Find out why it can be beneficial to start SEO work early in a websites development.
Ensuring that a website is properly optimised for search engines is one of the most important steps that an online business will take. Until a business manages to become renowned online (such as amazon, ebay, etc) a huge amount of their traffic will be derived from search engines. Due to this it is vital that the website appears near the top of search engine results pages. Despite the fact that most business owners are aware of the importance of achieving a high ranking in the big 3 search engines (Google, Yahoo and Live) a huge number of them don’t even consider search engine optimisation until they have either launched a website or are preparing to. This article aims to explain why it can be hugely beneficial to start an SEO campaign at the same time as, or slightly before, the website is being designed.
Keyphrase Selection
One of the most important steps in the search engine optimisation process is the selection of keywords. There are several important aspects to look for in a keyphrase that is likely to prove successful. Firstly it is vital that enough people actually search for a particular term. Secondly it is necessary to analyse the competitors that already hold the page one rakings for that phrase. If the top 20 results in the major search engines are held by dominant authority sites with high pagerank ratings it is extremely unlikely that a new website will be able to have a strong impact. Finally the keyphrase has to be considered in relation to how well it relates to the page that it will be linked to. For example, for businesses it is integral that they not only generate traffic but also that the traffic is likely to convert to sales. Typically highly generalised keyphrases will generate traffic that is looking for information rather than products or services so it is worthwhile looking into more specific long-tail keyphrases.
When designing and building a website it is enormously beneficial if the keyphrases have already been selected. This allows the developer to tie the different sections of the website (or product categories for e-commerce sites) to the keywords making each of these sections far easier to optimise for in the long run.
On-site SEO
One of the first steps that an SEO specialist will take when beginning to optimise a website is to analyse the website and create a list of recommendations on what can be improved to give the site the best chance at achieving high rankings. While often these changes are relatively straightforward to implement after a website is completed it makes far more sense if these recommendations are made early to allow the designer to implement them on their initial build. By doing this the owner of the site can save the considerable amounts of time and money that would have been incurred by writing and then rewriting the code and content on each page.
Copywriting
Another reason for starting SEO before a site is completed is that the copy on the site can be written with search engines in mind. While it is obviously important that the website is written for its human visitors first and foremost there are some straightforward SEO techniques (such as utilising the keyphrase within the text and linking to other relevant pages on the site using keyphrase appropriate anchor text) that can help boost a websites ranking. By figuring out the keyphrases early and writing SEO friendly content from the start a lot of the time and money that is often spent redrafting content can be saved.
Ultimately while it is perfectly possible to embark on an SEO campaign after a website has been completed it usually makes far more sense to start it early and then build the site with the SEO in mind. This can save the considerable amount of time that rewriting Titles, headers, descriptions, content, etc can take and result in a website that is ready to launch with the highest potential to rank highly.
10 Web Marketing Trends for 2010
Where to invest, what to test and which deserve a rest
Allocating your small business marketing budget to maximize return on investment and minimize the risks of a low or negative return can become a lot more unpredictable when your investments involve trends and emerging technologies. Investing in trends requires smart timing and consumer analysis.
You would think that marketing trends would be closely aligned with consumer trends, since effective marketing depends on getting your messages to appear where the highest concentration of qualified eyeballs are focused. That isn't always the case, however, because trend-focused marketers tend to place an inflated value on revolutionary technology and early adoption.
Thankfully, the majority of consumers permanently relocate their attention with much less frequency than marketing bandwagon drivers. Still, missing a trend or sticking with a has-been spells opportunity lost at best and negative returns or loss of market share at worst.
Trend #1: Search Engine Optimization
Advice: Test
Sites with relevant content and credible links will continue to rule the search rankings in the coming year, but 2010 has the potential to reveal a few new standards. As the volume of web content continues to grow, consumers will demand even more relevant and personalized search results. That means search engines will be looking for more relevant and personalized content from publishers and brands. In fact, the search engine algorithms are already beginning to pay more attention to date of publication, geo-location, mobile device browsers, past behavior and social media content.
Don't abandon your current SEO strategy in search of personalization, but make sure you allocate a portion of your budget to testing content, keywords and links that are targeted toward niche audiences. Test keyword and link placement in social media, local content and mobile websites, and make an effort to more frequently refresh some of the content you devote to search engine rankings. Once the search engines have tested these new search targets and revealed some concrete standards, you should be prepared to invest accordingly.
Trend #2: Paid Search
Advice: Invest
Paid search hasn't seen a revolutionary trend since the idea of the long tail was applied to keyword bidding. That's OK, because consumers will still use search engines in 2010 as a primary means of finding products and services to fulfill their needs, and they will still be clicking on relevant ads. Search advertising prices will remain reasonable, and average returns will remain comparably high as larger companies with decreased search marketing budgets continue to allocate resources to lower-cost SEO tactics in hopes of attracting visitors at lower prices. 2010 has the potential for even more downward pressure on price-per-click if Bing can gain enough loyal searchers to attract business away from Google.
You won't exactly feel like you're in the driver's seat when your search marketing placement choices are limited to Google, Microsoft or both, but that doesn't mean you should shy away from investing in the highly qualified leads that paid search is capable of producing for your small business.
Trend #3: E-mail Marketing
Advice: Invest
It isn't hard to justify an investment in e-mail marketing when the cost of sending e-mails is so low. The low cost isn't the only reason to send e-mail, however. Most consumers still consider e-mail to be their primary form of communication, even though there are several alternative ways for consumers to subscribe to periodic content from small businesses.
E-mail marketing will remain highly predictable in 2010 and may even become more powerful as e-mail service providers improve social media integration, search engine access to archived e-mails, auto-responders and new integrated applications. If you don't already use an e-mail service provider, invest in one in 2010. If you already use an e-mail service, invest in your e-mail list and in producing valuable content to nurture leads and attract repeat customers.
The cost of building a permission-based list is likely to stay the same in 2010 as it was in 2009, but more than one-third of consumers changed at least one of their e-mail addresses in 2009--due to job changes or other economic factors. Spend more time and money in 2010 focused on keeping your e-mail list current when those consumers return to work and change e-mail addresses again.
Trend #4: Social Network Marketing
Advice: Test
Social media has one redeeming quality for marketers--lots and lots of eyeballs. That's attractive if you're a major brand, but profitable interaction will continue to be the exception for small businesses in 2010 rather than the rule. A good test of your social network marketing potential is to survey your current customers to see how many of them consider social networking to be a primary form of communication. You should probably experiment with a Facebook fan page and a Twitter page if you find that a meaningful percentage of your current customers indicate an interest in following your business.
Make 2010 your year to test content that attracts repeat and referral business. Your current customers are more likely than total strangers to respond to offers posted on social networks because they already know you and trust you based on their prior purchases.
Trend #5: Blogging
Advice: Let it rest
If you're writing a blog to help with search engine rankings or to inform existing customers, you should continue to test or invest. If you're blogging in an attempt to attract new prospects and convert them to customers, however, 2010 will be a year that exposes the blogosphere's vulnerability to the law of averages. Converting prospects into customers depends on driving visitors to content that maximizes conversions, and that means your conversion rate is only as good as the content on your landing page. If that landing page is your blog and your blog changes frequently, your conversion rate is only as good as your latest blog post.
Instead of blogging to convert your website visitors into customers in 2010, work hard to test and develop great landing page content. When you find something that works, don't change it.
Trend #6: Web Presence
Advice: Invest
If you want people to see the content on your website, it might make sense to advertise the location of your website content by placing ads on other high-traffic websites. Driving visitor traffic to your website isn't the way to go for 2010, however. Instead, you need to spend 2010 driving your website content to the visitor traffic.
The difference stems from the fact that content aggregation websites like YouTube are boosting consumer demand for instant gratification and what I like to call "content nesting." Content nesting allows consumers to browse through content fed to them through a single web page, or nest, so that they don't have to click on links to individual websites all over the World Wide Web, which takes more time--not to mention that the results can be anywhere from unpredictable to shockingly irrelevant.
To take advantage of content nesting in 2010, your website content needs to be nested in as many content aggregation sites as possible. For example, a lot of people search for videos on YouTube. If you have a video on your website and it's not also on YouTube, people on YouTube won't bother searching for your website. To them, YouTube represents the total number of videos available to them on their topic of interest.
Trend #7: Mobile Marketing
Advice: Test
In case you haven't heard, mobile marketing is all about marketing to people through their mobile phones and smart-phone devices. Small businesses haven't had much of an opportunity to engage consumers on mobile devices, but 2010 has the potential to change that.
Demand is increasing dramatically for mobile applications and mobile web-browsing due to wider adoption of devices like the iPhone and the Google Android phone. As more people adopt these phones and features in 2010, look for small-business marketing services to start providing lower-cost mobile marketing solutions like text messaging, mobile e-mail marketing, mobile websites, mobile application development and location-based marketing.
Make 2010 your year to collect mobile preferences from your prospects and customers, and use tools like Google Analytics to see how many people are visiting your website on mobile web browsers. If you find interest in mobile interaction among your customers, begin testing simple mobile marketing campaigns such as sending a few mobile coupons via text or building a mobile micro-site for one of your products.
Trend #8: Podcasting and Online Radio
Advice: Let it rest
Online radio is actually on a bit of a growth trend, but that's just because so-called terrestrial radio is suffering so much that radio advertisers are switching their investments to digital formats. 2010 will be a year of exploration for online broadcasters as they struggle to find and attract loyal audiences. iTunes has long been the leader in podcasting, but there are still no clear leaders in internet radio.
Even if leaders emerge in 2010, internet broadcasters will need to make their media more sharable, more engaging, more trackable and more mobile to attract money from advertisers. If you're looking to attract an audience by broadcasting or advertising on broadcast media, go with online video in 2010 and wait for radio to finish reinventing itself.
Trend #9: Online Video
Advice: Invest
If a picture paints a thousand words, how many words does a 30-second online video paint? Countless buying emotions and memorable brand moments are possible with video. Until recently, spreading your message with video was limited to the television screen. In 2010, watch for video to become more accessible to small businesses through online outlets. Online video is interactive, memorable, widely accessible, cheap to create and highly shareable. There's also a lot of investment happening around video, which is sure to create even more low-cost opportunities for small businesses to participate in video promotions in 2010.
Video presents a great opportunity for small-business marketing, but don't think of video as a replacement for text. As powerful as video can be, it can be more cumbersome than text because you can't scan a video as quickly as you can scan a page of headlines, links and text to quickly find the exact information you need. Use your investments to find the right balance for your customers.
Trend #10: Coupons, Discounts and Savings
Advice: Test
OK, this one isn't entirely an internet marketing trend, but it's important enough to mention because of the economy. 2009 was another tough year for retailers, and consumers are so accustomed to shopping for deals that they might begin to expect the plethora of deep discounts currently available to continue forever. If you're engaged in heavy discounting to attract sales and survive the economic downturn, you'll need to spend 2010 slowly weaning your customers off your lower prices, assuming that the economy recovers. Resetting expectations won't be easy, so try swapping discounts for special privileges like loyalty discounts, free upgrades and other offers that won't lock you in to price comparisons.
Internet marketing trends develop quickly, so expect many new and exciting trends to emerge in 2010. Don't be too quick to jump on new bandwagons because consumers move more slowly than marketers and technology. Stay focused on attracting repeat business, deepening your customer relationships and solving problems for people. Those are the trends that never fail small businesses.
Trends and highlights emerging from this Internet predictions roundup:
Content formats: One of the main difficulties of the web is being able to really track a story as it develops and creating engaging formats for long-form articles. In 2010, news organizations and publishers will design stories that are more suited to the way readers consume online content. As a result, other formats that are either engaging and eye-catching will gain momentum in 2010.
Content nesting: In 2010 your own content will spread on multiple locations more rapidly than you can imagine. That is why your website content needs to be nested in as many content aggregation sites as possible. Social media, RSS / blog directories and influential websites should be your main target. Why is this really important? Picture this: If you have a video on your website that is not on YouTube, people on YouTube will not bother searching for your website, because they simply do not need to go elsewhere. For them, YouTube already represents the total number of videos available on their topic of interest. Got it?
Social media marketing: A survey by Verticle Response, Inc shows that 68% of small businesses plan to increase social marketing. Social media will indeed continue to be a great way for marketers and brands to create conversations with customers. So, be sure to make 2010 your year to test content that attracts repeat and referral business. Customers are more likely to respond to social media marketing, because they already know you and trust you based on feedback from other people or their prior purchases.
Online reputation: With more and more consumers making decisions based on what they find online, small business owners will have to pay greater attention to track the buzz around their brands. As consumers prove to be highly influenced by online reviews and comments, business owners that do not monitor their brand mentions may have a hard time to prevent negative word of mouth. In 2010 expect those that will invest time protecting their online identities to succeed, and others to fail.
Paid / free content: A recent report stated that 80% of consumers will not pay for online content. Another survey by showed that most people will pay a maximum of R30 per month for online paid subscriptions. What this means is that brands of 2010 are going to be built through a different model, based on consumer demand, the endless supply of content and the free distribution systems we all have.
Online video: In 2010, online video will keep growing, keeping pace with the good trends of this year. Online video is interactive, memorable, widely accessible, cheap to create and highly shareable, that is why entrepreneurs and business owners are willing to invest even more on video. It is crucial though, that you do not overlook your text content for video. As powerful as video can be, it can be more cumbersome than text because you cannot scan a video as quickly as you can scan a page of headlines, links and text to quickly find the exact information you need.
Online video advertising: Pre-roll ads will continue to dominate online video advertising. No innovation from Hulu, YouTube or Vivaki will prove as effective as a 0:15 or 0:30 coupled with a companion ad. YouTube only gains massive market share with its abundance of pre-roll and unless a brand new alternative is developed in the coming months, expect pre-roll to stay.
Business models: Expect new business models to emerge clearly in 2010. While alternative monetization opportunities have already sprung in 2009, it is next year that new business models will reach maturity and become a serious option for Internet entrepreneurs. Whatever you may choose, your main goal should be to increase, extend and diversify the range of your revenue-making channels. Entrepreneurs that have bet all their horses on a single business model may find unpleasant surprises, so start acting now.
Hyper niches: As already written, in 2010 content will be more and more ubiquitous and accessible. Those that will have the best content next year will float to the top, while everyone else will make less money and have fewer opportunities. It will be much harder to compete with big brands, which means next year the focus will be on niches and what John Arnold of Entrepreneur defines "hyper-niches." People will have to really narrow down their market niche in order to stand out and succeed.
SEO: Conversion rate optimization will dominate SEO next year. Still the most under-utilized and highest ROI activities in the marketing department, conversion rate optimization will reach more awareness and brands will focus on improving conversion over time. Online businesses can generate so much revenue from this, yet few invest. 2010 will establish this trend.
Internet advertising is huge
With the growth of information on the internet has growth the amount of time people spend on it, which has in turn generated a new market for internet advertising. Some of the wealthiest companies in the world have made sure that they get a piece of the internet marketing pie, and for a good reason.
Internet advertising is targeted
As a company looking for advertising opportunities to a specific market, internet advertising offers some targeting methods that insure that those who see your ads are the ones most likely to buy. Programs like Google's AdWords and AdSense match up advertisers with content that their target market peruses regularly. Forget the costly machine-gun strategy of newspaper advertisements, internet advertising is targeted!
Internet advertising enables good conversion tracking
It's impossible to get a good idea of how many people see advertising through traditional means. Tracking the reach of newspaper and television advertisments is difficult. However, internet advertising allows the advertiser to track the number of impressions an ad gets (how many people see it), and how many visits their business web site gets from particular ads, making it easy to see what kind of conversion rates internet advertisements are getting.
Internet advertising has lower entry-level fees
If you have a limited budget, internet advertising can be much more in reach than traditional methods. A small yellow-page ad can cost several hundred rand. However, you can bid for advertisements on Google and Overture on a performance basis. That means that you only get charged when visitors click on the advertisement, and bidding starts at a nickle or dime a pop.
Internet advertising can be much cheaper
Because of the targeted nature of internet advertising and the ability to track the effectiveness of ads, conversion rates from internet advertising is typically much better than traditional mediums.
Internet advertising has greater range
One more benefit is that, since the internet spans the globe, pockets of your target market scattered around the world can all be targetted at once, rather than trying to find different publications, radio stations and television stations that cater to a particular geographical area.
On the whole, internet advertising can be a great way to get the word out there about your service or product in a cost-effective, efficient way.
Internet Explorer 8, Firefox 3. No, that's not the result of a non-league football match with no goalies but the names of the browsers fighting for control of the way we view the internet. And, as Zeta discovers, Microsoft isn't having things all its own way.
When Firefox 3 was launched on 17 June, the free web browser generated 8,002,530 unique downloads in a day. It’s a hugely impressive figure that constituted a new Guinness world record, albeit in a category that didn’t previously exist.
For the Mozilla Foundation, the non-profit organisation behind Firefox, successfully encouraging so many users to download the new browser on day one was a canny way to grab headlines. But the release of Firefox 3 also marked the moment in which the cultural shift away from Microsoft’s browser Internet Explorer finally went mainstream.
Internet Explorer (IE) has been bundled with Windows since 1995. By 1999, it had become the world’s most widely used web browser, a position it has held ever since. At its peak in early 2003, IE achieved a staggering 95% usage share, leaving its onetime bitter rival Netscape Navigator as nothing more than a forgotten cyber-casualty.
But since July 2003, the level of IE’s dominance has steadily declined. Figures for June 2008 indicate that its market share is now at 73%, compared to 19% for Firefox and 6% for Safari, which is the native browser on Apple Macs and the iPhone (all other browsers have a share of less than 1% each).
Microsoft had become complacent. The first iteration of IE6 was launched in August 2001 and wasn’t replaced by a full IE release for over five years. The debut of the much-hyped IE7 in October 2006 failed to have an impact on IE’s overall market share. Indeed, by that point, Firefox - which was first released in November 2004 - had highlighted just how archaic IE’s interface was.
With its inclusion of tabbed browsing, integrated search box and - thanks to its open source architecture - the option for users to customise it with over 5000 third-party add-ons, Firefox quickly became the technophile’s browser of choice.
In contrast, the muted response that met the release of IE7 offers some clues as to why IE no longer enjoys the ubiquity it once had. Beyond incorporating some of the features that were the catalyst for many users switching to Firefox in the first place, IE7 offered little innovation.
Curiously, IE did have the opportunity to introduce tabbed browsing years before Safari and Firefoxpopularised it. NetCaptor, an alternative IE interface that was first released in January 1998, incorporated tabs at the bottom of the browser.
If a user wanted to have multiple pages open at once, they were able to use this neat solution as opposed to having to open numerous windows. It was, and remains, an elegant solution but one that IE belatedly embraced only after other browsers highlighted its usefulness.
But IE7’s limitations are more than just anecdotal. Its lack of standards compliancy means that it fails the Web Standards Project’s Acid2 test, which identifies flaws in web browsers: any browser that follows the World Wide Web Consortium HTML and CSS 2.0 specifications will pass. The test is based on whether a somewhat startled-looking smiley face is displayed correctly.
In October 2005, Apple’s Safari was the first browser to make the grade, something that Firefox, Opera and others have also since done. IE remains the only major browser that’s not Acid2 compliant, forcing web developers to insert conditional code to compensate for the differences between IE and other browsers.
Internet Explorer 8, which has been available to download in Beta since March and is expected to be officially released in 2009, comes at a critical moment in IE’s history. Microsoft’s IE development team have already confirmed that it is Acid2 compliant. It also has integrated developer tools, meaning that HTML, CSS and JavaScript debugging can take place directly from the browser.
A feature called Activities assists copying and pasting between web pages, while WebSlices will allow users to subscribe to a specific element of a web page, which can then be viewed from the Favourites bar (think Mac OS X’s Dashboard).
There are some well considered security touches, from safer mash-ups to domain highlighting, which automatically highlights a site’s owning domain to help users identify attempts at phishing. Handily, IE8 will also offer a Firefox-style crash recovery mechanism: if the browser crashes, any web pages being viewed will be salvaged when the browser is restarted.
But, given Microsoft’s closed-source approach to software development, what IE8 won’t do is reflect the open and adaptable nature of Firefox, which users are able to pimp with everything from blog editors to PicLens’ 3D wall.
IE remains couched in old web thinking. As long as that continues to be the case, it’ll risk losing yet more users to Firefox, whose market share has increased from 14% to 21% over the last two years. What began as a cool alternative for in-the-know webheads may be on its way to beating one of the world’s largest corporations at its own game.
For as much innovation that’s occurred on the Internet, Websites are still pretty much one size fits all. Amazon might give you a product recommendation or Google Maps might remember your favorite location, but sites look the same for you and me: same color, same layout, same text, same graphics and same videos.
Enter Magnify 360, a Los Angeles-based company changing how we see Websites — literally. Like bite-size nuggets of text? Prefer graphics? Bright or dark backgrounds? You’re covered. The “behavioral marketing” company worked with statistical mathematicians and psychologists to come up with more than 1,000 different personality profiles that take into account things like your location, bandwidth, type of computer and viewing history, and present you with a unique Website catered to your personality.
So this all sounds neat, but there are some real numbers backing things up. I spoke with Magnify’s founder and CEO, Olivier Chaine, about the company’s success: He said most of their clients see a return on their investment 7-15 times over in the first 90 days; the company guarantees clients a 10% increase in revenue or they get their money back; it’s grown 130%-140% each of the last few years; employs more than 40 people in its California, Kansas, Ukraine and China locations; and just raised another $2.5 million for expansion. With clients like HBSC, Citrix and Intuit it’s hard to scoff.
I also asked him if we should be worried about the creepy big-brotherish scenarios this concept conjures. Chaine told me not to worry, that Magnify would “never sell that information.” He admitted that the criticism aimed at online data-miners is “well-deserved,” but Magnify prefers to play the role of digital concierge, not private investigator.
It is often contemplated by business owners and managers whether they should make use of web professionals. Is it better to pay the price for a website that will show results in their success, or is this another area where they can save money and go for the cheapest possibilities out there?
Although now-a-days creating a website is an integral part of every business model, just making a website according to what you think looks good and what you like is hardly a smart and creative idea.
It is very important to note that a well designed website can lead to online success but a badly designed website can have adverse effect on your reputation and hamper the potential growth of your business.
The chief reason why so many businesses fail to tap the potential of internet is due to the fact that although their products/services are better than their competitors, their website does not reflect the same, thus turning away potential clients and damaging the repute of the company.
When designing a website it is very important for you to understand that your on-line success depends on your website and if it is poorly designed the potential clients will not waste anytime in pressing the back button. So it is very important for you to have a professional web designing company handle the job of designing your website because they have the adequate knowledge and know-how to help you create a website the can cater to the needs of your target audience.
Apart from designing your website, professional web designing companies also offer various other services like web hosting, Search Engine Marketing and website copywriting and take care of your other web related needs. This can help enhance the visibility of your website and help you attract potential clients and lead to online success by building a unique brand for your products and services.
Although a professional website designing company can garner to a lot of your website related needs and offer a variety of services for improving your online business, website designing has many other crucial aspects that require an active participation on your part as well.
The most important thing for you to find out before going on with your website is to have clearly defined goals as to what you wish to achieve with your website and having a clear idea about your targeted audience is very significant. This requires lot of efforts and in depth research on your part as it will be of no use having a website which fails to grab the attention of your potential clients. It is also very important to highlight on your website what makes you different from others who offer similar services and also why should a client choose to work with you instead of your competitors. In other words it is very important that you identify your unique selling point and highlight it on your website. It is very important that a person visiting your website knows what makes you different from your competitors and other similar companies.
A professionally designed website can go long way in not only increasing the growth of your online business but also helping you build a brand image and enhancing your repute. A well designed website puts the right impression on your clients and helps you build a long term brand image for yourself and your company.
Although it is widely believed that putting up a website and having a Search Engine Optimization company (SEO) do the rest can lead to instant online success, it is hardly the truth. A SEO company may improve your search engine ranking enhance traffic to your site but it cannot guarantee that a person who clicks on your website stays on it. It cannot convert a visitor into clients, this can only be done by a professionally designed website.
If your website does not appeal to the visitors than no matter how much money you spend on optimization of your site, it will give you no return if it is poorly designed but as a consequence it might hamper your brand image and damage long term reputation of the company.
Thus hiring a professional web site design company is worth its cost and can go a long way in enhancing your online success and developing a brand for your company.
So although the web provides unlimited opportunities for success and different avenues for developing your business, it also takes a lot of efforts and thinking on your part before you create a website and take a plunge into the world of web.
Inside Google’s design process (Business Week)
While many eyes are trained on Mountain View for the official release of the new G1/Android phone from Google and T-Mobile, I got an insight into Google’s design process from the company’s VP of Product Management, SundarPichai, and Group Product Manager, Brian Rakowski. These two spearheaded the launch of Chrome, a browser I’m truthfully still getting used to, but whose design certainly adheres to the company’s overarching philosophy of superficial simplicity disguising sophisticated functionality (for an indepth look at Chrome’s development, check out this really fine Wired article by Steven Levy.)
A problem that has beset engineering and technology-driven companies in the past is the disconnect between its various departments. Engineers dictated what should be done thanks to what could be done, technologically speaking. They then handed the ideas over to designers who were charged with making sense of it all. The disconnect often resulted in poor products, annoyed engineers and frustrated designers (and, ultimately, often, displeased CEOs.)
Clearly, Google is also rooted in engineering, but in its case neither technology nor aesthetics has a superior role. Instead, engineers are as invested in the design as in the functionality. As Rakowsi put it: “It’s an integrated approach where engineers are responsible from start to finish.” Such continuity ensures that aesthetics and functionality are one and the same. I’ve written before that sometimes the results aren’t as visually sophisticated as they could be, and some designers might feel that they’ve been left out of the equation altogether, but the logic of the approach is hard to reproach.
“Design is integral to everything we do,” said Pichai firmly. “We don’t say ‘here’s a feature, here’s a spec, now go and build it.’ We design it, we build a prototype and we make it real… Every pixel in Chrome represents countless discussions and people agonizing over the right decision.”
Of course, that agony is balanced by Google's obsession with data analysis, which is harnessed for the design approval process too. "A lot of our design is opinion driven but we do usability testing to make sure what we're doing is well received," said Pichai. "We don't go with something just because someone feels strongly about it, if the data says people aren't clicking on it."
By way of example, the pair pointed to the download manager toolbar, which caused them real problems and which required many trips back to the drawing board. The issue: How to resolve the tension between a single user's different requirements. Should the toolbar interrupt, to alert a user that the file is all present and correct? Or should it sit quietly in the background? Given that at various times, a user might prefer either result, the design solution wasn't initially clear. "We couldn't get it 90% right," remembers Rakowski. "The design needed to be flexible enough to support all of the potential different uses."
Their answer took on board complaints/feedback/suggestions from early users and was both simple and radical. Now, a large arrow briefly points to the downloaded file at the bottom left of the browser screen. It's there when needed, you know it's there, but it doesn't interrupt your work flow. It's an elegant solution -- that works.
Chrome isn't perfect, but Pichai and Rakowski are probably more aware of that than most. Even now they're working on adding new functionality, such as autofill, as well as on versions for Linux and Apple (those should come "early next year," they say.) But that's the thing about an evolutionary design process: the best is always yet to come.
With hundreds of hosting services ready to meet the needs of webmasters, choosing one can be a daunting task. There are many things to consider when choosing a hosting service for your website. Determining your specific needs based on the type of website you are planning is the first and most important step.
Basics of Hosting Services for Business or Personal Websites
Considering the amount of time and effort that goes into a website and its importance to you or perhaps even your business, you will want to find a hosting service that has an excellent reputation and offers little down-time. Today, even highly reputable hosts will have "budget offerings" that can provide stable hosting at reasonable rates. Though many people make the decision based solely on price, the best deal isn’t always the cheapest. We all know you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but when it comes to choosing a service company, online or off, presentation says a lot.
A web hosting provider with a poorly written website or an unattractive presentation doesn’t give much of a sense of reliability or professionalism. Support and overall services will potentially be less than desirable. In this scenario, it doesn’t matter how cheap the hosting plan is. There are many things to consider when choosing a hosting service for your website. Determining your specific needs based on the type of website you are planning is the first and most important step. If you haven’t actually created your website pages, consider making a site map or an outline of what you propose to get a clearer picture on the number of pages and bandwidth you may need.
• Space:
The amount of space your website will require is often related to the type of site. A personal website will need a smaller amount of space, perhaps as little as 20 megs of space, than a merchant or store-front site with a lot of media or download files that require a great deal of space.
• Bandwidth – Traffic – Transfer:
This is the amount of information that is transmitted to the individuals who view your site, typically calculated over a month’s period. Your transfer rate is the total size of your site files in kilobytes or megabytes and multiplied by the number of visitors expected to visit your site. This calculation is not very accurate and usually higher than your traffic will actually be; but overestimating will leave room to grow your website within the hosting plan you have chosen.
Hosting Service Features
Most start-up websites begin small with the hope of growing to become a major player on the web. Beginning small makes sense in that you can always upgrade as you get a better idea of how things works and how well your site is being received. So be sure that the hosting service offers a variety of increasingly larger plans to handle growth. The complexity of the features offered will depend, once again, on page content. If you plan to publish static pages with content that will be updated personally, limited features will be less daunting and easier to manage.
Also, if you are using simple HTML pages, a trimmed-down hosting service may be best. Sites that require a database or active scripting need a host server that understands and supports the language. Common alternatives are PHP, ASP.net, and ColdFusion. Some of the options will vary depending on the type of server your host uses, most commonly Linux or Windows. Other features that may be important to your website include mailing lists, merchant account support, forum software, etc. Sites that will offer a shopping cart need a host that will support the feature. Statistic packages like Urchin may be useful to merchant sites to learn more about and track visitors to their site.
Customer Support Services
A quality hosting company will offer top-rate support at all levels of their services. Poor support may mean that your site is off-line more than it is on. Ideally, they will offer direct phone support to speak with a technician 7 days a week. During off hours, the minimum amount of support offered should include a ‘help desk’ to email your questions or concerns, with a respond expected within 48 hours and a system that tracks your support history and is always available. Another option offered by some top-notch services is ‘live chat.’ A service offering all three contact options shows that they’ve invested some time and energy into customer support.
Points to Consider When Choosing a Hosting Provider:
1. Is the provider financially sound or profitable?
2. Do they deliver the up-time you need?
3. Are there guarantees to your business?
4. Do they offer a range of hosting services?
5. Do they provide unlimited support 24/7 or offer fee-based support?
6. Do they support the critical compliance standards you need?
01-26-2000 by Scott Pamatat of DesignMore.com
A discussion forum at the Internet marketing challenge web site (http://www.marketingchallenge.com?13417) sparked the idea for this article. It is a great place to discuss ideas and receive informative suggestions and because of that I visit the forum often.
Many web designers overlook the importance of color when designing a web site. Color should be one of your first concerns when it comes time to start your web site design. If you don't pay close attention to the colors you chose, your site you will end up either plain and boring or so chaotic it's hard to look at. The color you use should only be chosen after careful consideration.
Unfortunately web browsers can only see 256 colors. Even that number is hindered because all browsers don't share the same 256-color pallet. Currently web browsers only share 216 common colors. When designing key elements in your web site you should stay within the 216-color pallet.
If you go outside the 216 color pallet you start to use colors that do not exist within that browser. The browser has to mix the colors that do not exist. In order for the browser to display the color, it needs to take tiny dots from the colors native to that browser to come up with an approximate color. This is known as dithering. Some displays will distort the tiny dots to the point where the image is so speckled that it does not appear to be a solid color. This makes text very hard to read if it is placed over the dithered color. You should always use a browser safe color when using solid color as a design element. Some of the browser safe colors should be used with caution though.
Most of the eye operations are muscular and just like all other muscles it tires out. I will illustrate with an example. (This is a test I learned about 7 years ago and is very effective to get the point across). This is a simple test that should take only 45 seconds. If you do this short test, you will be better able to understand what I'm about to say. Go to this page and then come back.
What did you see when you looked at the white box? Did you see a bluish green color? (If not go back and do the test over). No this is not a trick or hallucination. There is a simple explanation. Without getting too technical, I'll tell you what just happened.
In the back of your eye there is a thin layer of tissue that contains millions of tiny light-sensing nerve cells called rods and cones. Cones respond to specific wavelengths of light. Your eye is filled with color decoding cones. When you looked at the red box the cones that detect the red wavelength become tired and fatigued. When this happens the opposite cones in your eye start to kick in. Hence the bluish green color you saw. Now that you know there is a scientific reason behind eye fatigue you should apply it to your web site.
I'm sure you have you noticed that caution signs are usually yellow. Pure yellow strains your eye more than any other color because of that, it is the first color your eye will fix on. Using these colors (I still advise you to use it sparingly) for banners and advertisements will receive more attention from the viewer's eye. Once the visitor comes to your site there is really no reason you should irritate the visitor with bright colors. You have done a good job if they are viewing your site.
You should use yellow and red colors sparingly in your web site itself. Only use them in areas where you want the visitor to focus on. Do not make large parts of your web site with bright color. It might get your visitors attention but they will either consciously or subconsciously notice their eyes getting fatigued. This will make them not want to look at your web site for long periods of time. There are enough reasons why a visitor would leave your web site. You don't need to add to that list by using irritating color.