Posts Tagged ‘cms’
October 26th, 2009 | 
Author: We must keep in mind: WordPress is primarily a blogging software tool. It was created with blogging in mind. It is a Content Management System (CMS). Just because it is an easy website building tool, it does not limit us from using it to create websites. There are three flavors of Wordpress: “mu.wordpress.org”, “.com”, and “.org”.
The first is for hosting several wordpress blogs under one domain. It is for anyone wanting to control and manage several blogs from one host or to control a network of related blogs like a university overseeing a community of teacher’s blogs.
The second, “.com”, is the hosted wordpress software. No hosting service is required to run this software. You can install it; pick your blog name; and, start blogging.
The third version, “.org”, requires a hosting service. It is more complicated to install. The “.org” version is better for affiliate marketers because of the complete freedom of content it allows the affiliate marketer. What puts many newbies off from using this software is that it is a little more difficult to install.
I built my first website under the .com umbrella. As an Internet marketer, I quickly learned that the hosted .com version frowned on content that included affiliate links. However, it did allow me to gain some experience and to become familiar with webpage terminology.
The primary reason an affiliate marketer should choose Wordpress for his first site is to gain confidence and to be able to hit the road running. Support for Wordpress within the Wordpress organization and across the global Internet is huge. Visit forums and you will find Wordpress the website building tool of choice.
You cannot ignore some limitations. Categories are limited to posts. Static pages all have the same sidebars and pages cannot be easily categorized. Many of the limitations can be overcome with some programming knowledge.
The pros far outweigh any cons. There are thousands of themes to choose from. The number of plug-ins grows daily. Plug-ins make the newbie website creator appear to be an expert and give the website professional look.
Best of all, it is FREE!
A good program can guide you and teach you not only how to install the software, but also what to do with it once you have it installed. More importantly, it can teach you how to make money with your new site.
For easy website building, a good coaching program can guide you and teach you how to install, build, maintain, and profit from your Word Press website. If you are serious about building a website, WordPress Wizard 2.0 will cut your learning curve by half. Learn more at http://newbieaffiliatesclub.com/wordpress/.
Article Source: For Easy Website Building – Newbies Should Choose Word Press
Contrary to popular believe, Website Design Company tells setting up a website is not as complicated as you think. Traditionally, taking a web designer on hire to put up a website will cost you hundreds of dollars. Now freelance web designer charges you on page basis. For example, Website Design Company says your package may include 5 static pages, and you are billed a total of $400 so similarly if you need more pages then you have to pay more.
Note down that still pages here the pages are standard HTML pages. There are no backend databases entailed if you want to set up a Content Management System in the backend, you may end up paying more. But Website Design Company says without a CMS, you soon understand that you can’t easily keep the website. So you have to carry on hiring freelancers to make update.
If you want to save money then it’s inevitable that you come face to face with the fact that it’s possibly better that you make your hands dirty by updating your own web pages. Website Design Company says HTML is easy to learn. You don’t have to learn how to code rather you need to be comfortable with opening a HTML page and modifying the contents accordingly. Again Website Design Company states with some basic knowledge of HTML, at least you have the confidence of doing so without spoiling the design.
Website Design Company views this is a key skill because you can truly save a lot of money if you can correct HTML web pages. You can find dozens of free website templates that are available for download on the Internet. These are professionally devised templates and you can use them for your business website also. They just come with suitable HTML code and high quality images.
Website Design Company defines the downloads are in fact available as a ZIP file which is a compressed file set-up that makes file sizes smaller so that you get faster downloads. So once you download the file to your computer, you have to unzip the file to gaze at the contents within the package. You can unzip the contents of the website to the same folder or to your desktop so that you identify where to look later.
H K Digital Online Website Designing Company India is one of the well known corporations which provides Website Designing India Services and also Provides SEO Services India in all over World.
Article Source: Website Templates Design in India Company
The following are the tips given by Website Designing Company India that you need to know in maintaining the quality of a web design while bringing down the cost:
Firstly, Website Designing Company India suggests never try to select complicated designs because they are more expensive. What you need to turn your website visitor into a customer is a website that exudes professionalism and has an excellent copywriting.
Secondly, Website Designing Company India says verify that you are sure about the website’s requirements. The alterations to the site’s particulars or aspects in the later parts of the designing are among the major reasons for the price increase. That is why Website Designing Company India suggests you should know and be certain of all the requirements, and check if the designers know your needs and wants.
Moreover, the cost of the project will be higher the longer it is put off.
Thirdly, if you wish to develop an E-commerce website or a CMS, then Website Designing Company India suggests an open-source platform can also be used. The use of open sources to build up a site is cheaper because they are without charge. Some of free open sources are Drupal and Joomla.
Fourthly, the website design firm must be given ample time to work on the design of your site. They will charge for additional payment if they are given a short turnaround time. Website Designing Company India says in considering a particular firm to design your website, devote some of your time to research. Search for firms using Google and jot down some agencies, tell them your needs and choose the firm that you feel most at ease.
Lastly Website Designing Company India says search engine optimization should always be the focus in designing your website. Having a good website design right from the start it is very crucial in cutting down the cost of your web design. So when you make your search engine friendly, you won’t have to design your website for another time. As a result, a lot of money will be saved and you can alternatively use it for the development of your website in future.
H K Digital Online Website Designing Company India is one of the well known corporations which provides Website Designing India Services and also Provides SEO Services India in all over World.
Article Source: Reduction of Cost in Your Website Design
Open source software is present right from the origin of internet which gives the chance to improve it and make people a part of it.
Usage of this software came into existence a few decades earlier and has attained much popularity, exposure and attention of the masses. You can say that open source software is created by the people, maintained by them and used by them. Usually users, programmers and software developers work in a combined a manner to create a specific software and then improvise it on timely basis. You can change this software, test and develop it also.
This software is contrary to the closed door software development which is developed by developers and bear high price tag. On the other hand open source software developers are not employed on salary basis so they work by self-motivation, thus users get the output that they have been looking for. The time required to develop it is also very fast as sincere and dedicated people work behind its development.
In order to extract the advantages of internet market open source software is developed. It consists of open source code that can be used by users when they require it. Here users have the power to make relevant changes in open source code if they think that its needed to improve it. Thus in this manner users make it sure that final program is according to their need. Changes that occur from using the source code are reverted back to the original writer and they can insert the modifications into official version. Many people get benefit out of this software as it can be found free of cost on internet and does not require any maintenance costs.
Even if you are not so well-versed in internet programming, you can publish and update the website with the help of CMS. So users can accomplish the task at their convenient speed and comfortability. Content management system has gained much popularity in recent times as best open source software. Options of display capabilities and built-in editing makes it easy for the user to use their website in desired manner. Here you can find large array of features that are high on usability quotient, you can use whichever is useful for you. As CMS is an open source system additional features and relevant components can be added to it on regular basis. You can find many websites online that have been created using open source software.
Copyright © 2009
SPINX – is a Web Design Company provides services like Graphic Design Portfolio, Website Design West Hollywood, Website Design Santa Monica & also across the world.
Article Source: Basics of Open Source Software and its Benefits
Web designing has come a long way. Just a decade ago, web design means publishing a few static HTML pages on the Internet. Everything is so simple that there is not much to consider. The problem is, this approach is not ideal for everyone. For example, some people do not like the idea of having to deal with FTP or edit HTML code.
Today, web designing is vastly different. There are so many other elements that you can consider. Let’s take a look at some of these elements.
Content management system.
Having a CMS makes updating much easier. With a user name and password, you can log in to your website anywhere, as long as you have Internet access. Using your CMS, you will then be able to update your website. Everything can be performed using the CMS without having to deal with FTP. You can upload images, post new pages, or edit existing pages. A CMS is usually database driven. All the data is stored on a database that is hosted on the web server. You can request your hosting company to back up the database periodically. To be doubly safe, you can even backup the database yourself.
Animation.
With the growth of broadband, more and more companies are realizing that they can do more on the Internet. Instead of just having static pages on their website, they can appeal to their visitors with animation and graphics. Multimedia is a huge part of the Internet these days. Websites are posting videos, streaming movies, etc. You can make full use of multimedia to make a stronger impact on your web visitors.
Ecommerce.
Of course, don’t forget that you can always set up an eCommerce store on the Internet. Being eCommerce enabled means that your website allows web visitors to make purchases online directly. Payment is made through a secure payment gateway. If you are to setup an eCommerce site 10 to 15 years ago, you will find it difficult to run the site. That’s because people are still getting used to the new technologies. Today, even a 60 year old grandmother knows how to shop for groceries online. So if you’re not setting up an eCommerce enabled website, you may be losing out!
SEO.
Once you setup a website, you need to figure ways to promote the website. Don’t expect visitors to come just because your website is online. It doesn’t work that way. One effective way of getting traffic to your website is to use SEO methods. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization.
When web visitors go online, they often use search engines to look for stuff. If your website is listed in the search index, visitors will click through and find your website. The process of getting your site to rank well in the search results is called SEO.
The new breed of eCommerce web designers will be able to do all of the above for you.
For Ecommerce web design, hire Ecommerce web designers.
Article Source: The New Breed of eCommerce Web Designers
An Open source development system would mean using the existing pattern, design and layout offered by a websites like Joomla and Wordpress and customizing it according to your needs. At the same time there are companies that need to build a custom CMS altogether for the requirement of their business.
An open source development system is the kind that works best for most companies for they provide the basic structure to edit/add/delete the content/graphics of the website. The framework for applications is provided beforehand and one needs to just work on the user friendly system. There is a time constraint in every job and no one has the patience to sit and get a CMS exclusively. Another advantage that an Open CMC offers is the effectiveness of cost which is reduced greatly in building the site. A few popular open source development systems are Wordpress, Drupal and Joomla which are used in the online world to a great extent. They provide a back end support to your website and allow you to edit and customize most of its available features. There are RSS feeds, daily polls, archive system, various presentable themes, fonts and colours to play with, the option of multimedia (graphics and videos) and many other applications to pick from. They have the option of multiple authors and users, flexible user ability and an easy platform to work on. The only downside that one might come across is the security as it is a little prone to external accessibility if not used carefully.
However, if you are in need of something extraordinary and if the open source development system doesn’t work for you the right way, then there is the option of the custom development. In the process of a custom CMS, the designing is done from the scratch exclusively for the company. Along with specialized widgets and features, there is an assurance of security of information. Along with the custom development come a few drawbacks like the high expenditure involved and the time consumption. Therefore, in cases where you need to launch a high end product or service, you are bound by time and financial restrictions in case of custom CMS.
Author has vast experience in the digital marketing strategy planning and management. He is currently associated with the premier full service Offshore it outsourcing company that combines a strategic internet marketing consulting and design expertise of a website design and development agency in India.
Article Source: Choosing between Open Source Development & Custom development
One of the difficulties with writing on a seemingly black and white topic (“choose A or B”) is that there really are shades of gray everywhere. The first place it pops up in “tech talk” is in definitions, and manipulating them to compare apples with oranges. In other words, in the subject at hand are we making a choice based on whether Joomla or WordPress (WP) is the best Content Management System (CMS), which one designers like better, which one code-heads like better or what? Frankly, this one falls squarely in the “or what” category.
Seriously, though, for all their differences, both Joomla and WP are touted as CMS tools, even though blogging is without a doubt the main chore to which they are both assigned. Truth be told, they are both capable tools with plenty of happy users. Even after you read the top 10 reasons to choose Joomla over WP, meeting your particular needs still might call for the latter and not the former. We can give you the reasons, but you are still the one who has to choose.
In no particular order, here they are, top 10 reasons to choose Joomla over WordPress:
1. Layout flexibility
Joomla wins this one over WP pretty handily. Trying to create a WP blog template can be awkward, with the process involving a search through stylesheets and php files to resolve irksome conflicts. In Joomla, however, you just present the content as “blog” and style it elegantly, easily and quickly.
2. Pings and trackbacks
WP has the straightforward edge here. These two items are important, but not enough to outweigh the other advantages of Joomla and disadvantages of WP. How wide is the gap in this race so far? Not very, but there are eight items to go.
3. The developer community
Among the strongest things about Joomla is the developer community. One online forum poster wrote about installing a certain bot for placing tags in the side column, but it made a big mess. He sent an e-mail to the developer and it was fixed within 48 hours-and this was a free extension. Now that’s community spirit.
4. SEO’d titles
For many users Joomla is the magic wand for creating redirects. Many developers and designers were using various one-trick-pony tools that would cause all kinds of issues. Switching solutions meant they had to change lots of URLs, meaning links from other sites. As you monitor your logs and see traffic arriving from the old URLs, it’s literally a three-second job to set up redirects to the new URLs. No messing around with that anymore.
Joomla 1.5 saw a huge improvement over 1.0 (the older version) in URL handling, bringing it up to Wordpress standards. The upcoming 1.6 version has still more improvements and tools that Wordpress doesn’t yet have.
5. Internal links
A sort of second part to the foregoing process is internal links. These can be useful for SEO, but no one cares how high you show up in Google on a search for the classic “read more.” In Joomla, a few available plugins and modules will change that, and include the article titles in the links.
6. Solid, attractive comment system
When the Joomla comment component JomComment showed up a few years back, it filled a big hole and kept folks on board. Its front end is attractive, it has a robust “captcha” and it’s easy to build into templates. It also has a few niceties like the ability to hide the comment form with Ajax.
If you need a slightly different comment experience, there are several strong candidates in the rest of the 3rd party developer community.
7. Sidebar categories
Easily done. Create a menu and module with the blog categories you want.
8. Good RSS that can service categories
Run Digital’s default RSS feed allows you to get a feed from anywhere, so you can provide unique feeds for each of your blog categories. This is handy.
Joomla’s RSS is very powerful. You can effortlessly create an RSS feed of any page of your site with a modified URL. You can also easily display feeds and links from other sources in your site.
9. “Chicklets”
Chicklets are those small icons by which you subscribe to an RSS feed with your reader of choice. Feedburner will automatically create them if you simply copy and paste the code into a module. This HTML embedding feature (in articles and modules) is a major benefit of Joomla.
10. Versatility
WordPress is a very good, very mature blogging tool. It’s really quite good at that, but it is not a versatile CMS like Joomla, and because it’s mature it won’t morph into one anytime soon. When you attempt to customize WP or get it to do that “little bit more,” the curve gets steep very fast.
Summing up, it is clear to see that Joomla is a full-blown CMS that can also blog if that’s what you want. Sure, there are some minor gaps in the toolkit, but the developer community is huge and growing and new solutions are popping up daily. Bottom line? Joomla is a powerful CMS with which you can create and manage your blog, as well as do all the CMS work that WP can’t handle.
You can also check out a more light-hearted comparison of Joomla vs Wordpress at compassdesigns.net.
For professional joomla templates, visit Joomla Shack.com online for a design that can deliver clean content for medium to large scale sites for complete control over the look and feel.
Article Source: 10 Top Reasons To Choose Joomla Over WordPress
If Drupal isn’t the world’s most popular Content Management Systems then it certainly is in the top five – there must be hundreds of thousands of websites built using this CMS.
Drupal was started by Belgium programmer Dries Buytaert in 2001, and today the award-winning project encompasses a thriving online community and many conferences and get-togethers in cities across the globe.
There is an extremely active development community that surrounds the project, with the company Lullabot being particularly keen to roll out audio and video guides for everyday use.
Based upon the Dutch word “dorp” (village), it is an open source project released under a GNU General Public License.
For those that haven’t used the CMS yet (and as those that have will testify to), Drupal isn’t easy to master. It takes some time to get to grips with much of the basic framework, and even then hardly any Drupal site is run without the assistance of one or more third-party modules.
When it comes to learning this CMS, the online Drupal guides are notoriously sparse. This isn’t a problem that is exclusive to Drupal as most developers love writing code, but hate writing the accompanying documentation.
If you find that the information on their site is not detailed enough or difficult to navigate through then a good book to buy is Building Powerful and Robust Websites with Drupal 6 by David Mercer (Packt Publishing). This book isn’t necessarily cheap, but it is easy to read and will give you a good grounding in using Drupal.
A good source of advice when tackling this CMS is at their forum. You can almost guarantee that your query would have been asked before so use their search function and check from the thousands of old threads before you start a new one.
A big problem too with using Drupal is finding the right third-party module for the job. There are over 4,000 published modules, and although some are extremely well-written by coders with years of experience, others are perhaps not so hot and code perfect.
It takes a great deal of trial and error to find the addons that you know you can depend on.
Here are some essential Drupal modules that I use in every installation:
Token: Used by a number of different modules including CKK, Custom Breadcrumbs and Pathauto.
Pathauto: This creates user and search engine friendly URLs.
Cache Exclude: It allows you to exclude certain pages when you turn on your cache. It is essential to exclude the frontpage if you have a number of different users signing in and out.
Custom Breadcrumbs: Creates pretty, workable breadcrumbs for individual pages.
Meta tags: Adds description and keywords meta tags to pages.
XML sitemap: As the title suggests, this module creates an XML sitemap.
Content management filter: Enables greater control of nodes in the administration section.
Javascript Aggregator: Minifies the aggregated JavaScript file when Optimize JavaScript is enabled.
CAPTCHA: Essential install in order to stop being overrun by spam.
PNG Behave: A great module if you are using 24 or 32 bit PNG image files and would like them to render properly in IE6.
Views / CKK / Panels / Contemplate: These are all essential modules if you really want to get to grips with Drupal as they allow you to make drastic modifications to Drupal core and themes without knowledge of PHP.
The biggest problem with Drupal at the time of writing is its bad usability, both in the administration section of every install and on the main site at drupal.org
This will be fixed over the coming year as a great deal of time has been put in by the Mark Boulton Design agency in fixing the myriad of usability problems as highlighted by studies carried out by the University of Minnesota and the University of Baltimore.
If you are not on the Drupal train then jump on board today as this Content Management System is going places!
Andy Walpole is a web designer and developer: Suburban Glory Web Design
Article Source: Drupal as Your Favoured Content Management System
In this article, let us discuss about the factors which can reduce the cost of website design without jeopardizing the quality of it.
1 In first step you need be sure about the specifications of the website. Website Designing India says one of the most common reasons for the increase of cost is because there are several changes to the features or specifications of the website in the later stage of the development. So it is important to know the specifications completely and make sure that the developers know what you want. Remember, the more time you take for the project, the more cost will be incurred.
2 Secondly, Website Designing India suggests never go for complicated aesthetic design. It will be costlier than others. So if you want to reduce your cost of the web design then go for simple aesthetic look. Flashy site will never bring more customers to your site what Website Designing India feels. Professional site with good copywriting is the ultimate solution.
3 While you design your website always keep search engine optimization in your mind. This is the main traffic referral source for most websites. Therefore, Website Designing India suggests develop a website which is search engine friendly. Many people fail to prepare a perfect site so they redesign their website a few months later when they fail to attract search engine traffic due to poor website design. So Website Designing India gives attention from the beginning by developing a search engine friendly website.
4 Fourthly it is always better to use an open-source platform if you want to develop a CMS or E-commerce website. Open sources such as Joomia and Drupal don’t charge any cost for their service. Therefore, Website Designing India creates website by using open source to make the over all cost lower.
5 Lastly it is important to give enough time to the website design company. If you give them a predetermined schedule then they will charge extra for the short period of time. Website Designing India never charges more and it can make your website perfect within the stipulated period of time. So Website Designing India tells give them enough time to work on it to reduce the overall cost of the project.
H K Digital Online is one of the well known corporations which provides Website Designing Delhi Services, Website Designing India Services and also Provides Website Design India Services in all over World.
Article Source: Secrets to Reduce the Cost of Web Design
Joomla is one of the top and most popular content management systems. Most of the Web design companies rely on Joomla to design cutting edge, powerful websites that are easy to manage, powerful and affordable. Joomla is the leading choice behind many new web design projects. On the other hand many businesses small or large with an already established web presence are migrating to Joomla based websites. This has led to wide spread in crease in the demand of Joomla web design services. Web design companies across the world are increasingly using Joomla for designing websites for a diverse clientele ranging form small businesses to established corporations.
Small businesses today are aware of the advantages a content management system offers over standard static websites. Content management systems provide websites with powerful capabilities that standard websites fail to deliver. It is widely accepted that businesses small or large need utilise a content management system if they are serious about realising the true potential of the internet. Joomla offers small businesses with a cost effective method of availing a powerful yet user friendly content management system at an affordable price.
Websites designed in Joomla are not only superior to standard static websites but they also offer easy management and administration of the different areas of the website. Websites designed with Joomla offers complete control over the website content to businesses. Joomla is packed with many powerful features for the websites and is easy to use and maintain.
http://www.prodigyapex.com
Article Source: Top reason for choosing Joomla(CMS)
One of the interesting things about the marketing world as a whole is how things are continually changing in order to make the process easier and better. A lot of marketing is now handled over the web in the form of web pages, websites, classifieds, commercials, ads and other publicity. The marketing world continually changes and those who are marketing items must be able to change and adapt with it. One of the great benefits of working on the web is that businesses can attract the millions of people who frequent the web daily. Web pages and websites are two of the most marketing venues and individuals must learn to take advantage of this in order to be truly successful.
Open source was developed in order to help take advantage of the potential marketing that exists in the internet world. Put simply open source is software that has an open source code that can be used by any individual that is interested. Individuals have the ability to read, adapt, change and then redistribute the source code as they see fit. The great thing about the open source code is that potential users can not only use but improve the code if necessarily. By utilizing the code this way, users can make sure that the final program does exactly what they need it to do. Any modifications that may come from adapting the source code are taken back to the original author and they have the option to import the changes into the official version. Most people take advantage of this because the software can generally be found free on the internet and there are no additional maintenance or license costs.
CMS allows users to publish as well as update their website without having to be well versed in internet programming. This allows users to work at their own speed and comfort level. CMS which stands for Content Management System allows users to make changes to their website or ecommerce quickly and most importantly easily. It has rose to fame quickly as one of the worlds best open sourced based CMS systems. The built in editing and display capabilities allow users to use their site in many ways. There are an extensive number of features that can be used and lots of additional features that individuals can choose from. The fact that CMS is an open source system also means that additional features and other components are added continuously as people make changes and modifications. Thousands of people have created websites using this very simple system and building off of what others have done.
Open source has helped CMS to continually grow and expand. Open source has provided people with more choices and any problems that arise are solved faster. With so many people working together to come up with the perfect management system, great ideas are a dime a dozen. The flexibility of the open source code also allow CMS to be flexible which mean more people are attracted to what it has to offer.
We are a marketing and IT consulting company that helps our customers to identify, attract and find the right timing to contact a customer. We offer services for B2B Lead Generation as well as professional Open Source CMS services for TYPO3, vtiger and MrTrack. For more details visit http://www.marketingpeople.se
Article Source: How Open Source Changes the CMS
Companies have realized the importance of the reviews and opinion polls being generated by the consumers of the products and services. Companies are taking advantage of these contents to build the brand name, increase the reliability and sell the products and services of the company online.
Consumer generated contents are invaluable assets for the companies because it has been observed that potential clients look for the beneficiaries, their experience with the companies sponsored products and services and their recommendations regarding the products and services promoted by the site. And, such reviews and opinion polls of the beneficiaries have a bearing on the promotion of the company and its products and services.
For all these reasons XML content management system is so important because it is a server of such consumer contents for digital publishing. XML CMS helps the online businesses to reach diverse customers across the globe.
The XML content management system is a digital asset management application and it can benefit you in the following ways:
• It can discover your digital contents in different media types – full textbooks, articles, sound and images.
• Concentrate all the digital contents in one archive.
• Find out where the contents have been used
• It capitalizes on reuse of content and reduces the cost and time required in content production.
• Easy transaction of contents from print to digital processes.
By using this system you can save the money that you would spend on advertising and writers. Thereby, it helps you to build up a much needed content base for expanding your website’s ranking in search engine result pages.
You must be aware of the latest trend. Now a days, the younger generations do not like to be persuaded by anyone what their interest should be. They want it to be done on their own, not to be persuaded by the advertisement.
Keeping in tune with the present trend XML content management system proves to be very useful as it can feed the reviews or contents of the consumers automatically to your website. This act will enhance the credibility of the products and services in your site.
Ruby Harrison is writing articles on content management system and web desiging for leading joomla web design company.
Article Source: Cut down advertising costs with XML content management system
So you’ve spent a few thousand dollars to build your new website and are pretty pleased with how it looks.
You may even have managed to squeeze a good deal out of the website designer and also saved a few dollars by spending 15 or 20 hours compiling and inputting your marketing blurb into the Content Management System (CMS).
Now all you have to do is sit back and wait for the visitors to stream to your great new website, right? Well in a perfect web world where no one else has a website, you may be right.
Unfortunately, in the online world, the famous saying from the Kevin Costner movie Field of Dreams, “Build it and they will come” simply doesn’t work.
If you put your website efforts into a ‘brick and mortar’ context, it’s like building a brand new warehouse and showroom, filling them with some great products and putting a small A4 sign on the front door with just your company name.
In this scenario you don’t tell anyone about the warehouse and showroom and you don’t advertise it to your target market or customer base – you simply sit in your office and wait for the odd passer by to pop their head in the door out of curiosity. And if you’re really lucky, the occasional visitor may actually find something they like and buy it.
Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? Well that’s exactly what you’ve done with your new website. Today there are hundreds of millions of websites and thousands more being added every day. There are so many websites out there that the chances of a qualified prospect finding your site are slimmer than a toothpick on a diet.
Sure you’ve emailed all your clients and told them to visit your new website. You’ve even sent an email to the names of prospects that never actually did business with you (BTW, that’s called SPAMMING and it’s illegal).
But they all already know about you. After all, they communicate and do business regularly with you, they have a copy of your brochure or catalogue, and may occasionally see your sales rep, if you have one.
One of the compelling arguments in favour of investing in a website (it is an investment, not an expense!) is that it enables you to reach NEW PROSPECTS and extend your reach and influence into a wider target market.
It should drive incremental business and present your company to new prospects that otherwise would not have considered doing business with you. So how do you move your website from its current static position to one that actually generates a return and reaches a wider market?
The first thing you have to realise and ACCEPT is that you will have to invest some money to market your website. In the ‘new warehouse and showroom’ scenario earlier in this article, an astute business operator would allocate a marketing budget to promote the new facility and all the great products inside it.
It’s the same thing with your website. The general rule of thumb is that you need to invest at least the cost of the initial website development in marketing it effectively. This web marketing budget doesn’t need to be spent immediately, but it would most likely be spread over a 12-month period.
If you’ve had your website designed and built by one of the many low-cost website designers/HTML code-jockeys, you may be in bad shape. And if you’ve written and added the page content yourself it may be the kiss of death for your online marketing efforts.
Achieving measurable ongoing success for your website requires a range of marketing activities to be implemented. Here are the key ones:
Developing effective web marketing copy
Not only is well written and correctly structured marketing copy critical for capturing the attention of your website visitors but it is also a key element in achieving rankings on search engines such as Google, MSN, Yahoo, Alta Vista etc.
The structure of web page copy is substantially different to copy written for other mediums, with careful use and placement of keywords, amount of copy on the page and keyword density crucial.
Even if you have a Content Management System for your website and wish to add and manage it yourself, you should at the least have a professional web marketing agency review and edit your copy and structure it according to search engine requirements.
Creating appropriate Meta tags
The addition of carefully developed Meta tags to your website is essential to being indexed by the search engines. If you have added the web content yourself it is unlikely that any Meta tags will exist on your site.
Without these tags, your site is not likely to achieve any search rankings. A professional website marketing and search engine optimisation agency can help to identify the main keywords for your particular business and market and will develop effective Meta tags for your site.
Ongoing analysis of website activity and page statistics
You should have subscribed to a website analytics service when your site was developed. The information provided by this service is an important part of measuring the performance and effectiveness of your website from a number of perspectives.
Typically it would detail how many unique visitors have visited your site; most popular pages; how visitors found your site; how long they spent on your site; what the most popular pages are; search phrases and words they used to find your website and a host of other valuable data.
Regular review and analysis of your web statistics data is essential to the ongoing improvement and effectiveness of the site and to ensure the best return on your investment.
Update your website regularly
Not only do search engines favour websites that are regularly updated, but so do the flesh and blood types that you will entice to your site by applying the techniques described earlier in this article.
The general rule of thumb is to change around 20% of your content every 6 months. This may seem like a major task, but it is really not that hard to do.
You should review your page content from time to time, making subtle improvements to the text to reflect changes in your market or company. Add new pages or sections to the site, gradually expanding the information contained in it.
If you engage a web marketing firm to manage the ongoing refinement of your site, they will most likely also be reviewing and improving your keywords.
These activities have a two-fold benefit; your site is favoured by the search engines as it is ‘fresh’ and your site visitors will also enjoy the new and expanded content.
One useful way to add fresh content is to write informative articles relating to your industry and to add them to your site. If you have a NEWS section it will also help keep your site ‘fresh’, but it does require someone to be responsible for writing the news articles and publishing them on the site.
There is nothing more irritating than visiting the NEWS section of a website and finding the latest article is 12 months old. In the online website world, no news is bad news!
Article Source: So You’ve Built a Website. Now What?
Over the past several years, a strong trend towards using content management system is seen in website design and ecommerce development. Increasingly, clients ask for the ability to manage their own website. A CMS is software that keeps track of every piece of content on your website much like a library.
CMS stands for content management system. As the name suggests, it is a back end tool that allows you to update text, pictures, and links without any knowledge of HTML. Some CMSs even allows you to add video, audio and other buttons. Therefore, CMS is necessary for a highly featured website development so that you can drive high traffic.
If you frequently update your site with news, product information, pricing or other information, the use of CMS can make sense. Also having a CMS allows updating and publishing your contents fast and helps you in saving some cents! You can update features such as new products/services, update product description and add news about your company and so on.
Content can be in the form of texts, pictures, music and documents. If you want to make your website reliable, flexible and user friendly, the CMS can come in handy for you. Whether you want to add new content, upgrade or delete the present content or adjustment of website templates, CMS allows web masters to take care of all the aspects concerning their website. A true CMS will allow you to have full control over your website helping you manage the content in whichever way you want.
When quality website for low prices is your business model, it makes sense to use the most cost-efficient publishing tool-wordpress as CMS. Wordpress is free to use for any website you want without paying license fees. Drupal is also a free software package that allows an individual to publish, manage and organize a wide variety of contents on the website. Joomla is another CMS, which enables you to build websites and powerful online applications. Best thing is Joomla is an open source solution that is freely available to everyone and is used all over the world to power websites of all shapes and sizes.
Pros-
1. Once set up, routine maintenance and updating of content can be done by someone with little or no technical knowledge.
2. A mature CMS has undergone years of testing and development by teams of developers and has therefore relatively few undocumented bugs.
3. Many hosting services offer content management systems that are already installed which you can customize for your needs.
4. Readymade graphics templates are available for purchase or freed download for many content management systems.
5. Content management systems generally have adequate security against hacker attacks.
6. A CMS based site can be set up in relatively less time.
7. Use of CMS maintains a consistent layout and appearance on all pages of the site.
For a better website development, you need a highly customized CMS. A well developed CMS allows you to control Flash animations, gaming, page generation without web programming knowledge. Also you will able to control navigation and sound using CMS.
Whether you already have a website or just about to get going, a CMS is an important tool to consider. It gives you freedom in managing your own website and allows you to redirect your saved dollars towards essential improvements of your website. With CMS, the target audience will not feel difficulty in navigating through your website and you will able to carve a niche for your online business. A major advantage of using CMS is that it requires almost no technical skill or knowledge to manage.
Ajay Prasad is President and CEO of Global Marketing Resources an Orange County based company that specializes in website design, website maintenance and website marketing. For affordable packages on website maintenance click on the link.
Article Source: Is CMS better?
HOW TO INSTALL A JOOMLA TEMPLATE
Simple Instructions for Installing a Joomla 1.5 Template
Joomla templates are easy to install and provide a wide variety options for your Joomla website. To install your Joomla Template you must already have the Joomla CMS installed on your website and you must have downloaded your template and have it readily available.
In Joomla 1.5, installing templates is done through the admin interface.
Log into your Joomla Administration Panel. This is typically a URL that looks similar to the below http://www.yoursite.com/administrator.
After you have logged in, the administration section’s “Control Panel” choose “extensions” from the menu bar and then choosing “Template Manager” from the drop options. You will now be taken to the template upload page.
Once you arrive on this page, click the “Browse…” button that is located in the “Upload Package File” section. A Pop-up Box will now appear for you to upload your template. Navigate to your template file and then double-click on the file.
The name of this zip file will be different for each template you upload. After you have clicked the open button, the pop-up box will automatically close, and you will be returned to the “Install new template” page. The path of the skin will appear in the “Package File” field, and your next step is to simply press the “Upload File and Install”
After your upload has completed you will be taken to the “Upload template – Success” page.
skin will appear in the “Package File” field, and your next step is to simply press the “Upload File and Install.”
You have reached your final step in installing your new Joomla Template. Simply select the template name that you uploaded by clicking on the Radio Button next to the name of the template, and then click the “Default” button located just under the main toolbar section at the top of red.
Now your Joomla 1.5 template is installed. Have fun!
Get Free Templates Free Templates for Joomla 1.5 Free Templates
Article Source: How to install Joomla 1.5 template quick and easily
Wordpress is by far the premier CMS choice for anyone who wants ease and functionality. With so many options and themes it is very easy to get exactly what you’re looking for to present you’re content. There are literally thousands of Wordpress themes out there and it can get confusing to find exactly what you want. That’s where a Wordpress showcase can be of service. With a Wordpress or CSS showcase you are able to view hundreds upon hundreds of Wordpress themes. If you are interested in learning more about Wordpress showcases that then continue reading.
As stated above, Wordpress themes are everywhere. Type in the words “Wordpress theme” and see how many his you get on any search engine. With so many choices it’s easy to become overwhelmed and give up on finding just the right theme for you. You should take your time and find a theme that fits your content. We are a visual society and becoming more so every day. The aesthetics of your site frame the experience your users will have when viewing your content. A theme that is poorly designed or unrelated to your content will provide just enough of a disconnect to cause people to click off of your page and never come back. This is not what you want to happen. To make your site truly “sticky” you have to provide an experience for the user. You have to give them a frame of reference they can quantify, that way when they tell someone about all of the cool content they found on your site they can instantly relate it your theme. To find a theme that will work for you, turn to a Wordpress showcase.
Wordpress showcases are simple to use. You will see a gallery style site with many themes on the front page. There will be several pages to sift through. A good strategy to use is to use the site’s “search” field and type in a general term to help find what you are looking for. If you were interested in having a theme that is mostly blue in color, then you would type in the word blue into the search field. If you want a theme that has to do with dogs then you would type in the search field “dog”. Some of the better Wordpress showcase sites will have already made some major categories to help speed up your search. If the showcase you are looking at doesn’t have a search field then it will be harder to find what you are looking for and will take more time. Once you have found the theme for you there will be a preview that you can see a full-sized version of the theme. If you like what you see then you will hit the download button and immediately have the theme delivered in a zip folder to your computer.
A Wordpress showcase can help you find just the right theme to brand your content. This article covered the basics of why you should pick the right Wordpress theme for you’re content as well as how to use a Wordpress showcase site. Now that you know how to use a Wordpress showcase site you can find exactly the theme you are looking for.
Elle Wood shares with you businesses, organizations and companies that will bring you customer service and added value. For more about Wordpress and CSS gallery, please visit http://www.WeLoveWP.com.
Article Source: WordPress Showcase
When a website is created apart from hiring a good web hosting company you need to look out for other features as well like an efficient web content management system. This system has many added benefits for its user, like its cost effectiveness and easy. Even if you lack professional help to build a website than also a CMS can help in building it without extra technical knowledge. Thus saving on cost for hiring professional help.
You can define CMS as a software that is used for creation of high quality website content. The website users get the control over their sites and can do creation, controlling, editing and maintenance. No matter whether your site is created for professional or personal use, you can make it dynamic and professional looking one with good content management system.
Generally maximum CMS offers options of templates to select from. You can associate these templates with different themes, here you can have a professionally created web page background and template just by click of the mouse.
Usually all web content management systems come up with tools that work on the principle that you get what you see. For example the place where you would put the text box on the web page while building would be seen at the same place on internet.
This system also provides tools which gives the facility to view the website that you have created and preview it before uploading it. Hence you can create a dynamic looking website for your customers and they don’t have to see work in progress message on your site. Some of the web content management system also contains plug-ins that can boost up the functionality of a website.
This system should not be ignored whenever you go to purchase web space from a web hosting company. With its help you can design sites that are of high quality without shelling out thousands of dollars. A good and successful web hosting company does offer web content management system to their clients.
A CMS needs to have a tool that can do SEO apart from updating latest information. As just updating content through CMS is not enough to guarantee high rank in search engines. Therefore you also need effective SEO in order to attract the search engine spiders and index your site. Stay a little cautious while selecting content management system with SEO. Features like meta description tag, meta keywords and title tag should be present in CMS.
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SPINX – Website Design San Francisco Company provides services like Web Design Los Angeles , Website Design West Hollywood, Website Design Santa Monica & also across the world.
Article Source: Content Management System Leads to Better Website Functioning
I first started looking into PHP frameworks last year, looking at a variety of frameworks including cake, symfony and finally Zend Framework.
When I got around to Zend Framework I was nearly ready to give up in programming with a framework, as I didn’t have a clear understanding of the MVC style of programming.
When I began looking into it I found though, that this is something that when I get used to the different style of coding, could save a valuable amount of time, and allow me to offer features to clients, that previously just would not be cost effective.
The main benefits of using a php framework I have found are as follows:
• Time saving – The amount of time saved by not having to type in complex code in a lot of situations cuts the time of many projects by over 50% in most cases.
• Reuse of code – Many web sites that you develop have common features. Because of the way that each part of the code is separate, you are able to copy over controllers, models and view folders to the next project. An example of this is that in every project that requires a content management system(CMS) we are able to copy across the login system. Something that used to be quite a time consuming process. Now we copy it across, and add the users, and we are set to go.
• Access to services API’s – with the way that the web is moving these days, having the ability to twitter, yahoo and Google amongst others is a great way of expanding a web site with ease.
• Community assistance – There is a large community out there which is always willing to help. When you are proficient with the framework, you can also assist others, which will also improve your coding experience.(Not to mention the warm fuzzy feeling that you get for helping)
• Easy plugin creation – When you have a feature you want to add to the framework, just simply create a plugin, in a directory that you can copy to all your projects. I created a image resizing plugin, which allows me to upload an image and resize it with 3 lines of code. Unbelievable, when you consider how long this would usually take and the best thing is, once I made it, I have this feature available in all future projects. The time saving benefits can be enormous.
I still have a long way to go with learning many of the features, but with the rapid progress that I’m making with learning Zend Framework, the future is looking bright, and I may be able to spend more time on other areas such as marketing for our Adelaide Web Design customers web sites and bringing in exciting new features to their web sites.
Paul Purczel is an Adelaide Web Designer specializing in Content Management systems, Ecommerce web sites and Search Engine Optimisation
http://www.acewebdesign.com.au
Article Source: Why Use a PHP Framework? The Benefits Explained
Noam Design is running a very popular program that lets anyone with the skills necessary to design high quality websites, sell their work and make a significant profit.
Noam Design uses the material bought through this program for an internal project (coming soon!) and NOT for any clients projects as all our web design and web development work is 100% custom made from scratch by our team.
The way the program works is that you submit a complete website or theme that is 100% ready (with dummy content). Upon review of your creation, Noam Design makes you an offer and you are free to accept or reject it. Noam Design is offering the most competitive compensation in the web design market so this is an excellent program that can generate very significant revenue! Some of the participants have made hundreds of thousands of dollars in a matter of months, selling us hundreds of beautiful websites.
Here are some of the specifics:
1. We are currently buying unique, high quality Wordpress themes, Magento themes, ZenCart themes, Drupal themes, custom CMS driven themes, and more!
2. Prices vary from $100 to $1200 depending on the quality and complexity of the work – that can add up to a whole lot of money if you are a professional web designer!
3. The website you submit must be your unique work and must be sold solely to Noam Design.
4. The website you submit must NOT infringe any copyright or intellectual property rights
5. The website you submit must be fully available online for our review
So let us know if you are interested in participating in the program!
Article Source: Make Money Designing Websites & Themes!
In a realm where having a website is more than a necessity; many people are taking the help of CMS. Using a CMS for blog is what every one will find very common over the Internet but using it for a website does not give you a professional feeling. But what can a novice do when he does not have enough money to build up a website? The most common CMS used is Wordpress and many try to work out their website through it only. People have started using WP as their website. Not only freelancers and individuals even many companies setup their online presence through WP only.
There are few tips which can help you to make few changes in your WP to give it a website look & feel. There will be some simple and straight working tips which a blogger or develop can apply to ensure that his website doesn’t look like a blog. Before starting we must keep this in mind that it is difficult to hide your website appearance as a WP blog but we can work on to minimize it’s such an appearance.
Customize the side bar and keep it consistent
You can change the titles of the sidebar which is a big give away from WP. The default titles of the sidebar such as ‘Blogroll’, Archive’ etc. can be changed according to the requirement. The text of the title and which title is to be displayed can be changed from the file sidebar.php in theme directory.
Even if you do not have any knowledge of the codes the WP codes are very simple. You just need to know the basics of how functions are called and how to open and close the IF statement to help you customize the codes.
Use “De-categorizer” Plugins for clean URLs
The URLs which could give the website more look like a blog. Clean the permalinks from querystring driven url and use custom urls which can be done easily through the WP dashboard. You can use De-categorizer which can strip off the category from the url that points to the specific categories on your site.
Don’t Use “Tags” or a “Tag Cloud”
“Tags” are those keywords that you add to individual posts in your Wordpress dashboard. They are similar to categories, but provide a wider interrelationship between posts.
Tags are the keywords which allow the user to see posts related to that keyword, while clicking on them. Tags also provide SEO benefits, as they help Google and blog directories properly categorize your blog’s pages. So inspite of such a potent relationship with Google I will not suggest you to include it in your web page. But you can use it in blog section of your website.
Pixelcrayon, a web design company delivers services like custom web design, web maintenance,PSD to XHTMLconversion ,template customization, e-commerce solutions and offshore outsourcing..
Article Source: Change Your Blog into Website, But How?