Also, I have to say with some satisfaction, that the cost of my site was less than what he will pay for his new site in a year and I know that my site would have totally outperformed his new site by the end of that year. I’ve seen his new site, though it did take a lot of searching, and it’s generic.

This is the problem with these kinds of website generating companies that offer “so much” for “so little”. They take a one-size fits all, or “beat it to fit, paint it to match” type of approach to site building that completely removes the personality that the site could have had. This particular business owner has tons of personality, but you’d never know if from his new site. So why would a potential customer choose him over someone else? Personality is a key differentiator, especially when you consider that many times, all else is pretty equal.

Lots of elements go into building a website that will work for you and I’m going to outline many of those over the coming weeks. By the way, when I say the site “works for you”, I’m referring to it’s ability to bring in new customers/clients or make the phone ring. Isn’t that what a business website should do? Stay tuned, my goal is to educate, so that you can make better decisions.

, , , Comments Off more...

Yellow Pages or Internet?

by on Nov.02, 2011, under Web Design

If you’re in business, you want to be found and the faster and easier it is for people to find you, the better. So what’s the best way to make that happen? For a lot of businesses, the Yellow Pages was the way to go, or at least it used to be. That seems to be changing though as more and more people turn to the internet to find the products and services they need. Let’s face it, “Googling It” is just easier in many ways.

Why the Internet is Becoming the “Go To” Source

We’ve all suspected that a change was happening, but few of us realized just how quickly it’s happening. PEW Research* has been monitoring the change in internet usage, breaking it down by generations, age groups and the facts are supporting our suspicions. In other words, adoption of the internet as a way of finding information about virtually everything is happening at a rapid pace. This is true for all age groups and generation classifications, even seniors.

Of course, we don’t always have a computer with us, nor do we go about with the Yellow Pages in our back pockets, but we do carry our phones with us and increasingly, that phone is a Smart Phone. As you know, Smart Phones are capable of browsing the internet, Googling, even showing us maps or GPS locations of what we’re looking for. PEW has done research on the adoption of Smart Phones too, and as you might expect, their use is increasing rapidly.

The Writing’s On The Wall

Change is good, right? Generally true in my opinion, but that doesn’t mean that it comes without causing confusion, vexation and frustration. But once you embrace the idea that change is happening, like it or not, we usually get used to the idea. Like “land line” phones, do you still have one? So what’s a business to do? I can’t help you decide if your ad in the Yellow Pages is worth the investment, but if you decide to embrace change and want to be found on the internet, I can help you with that.

How To Be Found On The Internet

Just put up a website! If only that were true, unfortunately, it’s not. A website is the first step, but there are other steps that will also need to be taken. Having a plan, setting clear goals and knowing what’s possible are all key elements of creating a successful web presence. I’ll share the details of how to build your web presence in my “Premium Content” section, which you can access by registering here.

 

* PEW Research – “Generations Online”
, , , Comments Off more...

What is Joomla?

by on Oct.20, 2011, under Web Design

And maybe more importantly, “Why should you care?”

Joomla Is A Tool

More specifically, a tool for building websites, also known as a Content Management System (CMS). And it’s FREE! You can download it for free, and learn to use it if you’re willing to take the time to do so. Understanding the underpinnings of Joomla is not easy for most people, as it’s built using PHP and MySQL and of course, HTML and CSS. But, and this is the beauty of Joomla, using it is not difficult to learn. In fact, most people who use computers probably already have most of the knowledge they would need to be able to use Joomla to add content to their sites. The basic operations of writing and posting an article are very similar to using a word processor like Word. If you can type, point and click, you’ve got it.

So, that brings us back to “why you should care?” Well, if you’re one of the millions of people who have a website or want to have a website, using a tool like Joomla could be a great facilitator for getting your website built in such a way that you can update it anytime you like. One of the drawbacks to having a website built for you the old “static” way was that if you wanted to make changes to the site typically you had to have your designer make them for you, as most people did not have the capabilities to make their own changes. Joomla changes that. You probably still don’t have the capabilities of making the site, but if you have a dynamic, CMS site built for you using Joomla, you will be able to make changes, add photos, even add new pages and so on. The learning curve is pretty small.

Open Source

Joomla is what is called Open Source software, which means that it’s not owned by anyone who will charge you to use it. There is a Joomla organization that oversees the development of Joomla, including managing security issues and new releases. There are thousands of people, developers, involved in improving it and creating thousands of extensions that add functionality to the core software. This large community of developers, not to mention users, makes Joomla a very popular tool for website development and design.

So this free, Open Source, website development tool, that is easy to use, therefore empowering its users, and that is so widely supported by an organization and large community of developers and users makes a pretty compelling argument for why you should care.

Shameless Plug

If you’d like to learn more about this or think you might need some help with your website, I invite you to get in touch with me to discuss this further.

, , , Comments Off more...

My New Site! Change is Good.

by on Oct.12, 2011, under Graphic Design

David and Company has a new website: http://www.davidandcographicdesign.com.

Why would I do such a thing? Well, for a number of reasons. First, the old site has been up for a number of years and it was just time for a new look. Second, the old site was a static site and I’m a firm believer in the advantages of dynamic sites, so I built my new site using Joomla, which I believe is a fantastic framework for dynamic websites. Why not WordPress? That’s pretty simple really. WordPress is primarily intended for use as a blogging platform and though I want to continue to have a blog, I wanted to have more than that. Joomla is more robust and has many more capabilities than WordPress – yes I know many people have used WP for their sites, but in my opinion, Joomla was the right choice for me. Not saying there’s anything wrong with WP. ;-)

New Logo

The third reason for the new site is that I’ve decided it was time to revise my identity. I have a new logo AND a new URL! When you pick a url for a company, it’s best to pick one that closely matches or relates to the company name. When I picked mine, many years ago, I didn’t realize the importance of this and so chose davsdesign, since DavidandCompany was in use by someone else. We also felt at the time, that short urls were important, but now realize that it really isn’t that important, which led to the new url, davidandcographicdesign.

So, it was time for a change and I invite you to take a look at my new site. For those who have registered on this site, registration has now been closed and you’re invited to register on the new site. I’ll send out a notice about this sometime soon. I’ll leave this site up for a while, but will not update the blog portion or the Portfolio section any more. Please join me on the new site for updates.

No tags Comments Off more...

Top 3 Reasons to Use a Static Website

by on Sep.15, 2011, under Web Design

People are always wondering which kind of site is best suited to meet their needs and of course the answer to that question is “it depends.” For a more thorough discussion of that, see my article titled “CMS, When to Use”.

Here, I’ll give you the Top 3 Reasons to use a static site.

First – you have a small site, not a lot of pages, and you don’t anticipate the need to change it frequently. It might be a “portfolio” or “brochure” kind of site, where the purpose is to share some information that isn’t going to change often. Many of these kinds of sites emphasize style and appearance and don’t have an SEO (search engine optimization) focus.

Second – you don’t have a lot of time to make changes, so having a CMS (content management system) style of site would just be a waste of time. This is a very realistic understanding of what’s involved in having a CMS site, in other words, CMS sites should be updated regularly in order to take full advantage of their capabilities. They can be very useful for SEO, but if you don’t have the time to post, you simply won’t get the benefit being able to update your own site.

Third – realizing that SEO is still important to those who have static sites (and you don’t want to miss out on that, after all, why have a site if no one comes to visit), you have handled that need by using a blog site like Blogger and you drive traffic to your site by linking to it in your posts. Well done!

Another solution that I’ve offered to some in this situation is to have the static site, but incorporate a dynamic blog within the static site, using WordPress in most cases. This also works well.

There you have it. My 3 Top Reasons to Use a Static Website and of course, if you’d like help with that please feel free to contact me at David and Company.

, , , , Comments Off more...

  • My New Site!

    Please drop in and check out my new site at: http://www.davidandcographicdesign.com

  • Medigrafik

    Medigrafik
  • Newsletter Sign-Up
    * indicates required
  • Grow your brain.

  • A List Apart Survey

    Take the Survey

  • Tags

    brochure budget client CMS compliant content copy Creative Suite CSS design designers dreams dynamic economy effective essence experience fast Graphic Design graphics great logo image Logos marketing Pantone photography photos Photoshop presence products professional proof quality save money SEO services software stories story update web 2.0 web design website websites XHTML

  • Meta

    • © David and Company Graphic Design
    Jarrah theme by Templates Next | Powered by WordPress