We each focused on our particular areas of  strength. Specifically, I discussed different types of websites, costs, SEO and hosting while Teri tackled marketing concepts, social media and how to drive traffic to your website. For an early Saturday morning the turnout was great and we enjoyed sharing our knowledge with business owners looking to get their business online or make it better.

We also put together a handout for attendees but feel this information is useful for anyone looking to have a website built. We would like to offer it as a pdf download to you and hope it helps you in your quest of getting a fantastic website online!

If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact either me or Teri! We’re always here to help.

Click Here to Download: EOD & MC2 Things to Know Before You Buy

Many people or businesses who have a website that has been set up by their web developer are unfamiliar with the terms of their domain name(s) or hosting account.

Because of this, they can fall victim to domain name or hosting frauds such as addressed in this KGW news report. Knowledge and information about your domain name registration and hosting account will help against these types of frauds:

In particular, you should arm yourself with this knowledge:

• - WHO your domain name registrar and hosting company is.
• - HOW are these accounts being paid for – through your web developer or on your own credit card.
• - WHEN your annual renewal dates are

As your web developer, I make sure to set-up hosting and domain name registration on your own credit card and set for automatic, annual renewal. I also give you a site information document when your website is complete that contains all this important information and more. And lastly, I am always readily available for question about your website and should be your first line of defense whenever you receive anything questionable regarding your online presence.

www.kgw.com/news/Small-Business-Owners-Beware-194400261.html

WordPress out of the box is set up as a blogging platform. In order to make WordPress behave like a regular website with a static home page, other static pages and perhaps no blog portion at all, settings need to be modified, navigation needs adjusted and pages need to be created. To really add “bells and whistles” custom page templates and individual sidebars should be created.

For the novice who gets WordPress installed on their hosting account, the point where they crash and burn is usually when they install their first theme and can’t figure out why the home page shows all the posts. They switch to a new theme and same thing. Soon they realize it’s not a problem with the theme it’s something much more evil that is thwarting their good intentions of “WordPress do-it-yourself”.

It’s at this point when you should turn to a web developer. Web development doesn’t have to be a start to finish project. It can also be a some hours spent configuring an “out-of-the-box” WordPress site so a client can use it like a content management system. We can “save the day” and keep you within your “do it yourself” budget!

This, of course, can be very subjective as there are many different definitions of what “looks good”. Sometimes websites are judged either good, great or poor entirely on how they look. But, a website is more than just a pretty set of pages on the internet. A website is a delivery method for information, products and services.

A website can be simple looking but because of how it’s marketed and it’s underlying structure, it could have excellent search engine ranking. One might look at a site like this and say it’s not that great a site but in terms of being found and showing up in the first page or two for keyword searches in the major search engines, this site could be fantastic! Because a website’s information, products and services need to be found online among hundreds, if not thousands, of similar businesses much of what makes a website great will be “behind” the pretty looks. However, if a website is visually unpleasant according to most peoples’ standards, then although the website is easily found online, it may not capture the attention and pocketbooks of all those potential customers.One thing I have found to be a death sentence to any website, even the ones that are heavily marketed, is an amateurish look (like something a preschool child would design) with bad, missing or ILLOGICAL navigation! Once viewer frustration sets in they bounce right off your page and on to somewhere else.

Making your website attractive involves either a background in graphics or art, a really good sense of style and taste or knowing someone with these abilities. It also helps if you are familiar with software programs like Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. Making your website rank well in search engines involves some of these factors:

1. a structurally sound website
2. search engine optimization
3. indexing with major search engines
4. up-to-date XML sitemaps
5. on- and offline marketing

Once your website is found, keeping a potential customer on your site to make a purchase, use your services or view your information, involves your website being:

1. attractive
2. easy to navigate
3. engaging
4. able to deliver the information it promises
5. easy to use
6. easy for customers to contact you
7. professional looking and sounding to assure customers of your legitimacy

If all of the above factors are taken into consideration when building a website and are practiced or employed to the best of the web developers and clients ability, then one should end up with a website that is truly GREAT!

In fact, what the heck is a content management site?

In a nutshell, a content management site or CMS for short, lets the site owner log into a back end management/administration area where changes to the site can be made without having to know computer programming/coding language. One such CMS platform is WordPress which provides the non-techie website owner an amazing amount of flexibility and control over their website content, structure, images, and more.

I define a brochure site as one with a smaller number of pages and mostly unchanging content. These sites do not need updating often but when they do, they require a person familiar with computer programming language. A brochure site is usually good for:

1. a business or individual who needs online presence and has a small amount of content information
2. a business that doesn’t need frequent changes in its online content

One should consider how their business may grow and the needs of their website to accommodate that growth. A brochure site can grow into a more extensive site consisting of many pages with additional dynamic features such as photo galleries, forms, etc…. This could be an additional cost in the future, possibly even more than the original site. If the additional content needs frequent changes, then this becomes another regular expense. For the business that is growing and thriving this isn’t a bad thing IF one has a reliable web designer/programer who gets work done in a timely fashion and is easy to get a hold of!

A CMS provides a means for a “non-technical” person to update or edit their website content. CMSs can have a wide variety of administrative functionality. There are other types of CMS solutions available but many of these lack the robust abilities of WordPress.

In the past I have used a small program that is added to a standard site so changes can be done through a familiar Word-like text editor. In my experience, these are limited to just text changes or image replacements on a page by page basis. They can be a bit temperamental to use and sometimes clutter the pages with junk code.

WordPress is a good solution for the business owner who needs to change their website content frequently, who wants full control over the content and image layout of their site and who sees their website growing quickly as their business expands.

For some types of websites, WordPress is “overkill”. A brochure site is good for the business that wants to establish themselves online for better customer visibility, drive customers to a brick and mortar store, or has content that doesn’t change much throughout the year. An example would be a horse boarding stable where the facilities and services offered remain consistent from year to year and the only changes may be new services or boarding rates.

A WordPress CMS is best for the business that changes services, products or information frequently. Shopping cart sites, blogs, or businesses that offer educational content or content dependent on calendar dates would benefit from this type of site.

At Equine Online Design we sit down with you and discuss your available options. We want to help you come up with a website plan that fits your budget, your goals and the forward direction of your business.