I blogged about the three things required for your website to be truly effective. In order to build a powerful web presence these are the three major items you must consider:
(sounds easy doesn’t it)
But I realized these are also applicable to general business growth and development. By keeping these three ideas in mind, at all times, not only will you grow your website you will also grow your business:
The “standards” are a set of guidelines set aside by the W3C (world wide web consortium) that detail how certain technologies are to be implemented. They dictate the format and use of code to ensure compatibility across multiple platforms, software, devices (TV, PC, Cellphone, Windows, Mac). Web browsers used to abide by their own set of individual web rules (and some still do). You had to write different code in different ways across different browsers to achieve the same affect across multiple browsers/platforms. Rather than just writing one set of code, this multiple-code multiple-platform format was very frustrating as designers and web developers had to essentially create sseparate websites for every instance.
Standards Website Save You Money
Current modern standards help save you money. When a web design company says they develop websites to standards using XHTML & CSS it means the site can (usually) be created quicker - and will absolutely lead to easier site wide updates (design or content). The separation of the different layers of a website means that every component can be accessed quickly leading to very fast updates.
Standards-Based Websites Make You Money
More often than not the goals you’ve set for your website is to have your visitors DO something. Do you want your visitors to sign up for a newsletter, purchase a product, or contact you regarding your service? Sure, but before they can do something, they must first find your site. How do people find your website? With Search Engines! A standards-based website will give you a HUGE advantage over your competition. Proponents of standards-based XHTML & CSS websites often neglect this big fact.
With proper coding your web design company takes out any road blocks in the search engine process, meaning your site can do well in the search engines. When you do well in the search engines it means people can find your website, contact you for your services or purchase your products. Unoptimized, non-standards websites often have images, and old code that impede the search engines’ ability to get to your content.
I was surfing the Internet this morning when I stumbled upon an old colleague’s blog, Tropical Web Works. The posts, authored by Sonja Ray, haven’t been updated in a little while, but there is still some great information buried within.
The post that most intrigued me was “Eight Tips Every Adwords Advertiser Should Know.” It contained some great basic steps that every advertiser should follow including:
Exclude myspace?!
I had never heard that before. Although by default if you do opt-out of the content network you have no fear of being included on myspace, if you don’t take this crucial step you may be included on Myspace. Why would anyone want to do this? Why would you want to take the time to alienate or eliminate a huge base of eyes to get your product in front of? Sonja makes a great point:
When myspace.com started carrying Google ads, thousands of advertisers were suddenly hit with huge advertising bills because of all the kids on myspace who click-click-click willy-nilly on everything they see, with no intention of buying anything
This seems to support our own observations. The advertising and medium must support the audience. Although Myspace is a great potential source for advertising (either with adwords or some other tool), its young, advertising savvy base is often not fooled or enticed by advertising, and, their familiarity with the system sometimes leads to them hurting advertisers (false clicks).
http://www.huntconstruction.com
We are excited to release the website of our new client Hunt Construction, a premier Southwest Florida custom home builder and upscale commercial developer, to showcase their capabilities and commitment to quality and customer satisfaction.
Established in the mid-1980s by Florida native Steve Hunt, Hunt Construction has built one-of-a-kind homes and customized model homes in many Bonita Bay Group communities, including Bonita Bay, Shadow Wood at the Brooks and Mediterra, Bonita Bay’s flagship development. Hunt’s luxury homes are accented by signature features such as outdoor fireplaces, courtyards, billiard rooms, dramatic stepped ceilings, private gardens and koi ponds.
Hunt Construction’s web site, makes it easy to navigate between residential and commercial projects and view a list of each.
On Friday Facebook released an upgrade to their flyers system.
For those unfamiliar Facebook is the social platform (social networking tool) that is sweeping the online world. Created by Mark Zuckerberg in 2004. Facebook is quickly approaching MySpace in size and users and is set to take over. It is growing at a phenomenal rate.
One of the nice features of Facebook is the ability for any user to advertise to their “network” easily and inexpensively. Their flyer system will allow a student or user of Facebook to easily blast a message or advertise an event in the form of a standard banner to the school or networks they desire. Until Friday these flyers were impression based (cost $ per the number of times they were seen by users).
Friday these flyers received a major update in the form of flyers pro. Now advertisers have the option of paying per click - a giant leap over cost per impression.
According to Facebook follower and online advertiser Willy Franzen, this new tool opens up a lot of possibilities:
…with the Facebook Flyers Pro option, I’m extremely excited about the prospects of advertising on Facebook. Beyond the fact that now you only have to pay for results, the platform allows for an impressive amount of targeting (by gender, relationship status, network/school, interests, age, etc).
As someone who has used the flyer advertising tool for both personal and professional purposes with limited results I hope this latest update will have an impact on a market segment that is easy to reach, but hard to break through. College students and other (generally younger) computer-savvy audiences are familiar with online advertising and although it is easy to get in front of them, it can be very difficult to get them to react.
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