Atilus Internet Marketing & Web Development

Once again, as I have done on many occasions, I will reference todays Marketing Profs e-newsletter that addresses the concerns of big business when looking into creating a web presence. Normally, I really respect their excellent marketing perspectives and insight, while praising their due diligence when presenting great references and resources, but not this time…

They report, as written by Tina Ferguson of the True You Marketing blog, that there are three ways to eliminate spending too much on too little regarding a new corporate web presence:

- Get to know the technology.
- Know your position in the marketplace.
- Ask to see working clients’ sites.

Now, I will agree with the first because I believe that every consumer should be less trusting and more informed. And knowing “enough to be dangerous” only means you know enough to get skirted with jargon you may not have brushed over. Certainly, having an educated IT professional you trust with you during professional meetings to discuss web development will prove helpful.

However, knowing your position in your marketplace only proves one thing: your position in your market place. Discounts are never in order unless you expect discounted work, but I have never and will never base my pricing or any form of marketing costs on the size or dominance of a company. To think that their are professional companies potentially engaging in this sort of unethical practice is discouraging and unsettling.

As for asking for “working” sites, I agree that it is far more comforting to access a served website with an active web address from your internet connection, but do not for a minute discredit successfully created websites that are off line, for whatever reason. Sometimes clients will take websites down, go out of business, or change a brand with a subsequent site redesign, which will remove the former site from internet accessibility. But since said site is still actively present on an in house server, you can view it in it’s entirety and still experience the site just the same.

Why should Web Development companies be held at the mercy of the choices made by their clients?

If you are looking for a specific or similar design or level of functionality, and the designer wishes to showcase it to you from a site that has been built in-house but removed from the web, should that downgrade the worth of the design or coded application?

I should hope that whoever wrote this article does their due diligence next time before writing such unfounded material.

In response, I believe the best way to avoid paying too much for too little is to ask the company is question for references, portfolio excerpts, a description of the companies management interface, meet the individuals that you will be working with multiple times, and fully understand the company, their process, their work and their pricing structure before solidifying a relationship. And beyond that, make comparisons with the competitors in question.

But again, as I have written several times, web development pricing is not arbitrary but is also not standardized. You will pay much more for the same work with one company than you will another if they are more experienced, creative and properly managed. What will take a freelance designer $10k to create may take a professional firm $50k to create.

It’s logistics and you will get what you pay for. In addition, time line, size of team necessary to create your web application, level of custom coding or design, amount of and type of software, if any, necessary to implement, level of customer service and response turnaround (based on references) and much more should all be taken into account when comparing pricing.

After reading many other blogs by Tina, I found her material to be intelligent, insightful and useful… but the post in question was a definite miss.

14 Jul | Post by Scott L. Clark. Filed under Uncategorized, Web Design.

I just got back from a meeting by the SWFRTP. I don’t really want to talk about the meeting, more touch on something someone said at the meeting - something that has just caught my attention.

First, a tiny background on SWFRTP. SWFRTP stands for Southwest Florida Regional Technology Partnership. It is a newly formed group that has grand plans for the area (Southwest Florida). SWFRTP is trying to bring technology awareness to Southwest Florida.  In a nutshell, when you think of technology you think of California (Silicon Valley), you think of Tampa, Seattle, etc. How did these places get to be known as “Technology Hubs”? How did all of that work, people, and technology-oriented business get there? Through groups like SWFRTP. It’s a grand task, but it’s being driven by people and leaders that are up to the challenge and we were truly honored to be able to join them today.

Anyway, a person at the meeting spoke up with something like the following:

“Technology solves business problems, we need to involve more businesses, CEOs, etc. No one wants to hear about the technology, they just want to know problems it is going to solve.”

A great point! And one mirrored in something I just read:

“our [web]site is not designed to ‘make us money’…”

I know we’ve written pieces before about similar issues. But, EVERY website should make money. But, at the end of the day, it’s not JUST about money. Websites are tools you can use to solve business problems.

Does your business want to grow its sales?

A website is a tool you can use to solve this. The problem of sales can be addressed through a well optimized (both for search engines and conversions) website and proper marketing.

Do your prospective clients spend a lot of your time and money (in printing costs) coming to your office for information about your product or service in doing research?

Well, don’t punish your customers. Solve two problems at once. Make sure your company information, news, events, pictures are on your website. Allow them to do their research more easily and save yourself some dollars on printing those fancy brochures and spending time qualifying people. Also, let your potential clients fall in love with your charity endeavors, and ideas through a press release section or blog.

There are countless other examples, but viewing technology not as an expense, but as a solution, and ultimately - quite quickly - an invaluable asset that will SAVE YOU MONEY and MAKE YOU MONEY is key to success in business in the 21st century.

05 Jun | Post by Zach Katkin. Filed under SWFRTP, Southwest Florida Regional Technology Partnership, Web Design.

How much does a website cost? Well… that depends. How much does a building cost? “Ballpark figure. If you had to give me a number?” All buildings are different. Is this a manufactured home you’re thinking of? A commercial building? Perhaps a beautiful lake front mansion with marble Romanesque columns. I guess the answer should be… it depends. And web development is not much different.

I can’t believe that it would take a company apparently as professional as yours upwards of 12,000 to make a blog. Either you’re ripping customers off or you’re incompetent. One framework could be re-used thousands of times, saving you time and your customers money. Yes, each site needs its own modifications, but if you build a solid framework you can run pretty much anything off it.

I’ll address this comment later, but first of all I would like to thank Scott for writing and publishing his great article on our blog – to which the above was a comment - just a few weeks ago. He was really able to sum up “what does a website cost.” Without going into full detail on everything mentioned here is just a brief break down of what was discussed regarding the cost of a good website:

• $1000-$2000 Basic Design Website
• $3000-$7000 Custom Design Websites – visually attractive, completely unique design
• $7000- $12,000 Content Management System (CMS) Websites
• $12,000- $100,000+ - totally custom situations, implementation of more advanced design & programming, etc.

Visit the Complete Article - What Does a Website Cost?

Internally we had discussed the idea at length – writing an in-depth article about how much does a website cost – and, finally decided to hit “publish” after weighing everything. We effectively laid all of our cards on the table, allowing our audience, the web developer community, our competition and future clients to understand how much this web stuff costs. The truth is the biggest thing we were concerned with in writing and publishing an article like this would be backlash from the web community or independent developers. Ultimately, the benefits outweigh the negative – we have to educate the community on the steps, time, and price involved in a proper web presence.

Personally, I am sick and tired of hearing two things from new or potential clients:

Read the rest of this entry …

13 May | Post by Zach Katkin. Filed under Business, Design, Web Design.

With the arrival of the next great internet boom – the internet marketing boom - the possibilities are limitless. The internet is exploding with new features and technologies such as interactive shopping, podcasting as well as newly emerging E-marketing tools and ideas. Among these new features are WiFi advertising (advertising to users of your WIFI network), and Internet capabilities on wireless phones such as 3G (AT&T’s network).

For those of you not in the industry, internet marketing is the buzz in the advertising and marketing world. With ever changing technology and improved techniques, and a now solid foundation of return, internet marketing is slowly coming to the forefront of marketing discussions.
And this internet revolution is even outpacing newer, less conventional forms of marketing and sales. Take for example traveling on any major airline. E-ticketing is available 24 hours a day and is convenient (whereas if you call the 800 or 888 number, you will be billed a transaction fee); you can print your ticket(s) 48 hours before the flight or 1 hour before the flight, at no additional cost attached.
I think that it is important that the advantages and disadvantages are carefully studied in contrast to traditional marketing. But that doesn’t mean the industry is without its evils. Issues that are still prevalent in and around internet marketing include: spam (which needs to be more heavily regulated), consumer loyalty (which needs to be studied more), and the different advertising strategies and performance that internet marketing has over traditional marketing.

However, one of the largest concerns of the general public is security and privacy on the internet. For example, if you read my previous post “Flirting with Diaster”, the attached You Tube video has a prime example of this: When Sarah Lacy asked the audience to begin asking their questions, an audience member stood up and said “What is the biggest obstacle that Facebook faces?” Zuckerberg replied “Building systems that allow users control of their applications/information.” The audience member replied, “Is it a security issue allowing users to control of their applications/information?” See how security is reiterated each time the audience member asks a different question? I have to say, it is a major concern of the general public, and must be addressed.

On the other hand, Internet marketing has truly revolutionized the marketing industry as a whole; traditional advertising and marketing firms better sit up and take notice and quickly adapt to the to the ever changing internet/technology as the general public consumes more media, does more searches, and spends more time online. Additionally one major advantage that internet marketing has that stands out ahead of traditional advertising is that with internet marketing you are able to customize and personalize your site from start to finish, making the process interactive between the internet marketing agency/firm and the client. And these custom solutions are growing the internet eco-system. For example, custom interactive shopping has revolutionized the way the general public shops, while improving the online shopping experience.

With that said, do you think internet marketing will revolutionize traditional marketing? You be the judge.

09 May | Post by Zach Katkin. Filed under Business, Clients, Internet Marketing, Pay Per Click, Search Engine Optimization, Tech Trends, Web Design.

Hello to all of you web designers out there! If you’re like me, you prefer designing your sites using some form of css, especially when it comes to designing menus. We love the hover over effects, and the customizable-ness of styling both hover and non-hover states of the menu items.

Some weeks ago while finagling with an Expression Engine template, it occurred to me that it would be pretty neat if EE could add a “_selected” next to my menu item’s class name if a visitor was on that particular page. This would effectively give me the power to do things like: make the menu item that corresponds to the current page highlighted while the other menu items stay normal. So, I set off to research the documentation of EE for plugin programming. This is what I’ve created for you to use as well:

Download the Plugin: atilusmenuclass.zip

Here’s how you use it:

Once uploaded, you will be able to add this snippet inside any of your template files:

<a href="/about/" class="{exp:menuclass:item class="aboutlink" selected="_selected" uri="about"}" title="About Page">about</a>

Any parameter you pass for selected will be added trailing your class name you pass for class. The parameter uri is used to specify the page URI for which the plugin will trigger this class name change.

For example, if a visitor is at the address http://yoursite.com/contactpage/ and you have set one of your links assigned with uri=”contactpage” as well as selected=”_selected” and finally class=”contactpagelink”, the plugin will change your link’s class name to contactpagelink_selected. And of course, when the visitor is on a page other than http://yoursite.com/contactpage/ the class name will be displayed as “contactpagelink”.

Output:

If visitor is NOT on http://yoursite.com/contactpage/ :

<a href="http://yoursite.com/contactpage/" class="contactpagelink"/>

If visitor is on http://yoursite.com/contactpage/ :

<a href="http://yoursite.com/contactpage/" class="contactpagelink_selected"/>

07 May | Post by admin. Filed under Expression Engine Plugins, Open Source, Software, Web Design.

As you read this there are people working on furthering the advancement of web design. You know, like CSS3 and stuff. Well here is something that will really knock your socks off. Webkit is the next generation of web design. Here is a rundown of some of what it can do already:

CSS Gradients
No more will you have to rely on a solid background color or having to create an image to get a background gradient. Webkit allows for CSS gradients. You will be able to style any type of gradient you desire down to where the color stopper is placed (just like Photoshop).

CSS Transforms
Think of an image that you have on your page. Now let’s say you have this crazy idea of rotating it 10 degrees, or maybe even the whole site 30 (because you’re just that insane about rotations). Well Webkit allows for CSS transformations. This entails not just rotations but resizing and skewing as well. It makes the image and keeps its relative position and makes the transformation without disrupting the rest of the content around it. SWEEEEET!

CSS Transitions
Stark rollovers are a thing of the past with CSS transition. This allows for smooth rollover transitions. For example, let’s when you rollover the white background link on your page it will fade or “transition” to any color your heart desires. This can be combined with other Webkit CSS features. Anyone in the mood for a square blue link to transition to green while rotating 15 degrees and getting twice the size. Crazy! Yes. Cool! Double Yes.

And finally…
CSS Masks
This code allows you to mask images to any shape you can think of. An image can be masked by another image, an SVG vector graphic, or even CSS gradients (see above if you forgot already). But let’s say you want to mask something else on your page (because your web design madness has run wild). Well you can. Masks can be attached to any HTML element, including forms and video.

OK, time to calm down and come back to reality. Don’t look for this type of technology to run rampant all over the internet. Webkit is still under production. Plus it can only be implemented under certain browsers and other applications. Neither IE nor Firefox is on that VIP list, but Safari is.

So the future is here, but still out of reach (does that make sense). If you are still at the edge of your seat wanting more you can visit WebKit and get all the latest news and information about what is going on with this new technology.

Cliché of the Week
Wearing clothes in public

28 Apr | Post by Jacob Giesler. Filed under Design, Web Design.

As seen on Marketing Profs, ‘The SEO Rapper’ host Charles Lewis is an online marketer for Pop Labs whose alter ego—the Poetic Prophet—likes to rap about his subject of expertise. It sounds weird, but the videos are not only entertaining, they’re remarkably informative.

This video is informative from a basic web design perspective…

Watch. Learn. And bob yo’ head.

18 Apr | Post by Scott L. Clark. Filed under Tech Trends, Web Design.

Thank you to Kathleen Davey for forwarding these hilarious cartoons. Please click the image to see the full cartoon series:

17 Apr | Post by Zach Katkin. Filed under Web Design.

Okay. It’s now time for you to get started on a task. It could be anything from updating website content, editing images on Photoshop, or even building a site from scratch for a client. Whatever it is, don’t let yourself feel overwhelmed.

You should have a base to start with and then work from there.

Focus on single tasks at a time. Avoid multitasking.

This goes for anything you do. Not just web designing. Complete all your tasks one-by-one in a systematic approach. Once you have completed one, you can tackle the next. And always finish the “important stuff” first before working on the fancy designs. Cool-looking images, flash movies, or any other non-content related gibberish comes second. The core markup (text, links, site navigation, organization, etc.) comes first. But remember that too much emphasis on the fancy-schmancy stuff can drive visitors away.

Additionally, all your completed tasks should work towards increasing visitor traffic.

14 Apr | Post by Andrew Pineiro. Filed under Web Design.

First of all, let’s get this out of the way… you need a website. Period.

And not just any ol’ website, but a great website with clear, crisp professional, easy to navigate design with superb user ability and functionality. Furthermore, you need a website that is just as easy for you to use administratively, as it is for your site visitors to use.

It doesn’t matter if you are a national corporate brand, a smaller brick and mortar with ‘plenty of business’, a brick and mortar with only local business, or an ice cream shop that only sells to people between 5′10 and 5′11 wearing baseball hats before 3 pm only… you still need a website! Your business can be broad or niche, it can be large or small, and despite what you may believe… you need a website!

Now, what does a website cost?

Read the rest of this entry …

10 Apr | Post by Scott L. Clark. Filed under Blogs, Business, Design, SEO, Search Engine Optimization, Web Design, social media.