tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7323183036162339322024-03-23T05:08:41.931-07:00Web Design InformationE Commerce Web Site design services India company offers best usable accessible web site design layout.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger107125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-10602868345564181562009-04-14T05:52:00.002-07:002009-04-14T05:53:50.988-07:00Are You Overpaying Taxes If You Use Tax Preparation Software?For many business owners the answer to this quandary is tax preparation software. Fill out a fairly simple interview, click “print” and out comes a completed return that will pass muster with the IRS. The answer to all your problems…or is it?<br /><br />Can One Software Program Cover All Businesses?<br /><br />Take a moment to consider the wide range of businesses that exist in the United States. Now cut that number down to those that can be categorized as “Internet businesses”. If you were asked to write a business plan to provide web design services to each of these services, how long would it be? It would be huge and completely useless because each business would have different needs. A Internet business selling flowers would have completely different needs from an online bank which would have different needs from a hosting company and so on. The only way you could create a practical plan for all Internet businesses would be to offer a collection of general services they could all use on their sites. Tax preparation software designers have the same problem.<br /><br />There are over 15,000 pages in the tax code and over 100,000 pages of regulations interpreting those pages. Changes are made to the tax code ever year, and new regulations are issued constantly. If one were to create a list of questions for every tax deduction and credit detailed in those pages, the list of questions would be the size of a phone book! Yet, tax software programmers have somehow boiled it all down to a simple 30-minute interview process? Common sense should tell you that doesn’t make sense.<br /><br />As practical matter, tax software programs are designed to make sure that you claim a general set of deductions that are applicable to businesses across all industries. Most programs try to mask this fact by asking you to identify your business before proceeding. For a lark, you might try selecting another industry and then running through the interview process. You will find that the interview process is modified a bit, but you are still being asked the same basic tax deduction questions.<br /><br />If you are only claiming general business tax deductions, you are paying more than you should in taxes. Ask yourself if you have seen any of the following questions in a tax software program interview:<br /><br />Q. Do you store business inventory in your house?<br /><br />Hint: You may be able to claim hundreds or thousands of dollars in deductions.<br /><br />Q. Did you start a pension plan for your employees?<br /><br />Hint: You may be able to claim a tax credit for the next three years totaling $1,500.<br /><br />Q. Do you have a home-based business and a second office?<br /><br />Hint: You may be able to deduct your commuting expenses each day. Yes, commuting expenses.<br /><br />Q. Do you have business meetings at your home?<br /><br />Hint: Did you charge your business for the space?<br /><br />Q. Should you claim the standard mileage rate for your auto or the actual costs?<br /><br />Hint: The standard mileage rate may not the best option.<br /><br />Q. Did you modify your business location to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act?<br /><br />Hint: You may be able to claim a tax credit AND tax deduction for tax savings of $20,000 or more.<br /><br />Q. Did you refinance your home?<br /><br />Hint: The points you paid on your original mortgage are fully deductible now, not over the length of the loan.<br /><br />This represents only the tip of the iceberg of available credits and deductions available to you. Just one of these deductions could save you thousands of dollars in taxes. Yet, you are never going to see these questions raised in a tax software program interview. The tax code and regulations are simply too large to be incorporated into a usable software program.<br /><br />Your business is unique. You face and overcome issues and problems that are unique to your size, financial situation and particular business needs. Don’t short change yourself by limiting your deductions by using tax software programs.<br /><br />Richard A. Chapo is with http://www.businesstaxrecovery.com - recovery of business taxes through tax help and tax relief. Visit http://www.businesstaxrecovery.com/articles to read more business tax articles.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-44906863144427002902009-04-14T05:52:00.001-07:002009-04-14T05:52:48.627-07:00Shameless Self-PromotionHi! My name is Janice Byer and I am the owner of Docu-Type Administrative & Web Design Services (http://www.docutype.net). I am the winner of several prestigious awards (information is on our website) and have a slew of happy customers, as the testimonials on our site will attest to. My services are professional, creative and in demand.<br /><br />Now, wasn’t that easy? In one small paragraph, I have shamelessly self-promoted my business and it’s success.<br /><br />I’ll admit it, I am addicted to shameless self-promotion, and why not? Who better to promote myself and my business than me? And, the opportunity to talk about your business should be the root behind every marketing effort you undertake.<br /><br />Networking utilizes shameless self-promotion almost constantly. After all, when you visit a networking event, why are you there? To promote your business of course! And, when you are at a designated networking event, it is not the time when you should hold back. Be shameless yet professional, and also be considerate of your fellow networkers. They are there for the same reason you are. So, give them the opportunity to shamelessly self-promote themselves.<br /><br />Networking is the “right time” to shamelessly self-promote. But, there are times when it is not appropriate. There is a time and a place for everything, including promoting your business.<br /><br />For instance, if you are a member of a news or discussion group, there are generally rules against promoting your business, unless that is what the list is for. So, don’t take advantage of the captive audience or break the rules. That can actually be bad for business.<br /><br />However, some lists have designated days of the week or month when you can shamelessly tell the world about what you do and what you have to offer. This is the time to show them what you’ve got.<br /><br />Opportunities arise at various times when it is good to promote yourself and your business. For instance, I was with my daughter at the library yesterday and the woman there asked if I was excited about my daughter going into grade one and the fact that she will be in school all day. This was the perfect opportunity to tell her that I run my own home-based business and what I do.<br /><br />Also, a few weeks back we had our water supply guy here filling up our well and we talked about his father’s business. Well, I didn’t give up the chance to say, “Does your father have a website? I can design one for him.” Well, the conversation went from there and I ended up giving him several of my business cards.<br /><br />My husband is also the owner of a small business; a tow truck and storage business. Well, the other day we had a fellow here delivering gravel for our driveway and, as he is always on the road, I asked him if he sees accidents and such. So, my husband gave him some of his cards and it has paid off already. Yesterday this dump truck drive called to tell my husband about an accident that he had just seen.<br /><br />And, don’t forget your existing clients. Do they know everything that you offer? I have a wonderful steady administrative client that I told a few times about some of the websites I am designing. Well, he was impressed and now we are in talks to design his website. He didn’t know I did website design until I told him. And, this may be true for you as well. Your clients won’t know everything that you can do for them unless you tell them. They may not need any of your secondary services right away, or at all, but they may know someone who does.<br /><br />My administrative client, which I mentioned above, has now given my name to some of his customers who need help with their office tasks and web design needs.<br /><br />As I said before, there is a time and a place for shamelessly self-promoting yourself and your business. Be careful not to sound arrogant and don’t be pushy. But, as a small business owner, you are the best person to tell others about what you offer and you should take advantage of situations that will allow you to do so.<br /><br />About The Author<br /><br />Janice Byer is a certified Master Virtual Assistant and owner of Docu-Type Administrative & Web Design Services (http://www.docutype.net). See this and other articles on her website.<br /><br />jbyer@docutype.netUnknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-6901774412280214502009-04-14T05:50:00.000-07:002009-04-14T05:52:15.207-07:00Dealing With Business SlowdownsWhen times are slow for your home-based business, chances are you won't have the luxury of waiting and seeing if things improve. You'll need to take steps quickly to get back on track.<br /><br />These suggestions will help you get business back to normal:<br /><br />1) Add Products And Services<br /><br />During slow times, your very instinct might be to cut corners, but in the case of your catalog of products and services this could spell disaster. Instead, you want to select additions carefully based on the needs and desires of your clients.<br /><br />Think of it this way: let's say you provide web design services. Your client hires you for the design work, then goes elsewhere to get a logo, hosting, and content. Having to hire four different companies just to complete one project is not cost-effective or time-efficient for your client.<br /><br />So what if you could offer web design and hosting or web design and everything else necessary as well? Chances are you'd have a definite advantage over your competition.<br /><br />Even if you don't have the skills or ability to handle those aspects of the project, you could team up with other companies like yourself who also want to boost business and give themselves a competitive edge.<br /><br />No matter what product or service you primarily provide, you could find ways to provide additional necessities to your clients.<br /><br />2) Step Up Customer Service<br /><br />Hopefully, you already provide good service and support to your customers, and you are probably already aware of how critical this is to your business's success. But when times get rough, customer service is even more crucial and you need to go beyond the call of duty to convince clients that their business is important to you.<br /><br />For example, you may want to guarantee responses within a few hours, instead of a few days. You may want to follow up with thank you cards or phone calls. If a problem does arise, act immediately to take care of it and rectify the situation to the client's satisfaction.<br /><br />Remember not only is that customer's business at stake, but also the potential business of every single person he or she is acquainted with.<br /><br />3) Market More<br /><br />Business is slow; budgets are tight. So what usually gets trimmed first? Marketing. Do you know what the results are? Disaster!<br /><br />When you conduct marketing, you are not selling yourself to generate business today or even tomorrow. Marketing is an investment in your business's future. In fact, research has shown that most marketing efforts don't pay off for at least six months.<br /><br />So think about that. Let's say you cut back on marketing in June and you weather the economic down cycle, what's going to happen in December? Absolutely nothing! Because all of your potential clients have been won over by the marketing efforts of your competition which were conducted during the summer.<br /><br />Instead of cutting back, a slow down is the time to boost marketing. Get back in touch with past clients, attend seminars, pass out fliers. After all, if work is slow, what else are you going to be spending your time doing?<br /><br />4) Keep A Positive Attitude<br /><br />Times are hard. Your nerves are on edge. You're feeling the pressure. When a past client calls to ask how things are going, do you tell them the truth and hope they take pity on you? Do you wallow in a self-defeating attitude? NO!<br /><br />If you want to get through the hard times, you have to keep in mind two things:<br /><br />A) No one is going to do business with a failing company and<br /><br />B) Hard times are only temporary.<br /><br />Let's think about this. If you called up a company about business and the representative says, "It will be great to be finally getting some new clients" or "Things have been horribly slow around here lately" are you going to trust them with your project? No.<br /><br />The first thing you are going to be wondering is why they haven't been doing well. And that's what your potential clients will wonder about you as well.<br /><br />So how do you keep from breaking down on the phone with your clients? By remembering that business is a cycle and just as things are bad now, they will turn around and you will be doing well again. The only thing permanent is giving up.<br /><br />5) Branch Out<br /><br />When things are slow with your business, you can take the opportunity to do all those things you always wanted to do but never had the time for.<br /><br />Why not write some articles or an e-book related to your business, then sell them or publish them to earn more money and to further establish your credibility.<br /><br />Or take a shot at teaching a class on e-commerce, computers, or a topic related to your business at a local college, vocational school, or adult learning center. Even if you don't get paid, the exposure could do great things for your business.<br /><br />You could also start giving speeches, take some business or technology classes, or take on some part-time work that will give you more experiences that will help you compete in the market when things go back to normal.<br /><br />Although ups and downs are simply an inevitable part of business, dealing with them effectively can make the difference between staying afloat or going under.<br /><br />-----------<br />Vishal P. Rao is the owner of Work at Home Forum, an online community of people who work from home.<br />-----------Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-91903682987377488422009-04-08T23:38:00.000-07:002009-04-08T23:39:38.769-07:00Content Ever be Profitable?THE CURRENT WORRIES<br /><br />1. Content Suppliers<br /><br />The Ethos of Free Content<br /><br />Content Suppliers is the underprivileged sector of the Internet. They all lose money (even sites which offer basic, standardized goods - books, CDs), with the exception of sites profering sex or tourism. No user seems to be grateful for the effort and resources invested in creating and distributing content. The recent breakdown of traditional roles (between publisher and author, record company and singer, etc.) and the direct access the creative artist is gaining to its paying public may change this attitude of ingratitude but hitherto there are scarce signs of that. Moreover, it is either quality of presentation (which only a publisher can afford) or ownership and (often shoddy) dissemination of content by the author. A really qualitative, fully commerce enabled site costs up to 5,000,000 USD, excluding site maintenance and customer and visitor services. Despite these heavy outlays, site designers are constantly criticized for lack of creativity or for too much creativity. More and more is asked of content purveyors and creators. They are exploited by intermediaries, hitch hiker sand other parasites. This is all an off-shoot of the ethos of the Internet as a free content area.<br /><br />Most of the users like to surf (browse, visit sites) the net without reason or goal in mind. This makes it difficult to apply to the web traditional marketing techniques.<br /><br />What is the meaning of "targeted audiences" or "market shares" in this context? If a surfer visits sites which deal with aberrant sex and nuclear physics in the same session - what to make of it?<br /><br />Moreover, the public and legislative backlash against the gathering of surfer's data by Internet ad agencies and other web sites - has led to growing ignorance regarding the profile of Internet users, their demography, habits, preferences and dislikes.<br /><br />"Free" is a key word on the Internet: it used to belong to the US Government and to a bunch of universities. Users like information, with emphasis on news and data about new products. But they do not like to shop on the net - yet. Only 38% of all surfers made a purchase during 1998.<br /><br />It would seem that users will not pay for content unless it is unavailable elsewhere or qualitatively rare or made rare. One way to "rarefy" content is to review and rate it.<br /><br />2. Quality-Rated Content<br /><br />There is a long term trend of clutter-breaking website-rating and critique. It may have a limited influence on the consumption decisions of some users and on their willingness to pay for content. Browsers already sport "What's New" and "What's Hot" buttons. Most Search Engines and directories recommend specific sites. But users are still cautious. Studies discovered that nouser, no matter how heavy, has consistently re-visited more than 200 sites, a minuscule number. Some recommendation services often produce random - at times, wrong - selections for their users. There are also concerns regarding privacy issues. The backlash against Amazon's "readers circles" is an example. Web Critics, who work today mainly for the printed press, publish their wares on the net and collaborate with intelligent software which hyperlinks to web sites, recommends them and refers users to them. Some web critics (guides) became identified with specific applications - really, expert systems -which incorporate their knowledge and experience. Most volunteer-based directories (such as the "Open Directory" and the late "Go" directory) work this way.<br /><br />The flip side of the coin of content consumption is investment in content creation, marketing, distribution and maintenance.<br /><br />3. The Money<br /><br />Where is the capital needed to finance content likely to come from?<br /><br />Again, there are two schools:<br /><br />According to the first, sites will be financed through advertising - and so will search engines and other applications accessed by users.<br /><br />Certain ASPs (Application Service Providers which rent out access to application software which resides on their servers) are considering this model.<br /><br />The recent collapse in online advertising rates and click-through rates raised serious doubts regarding the validity and viability of this model. Marketing gurus, such as Seth Godin went as far as declaring "interruption marketing" (=ads and banners) dead.<br /><br />The second approach is simpler and allows for the existence of non-commercial content.<br /><br />It proposes to collect negligible sums (cents or fractions of cents) from every user for every visit ("micro-payments"). These accumulated cents will enable the site-owners to update and to maintain them and encourage entrepreneurs to develop new content and invest in it. Certain content aggregators (especially of digital textbooks) have adopted this model (Questia, Fathom).<br /><br />The adherents of the first school point to the 5 million USD invested in advertising during 1995 and to the 60 million or so invested during 1996.<br /><br />Its opponents point exactly at the same numbers: ridiculously small when contrasted with more conventional advertising modes. The potential of advertising on the net is limited to 1.5 billion USD annually in 1998, thundered the pessimists. The actual figure was double the prediction but still woefully small and inadequate to support the internet's content development. Compare these figures to the sale of Internet software (4 billion), Internet hardware (3 billion), Internet access provision (4.2 billion in 1995 alone!).<br /><br />Even if online advertising were to be restored to its erstwhile glory days, other bottlenecks remain. Advertising encourages the consumer to interact and to initiate the delivery of a product to him. This - the delivery phase - is a slow and enervating epilogue to the exciting affair of ordering online. Too many consumers still complain of late delivery of the wrong or defective products.<br /><br />The solution may lie in the integration of advertising and content. The late Pointcast, for instance, integrated advertising into its news broadcasts, continuously streamed to the user's screen, even when inactive (it had an active screen saver and ticker in a "push technology"). Downloading of digital music, video and text (e-books) leads to the immediate gratification of consumers and increases the efficacy of advertising.<br /><br />Whatever the case may be, a uniform, agreed upon system of rating as a basis for charging advertisers, is sorely needed. There is also the question of what does the advertiser pay for? The rates of many advertisers (Procter and Gamble, for instance) are based not on the number of hits or impressions (=entries, visits to a site). - but on the number of the times that their advertisement was hit (page views), or clicked through.<br /><br />Finally, there is the paid subscription model - a flop to judge by the experience of the meagre number of sites of venerable and leading newspapers that are on a subscription basis. Dow Jones (Wall Street Journal) and The Economist. Only two.<br /><br />All this is not very promising. But one should never forget that the Internet is probably the closest thing we have to an efficient market. As consumers refuse to pay for content, investment will dry up and content will become scarce (through closures of web sites). As scarcity sets in, consumer may reconsider.<br /><br />Your article deals with the future of the Internet as a medium. Will it be able to support its content creation and distribution operations economically?<br /><br />If the Internet is a budding medium - then we should derive great benefit from a study of the history of its predecessors.<br /><br />The Future History of the Internet as a Medium<br /><br />The internet is simply the latest in a series of networks which revolutionized our lives. A century before the internet, the telegraph, the railways, the radio and the telephone have been similarly heralded as "global" and transforming. Every medium of communications goes through the same evolutionary cycle:<br /><br />Anarchy<br /><br />The Public Phase<br /><br />At this stage, the medium and the resources attached to it are very cheap, accessible, under no regulatory constraints. The public sector steps in : higher education institutions, religious institutions, government, not for profit organizations, non governmental organizations (NGOs), trade unions, etc. Be deviled by limited financial resources, they regard the new medium as a cost effective way of disseminating their messages.<br /><br />The Internet was not exempt from this phase which ended only a few years ago. It started with a complete computer anarchy manifested in ad hoc networks, local networks, networks of organizations (mainly universities and organs of the government such as DARPA, a part of the defence establishment, in the USA). Non commercial entities jumped on the bandwagon and started sewing these networks together (an activity fully subsidized by government funds). The result was a globe encompassing network of academic institutions. The American Pentagon established the network of all networks, the ARPANET. Other government departments joined the fray, headed by the National Science Foundation (NSF) which withdrew only lately from the Internet.<br /><br />The Internet (with a different name) became semi-public property - with access granted to the chosen few.<br /><br />Radio took precisely this course. Radio transmissions started in the USA in 1920. Those were anarchic broadcasts with no discernible regularity. Non commercial organizations and not for profit organizations began their own broadcasts and even created radio broadcasting infrastructure (albeit of the cheap and local kind) dedicated to their audiences. Trade unions, certain educational institution sand religious groups commenced "public radio" broadcasts.<br /><br />The Commercial Phase<br /><br />When the users (e.g., listeners in the case of the radio, or owners of PCs and modems in the case of the Internet) reach a critical mass - the business sector is alerted. In the name of capitalist ideology (another religion, really) it demands "privatization" of the medium. This harps on very sensitive strings in every Western soul: the efficient allocation of resources which is the result of competition. Corruption and inefficiency are intuitively associated with the public sector ("Other People's Money" - OPM). This, together with the ulterior motives of members of the ruling political echelons (the infamous American Paranoia), a lack of variety and of catering to the tastes and interests of certain audiences and the automatic equation of private enterprise with democracy lead to a privatization of the young medium.<br /><br />The end result is the same: the private sector takes over the medium from "below" (makes offers to the owners or operators of the medium that they cannot possibly refuse) - or from "above" (successful lobbying in the corridors of power leads to the appropriate legislation and the medium is "privatized"). Every privatization - especially that of a medium - provokes public opposition. There are (usually founded) suspicions that the interests of the public are compromised and sacrificed on the altar of commercialization and rating. Fears of monopolization and cartelization of the medium are evoked - and proven correct in due course. Otherwise, there is fear of the concentration of control of the medium in a few hands. All these things do happen - but the pace is so slow that the initial fears are forgotten and public attention reverts to fresher issues.<br /><br />A new Communications Act was enacted in the USA in 1934. It was meant to transform radio frequencies into a national resource to be sold to the private sector which was supposed to use it to transmit radio signals to receivers. In other words: the radio was passed on to private and commercial hands. Public radio was doomed to be marginalized.<br /><br />The American administration withdrew from its last major involvement in the Internet in April 1995, when the NSF ceased to finance some of the networks and, thus, privatized its hitherto heavy involvement in the net.<br /><br />A new Communications Act was legislated in 1996. It permitted "organized anarchy". It allowed media operators to invade each other's territories. Phone companies were allowed to transmit video and cable companies were allowed to transmit telephony, for instance. This was all phased over a long period of time - still, it was a revolution whose magnitude is difficult to gauge and whose consequences defy imagination. It carries an equally momentous price tag - official censorship. "Voluntary censorship", to be sure, somewhat toothless standardization and enforcement authorities, to be sure - still, a censorship with its own institutions to boot. The private sector reacted by threatening litigation - but, beneath the surface it is caving in to pressure and temptation, constructing its own censorship codes both in the cable and in the internet media.<br /><br />Institutionalization<br /><br />This phase is the next in the Internet's history, though, it seems, few realize it.<br /><br />It is characterized by enhanced activities of legislation. Legislators, on all levels, discover the medium and lurch at it passionately. Resources which were considered "free", suddenly are transformed to "national treasures not to be dispensed with cheaply, casually and with frivolity".<br /><br />It is conceivable that certain parts of the Internet will be "nationalized" (for instance, in the form of a licensing requirement) and tendered to the private sector. Legislation will be enacted which will deal with permitted and disallowed content (obscenity ? incitement ? racial or gender bias ?) No medium in the USA (not to mention the wide world) has eschewed such legislation. There are sure to be demands to allocate time (or space, or software, or content, or hardware) to "minorities", to "public affairs", to "community business". This is a tax that the business sector will have to pay to fend off the eager legislator and his nuisance value.<br /><br />All this is bound to lead to a monopolization of hosts and servers. The important broadcast channels will diminish in number and be subjected to severe content restrictions. Sites which will refuse to succumb to these requirements - will be deleted or neutralized. Content guidelines (euphemism for censorship) exist, even as we write, in all major content providers (CompuServe, AOL, Yahoo!-Geocities, Tripod, Prodigy).<br /><br />The Bloodbath<br /><br />This is the phase of consolidation. The number of players is severely reduced. The number of browser types will settle on 2-3 (Netscape, Microsoft and Opera?). Networks will merge to form privately owned mega-networks. Servers will merge to form hyper-servers run on supercomputers in "server farms". The number of ISPs will be considerably cut. 50 companies ruled the greater part of the media markets in the USA in 1983. The number in 1995 was 18. At the end of the century they will number 6.<br /><br />This is the stage when companies - fighting for financial survival - strive to acquire as many users/listeners/viewers as possible. The programming is shall owed to the lowest (and widest) common denominator. Shallow programming dominates as long as the bloodbath proceeds.<br /><br />From Rags to Riches<br /><br />Tough competition produces four processes:<br /><br />1. A Major Drop in Hardware Prices<br /><br />This happens in every medium but it doubly applies to a computer-dependent medium, such as the Internet.<br /><br />Computer technology seems to abide by "Moore's Law" which says that the number of transistors which can be put on a chip doubles every 18 months. As a result of this miniaturization, computing power quadruples every 18 months and an exponential series ensues. Organic-biological-DNA computers, quantum computers, chaos computers - prompted by vast profits and spawned by inventive genius will ensure the continued applicability of Moore's Law.<br /><br />The Internet is also subject to "Metcalf's Law".<br /><br />It says that when we connect N computers to a network - we get an increase of N to the second power in its computing processing power. And these N computers are more powerful every year, according to Moore's Law. The growth of computing powers in networks is a multiple of the effects of the two laws. More and more computers with ever increasing computing power get connected and create an exponential 16 times growth in the network's computing power every 18 months.<br /><br />2. Content Related Fees<br /><br />This was prevalent in the Net until recently. Even potentially commercial software can still be downloaded for free. In many countries television viewers still pay for television broadcasts - but in the USA and many other countries in the West, the basic package of television channels comes free of charge.<br /><br />As users / consumers form a habit of using (or consuming) the software - it is commercialized and begins to carry a price tag. This is what happened with the advent of cable television: contents are sold for subscription or per usage (Pay Per View - PPV) fees.<br /><br />Gradually, this is what will happen to most of the sites and software on the Net. Those which survive will begin to collect usage fees, access fees, subscription fees, downloading fees and other, appropriately named, fees. These fees are bound to be low - but it is the principle that counts. Even a few cents per transaction may accumulate to hefty sums with the traffic which characterizes some web sites on the Net (or, at least its more popular locales).<br /><br />3. Increased User Friendliness<br /><br />As long as the computer is less user friendly and less reliable (predictable) than television - less of a black box - its potential (and its future) is limited. Television attracts 3.5 billion users daily. The Internet stands to attract - under the most exuberant scenario - less than one tenth of this number of people. The only reasons for this disparity are (the lack of) user friendliness and reliability. Even browsers, among the most user friendly applications ever -are not sufficiently so. The user still needs to know how to use a keyboard and must possess some basic acquaintance with the operating system. The more mature the medium, the more friendly it becomes. Finally, it will be operated using speech or common language. There will be room left for user "hunches" and built in flexible responses.<br /><br />4. Social Taxes<br /><br />Sooner or later, the business sector has to mollify the God of public opinion with offerings of political and social nature. The Internet is an affluent, educated, yuppie medium. It requires literacy and numeracy, live interest in information and its various uses (scientific, commercial, other), a lot of resources (free time, money to invest in hardware, software and connect time). It empowers - and thus deepens the divide between the haves and have-nots, the developed and the developing world, the knowing and the ignorant, the computer illiterate.<br /><br />In short: the Internet is an elitist medium. Publicly, this is an unhealthy posture. "Internetophobia" is already discernible. People (and politicians) talk about how unsafe the Internet is and about its possible uses for racial, sexist and pornographic purposes. The wider public is in a state of awe.<br /><br />So, site builders and owners will do well to begin to improve their image: provide free access to schools and community centres, bankroll internet literacy classes, freely distribute contents and software to educational institutions, collaborate with researchers and social scientists and engineers. In short: encourage the view that the Internet is a medium catering to the needs of the community and the underprivileged, a mostly altruist endeavour. This also happens to make good business sense by educating and conditioning a future generation of users. He who visited a site when a student, free of charge - will pay to do so when made an executive. Such a user will also pass on the information within and without his organization. This is called media exposure. The future will, no doubt, will be witness to public Internet terminals, subsidized ISP accounts, free Internet classes and an alternative "non-commercial, public" approach to the Net. This may prove to be one more source of revenue to content creator sand distributors.<br /><br />About The Author<br /><br />Sam Vaknin is the author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" and "After the Rain - How the West Lost the East". He is a columnist in "Central Europe Review", United Press International (UPI) and ebookweb.org and the editor of mental health and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory, Suite101 and searcheurope.com. Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government of Macedonia.<br /><br />His web site: http://samvak.tripod.comUnknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-75927942739248804042009-04-08T23:37:00.000-07:002009-04-08T23:38:54.105-07:00Grow Your Business Using B2B Emarketplace - Part IISelecting the right emarketplace<br /><br />Although, IT spending has been staying flat for the last several<br />years, corporate spending in e-business is gaining significant<br />ground and at present surpasses 20 percent of overall IT budget.<br /><br />This means, more and more businesses are undertaking ecommerce<br />initiatives, and as a result increasing sales, streamlining<br />business processes and dramatically boosting productivity.<br /><br />Most experts agree that average business, which is slow in<br />adopting e-business applications, risks loosing its competitive<br />edge to their more progressive rivals.<br /><br />Emarketplaces provide with a great opportunity for small to<br />medium size companies to test online business for a minimal risk.<br />This is due to the factor that the e-business applications that<br />come along with an emarketplace membership package are<br />prohibitively expensive to develop in-house by most companies,<br />and require large professional workforce to operate. As an<br />example: product content development with required attributes,<br />suitable for e-business, itself might feel like a daunting task<br />for most offline companies.<br /><br />So, as a company, what should be your first step in starting<br />e-business through emarketplaces?<br /><br />Naturally, out of hundreds of emarketplaces available today,<br />you have to find one that matches all your requirements.<br />Choosing right kind of emarketplace<br /><br />In best case scenario, if yours is a large enough company,<br />you should build your private emarketplace with all the<br />necessary features specific to your business. The potential<br />of having your own emarketplace is amazing!<br /><br />- Ecommerce will add value to your existing business transactions<br /><br />- Your present suppliers will be able to post most updated information on their products via e-catalog and their storefront<br /><br />- You can build community from your present buyers and supplier, or invite members on the Internet<br /><br />- Real time marketplace will allow you to take quick buying and selling decision<br /><br />- Both buyers and sellers can contact you through Instant Messaging System<br /><br />- Your entire supply chain process can be managed from one place<br /><br />- You can issue real time purchase tenders with either limited access only to your community members or open to public<br /><br />- Sell your stock lots through online auction<br /><br />- Brand you emarketplace and establish your company as a serious online player within your Industry<br /><br />However, as I mentioned earlier, if you are not a very big company,<br />you will probably be better off with a membership in an established<br />emarketplace.<br /><br />If you are a manufacturer, wholesaler or a buyer of certain<br />industry specific products or services, your best choice would be<br />a vertical emarketplace that caters specially your industry. For<br />example: if you buy or sell fish, you should look for an emarketplace<br />that deals with this product only. Another thing that you should<br />keep in mind is how geographically limited your business is. If you<br />buy and sell fish within the locality of your state or region, if<br />available, get an emarketplace that works in your region.<br /><br />Totally different story, if you carry large number of products<br />from different industries; for you a horizontal marketplace that<br />cater a range of industries is a better choice. If you are an<br />international trader involved in import or export, you should select<br />a global emarketplace, which has members from the countries you<br />deal with.<br /><br />Features that are must<br /><br />A good emarketplace amasses various features in order to facilitate<br />smooth transactions of business deals. However, there are some key<br />attributes that are absolutely necessary for any emarketplace to<br />become successful; and as a prospective member you should look for<br />these features and characteristics while choosing an emarketplace<br />for yourself.<br /><br />Product catalog based on an industry-standard classification system<br />While it might not look so important from the surface; to have<br />accurate, well-defined and timely-updated product content is<br />extremely crucial for any online business. Since you have to<br />integrate your product catalog to the aggregated electronic catalog<br />of the emarketplace, which could be a very complex task, you should<br />make sure that the classification system that they have is widely<br />used online; and if necessary you can use same product content with<br />other emarketplaces or e-procurement applications.<br /><br />The best option, as I believe, is based on The Universal Standard<br />Products and Services Classification (UNSPSC), which is a global<br />coding system that classifies products and services. This<br />categorization scheme covers the broadest collection of industries<br />and commodities available today, and designed to facilitate<br />e-commerce transactions by providing geography-independent common<br />nomenclature system.<br /><br />Product search capability within the marketplace and e-catalog<br />Members of the emarketplace should be able to locate any product<br />or service, whether in the auctions, marketplaces, or in the catalog<br />with ease. Advanced search function should allow finding required<br />items using precise query.<br /><br />Supply chain process, i.e. request for quote, quotation, purchase<br />order, billing system, etc.<br />Efficient supply chain management is the number one strategic priority<br />for many businesses. In 2001, Cisco System alone had to write off<br />US $2.5 billion in excess inventories due to poor management of its<br />numerous outsourcing contractors.<br />E-marketplaces can help streamlining your supply chain process if<br />the required features are embedded in their system.<br /><br />Directory of members<br />Usually most emarketplaces incorporate a searchable directory of<br />their members. The members get an added opportunity of creating<br />new business relations and increasing sales thanks to this feature.<br /><br />Product content adding and editing interface<br />In order to make product content adding and maintaining easier<br />for sellers, the marketplace must have an uncomplicated tool.<br />The tool could be a wizard-based combination of simple forms.<br />To integrate larger catalogs speedily and efficiently the<br />emarketplace should have XML based interface.<br /><br />Ability to promote products and services<br />The process of posting an offer for sale of a product or a service<br />on the marketplace should be simple and easy but sophisticated<br />enough to create dynamic offer, offer with time limit, variable<br />pricing based on quantity, etc.<br /><br />Apart from the above mentioned functionalities that facilitate<br />conducting e-business, other key characteristics of a quality<br />e-marketplace should include:<br /><br />Simplicity – An emarketplace should be easy to learn and use.<br />Large Community – The quantity of members should be big enough,<br />so that new participants can expand their business.<br />Flexibility – Emarketplace functions should be flexible enough<br />to modify or add with new features when necessary.<br />Neutrality – The emarketplace should be an unbiased venue for<br />both sellers and buyers. No member should have any privilege<br />at the expense of others. Providing an open and transparent<br />market for all the participants is an important constituent<br />of the value proposition of an emarketplace.<br /><br />Cost of doing business through e-marketplace<br /><br />In general, thanks to the large member base, e-marketplaces<br />charge a reasonable subscription fee if you would like to<br />participate in it. Many emarketplaces also charge a nominal<br />fee for each trade made using their facilities. Other costs<br />involved, that you should consider, are internal workforce<br />needed to handle business via emarketplace, catalog<br />integration and maintaining, etc. In any case, the cost of<br />doing business through emarketplaces is negligible for most<br />businesses compare to the gains they make.<br /><br />Get your partners involved<br /><br />If you just build a corporate website and don’t spend<br />required time and money to promote, it won’t bring any<br />business. Same goes for emarketplace! Mere participation in<br />an emarketplace also will not produce any significant<br />benefit if you don’t convince your existing buyers and<br />suppliers to work with you through your chosen emarketplace.<br /><br />Nowshade Kabir is the founder, primary developer and present CEO of Rusbiz.com. He has Ph. D. degree in Information Technology. Dr. Kabir has over 12 years of experience in International Trade and has worked as an advisor to several government projects. You can contact him at mailto:nowshade[at]rusbiz.com, http://ezine.rusbiz.com, http://www.rusbiz.comUnknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-66003121820694821762009-04-08T23:27:00.000-07:002009-04-08T23:37:42.169-07:00Making Freelance Writing Niche Types Fit: A Few Niche Types by Definition and DescriptionOur Freelance Writing Needs Defined<br /><br />We must make freelance niche types fit our needs, wants,<br />values and lifestyles, and we also must make ourselves fit<br />freelance niche types. Of our waking hours, we work more<br />than we do anything else. I keep this in mind when college<br />students come to me concerned about what to do for a living,<br />and I tell them (because I want them happy) to do what they<br />love. I also tell them (because I believe in the truth) to<br />do what they are good at.<br /><br />The same goes for freelance writers. If we are talented, we<br />have a chance. If we have a severe work ethic we have a<br />better chance. And if we are devoted enough and relentless<br />enough (and¡ªahem--masochistic enough) about writing for a<br />living, we will be able to put on our vitaes that we are<br />indeed professional writers. But in order to do and be so,<br />we best find the freelance writing niche types or type we<br />will be spectacular at, staking out a corner in the niche<br />market, one which we¡¯ll bring passion to every morning as<br />that damned alarm (later a wonderful thing) sounds.<br /><br />Niche Defined<br /><br />From the Italian-derived French for nicchia, "a shell-like<br />recess in a wall," a niche is an inset, concave enclosure.<br />It is this little enclosure we freelance writers need to<br />find, study, practice, and own. It is the small area of<br />specialty we make ours and offer to those in need. So the<br />smaller (and therefore the less competitive) the better.<br /><br />We in the freelance writing business and those of us working<br />to get into it have plenty of industries to work with:<br /><br />Advertising<br /><br />B2B (Business to Business)<br /><br />B2C (Business to Customer/Client)<br /><br />Entertainment<br /><br />Finance<br /><br />Medicine<br /><br />Non-profit<br /><br />Publishing (online/offline)<br /><br />Recreation<br /><br />Research/Marketing<br /><br />Real Estate<br /><br />Science<br /><br />Technology<br /><br />Niche Types Defined<br /><br />And for every industry there are tens of freelance writing niche types:<br /><br />Creative Writing- I¡¯ll say again from my lofty loft of<br />opinions that I believe all writing is creative, as it is<br />generative. My point is affirmed when we look at all of the<br />kinds of writing projects a creative freelancer can do or<br />get into, from magazine articles about bushwackers and<br />George Bush to books about needlepoint and pine cone needles<br />and needling family members to¡<br /><br />Ghost Writing- Ghost writing is a popular preferred<br />choice of many clients, even those who have hung out a<br />writer shingle (or banner) and outsource the assignments,<br />collect them, pay us (hopefully well), and put their own<br />names on the work, be it a booklet or a book, a piece of web<br />copy or a piece of ad copy.<br /><br />Proposal and Business Plan Writing- For profit or not,<br />businesses need writers to create proposals that show need<br />and get that need satisfied¡ªmonetarily. As there is with<br />all freelance writing niche types, with proposal and plan<br />writing a freelancer has the skill sets and experience to<br />prepare documents that will be convincing enough that if the<br />client needs hot soup sold in hell the writer will be able<br />to deliver. I have written two successful proposals and a<br />number of grant proposal reports (that ensured continuation<br />of the grant). They are somewhat interesting, but only to<br />those writers with a particular finesse for a cross between<br />technical and creative/dynamic writing.<br /><br />PR (Public Relations) Writing- PR writers do concept copy<br />or concept to completion work in a number of media, writing<br />ad copy, doing the layout, and designing such items as<br />brochures, newsletters, press releases, media kits, and<br />more, to achieve the ultimate goal for the client: name<br />branding.<br /><br />Technical Writing- Involving everything technical, from<br />professional, consumer, and user manuals to white papers,<br />technical writing depends upon a writer¡¯s ability to<br />organize, synchronize, structure, and develop the details of<br />technical content.<br /><br />Web Content Writing- To meet the client¡¯s goals of web<br />presence and online branding using highly trafficked,<br />sticky websites/pages, the web content developer or<br />producer writes what are known as KRPs, keyword-rich pages.<br />This particular wave of freelance niche types was discovered<br />(years ago) to be most beneficial as SEO, search-engine<br />optimizing/optimized/ optimization, text (or content).<br /><br />While I also specialize in mental health/disability writing<br />and creative and memoir writing, web content development is<br />one of my favorite freelance niche types. To get the<br />keywordphrase keywordphrase keywordphrase construction<br />clear, engaging, and entertaining while keeping it from<br />doing a hideous grammatical/ rhetorical pileup is a<br />challenge I look forward to every morning.<br /><br />Hey, it beats the alarm clock jangling, signaling the dread<br />of having to punch a card at a factory or see the boss off<br />to work so I can clean her toilets and scrub her floors. Of<br />course, there's no shame in those jobs. I did them for<br />years to get through grad school. But that's more to do<br />with the other definition of niche: "the status of an<br />organism within its environment/community, affecting its<br />survival as a species."<br /><br />And besides, I love writing so much, much more. It's a<br />much better fit, one I wish for all of you who adore the<br />writing process as much as I adore it.*<br /><br />--------------------------------------------------------<br /><br />*If this is the case, you definitely need to check out the<br />pages on my site with web content and writing niche samples,<br />articles that exemplify good, tight, even humorous writing<br />and that are about writing at the same time.<br /><br />Works Consulted<br /><br />Bly, Robert W.. Secrets of a Freelance Writer: How to Make<br />$85,000 a Year. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1988.<br /><br />Hyperdictionary. WEBNOX CORP., 2000-2003<br />7<br />Dec. 2004.<br /><br />Konradt, Brian. “Creating a Specialty.” Write from Home. <<br />http://www.writefromhome.com/writingtradearticles/145.<br />htm> 7 Dec. 2004.<br /><br />N.H.-born prize-winning poet, creative nonfiction writer, memoirist, and award-winning Assoc. Prof. of English, Roxanne is also web content and freelance writer/founder of http://www.roxannewrites.com, a support site for academic, memoir, mental disability, and creative writers who need a nudge, a nod, or just ideas…of which Roxanne has 1,000s, so do stop in for a visit, as this sentence can’t possibly get any longer….Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-40299223693600463232009-02-01T23:54:00.000-08:002009-02-01T23:55:58.173-08:00SEO Web Design - Create Online Business PresenceAt present, the demand for SEO web design service is increasing day-by-day as it plays a significant role in creating a successful web presence for online business. A perfect website meets the requirements and vision of the clients highlighting their products and services, and effectively drawing more and more customers.<br /><br />Entertain, Inform and Bring Customers Back<br /><br />Search engine optimization and web design services focus on creating informative and appealing websites with high-impact graphics and interactive solutions. Effective search engine optimization can successfully market your website, enabling it to gain a competitive edge, increase online visibility, increase sales revenue, make your business more efficient, and bring in more enquires. Moreover, it offers the highest levels of accessibility and usability.<br /><br />Benefit from Dynamic Websites<br /><br />Design and develop a successful website with excellent graphic design and other features. To create a professional image for your company in an eye-catching way, websites are developed with key features - user interface, Flash animation and more. A lot of graphical images, active databases, splash entrance pages, web forms, shopping cart, storefront, auction and product imaging are incorporated to make your simple website e-commerce enabled. SEO web design service package includes:<br /><br />• Website design and development<br />• e-business consulting<br />• Product imaging<br />• Search engine optimization<br />• Audio and video integration<br />• Complete e-commerce website production<br /><br />Usually, a professional website designer creates an extremely attractive website with SEO in mind by identifying the target market, online competition and the right keywords.<br /><br />How to Select Experts - Web Design Service and SEO Solutions<br /><br />A number of web design and development firms offer SEO web design services to make a lasting impression for your business, and thereby ensure it a strong web presence. With so many web design companies around, try to select one with high professional standards and expertise in all aspects of design and SEO works.<br /><br />Viral SEO Services offers high quality SEO web design services for the clients. Avail of our website SEO solutions to improve your search engine rankings and produce a higher return on your investment.<br /><br /><a href="http://webdesign.warriorzinfotech.com">e commerce web site design company</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-75082497747005088262009-02-01T23:52:00.000-08:002009-02-01T23:53:59.349-08:00Professional Web Hosting And DesignSo, you decided that you want to hire a professional web hosting and design service to develop and host your website. What can you do to make sure you get the most of your money?<br /><br />First consider that you don’t need to hire the same company to handle both the web hosting and the design. Sometimes you get more value for your money if you hire a professional company to handle the web design, and another professional company to handle the web hosting. However, it is convenient to have your professional web designer take care of the hosting as well.<br /><br />When hiring a professional web hosting and design service, it is important to maintain good communication. That usually means that you will have to do your homework before you hire someone. Consider exactly what purpose your website will serve, what content you want to include and information about how many pages you would like. The more you envision your website, the more you will get out of your experience. When a professional web hosting and design service puts together a quote on the project, the more information you provide means the quote will be more accurate.<br /><br />Also, make sure what the web hosting and design company’s policy is on revisions. Some companies may charge you extra to make changes. Others may include that in their initial quote. Before you begin, make sure you get the quote and their policy in writing. A lot of web hosting and design companies make you sign a contract. Make sure you understand exactly what it says before you sign. Some web hosting and design companies quote you a price with the understanding that it will change if the circumstances change. Make sure this is communicated to you before you begin, so there aren’t any surprises down the road.<br /><br />Web Design And Hosting provides detailed information on Web Design And Hosting, Professional Web Hosting And Design, Affordable Web Design And Hosting Services, Cheap Web Site Design And Hosting and more. Web Design And Hosting is affiliated with Create Your Own Web Site.<br /><br /><a href="http://webdesign.warriorzinfotech.com"> web site design</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-8975983575374186722009-02-01T23:46:00.000-08:002009-02-01T23:52:00.304-08:00Web Design For Search Engine Optimisation.Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of managing your web site and it’s resources in order for it to rank as high as possible with the search engines. The tools and techniques are sought after and much is said and written about what works best and what is , very often, total rubbish. No matter what is said, the web design, the way the web pages are put together certainly affects the SEO process. Unfortunately, one can go too far with ones SEO fanaticism and forget the core of why a web site is being put together, the objectives of the product. Good web design is the best attempt at balancing the benefits of SEO and the fundamental objectives of the web site. If it is a sales tool, the web site needs to sell products or services. If it is an information web site, the web design needs to meet this objective.<br />It makes sense to consider the web design carefully. After all, what good is it to rank on top of the search engine, get a lot of traffic and fail to impress your web site visitor?<br /><br />What then shall we say? If web design more important than SEO, or is it the reverse? One thing is for sure, do not forgo the fundamental principles of good web design. Search engine friendly web design is not just about getting excellent ranking on search engines. Remember that the latter do not read and use your web design content, your audience and clients do. So the search behaviour of your target audience is important for your web design. Remember the five principles of good web design: pages should be easy to read, easy and consistent navigation to take your audience smoothly through your web site, use good web design features and images and be easy to download.<br /><br />It is possible to achieve all five web design principles and still produce a search engine friendly web site which works for your audience and attracts leads and which is ranked well on the search engines. While the whole search engine friendly web design process sounds tedious, you do get used to it and with time it becomes almost second nature. After working through more than 200 designs we think it is best to consider both aspects while planning your web design. As flash and images are invisible to search engines, consider having the right balance of text, including your tags, and images, flash elements from the outset.<br /><br />Clearly the principles of web design with the target audience in mind should not be overlooked while building SEO techniques and technology into a web site. Always keep your goals in mind and remember that getting to the top without a clear selling plan does not pay.<br /><br />Ralph Ramah is the webmaster of Discount Web Design, one of the leading web design company in the UK offering quality web site design and SEO services<br /><br /><a href="http://www.webdesign.warriorzinfotech.com">web design</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-85463117670921634872009-01-29T05:13:00.001-08:002009-01-29T05:14:30.970-08:00Corporate Web Site Designw<div id="body"><p>If you are searching for web design solutions the corporate web site design Manchester services on the Internet are prepared to help you design your web pages at prices you can afford. Many of the corporate web site design Manchester services are prepared to help both small and large companies design ecommerce web stores. The design process involves programming language, e.g. Perl, C++, Javascript, etc, so be sure to find qualified designers at the corporate web site design Manchester services. Many people these days are building PHP based web sites, MySQL, and other sites that are programmed with server-side programs and database.</p><p>The corporate web site design Manchester services can help you get the pages you desire. It is not easy to design and program these types of web pages so keep in mind that while the company offers affordable prices, the costs has to match the timeline and other duties of the Manchester services. When it comes to designing web pages there are many things involved. A lot of the web sites today often contain client-side programming and web design strategies that make them unique. client-side programming and web combine with scripting language to improve web design and offers pages that contain rich content that can be ready by servers and then inserted into web pages before you see the results.</p><p>Server-side programming is language we use to achieve this goal, but then designers may have to use client-side programming and web design applications to get the pages at the right side of the browser once the pages are received. You can use these scripts to execute various tasks that relate to the information in which the page was received, including changing display colors, executing calculations, styles, checking user input, and validity.</p><p>Almost every browser supports many versions of the script language we know as JavaScript. JavaScript language is one of the most needed languages to create Ajax web pages.</p><p>Programming language is a mere part of creating web pages, but when designers from the corporate web site design Manchester services consider the pages they have to think of DNS and other aspects of the design carefully. DNS works with client-side programming. Each computer connects to the Web has its own special numerical address, which we refer to as IP, or Internet Protocol. This address is essentially needed because without it, we cannot access the Internet. IP is to some extent like a physical address. Internet Protocols enables you to view specific web pages from the browser without having to type in the IP address.</p><p>Users are not likely to type in strings of numbers into a search engine to pull up a web page and for this reason the pages must be optimized and use IP. Using the domain name, you can request web pages easier. Domain name when requested are handled by the server. The server submits the request from the DNS server, and searches the databases to find relevant information. Error messages appear if the server cannot locate anything that associates with the domain name. Designers at the corporate web site design Manchester services have to consider all these aspect while designing your web pages.</p></div><p>For further information, please visit <a id="link_74" target="_new" href="http://www.design4web-online.co.uk/">Corporate Web Site Design Manchester</a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-77641145433721044082009-01-29T05:11:00.000-08:002009-01-29T05:13:07.665-08:00Web Design And Hosting<div id="body"><p>There are a lot of websites on the internet that are either finished or under development. Would you like to have your own website? Do you know the best options concerning web design and hosting?</p><p>First, you need to determine your reasons for wanting a website. Is it for business, personal or for other purposes such as sharing your opinion? Once you have determined the purpose for your site, you will get a clearer vision on the type of web design and hosting you will need. If you have the skills, you can design your own. However, another great option is to hire someone to design and develop your website for you.</p><p>If you decide to hire someone, you will need to consider your budget. You can post an ad on a classified website or on a freelance bid site. This is often a good way to make sure your project stays within your budget. You can also ask around. Contact people whose websites you admire, and see if they’ll offer you any advice or ask your friends and family if they know anyone.</p><p>Once you have the web design aspect of your site taken care of, you will need to consider your hosting options. Some web designers also offer hosting as part of their packages. You can find a company online or ask around. Just do a search on “web hosting” to find the companies. Check out the review sites to see what people think of the different companies.</p><p>It may seem overwhelming at first, but it is worth it to consider all your web design and hosting options before making a decision. Once your site is active, you can start to reap the benefits and have the personal satisfaction of sharing your information, opinions or business with others over the Internet.</p></div><p><a id="link_74" target="_new" href="http://www.wetpluto.com/Cheap-Web-Site-Design-And-Hosting.html">Web Design And Hosting</a> provides detailed information on Web Design And Hosting, Professional Web Hosting And Design, Affordable Web Design And Hosting Services, Cheap Web Site Design And Hosting and more. Web Design And Hosting is affiliated with <a id="link_75" target="_new" href="http://www.e-createawebsite.com/">Create Your Own Web Site</a>.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-32650191571502484292009-01-29T05:05:00.000-08:002009-01-29T05:10:56.687-08:00Two Simple Things To Keep In Mind When You're Talking About How Your Web Site Will Look<div id="body"><p>Any web site designer for small business will say that design is one of the big parts of a web site. And I would agree.</p><p>Actually, you agree with this also. If a site that's being built for your business doesn't look good to you, you'll tell your designer to go away and start again. You wouldn't sign off on a poorly designed site for your own business, and you appreciate that your customer won't either.</p><p>You've got to have pleasing design, then. But where do you find it?</p><p><b>Fashion drives site design.</b></p><p>Look at the fashion change taking place at this moment at sites set up for Web 2.0. The clean lines, solid colors, gradients and large fonts are popular and becoming wide spread. Another, earlier, fashion change can be seen on corporate websites. A decade ago they had gray backgrounds and used burgundy colors: now you probably won't see this combination on a corporation's website. Just as design never stands still off-line, it is never resting on websites.</p><p>Welcome to Web Fashion. Your site ought to be reasonably close to the current fashion so it stays up-to-date for your visitor. For this reason evaluate your site every couple of years and perhaps redesign it.</p><p><b>As well, there is a technology consideration to design.</b></p><p>Form to email boxes, and Google Earth's maps and satellite imagery, are examples of this. New technologies in their days, these tools are now routinely built into web sites by designers.</p><p>You should use new technology on your site if it will help your customer, and your site will work better for them.</p><p>The design of a site is pushed by what visitors think looks cool and what designers know is technically possible. Think about both when you design a web site.</p></div><p>Len McGrane is a <a id="link_74" target="_new" href="http://www.telfordsquare.com/">web site designer for small business</a> giving small businesses web sites that look good and work exceptionally well in the commercial process ... for under $500.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-32936876263274913672009-01-08T21:17:00.000-08:002009-01-08T21:18:02.422-08:00Best Web Page Design<div id="body"><p>There is a lot of debate when it concerns the <b><i>best web page design</i></b>. There are those that think the best business web page design is one filled with all kinds of graphics and data while others will advocate a more sleek and streamlined web page.</p><p>My thoughts on this will differ depending on the purpose of the web page. I my opinion the best web page design is a design that will accomplish the page’s goal with the least amount cost and time to develop.</p><p>If your purpose is to design a web page that is a profile type web page that will be used primarily as an informational web page for friends and family then the best web page design is something that allows you to customize the text and layout of the web page. You will also want to put photos on your web page. This type of web page design can be accomplished with just about any type of web page design program.</p><p>Now let’s say you want to build a web page that is going to sell a number of different products or services. The best web page design in this circumstance is generally to design a web page with multiple images and scripts. This type of web page design is done with a more advanced web page design program and requires quite a bit of experience.</p><p>For those of us who market products as an affiliate the are many approaches to use, figuring out the best web page design can be a bit tricky. One way to accomplish your goal is to create a review web page. This type of web page can be built with many different type of web page design programs. I have found the best web page design program for this purpose is a step by step, point and click web page design program.</p><p>This type of web page design program can cut your time in half and keep your cost for each web page down to a minimum. For my money this is the best web page design and if your are inexperience a step by step program will help you get up and running quickly.</p><p>As you can see figuring out which is the best web page design really depends on the type of page and what the purpose of the page is.</p></div><p>Victoria Hargis has been a web developer for over 10 years. Take all the fear out of building a web site with a revolutionary new Web Site Creation Tool. Follow the step by step, point and click web site design system to build a web site in less than 2 hours. Go to <u><a id="link_78" target="_new" href="http://www.jvwebsitedesign.com/">http://www.JVWebsiteDesign.com</a></u> and take all the fear and most of the work out of building your web site.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-23705350078598897942009-01-08T21:16:00.000-08:002009-01-08T21:17:10.629-08:00Lucrative Web Design Business – How to Create a Strong Web Design Business<div id="body"><p>Lucrative Web Design Business – How to Create a Strong Web Design Business</p><p>How to get good at a lucrative web design business – it will require some hard work and testing, but it can certainly be done, even if you are just starting out. A lucrative web design business is one great way to explode your internet business. Also, a lucrative web design business is a great way to maximize your online business revenues.</p><p>So how do you use a lucrative web design business to explode your internet business and to maximize your online business revenues?</p><p>I have developed some incredible new innovations to help you to explode your internet business with a lucrative web design business.</p><p>Try these powerful new ways to help you to explode your internet business with a lucrative web design business:</p><p>- to explode your internet business with a lucrative web design business, first begin by building a list to which you can mail regularly. One of the most important things about growing any business online, especially a web design business, is creating a list of subscribers to whom you can promote your business regularly.</p><p>- to explode your internet business with a lucrative web design business, send quality traffic to your web design business by writing and submitting articles to the major article directories online. They will promote your articles for you, and you can simply write and watch the quality traffic come in.</p><p>- to explode your internet business with a lucrative web design business, use the web design business as an entry point for people into your business. Be willing to expand past just web design, and meet other needs of your customers.</p><p>- to explode your internet business with a lucrative web design business, look for additional revenue opportunities and convert one time web design customers into long term customers by offering backend, related products.</p></div><p>Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, 'Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide'</p><p>Download it free here: <a id="link_74" target="_new" href="http://www.secrets-of-internet-success.com/ezrss.html">Secrets of Article Promotion</a></p><p>Do you want to learn how to build a big online subscriber list fast? Click here: <a id="link_75" target="_new" href="http://www.secrets-of-internet-success.com/listbuilding.htm">Secrets of List Building</a></p><p>Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 9034 articles in print and 14 published ebooks.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-87139432287107699402009-01-08T21:11:00.000-08:002009-01-08T21:14:04.673-08:00Everything You Need to Know About Web Design<div id="body"><p>A representation of content, related to an individual, business or any other topic; using design and graphic principles on the internet in the form of web applications and web sites is known as web design. Web design usually involves and uses technologies and standards such as HTML,<br />CSS, XML, SSL, PHP, ASP, etc.</p><p>Web design differs completely from web development, which is more technical and deals with issues concerning the web site dynamics, validations and constraints. The principle of web site design further involves conception and collection of web pages, that in turn, collectively are known as a single entity, a web site. Web pages are usually the basic content and design holders for the entire web site.</p><p>Web design involves great many characteristics of design. The web site design usually depends completely on the type of content. The web site design should be consistent with the content offered by the site and should be able to please the target population looking for such content. Web site design, should be such that it renders the site almost maintain ace free. It should also be user-friendly, with the most basic navigational concepts instilled and an interface that keeps bringing its users back for more. Thus web design plays a very heavy hand in retaining the web traffic. Aesthetics should be eye pleasing and should be consistent throughout the web site. The whole idea of web design, caters around the presentation of the content posted on the web page, this should be kept in mind during the design phases, so that the content is stark and completely readable without any hindrances. Web design definitely affects the online business and visitor retention a lot, no body wants to visit a web sit again which is poorly design and the navigating is a pain.</p></div>Written by William Amerson. Find the latest information on <a id="link_74" target="_new" href="http://www.dolphinpromotions.co.uk/webdesign.asp">Web Design</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-38546796265816404602008-12-29T02:29:00.000-08:002008-12-29T02:30:37.269-08:00Most Useful Tips To Reduce Your Web Designing Costs<div id="body"><p>In order to design a website for personal and business use, you need to apply the tools that can not only make your web site attractive but user-friendly as well.</p><p>Given the stiff competition that you would have to counter with in promoting your business, and creating that “Brand Image”. Its quite obvious you need a web site that stands out.</p><p>One of the best way to make your website unique and attractive is to use flash web design work on your website. Doing so allows you to showcase information that is not only visually appealing, but also helps users navigate your site better.</p><p>Best deals on flash web design</p><p>There are a number of service providers to choose from if you want affordable flash web design for your web site. You can get a professional flash web designer to do the job. And given the amount of competition on the Internet with regard to these services, you can expect to get some good deals from freelance designers and web design companies as well. As the Internet can provide you with a wealth of information on flash web design services, searching for the best deals will only require a small amount of research and canvassing.</p><p>Another option is to <a id="link_74" target="_new" href="http://www.miraclestudios.in/" title="web site design company">outsource your web design work to India</a>. It can easily reduce your costs by 80 percent. MiracleStudios is a professional <a id="link_75" target="_new" href="http://www.miraclestudios.in/" title="web site design company"> web design company</a>in India, which can help you reduce your costs by providing high quality web designing services at marginal price.</p><p>Building an effective web site need not be expensive. There are a number of options you can choose from to make the process of building your site more affordable. Doing so involves searching for the best deals not only on software but also on web design services, which are readily available from a number of sources. One of the best among these resources is MiracleStudios.In</p></div><p>Naveen Kumar is an experienced author from India. He loves writing articles on SEO, Internet marketing, health and travel. Presently he is writing for MiracleStudios.in.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-47841498388499641892008-12-29T02:28:00.000-08:002008-12-29T02:29:52.066-08:00Flash - 99% Still Bad?<div id="body"><p>On the 29th of November 2000 almost 8 years ago Jacob Nielsen infamously stated that 99% of Flash is bad. In his article he stated that "Flash on a website constitutes a usability disease" and summarized that Flash breaks design.</p><p>How true is this of today's high standard of design? Firstly lets take a trip back to the year 2000. If Flash wasn't going to kill design, it was certainly going to be the 'Y2K bug'. Macromedia owned Flash and was primarily used for creating long ugly flash intros. Which was in fairness a usability nightmare even with a skip intro button.</p><p>So yes the vast majority of Flash being used in websites did depict poor usability and bad design. We saw a huge increase in annoying loud Flash adverts, which were considered browsing hell by users and often resulted in the user leaving the page to escape them. However I still believe even back in 2000 flash had many benefits in web design and that nowhere near the large amount of 99% being considered bad.</p><p>By nowadays standards flash has grown and grown. Being implemented in more websites than ever before. With the release of Actionscript 2.0 and now Actionscript 3.0, the quality of design and usability in Flash websites have reached a new level and possibly hold the key for the future of web design. Not only by adhering to the basic set guidelines of user friendly web design but also by pushing new user interfaces for example jlern.com.</p><p>However, like anything new and experimental people will discard anything away from the norm and at the end of the day thats what it comes down to. Jakob Nielsen did produce a excellent and valid point at the time, but no longer relates to todays high standard of Flash Animation in web design. However, there are still many Flash related usability issues including the lack of consideration for users with hearing or sight problems.</p><p>With Google announcing it is now in works with Adobe to make text accessible by search engines in flash sites. Allowing a Flash website to be properly optimized for search engines. The inability to do this in my eyes is the major drawback with using Flash in web design. When incorporated properly in <a id="link_78" target="_new" href="http://www.firebubble.co.uk/">web design (like here)</a>, its future of Flash seems brighter than ever before and I can confidently say that only 29% of Flash is bad.</p></div><p>Published by Sam Logan Designer for Firebubble <a id="link_79" target="_new" href="http://www.firebubble.co.uk/">Web Design</a> and Logo Design Company.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-57999845153194129112008-12-29T02:24:00.000-08:002008-12-29T02:28:52.046-08:00Add Some Flash to Your Site in a FlashAdd Some Flash to Your Site in a Flash<div id="body"><p>If you are looking to bring your website to life and have a site that demands attention, I recommend you look into adding some Flash to your sit. <strong>Flash web design</strong> brings movement to an otherwise dull looking static site. This is especially important when you are looking to monetize your site using advertising. Simple flash can draw your web site visitors eyes to your advertisment.</p><p>Most people today already have a flash enable browser. If they don't, when flash is present, your web visitors can be redirected to Macromedia, who is the company that provides the plug in to make flash work on your site. Millions of web sites now use flash to explain products, showcase services, and entertain your web visitor. The power of flash on your site can not be underestimated as a very useful feature on your site.</p><p>Any site that would make use of multimedia would benefit from the dynamic aspects of flash. Not only can you utilize flash for graphics but you can combine it with audio to really enhance your site. I am sure you have visited many sites that have incorporated moving animation with music or sounds. It can be an effective tool when used properly. Unfortunately many people do not know how to incorporate flash and over do it or misuse it. Have you ever landed on one of these sites and clicked away immediately?</p><p>Flash has become rather common online as graphics can now be compressed more, which gives your site more flexibility in using flash. The most frequent use of <em>flash web design</em> is in advertising, and especially banners and buttons. This kind of flash is commonplace and very easy to do. With the onset of video learning, you can purchase software that will allow you to create flash on your websites. Most web developers today are capable of bringing your site to life and adding flash to your web pages. One of the keys is to not over do it, so use flash sparingly and look into adding flash to your site in 2007.</p></div><p>If you would like to add flash to your website or if you have any web development needs feel free to contact <a id="link_78" target="_new" href="http://northeastwebdevelopment.com/">Northeast Web Development</a>. Sam Clark is a professional web developer and Ceo of Northeast Web Development. For more information on <a id="link_79" target="_new" href="http://imbydesign.com/">web design and development</a> head over to Imbydesign</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-27328023584638774162008-12-17T23:53:00.000-08:002008-12-17T23:56:34.437-08:00Web Design - The Pros and Cons of Flash<div id="body"><p>Firstly what is flash? Well Flash refers to both the Macromedia Flash Player and to a multimedia authoring program used to create content it (such as games and movies). The Flash Player is a client application available in most web browsers. It features support for vector and raster graphics, a scripting language called ActionScript and bidirectional streaming of audio and video.<br />Macromedia Flash is the integrated development environment (IDE) and Flash Player is the virtual machine used to run the Flash files, but nowadays these terms have become mixed: "Flash" can mean either the authoring environment, the player, or the application files.</p><p>Since its introduction in 1996, Flash technology has become a very popular method for adding animation and interactivity to web pages. Flash can be used to create fantastic animations; to design web-page elements and also to add video to web sites. Websites made with flash can be much more interactive and flashier (pardon the pun) than site made with only html.</p><p>The Flash files, or "flash movies", usually have a .swf file extension and may appear as an element of a web page or to be "played" in the standalone Flash Player. For more information visit www.webdesign-resource.info</p><p>Due to wide usage of Flash in web advertisements and the extra time it takes to load these pages, tools have emerged for blocking Flash content in some or all web sites, or temporarily or permanently turning Flash Player off, such as FlashBlock and Adblock for the Mozilla Firefox browser.<br />If Flash has been disabled in a web browser then users may be unable to access some Flash-dependent websites, or may experience a degraded user interface.<br />Using Flash content stores the content of the web page in a binary file and since Flash uses animations, the design of the page is not static. These factors make Flash-based content unsuitable for indexing by search engines.<br />'Misuse' of Flash software has led to the creation of a new industry term "Flashterbation," where the technology is used in a way that lacks customer focus.</p></div><p>Lucy Bartlett is a proud contributing author. Find more articles <a id="link_78" target="_new" href="http://mindbodyandsoulportal.info/">here</a>. For more info visit <a id="link_79" target="_new" href="http://webdesign-resource.info/sitemap.php">Web Design</a> or <a id="link_80" target="_new" href="http://webdesign-resource.info/flash-templates.php">Flash Templates</a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-27618296224528264762008-12-17T23:52:00.000-08:002008-12-17T23:53:49.966-08:00Flash Web Designing<div id="body"><p>Flash web designing involves the use of Flash in web designing. <br />Flash is a multimedia format developed by Macromedia. This <br />allows web designers to create and develop animations and <br />interactive movies or images, which can be embedded into a <br />web page. Flash web designing provides a number of benefits. <br />It can make a website more attractive, interactive and dynamic.</p><p>The special advantages that Flash offers in web designing are:</p><p>· Flash can show a whole company profile or presentation <br />within a 30 second Flash.</p><p>· Since a Macromedia Flash Player plug-in displays Flash <br />movies so the Flash based work will most probably be rendered <br />the same on all browsers and computer platforms. Thus, the <br />designers can escape from the constraints of more traditional <br />XHTML based design interfaces.</p><p>· Apart from being embedded within a web page the Flash <br />movies can also be exported to construct stand-alone executable <br />applications. These are ideal for CD-ROMs.</p><p>· Flash movies can be downloaded very easily and quickly <br />since they can be stored in very small file sizes.</p><p>· Innovative ads, games, movies etc. can be created <br />using Flash which can be displayed on a website.</p><p>Flash has come a long way since its inception. Flash technology <br />has become more powerful now and its inherent potential to <br />create more sophisticated web based applications is being <br />appreciated by developers. Great e-learning tools have been <br />coming up with small tutorials being created complete with <br />interactive animations and self-testing exercises- all using <br />Flash.</p></div><p>Elan Brown<br /><a id="link_74" target="_New" href="http://www.digitalcubedesigns.com/">flash web design</a><br /><a id="link_75" target="_new" href="http://www.digitalcubedesigns.com/html/index-1.html">usa flash design</a><br /><a id="link_76" href="mailto:webmaster_elan@yahoo.com"><br /></a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-85602881126212681982008-12-17T23:48:00.000-08:002008-12-17T23:51:54.517-08:00Flash Web Design - Using Flash Today<div id="body"><p>Since the advent of the Internet it would be obvious that web designing would offer a world of opportunities for users on the Internet. As the name suggests, Flash Web Designing involves the use of Flash in Web Designing. Flash is a multimedia tool that was developed by Macromedia. So what does Flash Web Designing has to essentially offer? It basically allows web designers to create and develop interactive movies, creative animations and artistic images which are designed such that using programming code they can be embedded into the website, besides other content. Now reading all this, one thing is certain that you must have realised- It makes a website create more Impact, makes it attractive and thus beckoning to the user.</p><p>There are certain features about flash that make Flash Web Design so useful and make so much sense in using it for your own websites.</p><p>For instance, flash can show with animations and tools your product/company profile with a 30 second of flash series content. Another advantage of Flash is that, since a Macromedia Flash Player plug-in displays Flash movies so the flash works the same on a variety of browsers and computer platforms. Thus, if a web designer is working with flash, does not need to bother over programming language requirements and can easily avoid the difficulties involved with the more traditional XHTML based design interfaces.</p><p>Flash can also be executed in stand-alone devices such as CD ROMs. Flash movies are easy to download and can be stored in small file sizes. What can flash offer besides playing movies? Well, a lot more. Using <a target="_new" href="http://www.rupizmedia.com/flash-websites-designing">flash web designing</a> you can construct innovative ads, and games as well.</p><p>Flash has come a long way, and yet there is a lot to be done using flash. It is a powerful and an effective tool. In every aspect of web design, the role of flash comes to play.</p></div><p>About the Author- Naman Jain is an online marketing professional, Presently working with Rupiz Media, one of the leading online marketing company offering expert SEO services, affiliate marketing services, pay per click, UK web development services and <a target="_new" href="http://www.rupizmedia.com/communities">community website designing</a> solutions over the globe.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-49763812896297791932008-10-24T07:45:00.003-07:002008-10-24T07:45:59.579-07:00The 5 Things You Should Already Knew About Web Hosting<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(75, 75, 75); font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13px; "><div id="body"><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Internet is now no longer connecting just website but connecting human to human. The World Wide Web has become part of our live whether you realize it or not. From net surfing, news reading, match making to online or offline shopping, credit card transactions. All cannot be separated from the internet. That explains why web hosting is never been that important before.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><u>What is web hosting?</u><br />Since web hosting is one of the foundations of the internet, do you really understand what it actually is. A simple illustration is your computer. Imagine you home PC with a quad core processors, a few Gigabytes of memory, a server motherboard and an extremely big hard drive. That sounds like a server computer in data centers and the storage space in the hard drive is what we call web hosting. Not forgetting a quality fiber optic connection to the internet access point making the files stored in the hard drive accessible by the world.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><u>What do web hosting company do?</u><br />What web hosting providers like Bluehost and Lunarpages do is to provide the storage space in the hard drive. They divide the hard drive into small partitions and let subscribers to store their files and data there. While preparing the storage, they also need to maintain and safe guard the internet connections making sure that no traffic congestion will happen. And in return the subscribers will pay them monthly for the service.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><u>Why am I telling you this?</u><br />Knowing that web hosting is important in our live we have to learn more about it. By understand what is it and what the providers do. We can be more accurate in picking up a suitable web hosting for our own.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><u>Why do I need web hosting?</u><br />Basically you can do a lot of things with web hosting. One of the most popular things to do is blogging you can either write a hobbyist or a business blog. With hobbyist blog you can share your thoughts and hobby while building up a online network; with business blog you can share your products online and have some customer service there. Besides blogging, you can build an internet business that make money from affiliate programs and Google AdSense or even better you can have your own online store. Also you could use the web space as a data back up centers for your data and files.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><u>How do I get a web hosting</u><br />You need to shop for web hosting. When I say shop that means you will need to properly choose a web hosting service. You need to do some surveys on hosting providers. Something need your attentions is that the cheapest hosting doesn't mean the best and also the most expensive one might not suit your needs. Therefore, be smart in the shopping. Know what you want, and look for the things. Always compare and <a target="_new" href="http://www.reviewlunarpages.com/" id="link_78" style="color: rgb(25, 0, 255); text-decoration: underline; ">review web hosting</a> services.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">I would like to emphasize again that the evolutions of internet is quick. If you would like to be advance in online tech stuffs, web hosting is something you must learn about. If you are going to host your first blog or website, get your own hosting and you will discover a lot more fun with it.</p></div><div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><div id="sig" class="sig" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: rgb(75, 75, 75); margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-weight: normal; "><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Daren is a writer and webmaster. He <a target="_new" href="http://www.reviewlunarpages.com/" id="link_79" style="color: rgb(25, 0, 255); text-decoration: underline; ">review Lunarpages web hosting</a> in his website. For a good quality of web hosting, Daren recommends Lunarpages web hosting.</p></div></td></tr></tbody></table></div></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-59991648320355398802008-10-24T07:45:00.001-07:002008-10-24T07:45:37.074-07:00Should You Use Free Hosting?<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(75, 75, 75); font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13px; "><div id="body"><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Need a place to host your website? If you're looking, chances are you've come upon offers for free website hosting. However, there are definite drawbacks to using a free hosting service.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Other people's ads will be on your space. Many free hosting providers make their money by putting ad space on their client sites.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">You won't get a domain name of your own. Most free hosts don't give you a unique name; you're stuck with a subdomain of their own.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">You won't show up on search engines. A big drawback of free hosting is that sites hosted for free often don't rank well in search engines.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Free hosting can hurt credibility. To those who know a little about websites, it's obvious when a site is being hosted for free.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">You don't get much space or functionality. Most free hosting programs allow you to have only a small number of pages on your site.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Dependability can be a problem. Free hosts aren't always the most dependable. You could get unexplained down time, so your site won't always be accessible.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Free website hosting fits every budget, but you get what you pay for. If you're building an e-commerce business or even putting up a simple website to advertise an offline business, you are much better served finding a paid host. A professional hosting site is a much more solid and dependable foundation on which to build your online reputation. So think about investing in good hosting, and you won't regret that you did.</p></div><div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; "><div id="sig" class="sig" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: rgb(75, 75, 75); margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-weight: normal; "><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal; ">Chris Smith is sales director for <a target="_new" href="http://www.on365.co.uk/" id="link_74" style="color: rgb(25, 0, 255); text-decoration: underline; ">http://www.on365.co.uk</a> a UK based data center Management Company and Server Rooms Specialists. For more information on server rooms see <a target="_new" href="http://www.on365.co.uk/Server-Room-Solutions.aspx" id="link_75" style="color: rgb(25, 0, 255); text-decoration: underline; ">http://www.on365.co.uk/Server-Room-Solutions.aspx</a></p></div></td></tr></tbody></table></div></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-46051443835444669022008-10-22T06:54:00.001-07:002008-10-22T06:54:39.000-07:00How to Find a Web Site Coder<div id="body"><p>So now you know what to look for in a coder--but a much greater problem for many people is the problem of where to find the perfect coder for your project. It isn't simply a matter of posting an advertisement in a local classified section and waiting for responses--that might get you some potential candidates, but it removes one of your best tools for assessing the suitability of a coder: the portfolio.</p><p>One useful method is to post your project on freelancing programming sites, one of the most prominent of which is rentacoder.com. Rentacoder.com allows software buyers--such as yourself--to post details of your project on their directory of projects, along with some idea as to the rate you're willing to offer. Coders can then bid on your project, giving you portfolio examples, any certifications they may have, and their ideal rate for the work. Once you've checked out what they can do, you can approve their bid, place your payment in escrow, and just wait for the coding work to be done. As soon as the coder sends you the work (and as soon as you approve it), the money is released to the coder, and you can both go on your ways--your coder with his cash and experience, and you with your functioning direct response website.</p><p>There are a number of advantages to this method. Most importantly, there's the wide talent pool from which to choose--just as putting your business on the Internet gives your product a much wider potential audience than you could achieve through traditional channels, looking for contract employees (like coders) over the Internet gives you a much wider selection and a much greater chance of finding someone with the perfect skills for your job. Additionally, services like rentacoder.com greatly simplify the process of interviewing potential coders and determining prices: most of the things that you need to know about a coder (namely, their skills and their price) is available at the rental site, just waiting for you to sort through the options and make your decision.</p><p>But it's important to keep in mind some of the disadvantages to services like rentacoder.com as well. For one, it's very difficult to get a good sense about a potential coder's personality from their rentacoder.com profile or even their skills set. Again, this isn't a problem for short-term work, but as we've discussed, the ideal relationship with a coder is a long-term relationship. Not only does rentacoder.com make it more difficult to create such a relationship by masking coder personalities, but it also makes it more complicated to hire a coder on an ongoing basis. Rentacoder.com only allows you to bid on a coder for a single project--e.g. a single website--with no simple provision for providing ongoing work.</p><p>Fortunately, these obstacles aren't insurmountable--it just requires more work on your part in order to build and nurture a relationship with your coder. Rentacoder.com automatically releases personal details like phone number and email address for all projects above $500, allowing you to contact your coder directly--once the project is in motion, unfortunately. Before the hiring process--or if your design work costs less than $500, which it shouldn't (see below)--you can post messages to your coder on the rentacoder.com message boards or chat rooms, which is the ideal way to contact them--and there's nothing that says you can't ask for a phone number or email address in such communications to help you make the informed decision before renting a coder.</p><p>Are there other options? Of course--there's always classified advertising (on or offline), there are personal references from other business contacts, there's the possibility of emailing the designers of high-profile sites that you've seen and liked, and there's the ubiquitous Craigslist posting. But as long as you're willing to put in the effort to build a personal relationship with your coder (and to assess their personality and skills before hiring), sites like rentacoder.com simply offer too much variety and too much talent to ignore altogether.</p></div><p>Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article writing success, 'Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide'</p><p>Download it free here: <a id="link_78" target="_blank" href="http://www.secrets-of-internet-success.com/ezrss.html">Secrets of Article Writing</a></p><p>Do you want to learn how to build a big online subscriber list fast? Click here: <a id="link_79" target="_blank" href="http://www.secrets-of-internet-success.com/listbuilding.htm">Secrets of List Building</a></p><p>Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 9034 articles in print and 14 published ebooks.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-732318303616233932.post-85802885891742955322008-10-22T06:53:00.000-07:002008-10-22T06:54:17.735-07:00HTML Or Web Builder Tools For Your Web Site?<div id="body"><p>Building a web page from the raw HTML file up can be deeply rewarding as an intellectual challenge, is certainly the most cost-effective solution, and gives you total control over the look and feel of your page. But it can also be extremely time-consuming--not only to build, but to maintain. If you want to radically revise your product information at some point, you'll have to go back in and change lots of very specific HTML formatting in your raw text files--not the most effective option, certainly.</p><p>An alternative to text authoring is to invest in an actual HTML authoring tool like Dreamweaver or Frontpage. These have significant drawbacks, of course, not least of which are the very high price and the lack of total control over your website. But they do allow you to change your text through copying and pasting without changing the basic formatting or underlying HTML code for every single HTML file you use, and they simplify some of the more complex layout coding that you might choose to use to make your page look more stylish and unique.</p><p>Some HTML authoring tools actually give you the best of both worlds--Dreamweaver, for example, lets you edit the basic HTML coding of a page at the same time as you edit the page text, images, and layout directly (without manually changing HTML tags), which can satisfy both the desire to work quickly and efficiently and the desire to have total control over a page's layout. Any tool, however, is only as good as the person who uses it, so just use the tools that you prefer and that work the best for your coding style.</p><p>If this sounds complicated, it's because DIY coding is complicated. There are definite benefits to it, of course--but for many business owners, those benefits aren't worth the time invested in learning the language. And even if you know HTML and CSS backwards and forwards, you might believe that your basic design skills can't give you exactly what you want for your company's website. If this describes you, then move directly along to our next chapter, where we talk in detail about just how to find, evaluate, and hire a coder or designer who can help your website--and your product along with it--stand out from all the rest.</p></div><p>Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article writing success, 'Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide'</p><p>Download it free here: <a id="link_78" target="_blank" href="http://www.secrets-of-internet-success.com/ezrss.html">Secrets of Article Writing</a></p><p>Do you want to learn how to build a big online subscriber list fast? Click here: <a id="link_79" target="_blank" href="http://www.secrets-of-internet-success.com/listbuilding.htm">Secrets of List Building</a></p><p>Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 9034 articles in print and 14 published ebooks.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0