dental articles from 2 Dental.com

by: Mike Roshuk

Have you ever visited a website that was so bad that you felt like it was sucking the life out of you? Sure you have, we all have. We all know what a poorly designed website looks like. And the sad thing is, internet surfers will more often than not judge your company by your website. These web-surfers are your potential customers, and the last thing you need is them fleeing from your website just seconds after they arrive.

If you’re thinking of creating a website for your company, or redesigning an existing one, here is a brief list of some web design principles that should be followed:

1. Make sure it loads quickly.

You could have the best designed site on the planet, but if it’s not in front of me within 3 seconds, I’m gone. Once you have your website up and running, check it from a few different computers. Make sure it loads quickly on other machines and internet connections, and still looks good on a couple different screen resolutions.

2. Use Consistent Navigation Layout

Never take away the viewer’s ability to navigate through your site. If you have the navigation links to the various pages in your website listed along the top or the left-hand side, try to keep this placement on all subsequent pages. You want your viewer to be focusing on your products and/or services, not on how to get back to the page where they were at.

3. Color Theory

This has always been a favorite of mine. I’ve even been criticized at times for paying too close attention to color theory, but there are many studies which prove that color greatly influences shoppers. This applies equally as much to the internet. I suggest doing a search for more intensive articles on color theory on the net; they can be a wealth of information. But here are some brief examples to get you started:

-Reds / Greens : Hunger colors, great for restaurants, grocery stores, and other food vendors
-Royal Blue or Orange: Know to appeal to ‘impulse shoppers’.
-Blue: Color of loyalty and trust. Calming color
-Red: signifies action, passion, and strength.
-Purple or Black: Colors of royalty, sophistication, or wealth.

Keep in mind the psychological impact of color also varies from culture to culture, so be sure you know who your target audience is.

4. ‘Dumping In’ photos and content

‘Dumping In’ content refers to placing images and text on your website without paying attention to how it affects the overall design of your website. Too often I see nicely designed websites with poorly placed content.

When designing your website, it is a good idea to have all your content written beforehand, as well as all the images you will be using. Also, pertaining to images, try to have the image incorporated more into the design of your site, rather than simply having it as a rectangular jpg floating beside your text.

5. Research

Before you even sketch anything on paper, before you open up Photoshop or even look at Dreamweaver, take a good look at other websites. Famous artists still dive into the history books to seek inspiration from the masters. Skilled painters still use photo references of their subjects. There is no reason you shouldn’t do the same type of research when creating a design for your website.

A good place to start is to do a Google search for ‘best websites’; this will usually yield some interesting results. There are some brilliant web designers out there, and getting inspiration from their techniques will make your website better in the end.

About The Author

Mike Roshuk is a professional freelance designer specializing in Web Design, Graphic Design, and Illustration. Mike Roshuk operates under the name dieselshack, based in Edmonton Alberta. To learn more please visit http://www.dieselshack.com.

mike.roshuk@dieselshack.com

by: Nowshade Kabir

The other day I received an email from a guy asking whether we could build his eCommerce website. Since Rusbiz is a company which has a full service web solutions development department, I sent him our executive brochure by email and asked if I should send him our website building checklist. The answer I received was “Can I work directly with your web programmer and tell me what your hourly rate is?” I wrote him back that there is no problem in working with the programmer, but we use a team of experts to build a website and he will be much better off if he goes by a flat price for his project instead of going by hourly rate. Apparently he did not like the idea! Too bad!

Web development services fundamentally differ from say an attorney’s services. If you are working with a professional company, depending on the size of your web project a team of people will work on it. Namely: your account manager, lead programmer, web programmer, designer, Content editor, database programmer, web promotional specialist, and web administrator.

The tricky thing about website is that starting from making your site by yourself on Geocity or similar free site builders to hiring topnotch web development companies that charge thousands of dollars the range is way too broad. Often, people select a company to do their web development job according on their subjective perception not based on knowledgeable decisions. Although, price should be a key issue, you should not go for a company just because it quoted you a cheap hourly rate! Many fall for nicely designed previous works of the vendor. The design is also only a part of the whole project, albeit a very important one but don’t make the mistake of overemphasizing on it! A beautifully designed website with nice graphics and pictures is not necessarily a good eCommerce website. It could be even just the opposite!

Website development is increasingly becoming a sophisticated task with narrow specialties. Before handing over your job, make sure that the company does have all the right people in its team. The team may also consist of other specialists apart from the ones listed below:

Team Members and Description of their Services

Project or account Manager

This is the person who manages expectations through a project’s lifecycle. Determines project needs, outlines specific deliverables and oversees the process and team from start to finish. He or she also maintains ongoing client communication and education throughout project. Handles budget and scope issues, including weekly status updates and additional changes.

Art Director/Designer

This person oversees visual design process. Helps transforming client expectations into the right visual look and feel. Applies technical and user needs into final UI (User Interface) design. Works with project manager and the client to establish a clearer vision of the site.

Information Architect/Designer

Defines overall site organization and layout from an informational, navigational and functional perspective. Works with client and project manager to determine overall content strategy and site structure, page layout and interaction through out a site. Participates in usability testing and works with developers to bridge gap between design and technology.

Developer/Programmer

This person works on writing and coding programming parts of the web site. Oversees design and ensures effective translation to HTML. Also works with other developers of the production team to maintain standards for coding. Depending on the size of the site, there could be several programmers involved in a project.

Content Manager

This individual provides a consistent style and tone of the site. He or she works closely with client to gather all information and materials for the Web site. Understands fundamentals of content development, and has a clear understanding of the overall goals and communication objectives of the site. He or she works with the designer to implement content in an efficient manner. He or she also works with Web Promotional Specialist in order to bring the content inline with search engines’ requirements.

Technical Lead

Provides management and direction of the programming team for back-end projects such as database development or system integration specialists. He or she acts as a liaison between front-end and back-end teams.

Database Programmer

Depending on the needs of the website, a database specialist may be necessary to handle the development of various catalogs and various database issues.

Usability Specialist

An individual with a background in human factors engineering and/or cognitive psychology who has a broad understanding of usability issues on the Web. This individual should have knowledge in information design, navigation and Web development processes.

Web Promotional Specialist

Helps optimizing web pages for search engines. Understand the fundamentals of search engine optimizations and aware of the latest changes in the algorithms of mail search engines. Make recommendations to the client and help him popularize the website. This individual works closely with content manager, designer and developer.

Now, for your website you may or may not need a team with all the members stated above, and in some cases one person may have knowledge of two fields but it is better to understand that in the ever changing world of the Internet if you are serious about your web business, you better build your site with the help of real experts of each core area.

Statistics shows that almost 70 percent of web projects do not finish on expected time frame with allocated budget. To reduce your risk while ordering your new website or revamping your existing one, take the following steps:

Check out the vendor’s site thoroughly.

Do they follow what they preach? How the site looks like? Are you going to buy a product from the look and feel of the site? Check out the example sites. Are they good enough?

Find out if the team consists of professionals.

Ask them detail questions. Check out cross reference. Talk to the team members directly.

Write a clear well-defined technical scope.

Develop a thorough technical scope before to start building your eCommerce site. This will eliminate confusions before they occur. You will have a coherent picture of the required time and budget. You will also understand your own needs better. A scope is like your business plan and works as your road map. Spend enough time to make your scope as meticulous as possible. Once you finalized your scope, no matter what, don’t try to change it at later stage if you want to finish your project on time.

Work closely with the team.

Ask questions whenever they arise to the individual of the team, whom they concern most.

An astounding large number of site owners are not happy with their websites. A little preparation and follow-up will help you avoid becoming one of them.

About The Author

Nowshade Kabir is the CEO of Rusbiz.com, a global B2B Portal, which helps companies build web store, buy and sell products and services using eMarketplace, eCatalog and other features. Rusbiz also offers website development packages: http://www.rusbiz.com/design_package.html

info@rusbiz.com

by: Earma Brown

You took the leap. You set up a website to display your important message. Congratulations! As in life, first impressions are important on the web. Web researchers found that you have about 2 minutes to make that first impression a good one. Visitors will judge your site in those few seconds on its professionalism and appropriateness to what they are looking for.

In fact, a website can lose about one-third of its potential customers due to poor design, according to a recent user study conducted by Jakob Nielson, Ph.D., a principal of the Fremont Calif.-based Nielson Norman Group.

Take a long hard look at your site. Or ask a friend to give you a brutally honest review of your site. Does it pass the test of professionalism? Are the graphics of good quality and clear? Is the formatting, font size and font colors consistent throughout the site? Or does your site commit design mistakes that speak AMATEUR as soon as it loads?

There are some common mistakes website owners make that may cause visitors to leave early. Correct these 5 mistakes to make sure your visitors stay long enough to read your important message:

Mistake#6 They post “Under Construction” signs all over the site.

Under Construction signs posted all over the website spell UNPROFESSIONAL in a big way. Seasoned site owners understand the power of patience. They know that timing the launch of your completed website is much more effective than doing it prematurely.

Solution: Be patient. Wait until the website is complete before publicizing your site. Doing it this way, your visitors will be impressed and gain trust faster. They won’t feel uneasy and run away because they see UNPROFESSIONAL stamped all over your site with each Under Construction sign.

Mistake #7 They place brightly colored counters on every page as a badge of honor.

The truth is most everyone knows counters can be set to whatever number you like. If you don’t want to start your counter at zero, you can easily start it at 10,000. It raises a red flag of questions. Therefore, it may repel your visitors faster than it attracts them. Why raise the red flag of questions, if you don’t have to.

Solution: Need to analyze your traffic? Look at your in-depth statistics instead.

Mistake #8 They don’t use copyright statements.

Some uniformed site owners don’t know that their copyright is effective the moment their creative work is set in a fixed form. So they fail to put their stamp of ownership on their work.

Solution: If you truly own your work, claim it. Post your copyright information at the bottom of every page.

Mistake #9 They write boring, long and sometimes complicated copy.

It slows your visitor’s reading to a standstill if they can’t quickly understand your copy (the words on your website.) Trust me; your visitor will not stop and get a dictionary if they can’t understand something. They will leave quickly.

Solution: Invest time into getting your copy right. Keep it simple. Get rid of passive verbs and too many adverbs that rob your copy of power. Use compelling words in short sentences full of action.

Mistake #10 They fail to identify the benefits of their products and services.

Most visitors don’t automatically know what your product or service can do for them. The ‘What’s in it for me’ is what drives most of us. If that question is not answered quickly, we may leave before we discover you have exactly what we’ve been looking for.

Solution: Make it easy for your visitor. Place your best benefits in your headlines, links and even picture tags.

Mistake #11 They forget to ask the visitor to do something.

Beginner site owners leave money on the table by not asking their visitor to take specific action. They don’t consider their visitor may be distracted, busy or dormant to any desire for their product.

Solution: Write marketing with the idea of what you want to happen after they have read your copy. What do you want your visitor to do? Write with the conviction that your prospect will do something after reading-click through to the sales page, contact you for more information, pick up the phone and order.

Don’t forget the power of direct commands. Be specific in your directives. Stop right now and fill in this coupon. Send for this ezine before you forget. People love easy steps. They don’t have to decide. The work of deciding what to do is already done.

First impressions are important on the web. Follow the simple design techniques above and stop turning your visitors away at the door. Use your first few seconds to impress your visitors with simple design that delivers your powerful message effectively.

About The Author

©Earma Brown, 11 yr. Web Developer, Author, Service Business Owner Helps service business owners, and writers with full featured hosting, domain names, websites and a host of other web solutions. Send any email to webwit@arrowproduction.com for free ezine Web Wit and mini-course ‘Jumpstart Your Website to Success’

by: Christie Turley

Using too many colors or the wrong combination of colors could alienate or turn off customers completely. Out of any form of non-verbal communication, color is the quickest way to communicate a message and meaning. Many studies have been done on the psychology of color and the subconscious emotions that they create. Studies have shown that color can help improve recall, comprehension, and understanding by 75%. In fact, color accelerates the ability to learn by 20% by keeping readers focused and improving retention.

Choose Colors with Care.

Marketers spend oodles of time and money determining the colors to best market their product: the colors that will prove the highest amount of return on investment. You may want to hire a professional web designer to help you. Make sure the web designer you hire is not just a programmer, but also a graphic designer and/or marketer. After all, the reason why 99% of all websites fail is because it was created by a technician, rather than a marketing expert.

So, What Colors are Best for Your Website?

That is hard to say. Again, you may want to hire a professional to help you. However, the following tips will help you understand the underlying meaning behind color so you may be guided to make the right choice. Keep in mind that depending on its value or intensity, one color can give very different emotions.

Red - Stimulating. Exciting. Energizing. Appetizing. When you eye sees red, chemical responses in your body cause your blood pressure, pulse rate, and adrenaline to increase. Fire engine red is more energetic than a more traditional burgundy.

Pink - Happy. Romantic. Spirited. Youthful. Best used for less expensive and trendy products. Vibrant pinks are common in the cosmetic industry. Bubble gum pink can be considered immature, but fuchsia or magenta are considered more sophisticated.

Orange - Friendly. Adventurous. Energizing. Inviting. Of all the colors, orange is the hottest. Similar to red’s arousing effect, orange is often associated with bright sunsets or fall foliage. Orange contains the drama of red with the cheeriness of yellow. Neon orange tends to be load and is the most disliked color, but a more tempered vivid orange is highly effective for point-of-purchase graphics and specials.

Yellow - Warm. Sunny. Cheerful. Vibrant. Yellow is equivalent to enlightenment and imagination. This color is especially effective for food service industries because of the -association to bananas, custards and lemons. Pale yellow is an excellent choice for point-of-purchase materials (materials at the cash register or reception area) because the eye sees the highly reflective yellow before it notices any other color.

Brown - Rich. Sheltering. Durable. Sensible. Brown is an earth tone and is related to the earth’s nurturing qualities and stability. Generally speaking, brown provokes a positive response, but the wrong shade could lead to customers relating it to dirty, which could be detrimental for a product in the fashion industry, for example. Brown works well with food products since customers also relate it to root beer, coffee and chocolate.

Blue - Cool. Trusting. Serene. Consistent. Similar to the earthy color brown, blue is related to the sky and water, both dependable constants in our lives. Blue is an ideal color for websites, especially e-commerce websites. Many banks and financial institutions use blue in their marketing because it makes customers feel more trusting. Blue also can generate a cold, distant, corporate feeling, the opposite of generating a personal relationship with the customer.

Green - Refreshing. Healing. Fresh. Soothing. Green offers the most variety of choices out of all the colors of the rainbow. Green works well for personal hygiene or beauty products because of its soothing and flattering tones. Most people link green to nature; they think of foliage or grass. Mint green is seen as fresh while bright greens are associated with grass. Emerald greens are elegant and deep greens are linked to money and prestige. Green is also combined nicely with many other colors and can also work as a neutral.

Purple - Elegant. Sensual. Regal. Mysterious. Purple is seen as sensual and spiritual as it combines the sexuality of red and the sereneness of blue. It is best used with creative products, new products, or cutting edge products. Deep purple is associated with regal sophistication and lavender has a more subtle nostalgic appeal.

Neutrals - Classic. Quality. Natural. Timeless. The neutral tones of beige, gray and taupe emulate the psychological message of dependability and timelessness. They are regarded as safe and non-offensive and will not go out-of-date as they are always in style.

White - Pure. Bright. Pristine. Simple. While white can signify clean elegance, it can also be considered generic and stark, unless you have stylish graphics to compliment the white.

Black – Strong. Classic. Mysterious. Powerful. Black is most closely associated with the night. Black is seen as powerful, dramatic, elegant and expensive. In food packaging, a customer will actually pay more for a gourmet image. Although black is associated with mourning, its positive associations far outweigh its negative. Warning: too much black can be overkill.

About The Author

Christie Turley is a web marketing expert and author of the Not-So-Dumb Blond Internet Guides.

RATE YOUR WEBSITE with her complimentary online Web Site Diagnostic tool and BOOST your Web Profits: http://www.NotSoDumbBlond.com/web-diagnostic.htm

by: Sitecritic.Net

I like to think of the theme of a website as something that makes the website easily identifiable. It can be a combination of colour patterns, navigation effects, layout…etc that leave a lasting impression on the user. All design elements in the site combine seamless to convey a strong message effectively to the user.

Every website needs a theme. When designing a website, it must be build based on a concept or an idea. A good way to start is to come up with a phrase that describe what you want to achieve with the site. It can only be one phrase as short as possible, no cheating. Why only one phrase? Because it forces you to be focused in your design which will eventually make your choice of colors, layout and graphics for your website easier.

For example, if the phrase for an automobile site is “Enduring Passion”, then I will be focusing on the keywords “Enduring and Passion” and I will make sure the meaing of the 2 words are being implemented into my design.

Brainstorming

During the brainstorming process, you try to expand the ideas of the keywords to generate more ideas for your design. The way we think are often moulded by our environment and memories. It is important that you do not stop your flow of thoughts in this stage. Write down what ever that comes into your mind, not worrying whether they are relevant or not. For Example:

Enduring - “Lasting, 3d, Complex, High Tech, Comfort, Excitement, digital…etc”

Passion - “classy, red, pink, bright, clean, elegance, details, light colours, thin lines, curves…etc”

There are no hard and fast rules, just throw in what you can think of. We will try and use these ideas in the next step.

Implementation

Now that we understand the keywords better, we will try to implement these ideas into the design elements of the site. An example is as follows:

a) Looking and Feel: We want the user to feel that they have come to a classy website. So we do not want too many words but strong visuals.

b) Design and Layout: Probably alot of negative space to convey the idea of elegance. Bright, thin borders, nice shadows.

c) Colors: Tints of gray, with black and white to emphasize the idea of elegance. The text will mainly be dark gray on a white background with occasional bolded red, orange or blue to provide contrast.

d) Navigation: Quick navigation with minimal effects.

e) Graphics: Use images that have techie look. To show the idea of “enduring”, we use the images of different sections of the automobile in every page, ie other than the logo and main menu, we want something similar in every page. Maybe use thin lines or 3d drawings to represent technology.

Again, there are no hard and fast rules in this stage. The idea is to let you have a clearer idea of the style you are going after.

Testing

In this stage, you try to create a visual representation of the final homepage in photoshop(or any other software). The end product is just a photoshop file to give you a general idea of how the final homepage might look like. If you like, create another subpage(an internal page that links to the homepage). Stare hard at the final images. Ask yourself whether the layout, colors, fonts, images and navigation reflects on the theme of the website. Once you are satisfied with it, you then need to convert the photoshop file to the actual web page which is another part of the story.

Conclusion

A website with a theme leaves a more lasting impression on the visitors. Many people design websites just to look nice(according to them) but has no theme. For example, many people like to use 3d effects in their navigation or images without asking themselves whether it is appropriate or not.

About The Author

www.sitecritic.net is formed by a group of web addicts, mainly volunteers from all over the world. Our goal is to create a community of web designers and developers who share the common interest in bringing out the best in creatiing effective web sites. More articles can be viewed at http://sitecritic.net/web_articles.php.

by: GameVilla.com and Dentaljob.org

Site studio is developed by Positive Software Corporation and is a software that hosting providers can install on their servers to help users build professionally looking websites.

you don’t need to know anything about FTP, HTML, HTTP, or Designing. If you can surf the Internet, you can build your own professional looking website. There are no downloads! This allows you to make sites on the fly while at home, school, or even at work. Your changes are saved the second you exit the program!

- Website Builder Online Demo

- List of 100’s of templates and colors

- For more Website Builder help visit here Website Builder Help

Key features of Site Studio:

• Simple to use: Our program guides you step-by-step, providing simple choices regarding color, style and images. There is no software to download and no code to learn. In addition, there is no need to mess around with programs such as FTP.
• Content and Design Separation: The content of the website is stored separately from the layout. This way, you can completely change the look and feel of your website in six clicks of the mouse, without ever having to retype any information.
• Complete control over color schemes: The program includes a number of built-in color combinations that look great with any layout. But if you want to add a little originality to your site, all the colors can be changed, either by using a point-and-click color picker, or, for even more control, typing in the color as a hex number.
• Layout templates: the layout of the site is controlled by layout templates. These are created in HTML enhanced by a few additional tags for generating images. A number of layouts are included with Wibsite Builder.
• On-the-fly Image generation: Our Website Builder dynamically generates the images it needs for each web site design, so each time you decide to change the color combination for a page, the layout, or just a button caption, the necessary image is automatically created.
• User-uploaded images: You will be able to transfer images to your hosting account without ever having to leave your browser. These images can be incorporated into page content or even page design. You can create an online photo album, or insert a personal picture to make it a seamless part of the page logo.
• Simple point-and-click interface: From making a simple page describing yourself, to creating multiple catalogues and integration with Amazon Associate Program, SiteStudio will let your create just about any kind of page you want.
• Variety of pages: The Website Builder can be used to make many different pages. Create an online resume, or build a personal photo album. Everything is done in a simple step-by-step process that is easy to learn and to follow.
• One-click publishing: Your website is published with one easy click. But even after publishing, you can go back and change it as much as you like. Clicking the publish button again will instantly make all the changes made be reflected on the “live” version of the site.
• Persistence: All yourinformation is saved the moment it is entered. If you decide to log out, you can come back and continue building your web site from the very point where you left off.
• Complete control over the website: With the use of Website Builder’s provided settings, you can make unique and attractive web sites. However for the advanced user, Website Builder provides a way to change just about every color, every font, every button caption on the site.

About The Author

Looking for free online games then visit Gamevilla.com
Looking for free dental job and resume postings then go to Dentaljob.org

by: GameVilla.com and Dentaljob.org

1. The best thing to do before you sign up for website hosting is buy your domain name yourself
Alot of the web hosting companies now offer free domain names if you sign up a domain hosting account with them. This usually sounds like a great offer until you decide to leave the hosting firm and then tell you they own the name. Dont risk it buy your name yourself

2. Choose a domain name that reflects your desired website
For example if your website is about free online games then ‘GameVilla.com‘ may be a good fit or if your site is about dental jobs ‘DentalJob.org‘ may be a good choice.

3. Select a domain name that contain your sites key words
like the example above the game site has the word GAMEvilla.com and the dental job site has the word DENTALJOB.org.

4. Select a domain name that is easy to remember
‘2dental.com‘ is definitely easy to remember and short.

5. Dont use long domain names
Long domain names are just to hard to remember. Try to find a name that is as short as possible and to the point.

6. Do not use dashes in your domain name
Like I mentioned above it is more work to tell someone your domain name when you have a dash involved. Best if you can find a name with out it.

7. Try not to use abbrevations in your domain name
Well known companies like AT and T can get away with ATT.com but it does not work for most websites. As a general rule, avoid using abbreviations or anything that will be difficult for your visitors to remember.

8. Buy .com .net or .org
There a ton of domain name extensions out there and there will be more comming. The best thing to do is buy the orginal three as those are the extension that has been embedded into our brains from the start.

9. Use good domain name company
Buy your names from a good domain name company like 2Budget.com. They offer great service, phone support, lots of free things with a domain name purchase of $7.85/year. Another great reason to use 2Budget.com is the fact that they offer Smart Search which allows you to find variations of a word or domain name by adding popular prefixes, suffixes, dashes or related keywords to your existing search.

About The Author

Looking for free online games then visit Gamevilla.com
Looking for free dental job and resume postings then go to Dentaljob.org