Tech Search

There are numerous technologies used by programmers (ASP, PHP, and Javascript to name a few), but this article will focus solely on XHTML and CSS. W3 has a set of standards for both of these technologies, and making a website W3-compliant ensures that most all viewers will see the site exactly the same way (no matter what browser they're using). Validation also helps with Search Engine Optimization (SEO) because clean code means easier search-engine spidering.

Cascading Style Sheets, or CSS, is a technology often used in sites with many pages to make aesthetic changes easier. The style sheet is an exterior file that runs interdependently with the HTML (or outputted HTML) of a site. The style sheet serves as a template for the entire site's color and font schemes, while also controlling borders, sizes, and more. Being able to edit a single file, instead of 100s of changes in many files saves time and precious web design dollars. Validation is imperative to get the most out of a website. That is, a user can upload or copy-and-paste their CSS file to the W3 site, and they'll be given a list of any errors it contains.
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Another of the technologies becoming more popular is Extensible Hypertext Markup Language, or XHTML. XHTML is an extension of HTML 4.0, and, while in its infancy, has become quite prevalent. XHTML conforms to standards moreso than HTML. As such, it is more search-engine and user-friendly:

- XHTML documents conform to XML. XML Tools can double as XHTML tools.
- XHTML is an extension of HTML 4.0. It is more user-friendly and streamlined than HTML.
- XHTML is a combination of HTML and XML in that it can run scripts and applets that use both the HTML and XML DOM (Document Object Model)
- As XHTML grows, XHTML 1.0 documents will be able to interoperate among other XHTML documents making it a more browser transitional language.
(Source: www.w3.org)

To conclude, using the standards of web development lined out by the W3 is imperative for users to get the most out of a site. Often, making a webpage W3-compliant is the first step of SEO, a marketing tool to get the most out of your advertising dollar. Validation is easy, and can be completed if a user has a basic knowledge of HTML-editing and FTP (File Transfer Protocol). Using these tools, coupled with the set of W3 standards can save a lot of money and help the site's overall functionality.

Website validation: http://www.w3schools.com/site/site_validate.asp

Take a look through Red Fly's portfolio, compare to other Irish design firms, and you'll see that the company has a lot to offer.
Web Development Ireland

Goal and target - Goal of the Website (site's purpose) and who is the target audience?

Context - Layout, design (user-friendly layout) and color schemes.

Content - Text, pictures, sound, and video (must be useful information which achieves goals and interest to your audience).

Community - How can the site enable user-to-user communication ?

Customization - Site's ability to tailor itself to different users to allow users to personalize the site.
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Communication - How the site talks to the visitor, site to user or two-way communications.

Connection - Degree that the site is linked to other sites.

Commerce - Site's capabilities for commercial transactions.

-Your domain should be your company name.

-Make a consistence in design. Changing interfaces is a potential barrier which should be avoided.

-Make the content on your first page rich and explanatory.

-Make your title clear. Clear title makes task clear.

-Show the users what's new with the site and company.

-Use focus and emphasis on the main product.

-Proper use of images (meaningful and clean images).

-Downloadable speed (pages load quickly and provide something to read almost instantly).

-Pages are easy to navigate so that you can find what you want and most importantly, the content is useful and worthwhile.

-Good interactivity engages the user and makes your site memorable.

-Easy to find information.

-Provide valuable, timely information to the user.

-Provide keywords for search engines (search engine optimization).

-Provide a search option within the site.

-Contact information should be easy to find and preferably visible on all pages.

-Updates should be made regularly to give users a reason to return to your site.

-Proper programming with no broken links.

-Provides copyright information.

-A good Website needs to be able to be viewed in whatever browser or service the customer is using, so cross-browser and platform compatibility together with accessibility features for the disabled are a must.

It is good to get websites designed by professional website designers.
A good web design company will be help you design a search engine friendly website. And also take care of search engine optimization too.

Article written by
Wendy
Best Web Designers

A lot has been written on web design that sell products and services but relatively few web designers know how or are even bothered about developing websites with the basic elements required to give your website a head start on search engines.

Here are a few important web design tips that will set your website apart when it comes to ranking on search engines and selling your products and services.

1. Every web design should include the famous tags. There is no excuse for not including these in a web design from the outset. No matter what they say, tags have their say in the way search engines look at your website and no web design is complete without carefully chosen tags.

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There are 3 important tags namely the Title tag, Description tag and the keywords tag. Each web page should have its own set of tags. What are these tags? These are words and phrases that are embedded in the HTML of the website and very easy to include in your web design.
Let us look at each of these tags.

2. The Title tag is an important part of web design for search engine optimisation. This tag is likely to be picked up by search engines and displayed as a result header when a visitor finds your website on a search engine. This tag also appears as the title that in the blue strip at the top of your browser.

A good web design will contain a short Title tag that includes the keywords you think visitors will use to find your site.

3. The Web design should also include the Description tag. This is a short description of what the web page is about and it often appears just below the title in search engine results. Although the importance of the Description tag in search engine ranking is uncertain, the description in a web design acts like a sales pitch. This is your opportunity to tell the visitor what the web page is about and why he or she should click on your website. Remember, web design is not just about building a website and getting it ranked. A good web design should do all this, get the visitor to click on your website when it is found and sell your products and services.

4. Let's look at the Keywords tag. A lot of web designs contain a mass of supposed key words in the Keywords tag. Keywords are the words or phrases that visitors use to search for websites on search engines. A good web design practice is to have focussed and themed web pages. This means that each web page should be focused on one keyword at a time and this keyword should be in the web page Keyword tag. It is very important that the keywords used in the tag also appear in the body of the text.

5. The h1, h2 headers are also important elements of a good web design. Use h1 and h2 headers as these are read by search engines. Use them as high up on your web page as possible and where possible use the keywords in the h1 header. H1 headers are by default large fonts. It is possible to format these so they match the overall look of the web design and retain their header properties.

Ralph Ramah is the webmaster of Discount Web Design( http://www.discountwebdesign.co.uk ), a leading web design firm. Please feel free to republish this article provided you keep this resource and the hyperlink.

Have you noticed these days that so many websites all look the same - square box in the middle of the screen? That's because it's fairly easy and cheap to use the many templates available to build a simple website. There are many web designers or friends of a friend out there that will offer to do you a website for a few hundred pounds but there are many technical issues to consider to ensure really professional results.

A good website should have the following attributes: Strong corporate identity User friendly navigation Quick to download A useful resource Expandable - needs to incorporate technology that allows scalability Visually attractive to encourage usage Must work in all browsers on all computers PC and MAC Good investment / value for money Search engine friendly

Remember that first impressions count and a badly designed website is worse than having no website at all. You wouldn't get a friend of a friend to do your company brochures or service your nice new car you would go to a specialist, so why take the risk and compromise on quality with your website.

A well designed website with good graphics and strong corporate branding will last for years and should be a good investment for your company. Updating the content is simple and inexpensive.

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You can start with a small but well designed website that fits within your budget. The key is to ensure that your website is expandable so that as your business grows it can be added to - you may even wish to add a database or e commerce functionality at a later stage.

We believe that Flash is really designed for use in the entertainments industry and we do not recommend using it on a business website. Even with the increasing availability of broadband Flash can be very irritating for users, it serves no purpose, it can detract attention away from the important messages on your website and it will adversely affect your search engine rankings. Strong visual affects can be achieved using other methods.

Using HTML is the most popular and cost effective way to design a website. These can include original graphic designs and are text driven to incorporate relevant search terms, which is good for getting your site recognised by search engines.

DYNAMIC websites incorporate a database and offers more user functionality. A dynamic website can be classed as a web application and is a powerful tool for gathering and providing data for your customers who will be able to log in and search the site quickly for information. If you require a dynamic database driven web design you will have to budget for the back end coding required to build the database. This will be more expensive than a HTML site and will need specialist hosting. As a less expensive alternative it is possible to build a HTML site which links to a third party database which you can access through your existing ISP.

An E-COMMERCE WEBSITE is an online secure shopping facility so that customers can purchase your goods by credit card over the web.

graphic design Edinburgh and web design Scotland

John Lewis is a multimedia designer who specialises in producing interactive CD Rom, original graphic design Edinburgh and web design Scotland

Many of you are probably already asking why eCommerce website design is different from any other website design. They all need to be attractive, well organized and use the right colors that fits the website spirit and so on. Your instincts are good. However a close look at some successful eCommerce websites will reveal the conceptual differences that are typical in a successful eCommerce website.

An eCommerce website needs to follow certain selling principles:
1. Give the user a pleasant experience during his online shopping.
2. Make certain you provide sufficient information on who owns the website and why they should be trusted.
3. The website must be easy to use. If it isn't, the visitor will go to your competitor.

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Those principles are not new. We all know those basics from our day to day experiences in the mall, shopping center and every other market place that is waiting for us to open up our wallets. The big challenge for a web designer is how to translate those conventional marketing techniques to the virtual world of the internet. I'm sure you've all noticed that in most supermarkets the bread stand is placed at the far end of the building, yet you can smell the fresh bread at the entrance (sometimes they even use a special air duct to carry the smells). That has been done deliberately. Marketers use our sense of smell to draw us through the store where we are exposed to all sorts of tempting goodies as we go to get our loaf of bread.

How do you draw an imaginarily path in a web page? A path designed to lead the visitor to do what you want him to do...make an online purchase. Unlike the supermarket our website has no smell. In a website the distance from one point to the other is pretty much the same, so the exit is always right there. In a website you can try to order the "shelf" in the way you think will best expose the visitor to many of your products, but there is always a chance that he will find a short cut to another page that can also be the way off your site.

As can be see, although putting your products on the web is much easier then renting space and opening a supermarket. However, selling your products on the web can be difficult.

A good eCommerce website design will lead the visitor to the right page in one click or two at the most. Sometime web designers will use techniques that would never be considered for non-eCommerce websites. Everyone has seen at least one sales letter website. On these web pages the only link is to the order form. Sales letters are not the most typical eCommerce website because they usually sell only one product. That allows the web designer the ability to exaggerate the one click principle and make it an advantage. All the facts about the product have been presented to the user is a smart way while every few lines he has the option to click on the order form. If he is not yet convinced he will have the option to continue to read more facts and testimonials about the products. Believe it or not, those sales letter websites are actually selling.

"What about online shops?" Online shops have to deal with more then one product. Of course, the greater number of products increases the complexity of the website. Sophisticated eCommerce websites use a variety of personalization technologies in an effort to determine the best selection of products to offer to the visitor. Personalization technologies are a major part of advanced eCommerce websites. However this topic is beyond the scope of this article. The cleverness of an eCommerce website's personalization technology has a major influence on its design. The first to use such technology was Amazon.com who decided to push their client's books to a visitor based on that visitor's past orders combined with the statistics they had collected on all visitors used to predict what someone looking at a specific book might also be interested in reading. Today the goal is to try to predict what to offer the user on his first visit as well.

An eCommerce web design is also about the layout. One important aspect is where the user's eyes look first when accessing a web page. Lots of research has been done on this topic. Most research showed that the middle left side area will attract the most attention followed by the center of the page. By using these techniques web designers try to draw the "walking path" for the visitor's eye, much like what was done at the supermarket. An experienced eCommerce web designer will know how to create designs to meets those demands.

If you are about to open an eCommerce website or you are already own one, make sure you understand the web design principles for online selling. Consider consulting with an experienced website designer preferably someone who has experience with eCommerce websites.

Good luck with your sales.

About the Author:
Warren Baker is an Internet business consultant for WebDesigners123.
WebDesigners123 connects the Freelance Web Designer with Webmasters who need their services.
If you would like to read more of Warren Baker's writings, visit our Website Design Articles page.

1. Every web design should include the famous tags. There is no excuse for not including these in a web design from the outset. No matter what they say, tags have their say in the way search engines look at your website and no web design is complete without carefully chosen tags. There are 3 important tags namely the Title tag, Description tag and the keywords tag. Each web page should have its own set of tags. What are these tags? These are words and phrases that are embedded in the HTML of the website and very easy to include in your web design. Let us look at each of these tags.

2. The Title tag is an important part of web design for search engine optimisation. This tag is likely to be picked up by search engines and displayed as a result header when a visitor finds your website on a search engine. This tag also appears as the title that in the blue strip at the top of your browser. A good web design will contain a short Title tag that includes the keywords you think visitors will use to find your site.

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3. The Web design should also include the Description tag. This is a short description of what the web page is about and it often appears just below the title in search engine results. Although the importance of the Description tag in search engine ranking is uncertain, the description in a web design acts like a sales pitch. This is your opportunity to tell the visitor what the web page is about and why he or she should click on your website. Remember, web design is not just about building a website and getting it ranked. A good web design should do all this, get the visitor to click on your website when it is found and sell your products and services.

4. Let's look at the Keywords tag. A lot of web designs contain a mass of supposed key words in the Keywords tag. Keywords are the words or phrases that visitors use to search for websites on search engines. A good web design practice is to have focussed and themed web pages. This means that each web page should be focused on one keyword at a time and this keyword should be in the web page Keyword tag. It is very important that the keywords used in the tag also appear in the body of the text.

5. The h1, h2 headers are also important elements of a good web design. Use h1 and h2 headers as these are read by search engines. Use them as high up on your web page as possible and where possible use the keywords in the h1 header. H1 headers are by default large fonts. It is possible to format these so they match the overall look of the web design and retain their header properties.

Ralph Ramah is the webmaster of Discount Web Design (http://www.discountwebdesign.co.uk), a leading web design firm. Please feel free to republish this article provided you keep this resource and the hyperlink.

Fortunately, there are many tools out there for webmasters to make the tasks of design and development easier. Wading through the sea of web tools can also be a time-consuming process. In designing your website, you should be aware of all the components that go into successful development and how to use them to your best advantage.

The first step, other than developing great informative content for your visitors, is to put everything together in an attractive, user-friendly format. If you need a little help in manipulating HTML coding or CSS (cascade styling sheets), you might visit www.xhtmlandcss.com for advice and tutorials regarding these components. CSS in particular is an invaluable tool for webmasters; these are the programs that control the set of styles for your fonts, tables and many other attributes of your website. The ability to manipulate CSS allows you to customize sites such as web forums and blogs and create a website that stands out and gets noticed. You can also amplify the attractiveness and user-friendly attributes of your websites with e-mail and forum signature generation tools from www.needasig.com and brighten your format with free smilies from www.thesmilies.com. Internet users love extras, and adding customizable interactions such as signatures and smilies will help keep visitors coming back.

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Once your site is developed, you must then undertake the task of optimizing your website for search engines. There are many ways to do this. One is to use relevant keywords throughout your content and page tags—without overusing them—that will help visitors find your website when they’re looking for information. Using a keyword generator such as the free tool at www.webmasters-cavern.com is an easy way to find plenty of relevant keywords and phrases. When incorporating keywords into your content, you should make sure the text reads well. The practice of keyword stuffing to boost search engine ranks not only endangers your listings with search engines, it also turns visitors off to your website and will keep them from coming back.

Another component of website optimization is getting your website listed with search engines. If search engines can’t find your website, neither can visitors! After you have created great content with relevant keywords and lots of user-friendly extras, you should then begin the process of getting your website out there for people to find. You can submit your website URL and descriptions manually. Major search engines such as Google, MSN and Yahoo include links to their submission process for manual submission. However, these links can be difficult to find. You may want to consider using a search engine submission service to submit to several search engines at once; there are many good, free submission services that cover multiple search engines. It is important to remember that submitting your website once is not enough to get it noticed on the Internet radar. You should carry out the submission process on a regular basis. However, you also must realize that submitting your website too often can get your URL banned from some search engines. It is a good practice to submit to search engines every 30 days.

Beyond search engines, you should also list your website in as many relevant directories as you can find to increase your site’s exposure. Strive to find directories that don’t require linkbacks to your website for listings, because reciprocal links carry far less weight with search engines than strictly inbound links. Two excellent directory service that doesn’t require linkbacks can be found at www.submiturlhere.com and www.urlshack.com . You can find many directories for your website; just make sure they are relevant to your content. If you have a webmaster site, then www.kingofurl.com is an ideal choice.

If you have multiple websites or long website URLs, another great tool for you to use is URL redirection. You can get a short, easy to remember and easy to post URL for your website that will sit well with search engines and make it simpler for you to advertise your websites on forums and in e-mail messages and signatures. Free URL redirection tools are available at www.smoothredirect.com.

Tracking visitors to your website is another important aspect of running a successful site. You should install a web counter that is invisible to visitors, but allows you to find out where your traffic is coming from so you can concentrate your promotion in effective areas. For example, a good web counter will not only tell you how many hits your website receives, but whe

1) What not to look out for?

Most people who search for "affordable ecommerce solutions" will input "cheap ecommerce solutions" as their search phrase on yahoo/msn/google or any other search engine and end up with a lot of websites providing cheap e-commerce packages. But one should keep in mind that everything good comes at a price. Cheap website hosting providers will advertise their website as "cheap & easy", but beyond the advertising lies the 99% failure rate of old-fashioned Web hosting. If you still want to trust a cheap e-commerce service provider please check their track record before you sign-up.

2) What to look out for?

It has been rightly said, "If we fail to plan we plan to fail". This holds true with every project small or big. So lets chalk out what we will to decide which is the best e-commerce solution for your website. Take a pencil and paper and list these points: {mosgoogle}

1) Product and Customer: Keeping your product/products in mind think of what your customer will be looking for. Not and highlight the points that come to your mind. Do you have an international market for your product?

2) Payment Options: What payment options you will be required to provide the customer. There are many available like paypal, firepay, xoom etc

3) Shopping cart: Do you need one? It's a necessity if you have more than one product if you have a single product then you might opt out of this feature.

4) Advertising & Promotion: How you are going to advertise and promote your website for attracting customers and increasing sales. There are a number of ways of doing this like banners, advertisements etc you will need to hole in on a few.

5) Your Budget: There are a lot of ecommerce solution providers available on the Internet but you should be having an idea of the $$ that you are ready to spend on them before you take the big leap as some of them have hidden costs. You may choose a package and then know that a few features that were not included cost you a lot when you buy them.

Depending on these points we can shortlist some basic features to look out for in our ecommerce solution service provider

1) Payment Options: What are the payment options available with the ecommerce service provider (ESP)?

2) Shipping: For international trade this is a necessity. Is your ESP providing it to you?

3) Web design/Hosting: How would you like the over all design of your store? Is the layout provided by the ecommerce service provider easy to use and understand for the customer?

4) Features: What extra features will you be looking for in your ecommerce package? Will you be content with payment, security, tax and shipping solution only or do you require more? This will require a thorough review of at least a few ecommerce solution providers and what you really need.


If you are a corporate body you will need to bring all your departments together to get their ideas on sales/promotion/advertising etc. It will be a day's hard work but the rewards will be substantial if proper planning is met with efficient execution.

These are a few different scenarios that you will find yourself in after you have listed all the points. Should you opt for: 1) A ready to use ecommerce package. 2) Rent a space/store in a network-based e-commerce solution. 3) Ask a web designing company to build you a website from scratch

Most of the e-commerce solution providers will have a basic scheme where you can add a product/category, delete a product/category, check the order status, calculate shipping cost deducting taxes if any, owner can see all the list of purchases, he can make the item shipped, out of stock, credit card denied, etc. For more info on this please check affordable ecommerce solutions

Ready-to-use Ecommerce Package A ready-made package of ecommerce solution software like InterShop that will help you display your products and meet most of your needs. These ready-to-use packages have a lot of features available. But if you need something customized it will come at a price. Automated features for payment, shipping etc will cost you a few more dollars. This might look as the most affordable ecommerce solution available but the main problem with this kind of ecommerce packages is when your online business expands and you desire more customization. But if your requirements are met with the package features go ahead and buy it. This package is recommended as affordable ecommerce solution for companies that fall in mid-sized business category.

Rent a space/store in a network-based e-commerce solution These web based-solutions are quite inexpensive and provide a lot of features. You have to just customize your store by picking a theme (looks and settings). Being web based they are very fast. You don't need to install any software, customize it and put in your product information. And you are ready to go e-shopping on your own store. If you think that this kind of ecommerce solution provider provides what you are looking for then go ahead and sign-up for it. The good part is that there is no installation involved so no complications. If you feel that this package meets all your requirements then you should settle for this option. But you'll surely want more in days to come. And will feel something is missing once a few months pass by. A store is recommended as affordable ecommerce solution for small or mid-sized business Ask a web designing company to build you a website from scratch If you run a large Enterprise and feel that it has outgrown the Ready-to-use ecommerce software package or smaller storefront services, you can get a unique customized website made from scratch according to your specifications. It always good to develop once own ecommerce website as it the developers are always available for any updating or changes that you might decide to have later on. This scenario also leads us to two choices: 1) Hiring the same company to design and host your site. 2) Hosting with one and letting another company design your site. Hiring the same ecommerce solution provider company to design and host your site This option wont let you be more flexible with the hosting platform and you might end up with a platform that the designing company finds the best. Do not forget to read user's reviews about the hosting and the support provided before you sign-up with any design + hosting company. Some reviews may be fake so you should try and contact the customers personally if possible to know the company's ecommerce hosting capacity and efficiency. If you find that they have had previous issues related to hosting or updating with any customers get it clarified from a support personnel. Do study if they allow easy updating. Also find if it can be done on your own or you have to upload it through some respective personnel of hosting company. Hosting with one and letting another company design your site. Expect for a few ecommerce solution providers that provide both hosting and design most of them are found lacking in one of the skills or both. But if you are thinking of separate hosting and design then you will have to make sure that the designer should be aware of the hosting services which will be utilized and services rendered by them. When making a choice between designers take a look at the ecommerce websites they have made in the past and ask for references. Call the references or mail them and ask them their experience with the designer. While choosing a host be sure not to commit mistakes that you will repent later take the designer into consultation if you have already chosen one. These two options are recommended for big corporate companies.

How to decide which option is the right one for you? Companies are generally categorized into three 1) Small Business 2) Mid-Sized Business 3) Corporate Business If you can enlist your company in one of these categories then you have already found a solution in the recommendation provided at the bottom of each option. If you think that you are going to make it big on the Internet then you should opt for the third option. Though I would recommend getting a feel of the online business before you go for the bigger package. Coming to an end of the article. The topic of ecommerce solution has such a wide scope that it is not possible for any article to cover it. Having read through this article you might have got a brief idea of how to choose a perfect ecommerce service provider (hosting and design) who fulfils all your requirements. If you need more information on affordable ecommerce solution providers please click here. Best of luck.

Effective website is all about stepping into the shoes of the visitors. Every designer must have the same mindset as the visitors so as to be intimately related to them. To know what to expect and to feel about a certain site is an advantage that can only be reckoned if you place yourself in the place of another person. To know the wants and the needs is also another added factor. This will enable designers to deliver to the visitors what they expect and need.

Understanding specific needs, benefits and concerns gives us the idea of what we should create - from page layout to graphic design and overall site organization. Anticipate the queries that might come out upon seeing the page. Be sure that these queries and objections are answered and understood so as to draw out loyalty and trust.

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In order to be sure of what you are designing here are the rules of thumb in designing:

1. Provide simple, clear and straightforward directions. Do not forget to emphasize the ‘call to action’. This is the most important aspect of web designing thus, make sure it is not overshadowed by other aspects.

2. Aside from emphasizing the ‘call to action’, also emphasize the functionalism of the site. Make the benefits more understandable and apparent. These are your weapons to achieve persuasion. As we all know persuasion is the most important factor that affects the purchasing decision of visitors. This should not fail so as not to fall short in the site’s objective.

3. Objections must also be answered. If the visitors have hesitations, this may hinder his decision to buy or subscribe. Hence, the site must remove the clouds of doubt in order to direct the visitor to buying or subscribing.

4. The goal is to draw a path that leads to the site’s goal. Bear in mind the link between the ‘call to action’ and the end goal they must result to the site’s satisfaction. The design must motivate a person to do the next big thing and that is to do the ‘call of action’.

Finally, after doing the web site, evaluate whether each element are present and that principles are practiced. That way, you are secured that you are producing an excellent site!

Please visit Web Development Services Pros site at http://www.webdevelopmentpros.com for comments and inquiries regarding this article.