What Kind of Web Design Software Should You Use? A Web Editors Or Site Builder?

Do you want to build a web site for your home business but find web design complicated? You can find many web design tools online to help you design your own web site quickly and inexpensively. They range from web editors, web site builders, web site templates, to hosting, autoresponders and shopping carts.

If you want to design your first web site yourself, you probably want to use a WYSIWYG web editor or site builder.

A web editor is software that creates the HTML code for you. Web editors and site builders help you quickly create simple web sites without the need to know HTML programming and without having to buy expensive web design software.

A WYSIWYG editor helps you design your web site using a "What You See Is What You Get" interface. You can see what your page will look like similar to the way your word processing software displays what you're typing. WYSIWYG editors are easy to use and don't require knowledge of HTML. A WYSIWYG editor may be a good option for you if you want to make a small, simple web site quickly and easily without paying for software.

Some of the many good free WYSIWYG web editors that are available on the web include KompoZer, HTML-Kit, SeaMonkey Composer (Mozilla), Amaya and Trellian.

Even when using a web editor, it helps to learn the basics of HTML to solve some design problems and make changes.

Paid editors will give you more powerful features. Dreamweaver is the most popular professional web editor today but has a steep learning curve. You can get a free trial of Dreamweaver at http://www.adobe.com/downloads/. FrontPage is popular for non-professional users. However, it is incompatible with other programs, is not receiving any new updates, and will cause problems if you need help from a professional designer in the future. I don't recommend it.

Site Builders help you design your site from pre-packaged templates. Sometimes they provide a WYSIWYG interface to change elements from the templates. Using a site builder is an easy way to get your first web site up fast.

Advantages of site builders include: no HTML web design knowledge is required; they typically include pre-designed web site templates; you can upload the site easily without the need of an FTP program to upload your pages; they usually come with an image library where you can download free images, templates, backgrounds and web site headers; you can upload your own images.

Free site builders usually have restrictions that may include a limited amount of pages, you may not be allowed to include custom HTML, and you have less options for customizing your template and page layout than you have with commercial site builders.

Free web site builders include 1&1 Website Builder, Office Live Small Business, Site2you and website Wizard.

Many hosting companies offer template-based site builders and wizards that will guide you through setting up your web pages. Using those makes it easy to start creating web pages. Wizards allow you to create web sites easily through point and click design. Typically, they work like this: You can choose a layout from their library of web site templates. You choose a graphic, select the font size, text color and navigation button style. You can edit your content. You can often add features like a counter, feedback form and guest book.

Be aware that it might be difficult to make changes when using template-based site builders and wizards. When using templates and site builders provided by your hosting company, you probably won't be able to move your pages or they won't work properly when switching providers.

If you want to design your own web site, try some of the options above.

Think you don't have the time or know-how to build your own Web site? Then, consider hiring a professional web designers so you can focus on running your business instead of the numerous technical issues involved in web design.

Leva Duell, Five Star Web Design and Marketing, provides web design built on proven marketing strategies. To get a FREE ebook, Inside Secrets to Developing a Profitable Web Site, providing powerful, non-techie web design and marketing strategies to increase your online profits, visit http://www.fivestarwebdesign.com/ebook.html

How to Find the Right Web Designer For Your Web Development Project

Finding a web designer is the easy part- all you need to do is perform a quick search online and bingo, you're presented with pages and pages of them in the search engine results. The hard part is choosing the right web designer for your individual project. Every web design project has a specific set of requirements and every web designer has a unique set of skills that may, or may not, be suitable for your needs. In this article, I'll list some key factors that will help you find the right web designer and how you determine if they have the necessary skills to undertake your web development project.

Research the Web Designers Website and Online Portfolio

Every web designer should have a functioning website and an online portfolio of their work. If they don't, you can scratch them off the list. After you have found some web designers in your area, or anywhere else for that matter, you should research each of their websites and check out samples of their work. Different web designers take different approaches to their work and use a variety of technologies. You should read up on their skills and approach to web design, to make sure they suit your requirements. Viewing completed websites and samples of the web designer's work is also essential to get a good idea of the design style and skills they have. Make sure the websites function correctly. If some of the web designer's recent samples are not working, there is a good chance that, if you use them, your website might have the same issues. Look at the design style of their portfolio samples. Most web designers tend to stick to a particular style. If you like the look of their websites, and their website text sounds appealing, you're onto a winner. Take the next step and call them, or send a project brief through.

Speak to Your Chosen Web Designers

Another key point to determine which web designer is best for you, is finding out whether you can communicate with them. You will need to explain your vision to the designer and they should be able to respond with ideas and suggestions for your project. If you call your designer and there is, for example, a language barrier between you, that could be a problem throughout the development process. Talking to a potential web designer also gives you a good idea whether you are going to get on with them or not. If you call to speak with your chosen web design company and you are put on the phone to a rude or uninterested individual - in my books, that would not be somebody you would want to deal with on an ongoing basis. If they are enthusiastic, keen and communicate well you are more likely to have a successful ongoing professional relationship.

Qualification and Experience

Qualifications and experience are not always essential but they do give you some security that the web designer knows what they are doing and has the skills to undertake your project. It's really up to your judgment whether you want to use a web designer with no experience but you never know, they might be a young gun with tons of talent and is just waiting for that first project to unleash their skills on to. Whether you prefer your web designer to have qualifications or not is also up to you. Qualifications just mean they have had some formal recognition of their skills. My preference would be experience beats qualifications any day. Your web designer may have undertaken a six month course which has got them a certificate of some sort but that does not make them a good designer. There is so much information online and ways to hone your design talents now, that needing somebody to teach you is not essential.

Creative Vision

It is very important the web designer you speak to understands your creative vision. To create a website that truly serves a purpose and business goal, the designer need to understand the nature of the website and relate to your overall vision. Take note on whether the web designer offers any ideas or suggestions when you're talking to them. This is a good indication of whether they understand the project and are enthusiastic about it.

The Right Technology

Different web projects need different technology behind them. Not all web designers have all the necessary skills for some types of web development. For example you may need a full content management system with database driven content and advanced search engine optimisation. This is something not all web designers can provide. Most designer's will tell you straight away if they are unable to complete the project, due to technical limitations. It is up to you as a client to inform the designer of all the feature's you anticipate your website to have so they can tell you whether they can complete it.

A Reasonable Cost

The cost of the web project is normally the key factor in how people choose their web designer. The scope of your project and what budget you have can limit what designer you choose. If you have a very small budget but want to build the next Facebook, any sane web designer will tell you they can't help you. However, it is always good to get a few quotes and see which designer can offer the best package, for a reasonable cost. If they're too expensive, it might be because they are a larger company with more overheads, or they are simply very good at what they do. If they are cheap, do a bit more investigation before committing - Cheap web design may end up costing you more in the long run, as it probably won't serve its purpose very well and you will need to get it rebuilt. The cost of web design is often open ended... 'how long is a piece of string?'... A good web designer should be able to explain the reason why they have quoted a certain price, and discuss what they can do within your budget - Just because you have received an initial quote that may be higher than you originally anticipated, talk to your designer about it. Quite often, there could be features or aspects of the quote than can be removed, or modified, to get the project back within your budget - If you don't ask, you'll never know.

At Big Click Studios we can turn your web development vision into a functioning web site that looks great, works perfectly and ranks well. Our web designers take the time to understand each and every project to make sure, you as a client, gets a return on your investment.

To read more about web design, web development, web marketing, SEO and business growth please visit - Big Click Web Design.

Web Designing Company - Hiring A Web Designer Verses Graphic Designer

Today, the web designing company has come up as a great source of relief for all those business owners who find it hard to carry out the efficient promotion of their products and services. The Web Designing Services offered by different software firms have been of immense help to such business owners.

A web designing company hires both the web designers as well as the graphic designers. The web designers hired by a web designing company are well aware about all kinds of programming techniques which are essential in order to highlight a website in the best possible manner. These web designers offer efficient Web Designing Services which include features that are well capable of adding an extra tint of elegance and functionality to a website.

The graphic designers on the other hand are not entirely aware about all the programming techniques that are required in order to provide a new outlook to a website. The basic working of a graphic designer includes illustration (digital or fine art illustrations including painting), magazine layout and book layout, textile design (carpets, materials and upholstery), print design and advertisement design (concepts for advertising campaigns and silkscreen printing for clothing), video effects and editing (shooting and editing of corporate video and commercial video as well as special effects and animation). A graphic designer is not that much capable of designing the codes that are required for web designing.

The task of a web designer is absolutely different from that of a graphic designer. A web designer is involved in creating web pages for the internet. A web designer designs the graphical display of content and images which are further displayed on the internet in the form of web pages. A web designer uses different applications such as HTML, CSS, XHTML, JavaScript, PHP, Photoshop, and images such as JPG. The work of a web designer is more inclined towards the technical side. In contrast to the work of a web designer, the work of a graphic designer is extremely concise. A graphic designer may be unable to offer a shape to every thought of yours.

The Web Designing Services offered by different software firms include the working of both the web designers as well as the graphic designers. There are some firms which rely on hiring just the web designers for all the major programming activities. This is because the web designers not only possess the technical skills but are also aware about all the tricks that need to be implemented in order to enhance the ranking of a particular website.

A web designer is more efficient in nurturing your thoughts into reality. He/she can actually provide a better shape to your ideas than a graphic designer. I, personally believe that if you wish to create an excellent website for the promotion of your firm, then you can always trust the web designers. If your business is an online one, then the Web Designing Services offered by a perfect web designing company can help you achieve immense amount of popularity worldwide.

J Coleman writes for Technousa where you can read more about - Web Designing Services and Technousa as a Web Designing Company.

Web Designers

At the risk of simply stating the obvious, web designers design websites.

However, even a brief surf round the web shows that not all websites are the same (or as effective) and, by implication, not all web designers create websites in the same way. Whether websites are good, bad or indifferent, web designers have a huge responsibility for the ultimate success (or failure) of any website.

How Do Web Designers Design Websites?

The first thing that a professional web designer should try to do is to understand the client's exact requirements. Entering a few basic search terms for a client into a search engine should give an indication of the current state of the client's web presence and might trigger some obvious questions that the web designer should ask the client.

The client's answers to the following questions can be helpful to the web designer:

- Is a new website required or does an existing website need to be redeveloped?

- Is an e-commerce website or an information only site required?

- What products or services does the company or organisation provide?

- What is the client's target audience?

- Does the client have demographic information about the target audience?

- What information is to be provided via the website?

- How does the client use logos and branding?

- What competition does the client face from other websites?

- How will the website be updated and maintained?

Web Design Software

Although interactive web design software is available online, particularly for creating blogs, the available templates are usually quite restrictive and often lead to the creation of websites with a similar look and feel. Most web designers avoid this approach because the resulting websites tend to be very stereotyped.

Besides the option of writing HTML, ASP and Javascript web pages from scratch, web designers have a choice of web design software packages available for creating web pages, for example, Adobe Dreamweaver and Microsoft FrontPage. However, simply having suitable web design software tools available is not enough to guarantee the creation of a functional website that looks enticing.

Benefits of Bespoke Website Design

The overall layout and navigability of a website is absolutely critical to its success. Research has shown that if a user doesn't find what they're looking for on a website within four mouse clicks, then they'll look elsewhere. Therefore, it is essential for the web designer to get the basic structure of the website right. Aesthetically pleasing images and fancy colour schemes count for nothing, if users can't find their way around the website. In addition, a good web designer will always create a website that is easy to update and expand.

"To begin at the beginning ..."

The most important page on any website is the home page.

Any web designer who forgets this basic fact is likely to come to grief. A website's home page is the starting point for most visits to a website and indicates to users what the website has to offer. The web designer should include a meaningful title or one sentence tagline on the home page explaining what the website is all about. The home page should make clear the important items that the website contains and how the website can be easily navigated. Most web designers consider that for a website home page, 'less is more'. What this means is that the website user should be presented with a clear uncluttered view of what is available, without distraction from excessive detail and whizzy graphics.

Choosing a Web Designer

Like other forms of design, web design is a combination of taste and functionality. Looking at websites that the designer has created previously is always a good starting point. However, it is also important for the client to communicate directly with the web designer; the web designer will need to interpret the client's requirements because in the end it will be the client's website, so the client must be entirely happy with the final result.

E-Business Engineers Ltd are a leading website designers that offer all types of bespoke commercial and traditional web design. To view some sample designs log onto our case studies page [http://www.e-businessengineers.com/Case_Studies.asp?PCID=5].

Why Outsource Web Design Service?

Web design service: Web designing is the most popular tool in the world of computers. Today is a world of technologies and everybody wants to use this technology for their betterment. Web designing is used to design and develop websites. These websites can be used in businesses for their publicity or by an individual for their portfolios etc. Web design services are in demand as every one wants a good look for their websites as this is the first impression and first impression should always be good. An impressive look always attracts towards it. It includes designing and developing part simultaneously. It should be done by experienced web designers.

Web designing tools: Web designing services tools include flash, Photoshop, corel draw, illustrator, firework, dream weaver, HTML, and dhtml. The developing tools include php, asp.net, vb.net etc. These tools are used by experienced person for designing and developing a website. Now days either in business or individual every body wants to create a website for their publicity.

Why need of outsourcing web design service?: As time changes, new techniques are developed for everything. Like in old days, the advertisement had been done through news papers, pamphlets etc. But now as new technology becomes vast new ways are come out like websites on internet. Today every active person knows about this. But the question arises what about those people who know what web designing is but don't know how it works? What are the techniques used? The answer is Outsource web design service. This is a good concept for those who has less or no knowledge about designing that how it works but has a desire to develop a website for their product promotion internationally. Outsourcing is beneficial for those who know how to beat the time. In outsource web designing; there are professional designers who worked out for either an individual or a company according to their requirement. Just explain what your requirements are? and a skilled people will do exactly the same for you. Outsource web design services provide full range of web services like eCommerce website design, flash animation web site design etc. Web development services include shopping carts, online software etc.

Why India? There are many companies which provide outsource web designing services all over the world. These companies provide their services across the world. Some companies provide only designing services, some developing services and some both. These Companies appoints experienced and skilled staff for providing the services. Outsourcing these services to India is always beneficial. India has many experienced and professional web designing companies who have skilled people who are best in their work. It is also cost effective area than other countries. India has many web designing service providers who work at very low cost than others. Also Indians can do their work according to given time span. Indian designers are hard worker and complete their work in time. Indians are very efficient that they can work for 24 hours. So it is always being beneficial to outsource to India for getting cheap and best output.

India web design company provides business website design, small business web design, attorney web design, HTML website design, dating website design, matrimonial website design, Joomla web design, CMS solutions, Blog setup, SEO friendly web design. For more information please visit our website web design India.

The Importance of Professional Web Design

Professional web design is important to your companies image. It will help your business grow, helping you to reach many other businesses and customers that may not know that you currently service their needs. A quality design is important for any company that wants to keep ahead of their competition.

Three main keys to a professional website are: Multiple-browser usability, minimized load times with the use of valid CSS, and valid HTML code that will not cause frustrated visitors to leave your website due to loading errors or prolonged load times.

Professional Web Design is your first necessary step towards Internet market and is essential for making an impactful first impression on those who visit your site. Your website should be done by web design professionals. To put it simply, what separates professional web design from poor web design is whether or not a designer or web design company takes into consideration the above items when designing and building a website. Usually, a web designer or web design company claims to offer professional web design services for their clients. However, should they be promoting "web design services" rather than "professional web design services".

Whether you are trying to establish yourself as an online presence or acquire more clientèle, the quality of your website is crucial. Successful, efficient, professional web design is not easily accomplished, though. And, you must be careful about selecting a designer because poor web design will give visitors a poor opinion of your company and your products. Forrester Research estimates that poor web design will result in the loss of 50 percent of potential repeat visits, due to an initial negative experience. A professional web designer will talk with you about your business, your customers, and your expectations, before even talking about the design of a new website. Another source of poor web design is often derived from an internal employee.

Blatant unprofessional web design shows a lack of professionalism, thoroughness and thoughtfulness in general. More often than not, poor web design is complemented by spelling mistakes, which makes it

even easier to spot businesses that you wouldn't want to deal with. Poor web design is one of the leading causes of small business failure. One of the most glaring examples of a poorly designed website is single-browser compatibility. There are literally thousands of home-based Internet businesses struggling to make a living online and having a poor website is one of the leading causes of small business failure. However to end on a more positive note, although poor web design will almost guarantee you anonymity on the search engines, good web design will ensure that you have the best possible chance against your competitors.

In short, when selecting a web designer, be sure you're getting the quality that your company and your brand deserve.

Micah owns and operates his own Professional Web Design and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) company called Micah Media. You can find him on the web at http://www.micahmedia.net

He specializes in creating first-class sites, with top-rated SEO, coupled with the best personal service in the industry.

For More Information on Professional Web Design and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Services, visit Micah at http://www.micahmedia.net

10 Things To Think About When Selecting A Web Designer

1. Look at the detail of the web design company's own website. This is almost always a good indication of the level of detail your new website will have. See if you can find any areas that have added level of detail, such as images with added effects. This could be rounded corners, gradient effects, colour fading etc. No matter if you do not want those design elements on your own website, it gives you information about the designers and their eye for detail and quality.

2. Know what you want. Even if you don't know the technical aspects or terms of web design, you should have a fairly good idea of what you want the end result to look like. If you leave vital parts of your website design and functionality to the web designer, you are likely to pay more than you have to. If you don't know what kind of features you could ask for, look around online at some larger websites. If you are selling products, you could try and look at ebay.com or amazon.com for some design ideas. If it works for them, it most likely will work for you.

3. Ask if a detailed quote is available. Just as with other areas of business where you have little or no idea how things are done or how long they take, it is important to get a breakdown of services that you are paying for. Are they only giving you a total price for the web services you have been discussing over the phone or email? If so, they are not giving you information that you can use to compare other web design companies with. You should ask what their hourly rate is which can help you figure out from the total cost how long it is going to take to design the website!

4. What level of support is available during and after building your website? It is very important to know how many changes you can make to your website while it is being built that are not going to cost you extra. Is the web design company giving you an option to view work in progress? How about if you change your mind on a design aspect after the website has been designed? These things need to be part of your contract before you agree to have work done. You don't want a surprise invoice for "additional requested web design work" to land in your inbox. Always be clear on what is going to be charged for and what is part of the web design package.

5. What do other clients think about the web designer? If you want to get an honest and unbiased opinion about this, there is no better way than going straight to the source! Find a previous client's contact information and send a quick email asking if it is possible to have them share some of this information with you.

6. Will your site be search engine friendly? Becoming part of major search engines such as Google and Yahoo is the inevitable next step after standard web design work has been completed. When you have a brand new website filled with information about services and products you offer, you want people to find it! Search engine optimization, or SEO as it is usually called, is an art form that takes years to master. It is a constant challenge for the web designer to keep up with ever-changing rules that the search engine companies make for who is more "important" in the search engine rankings.

You should not expect to get this service for free if it is done properly by a knowledgeable person, since it can potentially take more hours to complete than your entire website, and it is an ongoing process. You should be able to settle for a level of search engine optimization that suits your budget and still gives you an increased level of visibility online. Always ask how the search engine process will be carried out since anyone can say they are "optimizing" your website and all they do is adding keyword phrases in a few places.

The most important thing to remember about search engine optimization is that it must be supported by strong research into your specific business niche. If your web designer does not find out exactly what people are searching for when trying to find your type of business, you are just paying for guesswork and are wasting your money.

7. How will you be billed? You want to know how work is being billed, both for web design work that is part of your contract and for extra services or additional hours of work. It is common that a percentage of the total contract is charged up front before web design services have started. It is not recommended without a valid reason to pay more than 50% up front, which is a fair level for both parties. It can be agreed on that additional hours of work are added to the final payment, or invoiced immediately. As long as you feel that your needs and requirements are being satisfied, either way is standard procedure.

8. How much control will you have over content? It is still very common today that all additional work that you want done on the website will be carried out by your web designer. If you want to be able to update content on a regular basis, look for web designers that allow you to log in and update information on your own. This requires your website to be dynamic, using elements of programming code that can separate you from your visitors.

The best type of website for this purpose is a CMS-based website. CMS stands for Content Management System and is a completely different style of web design than a standard static website that only displays the same information every day. If your web designer uses a CMS to design your website, you will be able to have website visitors give comments or write articles directly on your website such as in a blog, or give different people different level of access to content on your website.

This is the direction the Internet is moving today, with so-called "Web 2.0" websites such as YouTube and Facebook popping up everywhere where users can add their own movie clips, images and other information. Of course, your website does not have to have these features to use a CMS, but a content management system allows your website to grow and expand easily for future needs. It is important you try and figure out how you may want to use your website in a few years from now and if you need a CMS or not. This type of design usually comes at a higher initial cost, but will make all changes and additional work on your web site a breeze later on.

9. How is communication between you and the web designer? How fast do you get responses to your emails? Are the responses long or short and do they seem to get shorter for each question you asked? You want to make sure that you can ask "dumb" questions and still receive the highest level of professionalism from the web designer. Is the person you are talking to the same person that will do work on your website? You want to have direct contact with the web designer(s) that are going to work on your website, to avoid miscommunication and "lost-in-translation" scenarios. If you call the web design company, try and get a feel for if they are dedicated to your satisfaction by listening to what you have to say, or if they are constantly doing sales pitches to try and convince you to pay for other services.

10. Ask for a resume. A professional web designer should be willing to give you a resume of his or her previous work and background. Knowing the background of the person or company that you are going to work with (usually over a period of several weeks) gives you a better understanding if you have found a web designer with skills that will suit your needs. What you want to be looking for is someone who truly enjoys his or her line of work and has dedicated his professional life to this field. If a person enjoys doing what he/she is doing, it shows in the detail and quality of the work produced - and eventually in your new website!

cairns web design [http://www.orbstudio.net/articles]

Don't Get Burned By Web Designers

If you bring up the subject of web design with small business people, it wouldn't take long to find someone who has been burned by a web designer. Perhaps they have even come to the conclusion that a web site is not worth the expense. Let's look at how and why that happens, and outline some success principles that will help you when you need web design services. Since so many web designers get it wrong, the web design principles that actually work may surprise you.

One of the problems with web design is that software programs have made it seem easy to create a web site. If you have the software, it would not take you long to build a web site. There are an abundance of inexpensive templates available to make it even easier to put together a web site. Getting a professional looking web site is not difficult at all. So you may wonder, why is that a problem?

The process of creating a web site does not end with making it look professional. In fact, that could very well be one of the least important aspects of a web site design. Let's face it, there are ugly web sites that make a lot of money. Since life is not fair, there are great looking web sites that make little or no money. I'm not saying the professionalism of your web site is not important; I am saying it's not enough.

There is a serious flaw in the web design industry, and small business owners are especially prone to fall victim to it. The problem is that usually, very little business planning goes into a web site design. Too many web designers are more concerned with selling web design than taking the time to build an effective web site.

This deficiency stems from the fact that very few web designers are marketing people. Small business people do not have big advertising budgets, so they are easily attracted to the low rates of average web designers. Good marketing means setting priorities and effectively using your resources to accomplish goals.

The one element I find seriously missing in web design is the very thing that is fundamentally important; that element is uniqueness. A Unique Selling Point (USP) is one of the basic tenets of marketing. You must answer the questions: why should I buy from you, and, what makes you different from my other choices? If you fail in this area, your web site visitor will not be kind to you. They will leave and not come back; they will probably not tell you why they left either.

Read your web site copy to see if it contains another common error. Does it say, "We this," and, "We that?" Do not "we" on your web site visitors! Your web site copy should speak to the visitor, address their needs, and solve their problem. It must compel them in some way. You need to draw them in and sell them on your solution.

When you take notice of how many web sites violate these basic marketing principles above, you will begin to see how you have the opportunity to rise above your competitors. Just think, if the majority of business web sites are violating even these most basic principles, how much more could you benefit from hiring a web designer who understands marketing?

There is a lot of emphasis placed on search engine optimization (SEO), and there should be, because this is very important if you want to have your web site found by people using the search engines. For most web sites, search engines account for 80% to 95% of all visitors. However, as important as SEO is, if you have a web site that is not creating sales with the visitors you are already getting, SEO is the wrong priority.

The next principle is the one you will probably find the most surprising. People actually read web sites! Yes, they do have a short attention span, and we will look at that point next, but they do read. There have been many studies done to document the way people use web pages. Even though so much attention is given to graphics, the studies show that well over 75% of the time, web page users read the text before they notice graphics.

This does not mean that graphics are unimportant. Visual elements are one of the many advantages a web site can provide. When you consider that people use the Internet to seek information, then it does makes sense that they will read your web site's content. Providing the right information can mean the difference between winning a customer, or surrendering them to your competition.

I also promised to cover the short attention span issue. It is often called the 3 second rule. According to web studies, if you cannot capture the attention of your visitor in approximately 3 seconds, that's how fast they usually leave your web site. I suspect the reason is because so many web sites are such a horrible waste of time, that people's patience has been worn down. The solution is to have a fast loading page that quickly clues them in that you can solve their problem. If they can "skim" in a few seconds, and you grab their attention, you have successfully drawn them in so they will stay a while.

Statistically, it takes 7 visits before you make a sale. If your web site is not done correctly, you will have dismal results because you can't get them to come back seven times. That is why so many web site owners are disappointed with their success. That is why some web designers provide what seems to be a bargain, while other web designers have to charge more to give you a better value. It takes more time to plan and create a good web site design.

The good news is that most of your competitors will go for the bargain and suffer the same fate as everyone else who does not realize the value of an effective web site design. Very few of them will invest the resources needed for success. If you do, you can win. This does not mean you need the big budget of a major corporation, or that it has to be expensive, it just means you need to be willing to do better than average. The rewards are much greater when you stretch beyond the norm.

Steve Chittenden seeks to help business owners and organizations market themselves effectively and succeed. His company, Creative Business Services, provides carefully planned web design, graphic design, writing, and marketing services aimed at achieving this goal. Please visit www.cbscreative.com for more information.

Usability of E Commerce Web Design

The World Wide Web has offered a new platform of business. In the past, hardly a number of business concerns could trade globally. But, with the introduction of web there has been a drastic revolution in the market trends. Today, business companies make websites to reach to the millions across the world. In fact, small business enterprises are equally competing with big multinational companies to make their presence felt in the web world.

Increased competition across the cyber market has sped up the growth of new technological development. The obvious outcome was attempt to devise new ways to make the website more user friendly. E commerce web design became the ideal choice of the business concerns for its flexibility and user friendliness.

Usability

One of the most important feature of an e commerce web design is that it is very much user friendly. Moreover, an e commerce website is highly feasible solution for the web owners. Certain basic usability of e commerce website design are stated below:

* Easy product upload - New products of sale can be easily put up on the web page. These new goodies stored in the database of the website is uploaded in no time according to requirement.

* Quick price modification - The prices of goods displayed on the web page can be easily modified. According to the market standards, the prices of commodities are become lower or higher.

* Easy transaction of goods payment - Payment of commodities is done through the Internet. Customer payment is directly deposited in the owners account.

* World market - Websites make an indefinable presence in the global market. Successful e commerce websites create a favorable image of the business company in the eyes of the global consumers.

* Cost effective - An e commerce website is highly cost effective for the web owner. Web owners can trade with their global customers with great ease. These web owners are not harried of setting up business location, manpower etc.

* Fast marketing - Web user can easily shop in the Internet. The products of sale are displayed on screen within seconds. The web users order their requirements through the shopping cart facility.

* Highly convenient - It is the most convenient kind of shopping. The web user can market products according to choice sitting in a remote room from various websites across the world.

* Less time consuming - Internet marketing is very less time consuming. Web users can easily shop within less time.

Ways to make an e commerce web design usable

Business cannot grow if it fails to satisfy the needs and desires of the prospective consumers. An e commerce website must offer easy accessibility to its customers. Some guidelines to design a usable e commerce website design.

1."Bill of Rights": The company must have ready information about the fact that it is working in conformity with the laws of the trade. It is extremely essential to provide the prospective consumers with details that the website has been designed only to meet their needs.

2.Easy navigation: It becomes essential that an e commerce web design must offer the prospective users the liberty to easily navigate through the web pages. An e commerce websites contains numerous products of sale. The web designers must design according to the needs of the customers. The web users must be able to browse the products of sale through name, price and data with ease.

3. Clear business policies: An e commerce website design of a website must clearly demonstrate the business policies of the company. Make clear conditions with regard to purchase of products, the entire shipping process which is convenient for the user.

4.Earn trust of the consumers: It really very difficult to earn the trust of the customers. There is no direct communication between the web owners and the users. It important to provide the users with all possible information such as telephone number, postal address.

5. Simple checkout process: Web designers must design the check out process in a simple way. The user must not face any difficulty in the last phase of the transaction process. Generally the users turn to other sites and the obvious result is that there is the web site meets a fatal end.

6. Simple and organized design: A cluttered web design creates confusion in the visitors mind. Web users tend to turn to other sites, which offer easy access. An e commerce web design must be simple and organized so that the web users can easily access the site.

eCommerce web design has been witnessing huge technological changes. With increased competition, web designs are constructed to provide the consumers with state- of - the - art facilities to be more at ease. A usable e commerce website design is more attractive to the consumers and the most successful one.

This informative article is written by Debdulal Dey. He is a content writer and regularly writes for Quality Web Solutions.

Christian Web Design & Hosting

Believe me, I come across a lot of clients who have come to me after having been through many web designers and developers and are totally disillusioned with my industry. It's not an easy place to be after having been let down, cheated, ripped off, or manipulated. Often they sit in my office and look at me through skeptical eyes and understandably so! Most have spent thousands of dollars already in web development with not much to show for it or with a website that is not what they wanted.

It is unfortunate that this happens but as in any industry, there are people who promote honest and dishonest practices. Based on the information that I have gathered from clients and talking to other professionals within my field, there could be three major causes to having a bad or negative experience with your web designer or developer.

1. Personalities just do not blend.

It's very important to find a web designer whom your personality best blends with. You will be working with this person for most likely a long time and if you don't feel you can work with this designer or developer from the initial start, it won't get better. There will be many decisions and suggestions you'll need to make on the road ahead so its crucial this relationship is one your comfortable with from the onset.

2. Not understanding the difference between a web designer and web developer.

There are essentially two breeds in the web world and both are very different from each other. The two titles are not interchangeable, really. Speaking in general, the web designer is the creative being that if skilled, can create beautiful designs and concepts for you. Clearly, this is a left brained thinker and would also be the more personable one of the two. Often however, a really good web designer can lack the technical skills to take their design concepts to the coding or development of a website. The web developer on the other hand, can be a highly skilled, technical person and can take a design from start to final phase. However, the right brain developer lacks the creative skills to manifest beautiful designs and concepts. Because each have a weak area, they often contract the other to compensate for other. This is fine but what happens with the overall cost is passed down to the client. It's important to find a web designer/developer who is well rounded and able to do both equally well. You'll save time and money in the long run.

3. Lack of understanding about the Web Design process.

Unless you are a designer or developer, your not going to have a good knowledge of the flow and process it takes to design or develop a website. But at the same time, your web professional should assist you in helping you understand the process by educating you along the way. This is where trusting your web professional is important. You need to be able to trust him or her knowing that they have the best interest for your website. Too often, a lack of understanding causes misunderstandings and opens the door to future problems.

Doing your homework and interviewing several web designers or developers is a must before you employ anyone with your website. You will be investing a good amount of money for a website and its critical to find someone whom you can trust and will be able to work with for the long haul. Having a web professional who is local in proximity is good but if you are able to find someone who meets the three factors listed above, then its perfectly fine to have a web designer or developer from a remote location. Just make sure that he or she is always accessible either by phone or email.

Because the web jargon can be confusing, it is easy for you as the customer to be manipulated. Be cautious and always ask for an explanation that you can understand. I believe the need to find good, honest, ethical web professionals will continue to rise. Christian web design and hosting companies are often sought after because those seeking them already have a preconceived notion in the type of ethics and character of a Christian website designer. Its good to work with others who share in the same belief system as you and that work and service is done at a higher standard.

Most Christian web design companies offer hosting as well as design & development services. It is always a good idea to host your website with your design firm if that is available. This way, the designer can work more efficiently since they are already familiar with their hosting servers. Finding Christian web design & Hosting will be worth the effort!

Carole Galassi is a senior web developer of Creative Media Web aka Bay Area Website Design, a Christian Web Design & Hosting company located in Northern California and has worked in the Information Technology field for 15 years. She also has a background in creative design and offers a full Graphic Design studio.

Carole is the Creative Director for The Funeral Programs Site, that offers beautiful funeral programs templates.

Good Web Design

What is Web Design?

A Web site is the final output of a Web design. The Web site sits on a Web server where electronic files are stored. The Web site presents the contents and interactive features or interfaces to the end user in the form of Web pages. How the information requested is displayed to the user is par of the Web design process. Additional controls are embedded in order to display more complex media like animations, sounds and other forms.

Whats New? The Clouds of Course!

Everybody wants something new from time to time and yet some need a fix of something totally different. In the realm of the internet, that is quite a common occurrence with the many innovations that are always popping up and with all of them, none can be as exciting as the move into the clouds.

The Open Design Community: Free CSS Templates!

If youre most people out there who dont know CSS and have no time, or care, on how to do one for your blog, then the next action for you would be to find a place where you can download one for free. Thank goodness that there are a lot of sites out there that give them away for free. The only problem is, that since you were not the one who created it, you will be subject to their designs and whims.

One of the sites that give free CSS of cool web designs is The Open Design Community (TODC). The Open Design Community is a hub for open source website designers from around the world providing thousands of XHTML and CSS based free web design templates available for download. So, please feel free to take a minute or two and browse through the designs that our fabulous designers have submitted and see if one might work for you! And remember they are free!

Bad Web Design

Here are some features that can really mar the over all concept of your web design. It is important to take notice of the most common mistakes web designers commit. You might be able to use some insights into creating an effective web design which might be simple but can invoke your projected image. Backgrounds that are gray in color by default presents so many problems most especially with the pages readability. Avoid color combinations that can render the characters unreadable. Backgrounds are mostly effective when it is left simple and does not interfere with reading. Texts must be readable. Avoid small characters. Keep the links colored blue as much as possible because common users are already used with the color.

DIY Web Design

Do it yourself design projects are proliferating in the internet these days. There are a number of web sites that practically teaches you what to do without hiring a web designer. A do it yourself web site design applies perfectly for young professionals who are just starting to learn stuff in business or trying to reformat the existing business that they are running. DIY web site design offers you total control over the project and over the site that is why its simply gaining popularity. It takes the work out of dealing with consultants, designer, contractor landscaper and the likes. In DIY design, your ideas are sure to be heard and taken careful attention to. You get to express your style and personality. because at the end of the day, it still will be your website, selling your products. This has solved constant problems with web designers who are truly passionate in their work who sometime can get overly sensitive to a small correction or observation of his work. Do it yourself web designing surely saves you money and time and energy.

Benefits of Web 2.0 Applications

Web 2.0 applications are the latest trend in website design . Many Internet companies and users are turning to web 2.0 for its added features. It has also increased functionality. It has brought about a new wave in how sites are to be built, designed and applied hands-on. It makes the users enjoy blogging, download, RSS feeds etc. These developments give added excitement to online experience. It is said that Web 2.0 companies sites get higher ranking in search engines, like Google, yahoo and countless others. Web 2.0 benefits are countless. You can post photos, albums, help guides and maps for planning your travel abroad.

It has radically changed the quality of social interaction worldwide. Blogs proliferate. marketing online costs much less. And it has created networking success stories. Web 2.0 gives you full control over your business while adding smaller but very useful features to it.

Website design is of course not giving the visitors with another plain piece of text. Go as per the old saying "beauty is in the eye of the beholder". Here the beholder is the visitor of the website that you are going to design. So as a skilled website designer you should have mastered all the skills needed to create classy and attractive graphics, colors and shapes placed in perfect balance to catch the eye of the visitor together with drawing his focus to the most important sections of your website. Your job as a website designer is to make use of colors, text and graphics and translate into a visually appealing layout, logo, banner, and button system.

As a professional website designer, you need to chalk out a well-devised approach for creating the website. First, you need to understand the specific business necessities of your client and lay out the basic structure of the website. In order to minimize the cost of the set up, the website designer should be equipped with predefined web templates. Having this feature in your armory, you don't need to go hog-wild with the designs for the reason that you are not designing a website by tinkering.

Internet Marketing (Part 2)

Start a blog. Blogs have now become a favorite for search engines. If you go ahead and launch a blog, link it into your main site, print blocks of information and float RSS feeds. If you do these then most of the search engines can locate you much faster. Design some copies of digital books that you can send out to everyone. You can write for articles or courses online that could be submitted elsewhere. Then, create your own write-up in a manner that you can use them in any possible type of media, whether online or offline.

Regards,
Michael Pereira
The Comdyn Group
704.501.4509
mpereira@comdyn.com
mike@sevendegreesmedia.com

.:: The Comdyn Group ::.
.:: Seven Degrees Media ::.

How To Identify Fake Web Designers -- And Choose A Real One

Like going on a blind date, choosing the right web designer can be an adventure fraught with false hope.

Unlike a big corporation, a small business generally has a tight budget--especially when it comes to advertising and promotion--to engage a big web design agency to serve their online marketing needs.

With the understanding that a cheap-looking website is not the best way to represent your business--or that you do not have unlimited funds to throw at web designers on the off-chance that you'll get something that resembles what you want--there exist good small design studios and professional freelance web designers with reasonable rates, fortunately.

Here are some tips on how to choose the right one to meet your small business needs.

Identify the Fake Web Designers

Check out their portfolio!

Do they look professional? Is the style of the designer something you would like to have on your own site? Are they logical, easy to use, and provide what's needed to help customers achieve their (and the clients') goals? That means that a lot of business development has gone into them.

Web Designers vs Web Programmers

There are many web designers who are actually programmers who know little, if at all, about design. They use templates that are created by other professional designers. Unfortunately, templates aren't customized to your unique business.

Moreover, with advances in software applications, it is easier than ever to create and build a website. These software can help anyone build a website without knowing a thing. However, there is a distinct difference between creating and designing one.

Design, be it web or print, is about communication. Without the necessary design knowledge how could the programmers do an effective job communicating with your prospective customers?

How Can Good Design Help Your Business

Design is about you--what you know, what you see, and what you have to say. Behind every design is a vision, a purpose, a reason to be. Web design is not about decoration but communication; about making your words and vision visible, giving it form and body for all the world to see.

While the sales copy of your website remains vital for the effective selling of your products or services, the use of typography, color, graphics and layout help lead your prospects read and navigate your website.

This makes your page a pleasure to read and increases their overall user-experience.

A professional, well-designed website has been proven to increase sales!

Web Design Process

The web design process is also a matter of planning, what to include and what to exclude, good design, appealing text, how to sell, what business plan to follow, and more.

Like any other marketing medium, it requires a lot of work by individuals who understand what visitors and the search engines like to see: properly organized text. Combining a nice layout with SEO isn't easy, make sure the designer understands both the human and search components.

The result is pages that perform well for visitors and rank high for specific keywords.

No doubt, there are many who can turn out professional websites, but few who will volunteer to spend dozens of hours consulting with a client, designing a clear and unconfusing website, and sweating over ad copy, pictures and all the major and minor details -- in essence, creating a online marketing vehicle.

Online Marketing

The number one mistake that most first time web site owners make is that they don't know what to do with their site after it's designed. It is very possible to have a beautiful site designed for you and no one ever sees it.

A website is merely another means of marketing your products or services. With hundreds, if not thousands, of websites sprouting out everyday, competition is fierce. Having a "web presence" for your business has virtually become an understatement.

A good designer will not only help you create a professional looking site, they will also ensure that your site gets a good ranking with the search engines so that your site can be easily found online. Make sure that your designer will optimize your site for the search engines and submit it to the major search engines. Your website need to rank reasonably well in search engines.

Moreover, small business should seriously look into harnessing the power of the social media and sound web marketing design to increase the exposure of your services and products to extend your reach.

Is a Website Just a website

In the online world, traffic and targeted prospects is the life blood for you website. A pretty website becomes a white elephant if no customer visits it.

Does the web designer practice what he preaches? How much traffic is his website receiving?

To get an estimation of the amount of traffic, go to http://www.alexa.com, enter his URL to get the traffic details. You'll see the Traffic Rank for his website. As a general rule of thumb, if the traffic ranking isn't within the 1st Million globally (e.g. Yahoo ranks no. 1), then his online marketing effort certainly has much room for improvement, even for his own business website.

Offline Marketing

Small businesses exist in numbers far larger than big corporations.

It is ever more important for your business to stand out from your competition with a professional, consistent image--your corporate identity, namely from your web design, company logo, to the offline marketing collateral such as business card and flyer designs etc.

Having the same company to design both your online and offline marketing collateral have significant advantages of consistency and cost.

Word of Mouth and Testimonials

Word of mouth is a good indication of someone who knows his stuff.

If he comes strongly recommended by trusted friends or family members, chances are he's created design solutions that work for their business quite well. Ask them whether it was a good experience or not.

Most designers will have testimonials from previous clients on their website. It's a good idea to see what his customers are saying about his services. Follow the web links and try contacting some of them. You should have a feel after talking to one or two. This also ensures the testimonials are not fake ones that were simply "made up".

Chemistry is Key

You are going to have to share aspects of your business, from visions to operations to preferences to competition, with this person.

So it's important that you feel comfortable enough with him to be honest about your business details and goals, as well as ask as many questions about his advise as you need to. Does the designer seem friendly and are they willing to answer all of your questions? Does he respond promptly to your emails and/or phone calls?

A good designer will keep in touch with you every few days, at least. You don't want to get down to the final days of creating the site only to find out you don't like it!

Look out for his modus operandi during the first meeting. He should be asking you extensive, detailed questions about your requirements and goals, in order to analyze your needs.

Someone who is more interested in telling you the different design packages he can offer you is probably more concerned about making a quick buck.

Website Maintenance

A common issue with most small business is a lack of technical skills. What happens if you want to update the content after the project has been completed? Can you update it yourself without any HTML knowledge?

Content Management System

Would your website be built on a content management platform such as Wordpress or Joomla? This will allow you to update, edit and add pages on your own without going back to the web designer. Thus saving time and cost.

Engage your Customers via Blogs

If you are marketing your business on the web and you don't have a blog, you will always be beaten down by your competition.

A Blog platform allows you to do things no one else in your market can do with static websites. This means you don't just have a web site, you have a search engine magnet and an interactive community builder that will drive targeted, willing-to-buy visitors to your site.

Price

This is an important factor for any small business to consider.

Although there is no clear-cut rule as to what an "average" price for web design is. In most cases, you get what you pay for. You are paying for this his expertise, time and experience.

Be realistic about your budget. You may not have all the bells and whistles such as animation and special effects.

It is more important to create a successful website that has a good position in the search engine and one that you are very happy with the look and function of than to save a couple of bucks. If you get a good site, your site will be able to grow with your company and, hopefully, that's for a very long time!

The savvy, experienced web designer can implement your ideas and enhance them, spotting possible pitfalls and making recommendations along the way--and he'll help you to understand the procedure and give you the benefit of his experience and understanding of the Web, so that you come away not only with a website, but with an enhanced understanding of the Web and online business. In short, he'll work with you and be effective.

Pagethinker is about web design for small business. A small singapore web design studio specializes in designing effective websites for online marketing. For tips on how to design to attract both customers and search engines, and ultimately, sell your products & services, visit http://www.pagethinker.com

Web Design Tricks

Web design tricks are used by Professional web designers; to create effective web page designs but most importantly to show off beautiful code. A web designer's job is to develop web pages that communicate effective design, while also demonstrating knowledge of html and CSS. Web designers can utilize a variety of web design tricks there are tons of design related resources available for free to  designers, graphic designers or anyone seeking knowledge of creating or learning about website design tricks.  Professional web designers such as Molly, Lynda, and Eric Meyer, often have blogs or have written books, dedicated to helping others learn how to create web design tricks. I have found a great list of web design tricks & resources and have listed them on my website, you can check out the article it's called "Useful websites that offer free web design tips & tricks" I have also included in this article some basic web design tricks that you will be able to incorporate in your next design project.  

The first thing you want to do before designing your web page is to create a flowchart, a flowchart will aid in the outline of your web design project.  Next you will need to decide how you want to lay-out your site. There are a few basic layouts, however most professional designers use layouts that are compatible with the more popular browsers, "this design trick' is very important to know, as you will want all users to be able to access your web pages. The site Just dreamweaver has a ton of free blank or empty layouts that you can use as a guide. Or you can choose from some pre-made templates that are featured free, on smashing magazines website.  If you don't like any of the layouts suggested, you can create your own. Make sure to ensure browser compatibility by incorporating the right browser hacks. Make sure you know how the browser hacks work before you use this particular web design trick. Do some research on website design tricks before attempting to write your own code.  

Next you will use the measurements from you're empty web template to start the design process. Most Professional designers use Photoshop to design the graphical interface of their web page. I like to start my PSD interface template by boxing my layout first. For instance If I have a header at the top of my page, I would first create a big grey box and label it header, than on my side bar I would create another grey box, matching the measurements 100% from my html coded template, this ensures that I have a perfectly even and compatible transition from PSD to html or xhtml. After you have laid out your grey outline you can turn on rulers and guides and start lining up your grey outlines.  

Now if you turn off the entire layer, you will see that the rulers have perfectly lined up your site for you. The next step is to lock the rulers than group the grey layer and hide them and then lock the grey layer as well. Now you are ready to start your design, if you are having trouble coming up with concepts, look at some example sites to get your creative juices flowing. With these Web Design Tricks you are sure to create a 100% cross browser compatible web design that's super easy and fast to create, furthermore now that you know these simple web design tricks, you can incorporate them in your next design project.  

To get instant access to cutting edge graphic design resources click: "Web Design Tricks"

Charlotte Salcedo is an expert web designer who specializes in creating web designs that convert your visitors into customers. You will always get the best price and the wow factor that will blow your clients away an practically hypnotize them into whipping out their credit cards, guaranteed!

Basics of Web Design

Presentations delivered through the World Wide Web are usually created through web design. Thus, web design can be defined as the skill used to create these presentations. Designers create such presentations using the web browser or software such as internet television clients, RSS readers as well as microblogging clients. The software used has to be web - enabled. This is normaly carried out in order to generate an anthology of electronic files located on a server. It is also necessary for the presentation of content as well as interactive features or interfaces so that the end user can easily access them in the form of pages. Web design involves the placement of several elements including text and bit-map images such as gifs, JPEGs as well as GIFs on the page. The use of HTML, XML as well as XHTML helps designers to place these web elements.

Web design also involves the placement of other more complex media such as animations, sounds, vector graphics as well as videos. In such a case, design would therefore require the use of plug - ins which can also be fixed to the web page through HTML together with XHTML tags. Examples of plug-ins commonly used include QuickTime, Flash as well as Java run - time environment. Since there have been major developments in web design ever since its advent, most people use XHTML and XML together with Cascading Style Sheets commonly referred to as CSS. These tags are necessary in the positioning and manipulation of objects and elements on the web page. As advancements in web design keep growing, designers are slowly embracing the creation of web pages without plug - ins.

Web designers create pages that could be broadly classified under two groups; static or dynamic. The content and layout of static web pages can only be altered with manual updates created by the programmer. Dynamic pages on the other hand can be altered by an end user's input. The computing environment can also alter the content of a dynamic web page. It is however necessary to note that web design is especially concerned with the graphic design of a web page rather than the logistics as is the case in web development. Web design involves the use of several disciplines. These include search engine optimization, animation, typography, graphic design, interaction design, communication design, photography, corporate identity, marketing among others. What is more, it uses Multimedia technologies such as Flash and Silverlight together with Database technologies including PHP and ASP. Mark up together with Style sheet languages are also used, not forgetting to mention client - side scripting as well as server - side scripting.

Designers have to conform to certain principles in order to ensure that the web pages are accessible. For instance, it is advisable to use semantic markup so that the web page can have a meaningful structure. What is more, the web page should also be organized semantically so that other web services can easily recognize them on various web pages. Web designers also need to use a valid mark up language that follows the standards of a published DTD or Schema. Non text components should be presented in forms equivalent to text such as images and multimedia. Hyperlinks are also necessary but they should be placed in such a way that when one reads the text, it still makes sense. For layout in Web design apply CSS instead of HTML tables. Frames should also be avoided. It is important for any web design process to consider the intelligibility of the web pages while it should also be easily accessible to the users.

More on Web Design..

What is the Difference Between Web Design and Graphic Design?

Although web design and graphic design both use images, text, and typeface to create a desired method of communicating ideas, designing for web and print are two different practices. Graphic designers have been around since print media was created, while web design came into being when the Internet was developed. Before choosing a print designer or web designer, it is important to understand the differences between web design and graphic design.

Graphic Design

Graphic Design includes any type of design that has been created and printed. Graphic design uses the blending of technology and art to communicate messages and ideas. The graphic designer utilizes a number of communication tools to deliver a message from a client/company to a specific audience. Graphic design illustrations can be found in magazines, newspaper arrangements, newspaper ads, billboards, logos, brochures, books, labels on a variety of product packages, and much more. Graphic designers create the layout design for a variety of types of print advertisements. The print design is normally 2-dimensional. Each design component is created for a fixed size display. The main tools used are image and typography. Images are used to communicate a mood or emotion.

The audience reacts to the images and the advertising messages that they receive. Typography is a type-based design where words are used to convey a message. The designer will focus on the appearance of the words such as lettering size, location, shape, and color. They are designed to catch the attention of the consumer, enhance the ad display, identify the product, and help convey the advertiser's message to the targeted audience. Graphic designers work with market analysts, illustrators, and photographers as well as with typesetters and printers and other production experts to in order complete the entire ad design project.

Web Design

Web Design is task of creating a web page on the internet. Web designers work for businesses creating and implementing their websites. They work exclusively on web sites. A Web designer designs a graphical display of content and images that is displayed on the Internet in the form of a web page. They employ a number of web applications such as HTML, CSS, XHTML, JavaScript, PHP, Photoshop, and images such as JPG. The function of Web designer includes all of the technical aspects of creating a website, such as the coding and writing of web pages.

Both graphic designers and professional web designers are specialized to use such applications as color to create a mood or set a tone. They know how to communicate ideas and messages through such technical expressions as using the meaning of symbols to convey an idea. As well, they know how to use shapes, objects, and colors to provide balance and equilibrium to communicate to a targeted demographic and inform and encourage them to take a certain action such as buying a product.

Both web design and graphic design play an important role in the advertising, promotion, and sales of products and services. Choosing a professional web designer or graphic designer will depend on one's particular area of business.

Full service Toronto web design firm provides Web design, Web media and internet marketing services customized to suit your needs. Offices in California, Web design Vancouver web design and Kelowna.

Web Design Templates

The intention of web templates is to design a web site. Web design templates are used for separation of content from presentation in a web design and mass production of web documents. These collections of electronic files reside on one or more web servers to present content to the end user in the form of web pages. Studies have shown that web templates can grab interest of the first time user in only 10 seconds.

Web design templates are designed for professional and visual appeal. One can have a customized web design for a better reflection of the companies brand or for personal or commercial use.

Most of the web design templates created for commercial use, and should be appealing and luring to the visitors of the site. The web template should be stunning, innovative and ready to use. A spectacular web template will without doubt create an eye-catching home page that can almost grab the visitor by the collar and engross them on the site. However not all persons have the technical skills to create web design templates. For such people one can always ask a professional to make a customized web page at a certain cost.

For a minimal fee, one can own web design templates created by the best designers. These web templates are cost effective, unique, professionally designed, have functional web layouts, innovative, easy to customize with interfaces in Photoshop format. Other than purchasing the web templates, it is also possible to get free web design templates from the various websites that offer them. After purchase, the website can be used as one's own but there are rules pertaining to the terms of usage. To avoid copyright, one should have the link of the web designer on the home page. An amount can be paid not to have the designers' link on the home page.

After downloading the web design templates, one can replace all generic information that came with it and use their own to fit their profile or organization brand. The web templates are used to display personal information or day-to-day activities, to display information about an organization or company, displaying family history, a gallery of photos, to place music files or mp3 through the browser or to set up private login areas on-line.

Most of the successful web designs companies and other designers emphasize that the most important factor for creating web design templates is that it should offer original content to the readers in a way that will easily assist the search engine results. To be able to achieve this, web design templates should be interesting, in that they should attract viewers by adding quality and original content. Other ways are getting the brand right, keeping the home context short, easy linking pages, pictures to give enough emphasis; also, the size of the text especially on home page should be large enough to suit the web design layout. However, one is not limited to one design it is best to research on the content that one wants to use and even ask peers on the best way to create good web design templates.

JSICorp Web Design - free web design templates, free web templates, web design tutorials, web design scripts and free web design tips.

What Types of Web Design Courses Can I Take?

Web design schools offer many courses in web designing. If you want a challenging career that can prove lucrative, you should take a web design course. Because most companies are going online, they all have a need for a website. The need for people with skills in web design these days is very great.

Perhaps the most popular editing and managing tool Dreamweaver. In the Dreamweaver web design course, the student will learn how to make a web page using drop down menus. It is an excellent way to gain expertise in web designing while using basic designing techniques.

A Flash course has many exciting concepts that you will enjoy. The course provides techniques in cutting edge applications for a web page design. This course can be very challenging but interesting. Flash requires creative skills as well as analytical expertise. Some of the techniques used in Flash are very demanding and you will be required to implement your artistic skills while using complex programming. This is a web graphic course, and attention is focused on web picture optimization, creation of stunning images, special feature support, AutoShape attributes and many more.

Website designers and developers often provide their services on a contractual basis. Students can take up an introductory course on web design contract. This will provide them with the opportunity to create a contract. The course deals with the procedures and techniques required to make sure that the project is a success so that they can gain maximum profit.

Web content writing is another course offered in a web design course. This particular course improves writing skills in making precise and clear web contents. The website is your window to the outside world. That is why writing web contents can be a very sensitive issue. Aside from improving your writing skills, you will also learn how to write attention-getting contents. This course is also useful for those who want to start their work as technical writers to hone their skills.

The web project management course includes key concepts to make design projects successful. The course incorporates web design project planning guide, design documentation, allocation of resources, cost estimates and tracking progress and work done on design.

Part of the web project management course focuses on software packages used in web making and implementing techniques. It also places emphasis on one of the most important things in web designing-- the testing phase. After the testing phase, the web project is turned over to the web owners.

In the web site promotion course, students learn the best web strategies to promote their websites. The course teaches techniques that promote your web business through your design. Search engine optimization is one of the best strategies to promote your website. This course also provides fresh and new concepts to turn your website into a money-making venture.

Get a web design education from the comfort of your home. Check out the top web design classes by visiting us today!

How Professional Web Designers Can Improve Your Presence Online

The Internet is the new way to advertise your business and reach thousands of people a day. Unfortunately there are also other competitors that are advertising online too. A professional web design company knows how to design a web site and promote it to attract the highest number of customers.

Your Business Card and Store

The business web site acts as a business card and an online store. The appropriate web designing can project a very knowledgeable and polished web site. Just like you would hire someone to build and design a physical store and advertising campaign, so should you hire expert web designers to build and design your business web site. Without the expert look, your web site will lose clients.

Saving Time

A wise business owner will outsource web designing to save time. There is a lot to learn before effectively designing a web site including SEO, HTML, CSS, Photo Optimization, Search Engine Optimization, Java Script to name just a few. Most business owners do not have the time to learn all these different facets of web design quickly enough to build a professional looking web site.

Customization

With over 58,000,000 web sites on the Internet your site must stand out and attract customers that will use your business. Professional website designers will know how to design a site to suit your business needs by adding contact forms, picture galleries, FAQs, forums, and other necessary tools that are not found on pre-made templates. Expert web designers also know how to convey the correct business message using fonts, color and layout.

Finding a Web Designer

The best place to find a web designer in online. However choose a web designer that is suited to your potential clients. For example a company in India would be wise to search on the Internet for "web design company India" as professional web designers in India will know the Indian audience better than a web designer that works out of Scotland. Once you have a list of web design companies in India look through their web sites and make sure they are professional, easy to navigate and get their message across.

Hire dedicated web designers expert in website designing, graphic designing, hand sketch, table less designs and much more to give your site a professional and impressive presence online. Visit leading Web Design Company India and find your best outsourcing partner for all your web designing needs.

How to Choose the Right Web Design Company to Design Your Website?

Whether you want a new website designed for your company or are looking to re-design your website, finding the right web design company for your needs is the first and crucial step that will ultimately decide its success or failure. Unless your are an established business with an in-house Web design team the chances are that you will need to either hire a professional web designer or build the website or contract a web design company to do this for you.

Most businesses small or large do not have in-house expertise to design websites themselves and have to contract the work out to an external web design company. The importance of professionally designed website is essential. A poorly designed or an outdated website can have a negative impact on your company's brand and drive customers away to your competitors. A company's website is a window to its products and services and often the first point of contact with customers. It is vital for your website to present the right image and brand for your business.

Should you work with a Web design company or a Freelance Web designer?

Whether your website is designed by an independent contractor or a web design company you will need to consider certain issues before you make the decision. Both working with an independent web designer or a web design company have their advantages. Working with an independent web designer can be cost effective and flexible. Working with web design companies on the other hand may cost more but offers significant advantages. They are represented by a team of web designers who often possess wider skills and experience. Each member of the team will often specialise in a distinct area of website design and development, and will often be able to solve complex business issues with ease. Working with a web design company will provide your business with easy access to support as and when required or when something goes wrong.

Factors to consider when selecting a Web Design Company to design your website

Experience and Skills - Analyse their experience and technical skills. Review the information on their website and marketing material. Better still speak to them personally as often a direct conversation about your project will give you a clear idea of their knowledge and expertise.

Portfolio and case studies - Review and analyse their portfolio or case studies. This is usually available via their website. Reviewing other software or websites designed by the web design company can provide useful information anon their suitability for your project.

A streamlined process with a fast turn around time - Understand the web design company's process to see how it fits with your requirements.

Ask for a detailed proposal outlining costs, timescales and proposed solution. A professional web design company will always submit a detailed proposal outlining theses issues.

One stop shop

Think forward. Determine what other products and services can the web design company offer. If your require web design now chance are you will need additional services in future such as web hosting, search engine marketing, content m management system and so on. It can be daunting and an administrative nightmare to deal with many different companies for different services.

Long term relationship

Focus on building a long term relationship with the web design company. It is better to go for a company that offers excellent and timely support as required. Analysing the company and communicating with them will give you an idea whether the company focus on long term relationship or just a one off sale. Supported service knowing that they will be around should something was to go wrong or if requirements change with time.

By taking time to communicate with the prospective web design company beforehand will enable you to select the right web design company to partner with who will meet your expectations. Finding the right web design company and forming a relationship can be a valuable asset for your business for many years to come.

The author K.Singh is the editor for Web design company blog offering advice and tips of Website design, Search engine marketing and Ecommerce.

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How to Create Good Web Design

There are many different types of web design, from those built using website templates and 'build your own' site building applications to complex content managed and e-commerce web designs such as those used by big brand names like Amazon, eBay and Tesco. Some companies, even some big name companies, have unprofessional looking and badly designed websites. Some have amazing looking websites but because of their high graphical content and minimal text content can take an age to load, are not user friendly and do not provide what the visitor wants.

Good Website Design

Though many aspects of website design differ from site to site, many things remain the same throughout the majority of websites on the internet. Most notably is the navigation or menu. The way in which a website's menu works and looks is very important, as ultimately, visitors to a website are looking for certain criteria that will make them either stay and interact or leave. This ability for a website to keep visitors interested is sometimes referred to as stickiness. Visitors want an attractive visually exciting experience, but perhaps more importantly, they want 'ease of use'. Website usability is a key factor for websites that want their visitors to stick around, make an enquiry and ultimately complete a transaction and order a product or service.

Easy to Use Web Design

Internet users tend to prefer easy to use websites, because they do not want to have to learn how to use a website every time they find a new one. They should be able to use a website after only a few seconds of looking around a homepage, any more and they will leave and browse elsewhere. The need for fast user interaction is vital and therefore having a fast loading website is also important for a website to succeed. Even with faster internet connections such as broadband, internet users don't want to wait around.

Just imagine, if you go to a shop on the high street and are totally ignored by shop assistants at the counter for 5 minutes, even after you have made it clear you want help. There is a correlation here to how an internet user may feel, when they arrive at a website that has been poorly designed, is difficult to use, unfriendly and slow to load. Making sure that a website has been well thought out and designed with the user in mind, displays a company's unique selling points within easily recognizable eye catching calls for action and has a clear, easy to use menu is key to its success.

Flash Web Design

With recent web design advancements, such as the introduction of Flash animation and high definition video content, impressive websites have been produced to take advantage of much higher levels of visual effects and interaction. However with this 'high end' web design, comes a price, more often than not, web designs which rely heavily upon Flash content are often ridiculously slow to load. They often have a progress bar, which slowly goes across the web browser to signify when the website will finish loading.

This is much like the progress bars that you may be familiar with if you use video editing or 3D rendering software, or if you use games consoles where they are displayed whilst you wait for games to load. Internet users on the whole do not want to wait 3 - 5 minutes for a web page to load even if it does feature high resolution images, animation or video. They want fast informative content rich websites. If they wanted to watch an animation or video they would watch TV.

Good Flash Web Design

This is not to say that Flash animation is all bad news and shouldn't be used in web design. If used subtly and in small amounts it can make a website more visually appealing without slowing the load time down too much. Suitable uses for Flash animation in web design are things such as; Flash banner advertisements, Flash video and interactive Flash forms for online questionnaires or business presentations.

Using Flash for a whole website design however, is not such a good idea. It slows the user's experience down because they have to wait for elements of it to load. Also, sites totally developed in Flash tend to use unfamiliar menu structures and features. This can confuse visitors who just want to quickly interact with the website and not be amazed by the way the menu animates. Just because you can do these things in Flash, it doesn't mean they have any real working value in the real world. They may look pretty, but if they are not functional and only irritate the visitor then they have no real value.

Flash Web Design & SEO

Another argument against using Flash to create a whole website is that it dramatically reduces the effectiveness of your websites' Search Engine Optimisation. Flash web designs are made up of one main file within a web page which search engines find difficult to index. This is because the text within them is usually graphical text and therefore is not usually accessible by search engines. Some recent developments allow some text to be displayed for search engines in Flash websites, but this is nowhere near as effective as text content within traditional HTML based websites.

Don't Write Off Flash in Web Design

Although Flash does have its limitations it also has its good points if used correctly. For instance; Flash animation is usually smaller in file size than traditional gif animation and because of the way it is made the animation flows smoother than gif animation too. Having said this, I would recommend only using Flash in small areas within a site to compliment other imagery that makes up the overall design. Finding a balance between minimal graphical elements, imagery, Flash and good quality informative text is the key to a successful user friendly website. This isn't to say that web design needs be boring. By working with quality web design companies there's no reason why you couldn't have a visually exciting, well designed, easy to use and successful website.

Visually Stimulating Web Design

When visitors first arrive at a website, they want to be impressed and engaged with what the website has to offer. This will be determined by the ways in which the web designer has laid out the website's content text, images and features. Arranging elements such as imagery, text, graphics, flash and video in such a way as to keep the visitor interested in the website is the key to good web design. If a website has poor design and doesn't grab the attention of the visitor in the first few seconds, then it may well be dismissed as just another average website. This ultimately means the visitor will go elsewhere to spend their time and, more importantly, money.

Good Web Design Layout

A lot of time and money is spent making sure that the right elements of websites are positioned in the right places. Companies spend large amounts of money conducting research into how internet users use their websites. This type of research shows where their visitors' eyes concentrate the most, which elements of the website they click on first and generally how they interact and use their websites. Most internet users will look primarily from the top left either across the page, or down the left hand side of the web page through an internet browser via a computer, mobile phone or TV set.

I would hazard a guess, that they are looking for the company's name or logo, their main selling points or slogans and then what the website has to offer in terms of what is featured in the menu. After which their eyes are probably drawn across the page content and over to the right hand side. Successful web design usually takes this into consideration and will ultimately affect the way a website looks.

There are of course rather famous exceptions to this rule for instance one rather well known search engine has a web design which is quite different. The main focus and core functionality in their web design is located right in the centre of the page. This however, isn't any ordinary website with tens or even hundreds of pages of products and services to display, its main focus is its recognisable logo and of course its search box. It does however feature a small minimal menu across the top of the web design, which flows from left to right. So even they have taken onboard some of the research undertaken into internet users' habits. If you go looking at websites after reading this article, I can guarantee that most of the web designs you'll see, will have a left hand menu and a defined header bar with a company logo and slogan across it.

Find high quality professional web design and search engine optimization services at the EC-Plus website; http://www.ec-plus.net Established in 1999, EC-Plus has a strong team of web designers & developers who create successful online brochure & e-commerce websites.