lovewebdesign

It’s funny because when I speak with new clients, especially the guys n gals that are newbies to the web world, I try to establish their primary goals and objectives for the site, the purpose for having one, their target audience etc… as in my view any half decent designer would. 

We tend to also take our clients through a learning curve as we go, teaching them that some aspects of their online presence need a regular input.  However, I find that I am becoming particularly bad at keeping this up myself.  I has now been quite some time since my last blog post, and yet I have accumulated quite a large quantity of material.

With the company growing, and being re-branded it has been difficult at times to stay on top of everything.  This for us, is where the social media aspects fail for the smaller company or for the sole trader.

What I am trying to say in this post is as I must learn to practise what I preach, we must all learn to adapt…

this is a good chart and one that I find really easy to reference – a definite bookmark!  There may be better ones, if you have any suggestions let us know – we would always be glad to hear about them…

http://reeddesign.co.uk/test/points-pixels.html

courtesy of Reed Design – Thanks

I am always being asked what is important from an SEO point of view?  This is a very big question for those that really do not have much idea what they are actually asking, and as this is not really my field of speciality I often find it hard to answer.  What I CAN tell you is there are a handful of things that you do need to ALWAYS complete and they are listed below:

Your Title Tag:

Looks like :   <title>keyword, category, website</title>

Should be no more than 70 character long.

Your Header Tags:

Look like : <h1>Most Important</h1>, <h2>Second Most Important</h2>, <h3>Third Most Important</h3> (H4, H5, H6 also)

Should always appear in ascending order i.e. H1 then H2, then H3 and so on.  The Header Tag sequence stops at H6/

Bold, Strong Text:

Looks like : <b>keyword</b> or <strong>keyword</strong>

Images:

Look like:  for XHTML <img src=”keyword.jpg” alt=”keyword description of file” title=”keyword description”/> or for HTML for XHTML <img src=”keyword.jpg” alt=”keyword description of file” title=”keyword description”> 

Hyperlinks:

Look like : <a href=http://www.mywebsite.com/page.html title=”keyword”>keyword in the anchor text here</a>

Site Maps:

Always try to include an XML sitemap as Google and the other robots are said to use these to assist navigation and listing of the website.  Visit http://www.xml-sitemaps.com for a free site map.

Common Problems:

The following list provides items that may be causing issues for robots that are trying to access your site.  If you suspect that your site has not been listed ask your web designer/developer to look at robot traps and the areas listed below.  They should know what you are talking about – if they don’t get another designer/developer!

Here is the list: 

• Forms with inputs
• Session IDs in URLs
• Cookie Restrictions
• Logins and Frames

Many of our clients request fonts for their web site that just simply will not show up on the majority of computers due to the viewers computer simply not having the font loaded. Below is a list of “web-safe” fonts that will insure your site to be viewable and appear consistently with almost all viewers to your site.

• Georgia and Trebuchet MS are bundled with Windows 2000/XP and they are also included in the IE font pack (and bundled with other MS applications), so they are quite common in Windows 98 systems.
• Symbolic fonts are only displayed in Internet Explorer, in other browsers a font substitute is used instead (although the Symbol font does work in Opera and the Webdings works in Safari).
• Book Antiqua is almost exactly the same font that Palatino Linotype, Palatino Linotype is included in Windows 2000/XP while Book Antiqua was bundled with Windows 98.
• These fonts are not TrueType fonts but bitmap fonts, so they won’t look well when using some font sizes (they are designed for 8, 10, 12, 14, 18 and 24 point sizes at 96 DPI).
• These fonts work in Safari but only when using the normal font style, and not with bold or italic styles. Comic Sans MS works in bold but not in italic. Other Mac browsers seems to emulate properly the styles not provided by the font.
• These fonts are present in Mac OS X only if Classic is installed.

This is the point in every year where we upgrade our phones and switch to comething more cost effective and of course, get a new phone!

This is great for the cash flow as we often get a better deal. However there is a downside, that is the one where you have to migrate all your information from one phone to another.

Now we have a classic example this year where we are transferring from Ericsson’s to Blackberry Storms and personally I can’t say I am looking forward to it that much! I do love the new gadgets and new technology but methinks I am an iPhone lover more than a blackberry lover.

Having now spoken to many other people about it though I am being told that their purposes in life are completely different? Is this true? Does anyone have a working view of Blackberry versus iPhone? Was the transition seamless? Was it a pain in the butt!

a short but potentially useful article for those that do not yet know/understand the purpose or relevance of  the little orange RSS button!

Courtesy of  Stilton Studios – Article Link: Link: What is RSS?

We have a new design underway with more features and less waffle!  We have been taking a good look at our website over a period of months and applying what we say to our customers to our own site!  What is it’s purpose?  What do we want from it?  and what should we be selling?

When you first start-up you tend to put everything that you can do on your website.  This is not always a bad thing as you never know what people are going to buy from you!  However, what happens after that is you never go back and adjust the website accordingly to what you are selling.

Why is this?  Do we forget? Get sidetracked by that lucrative job that takes all hours?  No-one really has the answer but in a year when everyone is turning to the web for their business promotion shouldn’t we all be having a good look at what we actually sell and what we want to promote and what is old, tired and out-of-date?

At our BNI Meeting this morning, Mark Keatley-Palmer of Sycamore Designs pointed out that quite often companies use the same marketing materials over and over again!  Do you do this?  Is yours tired?  Does it need a new look?

We certainly are under review – what about you? Are you ready for 2010?

We have much business and many things to do. A strategy is planned for this year to manage everything. With our long awaited re-design of both the website, new products and services and the advent of our bespoke services – which took the limelight in the last quarter of this year, we have much to look forward to in 2010.

Love Web Design has grown again in 2009 with much thanks to the team here however, we also owe thanks to those companies and sole traders that we work with on a regular basis – you know who you are and we thank you very much, we hope to continue developing our relationships throughout 2010.

So, enough waffling for now…

Lets all look forward to a good prosperous new year in 2010.

Sarah

A Great Read courtesy of Ivan Misner – Check it out…

Have a Good Story…Share It!

A useful read from this weeks Links for Light Reading courteousy of  <a href=”http://www.maxdesign.com.au”>www.maxdesign.com.au</a>.

<a href=”http://www.fatdux.com/blog/2009/08/07/20-tips-for-writing-for-the-web/” title=”20-tips-for-writing-for-the-web”>20 tips for writing for the web</a>.

Soon to follow my own series on how to Write for the Web – mind you I think I shall have to read this one again though make sure I don’t have to change anything

Sarah