What can a professional website design company do for me?
The answer to this question is neither short nor easy. With a little research and thought you can find hundreds of reasons, but there are a few general statements that may help you realize your needs. First a professionally designed website can reach millions of people that might not otherwise be available to you. Second, customers can view products, services, or whatever you want to share from the comfort of their own home. No matter what type of business you are in, there are ways to grow on the web!
Why does it matter how it looks, as long as it works?
When you recieve a visitor to your site, they will instantly percieve the quality of your services or products. The first impression a customer or potential customer gets depends on the appearance of your website. A visitor will be interested and explore your site if it is appealing and easy to navigate. You are marketing yourself and your business to the world over the Internet and it is important to show your best.
I don't think a website will do anything for me, am I right?
No, many people overlook the various products, services, or business processes they can include on a website. Any communication or interactions that happen within your business can be made easier and more effecient by the web. Your business will save money and time while appealing to a much greater audience, the world.
I have heard that my website can be a place to help my employees do their jobs, is this true?
While most businesses view the Internet as an opportunity to expand their sales through traditional e-commerce, few people are aware of the opportunities of increasing efficiency and reducing expenses. Placing business processes, especially those done daily, on the internet is possible for all types of businesses.
So, I want to establish a strong presence on the Web. But where do I start?
The four easy steps we provide below will guide you in the direction of a professionally designed, developed and marketed Web site.
Step One: Domain Name (URL) Registration -- This is the address people will use to access your Web site (www.yourcompany.com). Once you have determined that the URL you wish to use is available, the cost to register a name is anywhere from $8.00 to $35.00 per year. A domain name needs to be renewed every year.
Step Two: Design of the Web Site -- This is where the look, feel, and content of the Web site are determined and created.
Step Three: Hosting Your Web Site on a Web Server -- This is basically where you rent space on a computer that is always connected to the Internet. Price will vary, depending on the amount of disk space you will have and the connection to the Internet.
Step Four: Marketing Your Web Site -- You should be thinking about the marketing of your Web site as it is being designed. The content of the site needs to reflex the search terms if you want your site to appear on search engines.
What is a protosite?
A "protosite" its just a preliminary drawing of your future website. It helps both you and Directory One establish the way your website will look. Elements such as page layout, colors, item position, navigation, etc. can be mocked up to speed the design process. If changes (colors, moving things around the page layout, adding columns, text, images, etc.) are needed they can be made before actual coding begins. Once you approve your protosite, we move forward and we will code the protosite you approve into your new website.
What is a website architecture?
It's something that will help us visualize all your website sections. This its very helpful as it will help the development process. You as the owner, will know what areas your website will cover; a web designer will know exactly what pages he needs to build and the content developer (writer) will know what content he needs to build for each specific areas.
What is a page layout?
Page layout is the geometry of a page. It will help us to define how many regions will appear and how they are visually organized.
Why we need to define website architecture?
Building a website without the website architecture its like building a house without a blueprint. We need to write on paper your ideas with our knowledge and suggestions before we start coding. We'll then code as planned. Otherwise imagine how difficult it might be for an architect to add or remove columns to a house and how expensive it might also be for you to pay for materials and resources each time the architect add or remove a new column. When we keep things organized it helps the process to get it complete quickly.
Do Flash movies affects my Search Engine rankings?
In theory Google can index Flash movies, but we don't think Flash movies/content gets very indexed very well. With things being as competitive as are right now for keyword/key-phrases optimization we don't recommend using them. However, if Flash annimation is important to you and you're up to the challenge, go for it.
Why validated code its important to design a website?
There's a lot of competition to get good spots in the search engines for some specific keywords or key-phrases, so proper html syntax and a clean code help toward better rankings. Let's say we have two competing sites, both are suitable for the top spot and the search engine has a tough time deciding who to put first. Chances are that the validated site with proper syntax will be the winner. Validation of the html code on your site alone will certainly not guarantee or secure you a high rating, but as with so many other things it will help and might even be the contributing factor to get you across the line.
Why are Privacy Policies and Terms of Use important for a website?
People who visit your website deserve to know what you're doing or what you will do with the information you ask from them online. Respect that privilege and tell them why you're asking for some personal or business information on your website. Serious people do serious things. Terms of Use are the rules people should know to navigate your website. It usually contains information about price and/or content changes on your website, it must advise people that information on your website might change without having to inform all your visitors about those changes and that you're the owner so you set the rules.
Do I need to edit my website myself?
On small business brochure websites, not necessarily but yes, you can. As technology changes fast these days, its not common to have validated websites with clean code using frontpage extensions to update content on a website. There are a few new tools to help you edit some content on your website however you must be sure that the WYSIWYG editor you will use to edit content directly supports the new standards to update content on your website. We also offer some good online tools (add ons) to help you with content and picture changes on your website. You might ask for more details if you're planning to update your website yourself. If you're getting a e-commerce or database solution from us, those tools give you a back-end where you can define and update content on your website fairly easy.
What does it means CSS?
That's an acronym that means Cascading Style Sheets. CSS allows web designers to attache styles (fonts, colors, size, margins, etc.) to HTML documents. It works like a template allowing web developers to define a style for an HTML element and then apply it to as many web pages as they want/need. We can also use styles to display different elements for different media (screen, printers). It simplifies web site maintenance and also helps the way a page displays content for Search Engine robots on the Internet (and that's a good thing!).
How frequently do I need to update my website?
It depends on what you're doing with your website, but we definitely recommend you a plan for this. Content is critical for optimization and "fresh" or new content is an important factor for ranking. If you have a small business brochure website you might probably want to update twice a year some pages on your website, you might also have a page to display the latest news on your website and you can add a couple of notes once a month or every two months if you want. For e-commerce or database websites you might update or add content more frequently, those kind of websites are build to have those changes as need it. In any case if you're doing optimization, you might want to talk with our optimization people about the importance of getting new information on your website and what will be the best way to do it without having problems with the code and content to optimize your website.
What does website usability mean?
It means the ease with which users can perform the tasks associated with your web site. Think of it as the quality of a user's experience when interacting with a product or system. When we're developing or creating a website, we try to keep things simple for your clients/prospects, if we keep it simple for them, then it will become a good website and it will invite people to contact you. Simple doesn't mean low quality, it means doing all that is possible to make it better and understandable.
What About payment gateway and shipping integration on ecommerce websites?
We can integrate the most common methods on our e-commerce websites, however you might have a specific request and it might take some time to study that specific case. We're open to talk with you and help you during the integration process but we work must together during the process. It may impact the amount of time we initially defined at the start of the project. So keep that in mind and try to keep shipping instructions simple and use common payment getaways providers. Common things make life easier.
