Web Design Discussion

An old Web design can be compared to an old house. It’s lost its luster, it’s in a state of disrepair, and no longer looks attractive . The current design of your website may be the same. It may look outdated, unattractive and in need of a makeover.

Top 7 reasons to redesign your website

1. Outdated design

Perhaps your current design is several years old. You may have designed it yourself or had it designed by someone else who didn’t know what they were doing. Whatever the reason it’s time to get a new design so you can give your business a fresh look that will attract and retain your visitors. Your website is the first impression a visitor receives of your business so their experience should be a pleasant one.

2. Difficult to navigate

Website visitors should be able to navigate your web pages to find information quickly and easily. For example you may have navigation links at the top but not at the bottom of your pages. When someone reaches the bottom of your page they will need to scroll to the top to navigate to other sections of your website. To solve this problem include navigation links at the bottom of your web pages and links to internal pages within your content.

3. Code errors

If your website contains many HTML or XHTML errors it will be difficult for the search engines to spider your pages plus it will take them longer to load. When redesigning your website make sure your web pages validate correctly.

4. Slow loading pages

Website loading speed is now one of the ranking factors for Google. This makes sense because people want to access information quickly with their high-speed Internet connections. Your site should load within a few seconds. Slow loading pages are often caused by large images, videos, javascript, code errors, broken links or a slow server.

5. Pages are not search engine friendly

If your website is not optimized for the search engines you’re losing lots of traffic. To optimize your web pages your main keywords should be included in the title, description and keyword meta tags. They should also be included in your headings, subheadings, main content, links, file names and image descriptions (alt tag).

6. Lack of accessibility

Most websites on the net are not accessible to people who are vision impaired. They may be blind, colorblind or have difficulty reading small text on the screen. It may cost you more to make your website accessible to all people however it will expand your audience.

7. Sloppy web copy

If your Web copy does not inspire your visitors to take action you may have to rewrite it. You can do this yourself or hire a professional copywriter who can hypnotize your visitors with words that will get them to take action.

Hire a professional web designer to redesign your website. Make sure he or she has many years of experience so you will not only get a great design but receive help in marketing the site to make it profitable.

Related Articles
How to Write Effective Web Copy
How to Optimize Your Website for the Search Engines
Web Accessibility Benefits
Top 7 Reasons to Get Your Web Pages Redesigned

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Can you type 40 words per minute?

This is the basic minimum standard required by most employers. If you didn’t take a typing course or learn how to type correctly you’re probably much slower than this and use the “hunt and peck” method for typing your articles. This means you’re going to take longer to write one article than someone who can type 40 words per minute or faster. One of the best ways for quickly and easily writing lots of articles is using voice recognition software such as Dragon Naturally Speaking

How Dragon Naturally Speaking works to write articles quickly
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There are many options for designing a website for your online business. A content management system (CMS) allows you to easily maintain your web pages by logging in to an administration panel. WordPress is one of the most popular CMS on the web because it is easy to install, customize, manage and maintain. Let’s look at why you should choose WordPress to design and build your website.

Top 12 benefits of WordPress Web Design
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So you have a product or products to sell, have registered your domain name and purchased a hosting plan. One of the ways to quickly and easily create your ecommerce site is with WordPress software.

It enables you to create a dynamic site that you’re able to maintain yourself.

Benefits of WordPress

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For anyone that has never set up an online store it can be very confusing. There are many choices available so it is difficult to select what is best for your online business. Before creating a store you must first look at your business goals such as how much money you wish to make each month, types of products you wish to sell, a marketing plan and how you will accept payments.

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* Why hire a web designer when there are 100s of template designs on the Net?
* Why invest money in a web designer when you can download a free template?
* Why wait weeks or months to have a site designed when you can get a ready-made template?

These are some of the frequently asked questions business owners have when deciding on building a website to sell their products and/or services.

7 top reasons to hire a web designer

1. Professional knowledge

A professional web designer who has been designing websites for 10 years has accumulated a ton of knowledge about what works well on the Net. He will be familiar with the common mistakes new site owners make when establishing an online presence and will know how to design a profitable website.

2. Customized design

If you want your site to stand out from your competitors you should not use a template. Chances are many other online users will have the same design. A customized website enables you to have a unique design that matches what you’re selling.

3. Less costs in the long term

A professional design can be less expensive in the long run because it was built with a solid foundation. This means it contains clean code, the web pages load quickly and are search engine friendly. Templates often contain proprietary code that contains html errors, loads slowly and are not optimized for the search engines.

4. Search engine optimization

A professional web designer will make sure your web pages are optimized for the search engines. This means the pages will validate for correct html, css, contain appropriate meta tags, heading tags, descriptive file names, clear navigational structure and image descriptions. Even though you may find a pretty template you won’t understand what’s in the code underneath the design unless you’re a web designer.

5. Familiar with marketing strategies

A beautiful website will not attract visitors on its own. It needs to be marketed frequently and consistently to generate a continuous stream of traffic. A professional web designer can help you implement powerful traffic generation strategies.

6. Website maintenance

Business owners often don’t have the time, knowledge or desire to update their websites. They prefer to have a webmaster who knows what they are doing and can quickly and easily add new content whether it’s text, videos, audios or images. The web designer can also install scripts to capture email addresses, add a forum, blog, RSS feeds or social media tools. He or she can track the progress of the website by monitoring site statistics.

7. Cross browser compatibility

If your website doesn’t display correctly in all the major browsers you’ll miss out on lots of visitors. A web designer will make sure your site appears correctly in Internet Explorer, FireFox, Safari and Chrome.

When you buy a template you may save time and money in the short term however it may cost you dearly in the long term. Hiring a professional web designer will guarantee a top notch design that will help brand your business and give you peace of mind knowing that it’s been built correctly.

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Get a professional website designed for your business by visiting:
Professional Website Design

So you want to sell something online but don’t know where to start. It’s easy to become frustrated with all the options available online as their are many companies that offer all-in-one packages who are willing to take your money. This article will show you what you need and how to create, promote and monitor your ecommerce website.

7 steps to create your own ecommerce website

1. Define the purpose of your website.

It’s easy to say “I want to make money” however try to think a little deeper about what you want the money for e.g. “I want to make enough money to quit my job, work from home and spend more time with my family”. A clear purpose provides a deeper motivation that keeps you going especially during difficult times.

2. Define your business goals

Make goals for how much money you wish to make with your website and how long it will take to achieve them e.g. “I wish to make $3000.00 a month within one year.” Realize that most businesses fail within the first year and many fail within 5 years so you need be determined to be successful.

3. Decide what products or service(s) you wish to sell

Select a product (or products) or service that is in demand. Have you heard the saying “don’t sell iceboxes to Eskimos.” Research your market first to determine whether your product or service will be profitable.

4. Ecommerce website design checklist

Here is what you need to build your ecommerce site:

• domain name
• software to design and build the site
• web designer (if you’re not building it yourself)
• web hosting service
• list of products to sell
• product variables e.g. size, color, price, sku#, tax, shipping costs
• legal documents e.g. refund policy, terms and conditions, privacy policy
• images of products
• content for web pages
• merchant account
• payment gateway
• SSL certificate
• shopping cart software

5. Build your website

If you wish to create a customized website scan through websites online to see which ones appeal to you, then ask your web designer to create your site based on your choices. Alternatively select a ready-made template that you can use “as is” or be customized to your liking. A template will cost less however a customized website will have your own unique design and help brand your business.

If you’re selling 100s of products make sure you have the ability to maintain it e.g. add, edit, delete products and pages. This will save you from constantly paying your web designer to maintain it.

6. Create a marketing plan

Your website won’t become profitable if it’s not promoted. There are 1000s of different was to promote it however here are 10 very effective marketing strategies:

• search engine optimization
• link building
• pay per click marketing
• social marketing
• article marketing
• directory marketing
• video marketing
• press releases
• email marketing
• blogging

7. Track website visitors

Your web host usually includes site statistics that show how many visitors your website is receiving every day, week, month and year. It also displays where they are coming from (countries, browsers, website addresses) and what keywords they’re using to find your site in the search engines. Based on these statistics you set goals how much traffic you want to generate each month. The more traffic you receive the greater your profit potential becomes.

Related articles
How to Build an Ecommerce Web Site Using the PayPal Shopping Cart
Create Online Store – How to Quickly and Easily Create an E-commerce Store

To receive a free consultation on creating your own ecommerce website
please visit: Professional Website Design

Herman Drost is the owner and author of
http://www.DrostDesigns.com
Web Design, SEO, Article Marketing
7 Effective Ways to Build Your Own Web Site

Article marketing is a proven method for steadily generating traffic to your website by providing valuable content, building lots of backlinks and improving search engine rankings. As more online business owners use this strategy to market their websites it becomes more difficult for your article to stand out from the crowd. The top article directories receive 1000s of new articles every day so you not only have to frequently write unique articles but promote them consistently to be effective traffic generators.

7 ways to increase the effectiveness of your articles

1. Do research on your topic

Too many article writers simply regurgitate content that has already been written thus boring their readers by not offering anything unique. Gather research by visiting forums, blogs, etc in your niche. Leave comments and ask questions to tap into the mindset of your audience. This will help you to craft articles visitors will want to read.

2. Do keyword research

Keywords within your article enable search engines to spider your content. Therefore include these keywords in your headline, article body and resource box. Google “free keyword research tools” to find software that creates a list of monthly searches for related keywords. Integrate these keywords into your content.

3. Create an attention-getting headline

Your headline is the single most important factor of your article because this is what initially grabs your visitor’s attention and makes them want to read the rest of the article. Try to place yourself in your reader’s shoes by asking yourself, “would this headline make me want to read more?” Use action verbs such as discover, get, how to, read or ask a question. One of the greatest headlines is “How to win friends and influence people.” Use this example to create your own article headline.

4. Give what you promised in your headline

Your article body should expand the information promised in your headline by providing valuable tips your reader can use in their business. Write at least 400 or more words as shorter articles are read less due to lack of good content.

5. Get your visitor to take action

The resource box at the end of your article is the only place you can promote your product or service and include links to your website. Your content should leave your reader hungry for more information. Provide this for them by offering a free report, an e-course or tutorial. If you want to build long term relationships with your readers invite them to subscribe to your newsletter.

6. Promote your articles

The most effective method of attracting lots of readers is to distribute your content to many places on the Web. This may include article directories, your blog or website, social media sites (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube) , ezine publishers and online publications. The more articles you write and publish the more traffic you’ll receive to your website.

7. Monitor your article statistics

Track the effectiveness of your articles by observing which ones receive the most visitors. Check which keywords are being used to find the articles on your website by viewing your website statistics. If you submit your content to ezinearticles it enables you to track the number of visitors, keywords and click through rate of your articles.

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Many site owners make the mistake of building a website without laying out a clear plan for their online business. This is a set-up for future failure. There are 1000s of abandoned sites on the web due to lack of careful planning.

10 frequently asked questions (FAQ) before designing a website

1. What are your business goals?

It’s easy to say ” I want to make money,” however this is not a great motivator. Think of a deeper motivation that you feel passionate about e.g. “I want to have the financial freedom to spend more time with my kids as they are growing up.”

2. What’s the purpose of your website?

This is the question most visitors will ask when accessing your website. Your home page must clearly explain the purpose and benefits of the products and/or services you are offering.

3. What type of products or services will you sell?

Research the marketability of your products or services by doing keyword research. Use the free Google Keyword Tool to find out how many searches your main keywords receive every month. If there are no searches it means there is no demand and therefore not worth marketing.

If it is a very competitive market (millions of searches per month) it may be difficult to stand out from your competitors and create a profitable online business.

4. How many products will you sell from your website?

The number of products will determine how many pages your website will have. If you’re only selling one product or service you may only need 4 web pages e.g. Home, Product (or Services), About, Contact. If you’re selling 100s of items you will need a database driven site to store and manage all of them.

5. How many variables does your product have?

Variables may include size, color, type, sku#, shipping, tax? Make sure your shopping cart allows you to include all these variables.

6. How will you accept online payments?

To accept credit card payments online, you will need a shopping cart, merchant account, payment gateway and SSL certificate for secure transactions. This means you will have monthly fees and processing fees every time a customer purchases something from your website.

A less expensive option for accepting payments online is the Paypal Shopping Cart. You don’t need to purchase a separate merchant account, shopping cart, payment gateway and secure certificate. For a small processing fee it takes care of all this in one place.

7. Do you have a web hosting plan?

Your website needs to be hosted on a server for it to be available online. Select a hosting plan that has sufficient space for all your files and bandwidth to receive 1000s of visitors each month. Make sure you have the flexibility to upgrade your plan should you need more space and bandwidth.

8. Will you need to maintain the website yourself?

Asking this question before the design will determine what software your designer will use to build your website. If it only consists of a few web pages that don’ need regular updating, then use software such as Dreamweaver to build it. It creates clean code and you will have only a few files should they need to be updated.

If your website has 100s of pages consider a content management system such as WordPress, Joomla or Zen Cart. They all enable 100s of items to be stored in a database. The website can be managed (add, edit or delete items or pages) by logging into an administration area.

9. Do you have a marketing plan?

To create a profitable online business you must create a plan to promote it. Some methods may include, search engine marketing, pay per click, article marketing, press releases, social media, video marketing, etc. Website promotion needs to be done frequently and consistently for it to be effective

10. How will you monitor your website statistics?

Check if your web hosting plan includes site statistics (e.g. AW Stats). If not create a Google Analytics account and insert the code on your web pages. It will track how many visitors you receive daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, where they are coming from and what keywords are being used to find your site in the search engines.

If you answer these 10 questions first you’ll avoid the pitfalls of designing and building a website and increase your potential of creating a profitable online business.

Related Articles
How to Build an Ecommerce Web Site Using the PayPay Shopping Cart
7 Essential Web Site Maintenance Strategies

And now I would like to invite you to claim your FREE report titled:
7 Habits of Highly Effective Traffic Generation

Herman Drost is the owner and author of
http://www.DrostDesigns.com
Web Design, SEO, Article Marketing

If you want to generate traffic to your website from the search engines you need optimize your web pages and build links to them. The more incoming links you get to those pages the higher your rankings will be. Many site owners fail to put a regular link building plan in place. They may have achieved good rankings initially with a a few incoming links however over time their rankings dropped (and so did their traffic) as competing websites outranked them.

One of the easiest and fastest ways to build links is through writing and publishing articles. The more articles you write and distribute over the Net the more links you’ll acquire.

7 ways to use articles for link building

1. Create unique content

Every person has their own unique style of writing that will appeal to a segment of readers. Ezine publishers and site owners are constantly looking for unique content to place in their ezines or on their websites. Submit your content to the top article directories to make it easy for publishers and site owners to find your articles. For example one article could potentially generate 100s of links to your website if it was used in an ezine of 10,000 subscribers or bookmarked by readers using bookmarking sites such as stumbleupon, digg, delicious, etc.

2. Include links in the article resource box

Most article directories allow 2 links in the resource box at the end of the article. One should be anchor text (hyperlinked text), the other your full website address. The anchor text should contain your main keyword as search engines give more weight to links that include keywords related to your site. The full URL should also be included in case someone copies and pastes your article (from the article directory) into their ezine or web page. The anchor text won’t appear but the full URL will remain intact.

3. Practice Internal linking

When publishing the article on your website or blog find related articles or blog posts (within your site) then link them to your article using the article title as your anchor text. The best internal links are ones contained within your content (where the surrounding content relates to the link) .

4. Make it easy for others to link to your article

Encourage your readers to refer your article to others by providing the html code (containing your link text) to place in their web pages. You also use javascript code to syndicate your articles. Include bookmarking icons at the end of your article for easy bookmarking.

5. Create an RSS feed

RSS (really simple syndication) allows your readers to easily be notified when a new article is added to your website. If your blog or website was built with WordPress software then it already has RSS built into it. Every time you add new content the software automatically alerts the search engines.

6. Optimize your content

Search engines spider and index your content based on keywords. Before writing each article research the keywords people use to find information on the Web. Make sure these keywords receive a good number of searches each month. Weave these keywords into the title, article body and resource box of each article. This increases the chances of your article receiving good rankings in the search engines.

7. Write guest articles

Blog owners are constantly looking for new content to maintain their visitor’s interest. Offer a to be a guest writer for a blog that compliments your own site and receives lots of traffic. This will generate powerful incoming links to your own website.

If you implement these link building strategies on a regular basis you’ll see your rankings and traffic steadily increase.

Related articles
How to Syndicate Web Content With JavaScript
Syndicate Web Content Using An iFrame
How to Syndicate Your Articles Online

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