August 7th, 2010
Take control of getting your site actualized by a developer and know the process it will save you money and aquire you a site that actually works the intended purpose!
1. Understanding your business and how you are currently established in your market.
In order to create a site that truly meets your requirements; you first need to have a full understanding of your business including your products, and/or services and more importantly their market position. You then have to acknowledge how you want to explain your business and what it offers in 7 seconds or less. Sounds impossible? Well that is the average time that a user will consider the point “is this site I searched for?”.
2. Budget and estimation
Have a budget in mind and don’t be afraid to let the developers know what it is. In saying this: BE REALISTIC, $500 will never see a great web site created, nor will they be anything left in the bank to market it.
3. The creative process
Be armed with example sites and more importantly the elements of the site you like so they can accomplish an understanding of what you would like to see on your site and also what you find frustrating about other sites. This will build a good profile and analyze not only what type of site to construct for you but your tolerance to colours, animations, layouts etc. for your requirements which will allow for effective development. The more interaction and information you allow them in the beginning the more time you will save everybody in the long run by getting what you want 1st time round. Check with the designers on how many rounds of changes come with the contract, most will allow for a total conceptual redesign only once and 2 rounds of changes after that.
4. Production and Content
After the home page design is made, the developers will more than likely acquire the general layout of this concept and then formulate the inner page template. It is this template that will be duplicated for most of your pages for your site.
Present your content in a pre-proofed word processed document; don’t get too creative with the document fonts etc. as these will not be preserved when the content is copied into the code of the site. It is suggested that you do use bolding, underlining, headings and sub heading though ,as these highlights are transferred into the site and are crucial later on in not only interacting with the reader but for Search Engine Optimisation.
One last tip for content; present a decent amount of content but provide it in a way that a reader may acquire a summary of what you are trying to get across in the 1st couple of paragraphs and an image or to. The rest of the paragraphs that get into finer details ARE FOR GOOGLE !
5. Development Programming and CMS
If your website contains Content Managed Areas (CMS) or has any other dynamic sections the developers will wrap your design around a content management program such as Joomla or Drupal or they may have a custom built system. Make sure that you get to see how the CMS system works on another site they have developed or an example site they may have. You need to know that you can use and know the system when your site is complete.
6. Testing and training
We work closely with the developers to test your site especially if there are any CMS or special programs that have been created for you. You can guarantee if it is has just been written for you then it will not operate 100% first time round. This is a where things can get ugly in the process you must understand the way the program operates and test it as if you were normal website user. If it doesn’t make sense to you, odds are it won’t make sense to your audience. Make sure you test your website on more than just your browser, try to test it on Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari. All of these browsers are avialable on the internet for free!
7. Launch – going live
When the developers are ready to make your site live make sure you have completed the above testing step until you are happy that this website is the best representation of your business / product it can be. Remember even though you can change things after going live it is still a poor reflection on your business if there are spelling mistakes or broken images when you launch.
8. Marketing
There is little point in having a website if nobody visits it, make sure as part of you contract you have discussed search engine optimisation and or search engine marketing as part of your website build. This is the absolute most important factor of the whole process. If you are the only one looking at your site then you are in trouble.
Remember Search Engine Optimisation is about 30% Onsite (getting your site correct for Search Engine to index correctly) and 70% Promotion. Any developer who tells you otherwise hasn’t been in the industry too long.
For more information about web design Brisbane, contact Web Site Blue. Our web designers understand marketing as well as design.
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August 6th, 2010
A logo is a imperative step to forming a business. It is the face of your business. And like your face expresses the tone of your business, gestures the service and demonstrates the professionalism or lack there of.
People spend a lot of money on the formation of their logo and walk away with no artwork files. Then a couple months down the track when they need to put signage on their new building they cannot track the design studio down that created the original logo for them and so incur costs to have it redone. This is needless and may cause obstacles when trying to replecate the logo exactly as determined originally.
We have created some basic tips you for to think about when creating a logo. Hopefully these will help you from experiencing any future obstacles.
Tip 1
First things first - you need to decide if you would like your logo to have an accompanying icon. It is hinted that if your service or product name is not in your business name then perhaps an icon will help in conveying a clear message across to your target audience.
An icon can add an extra element to your branding in that you could use the icon on its own on collateral where perhaps you are sighting for a more illustrative finish without losing recognition.
A good example of this is the well-known and executed Fedex logo.
Tip 2
Colour can be an extremely important decision as it not only could affect the output costs but can also limit your output use. Consider the end result and what you will be commiting your branding onto in the future. Make sure your designer is aware of this as they should design accordingly.
Tip 3
Assure you get a back up disk of your logo as a master file and assure that it includes all the files needed for the different printing formats.
Creative software updates frequently and some programmes become obsolete. Confirm you have a copy of your logo as a PDF - with the text converted to curves.
Tip 4
Using images in your logo is not very easy to arrange. For example it is hard to to reverse into black and white. Images also have limitations when it comes to size - they can only be reproduced to a certain size before they start pixilation.
Tip 5
Using gradients in your logo is not recommended. This too can have limitations when it comes to output for ie: gradients are hard to reproduce when embroidering fabrics.
Tip 6
Assure sure the font is legible. Some logos need to be reproduced on small pieces of collateral ie: post stamps. It is important that in this case the text is
readable
Tip 7
Ensure that you acquire a copy of your logo in CMYK high resolution 300 dpi (for printing use) and RGB 72 dpi(for web use).
Tip 8
It is important to have a style guide of your logo. It will clearly show you how to use your logo so it looks exactly the same every time it is reproduced. This allows you to keep your corporate image consistent.
Tip 9
Make sure that you get a letter from the design studio declaring that you own the copyright to your logo.
If you follow these tips then not only will you acquire a well-designed logo but you will also own the artwork. And when it comes to reproducing your collateral you will be doing it the most cost effective way.
For logo design Brisbane and web design Brisbane, contact graphic design Brisbane today for a free two hour consultation.
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May 25th, 2010
To be paid, you would imagine is fundamentally important in your business because if you aren’t getting paid, why are you in business?
You will be astounded at the number of business people who permit their clientele to pay up when and if they get on with it. I am acquainted with one businessman who repeatedly collects bad debts like accolades. For what reason? Very possibly because he doesn’t bring himself to take the money and allows people to overpower him.
If you let somebody credit, do so only when they cleared consistency to you by paying cash on delivery (COD) for a time. Secondly, you must check whether they have the means to pay you - if not you shouldn’t do business with them. Don’t kid yourself into saying “I need the work” or “I need the sales”. It’s fruitless doing the service or providing the goods for nada if you aren’t paid.
If you are the kind of person who can’t ask for the payment even when the job has been completed, try these ideas:
Tell your customer that when the work is finished, you will need cash or cheque. They will likely have it on them at completion and you will not have to demand your pay.
When you send out an initial quote, make sure your payment terms are simple.
Create an invoice including the terms of payment clearly listed and send the customer the invoice when the job is finished. They will review the invoice and immediately assume they will pay you the money now without you being required to say a word. Manufacture a “nasty boss” who might flay you alive if you do not bring back the payment for the job.
Organise your banking institution to have you running with Merchant facilities so you can have credit cards such as Mastercard and Visa. The large part of people have credit cards and it can stop the dilemma of the client not holding a cheque book or not having the cash at the time.
Otherwise, don’t be frightened to hold your goods until the payment is made. Remember, until the goods have been paid for, the goods are still yours.
If you plan to give a customer credit, make sure you get the following details off them at a time BEFORE you allow them credit.
- Name
- Address
- Phone number
- Bank name and address
- Account no.
- 3 trade references with their names, addresses and phone numbers
After you record all this detail, ring the bank branch and make sure that they do operate an account at there. Then, contact every trade reference and request if they pay their fees on time or if there have been any issues with them.
Most people will be willing to tell you if the person is troublesome. If everything is OK, allow them a moderate level of debt, say no more than $500 (depending on your business). Monitor the operation of the account for a few months before allowing this amount to be exceeded.
If you’re looking for a Brisbane web design company or Brisbane SEO company, talk to Search Tempo. Check out their SEO prices today.
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