Web and Multimedia Design

So who else uses Joomla?

By Mark | Published October 6, 2010

Joomla More often than not, the websites that I create are based around the Joomla content management system. It is a powerful, intuitive system that allows my clients to edit and maintain their own websites with very little technical knowhow required. Editing pages is very similar to editing a Microsoft Word document!

Joomla is open source software (It’s free!) and has naturally become very popular amongst small to medium sized businesses who want a strong web prescence but don’t have the budget to have a bespoke system developed.

It may suprise you, however, that Joomla is also used by companies with multi million pound turnovers and monthly website visitors in the millions. I came accross the following sites with a quick search using Google:

Samuel L Jackson’s official website – http://samuelljackson.com/
Porsche Brazil – http://www.porsche.com.br/
Outdoor Photographer Magazine – http://www.outdoorphotographer.com/
The English National Ballet – http://www.ballet.org.uk/
Harvard University – http://gsas.harvard.edu
Total NonStop Action Wrestling (TNA) – http://www.tnawrestling.com/index.php

The Total NonStop Action Wrestling website is an excellent example of the potential Joomla has. It is a very large website incorporating video, countdowns, interactive slideshows, RSS feeds, advertisements and much more. As the second largest wrestling federation in the world, the website will have millions of visitors, showing just how capable and reliable the Joomla system is.

Looking for a cost effective website that you can edit yourself, with endless potential for expansion? Feel free to get in touch!

Posted in Announcements, Articles | Tagged joomla, joomla websites, websites | Leave a comment

Why choose a freelancer?

By Mark | Published April 8, 2010

Price

A fairly obvious point, but important nonetheless. Companies have to fork out a lot of money to pay for staff wages, employer’s national insurance contributions, sick pay, holiday pay, staff insurance, office rental, equipment for every member of staff, business phone lines and the list goes on. A freelancer will have far fewer overhead costs to deal with – they will probably work from home and use their own personal electronic equipment and mobile phone. Naturally, fewer overhead costs mean that a freelancer will usually be able to charge less per hour than a company.

Convenience

I often stress this point when I meet clients. With a freelancer you get a single point of contact for all your needs and usually a mobile number to contact them directly at any time. A web design company may have one person that sells you a website, another that designs it, another that builds it and yet another that invoices for it at the end…!

Quality

A freelancer’s own personal reputation is always at stake when they take on a project and as such they will usually bend over backwards to please the client. Sooner or later a freelancer will also realise that no matter how much marketing they do, there is no better source of business than previous clients recommending them to others.

There are some good companies out there but for every good one there are several bad ones (usually the cheap ones) that will ‘Sell Sell Sell’ and churn out poorly created non bespoke products.

The personal touch

As a client, you should have the right to tell a freelancer/company what you want out of a service, not the other way round. I’ve had clients in the past who have turned down companies who “didn’t listen” and dictated to the client what they were going to get.

Where some companies have an almost factory like routine for the creation of their design services, a good freelancer is much more flexible in their approach. They will gain a good understanding of your business and your requirements and give both the creation process and the final outcome a personal touch that is bespoke to you.

Obviously this article is very generalised. There are some great design companies out there as well as some very bad freelancers. The differences noted above are based on discussions I have had with my clients, observations of other companies and my own experiences working in a company for three years. However, I do hope that it has encouraged you to consider the use of freelancers in the future.

Posted in Articles | Tagged design, design companies, freelance, USPs | Leave a comment

The secret to search engine optimisation is…

By Mark | Published April 3, 2010

…that there is no secret! Anyone can take steps to make a website search engine friendly.

All too often I come across search engine optimisation companies offering some secret formula that will propel your website to the top of Google. Not only do these claims usually fall flat, there are regular reports of these companies using “Black Hat” search engine optimisation techniques resulting in websites being banned from Google altogether. This famously happened to BMW in 2006 (Read more here).

Modern search engines don’t just read a handful of keywords in the head section of your website’s code – they scour your entire website content and have a complicated system in place to make sure that the most relevant pages appear higher in the search rankings. This system is clever enough to prevent people from trying to cheat by using techniques such as “Keyword stuffing”.

Google always recommend that people design websites for users and not search engines. However, there are a number of legal techniques that can be employed to make sure your website is “search engine friendly”. The 15 Minute SEO List provides a fantastic list of factors that have both positive and negative effects on the way search engines view your website. Making relevant changes to your website based on this list will certainly have a beneficial effect on your search engine ranking.

Bare in mind however, that the benefits of making your website search engine friendly won’t be seen overnight. It often takes up to a couple of months for any changes to be reflected within search engine rankings.

Do I offer SEO services? Unlike some, I’ll never boldy claim that your website will be number 1 in Google because search engine rankings are impossible to predict. I will, however, take steps to make your website search engine friendly and incorporate legal techniques to promote your keywords.

Posted in Articles | Tagged search engine optimisation, seo | Leave a comment

“A website is never “done”. It is only abandoned.”

By Mark | Published February 15, 2010

“A website is never “done”. It is only abandoned.” – A great quote that I came across reading this thread on Freelance Switch.

Many website owners only want a basic web presence that offers web surfers a point of reference about their school or business. Fair enough in these modern times, where people often skip the Yellow Pages and perform a quick Google search to find products and services that they require.

But – a website can achieve much much more by giving users a reason to come back through fresh and updated content. This is the reason I am often keen to persuade my clients to use blogs.

In my opinion a blog is the easiest and least time consuming way to keep a fresh, dynamic website. You can use a blog to quickly post updates about your school/business, offer people advice, promote your new services and communicate your school/business ethos or personality of its staff.

Another reason to keep an up to date site is because Google prefers dynamic websites and tends to give them priority over static websites in search engine rankings. If you would like more information on how regularly updated websites perform well in Google, this article sums it up quite nicely

Want an easy to update blog for your school/company? Get in touch!

Posted in Articles | Tagged blog, blogs, fresh content, google, search engine optimisation, search engines, seo | Leave a comment

Things to consider when choosing a design company

By Mark | Published February 10, 2010

Traditionally if you pay for something you expect to claim ownership over what you have bought. Unfortunately it’s often not that simple. Certain design companies will use careful terminology within the contract to maintain ownership of various aspects of your branding identity. This means you are forced into reusing their services which, as a result, means they can charge extortionate markup prices.

I’d like to say this is uncommon but, in my experience, it isn’t. I have come across a number of instances, both in companies and schools, where this technique has been used.

Be sure to check your contract carefully for the following things:

Intellectual Property Rights

This is essentially who “owns” the work created for you. As described above, if you pay a company to design a logo for your company or school, you would expect the intellectual property rights for that logo to be yours. However, certain companies will maintain ownership of this logo through clever wording in contracts. This means that every time you use that logo for anything such as brochures, or websites etc. it would have to be done through the company that designed it or with their expressed permission. You can expect them to charge much more than other companies for their services at this stage because you have no choice but to use them.

Ownership of your domain name

A domain name is your website address (eg. www.google.com). It is important to note that anyone can purchase one of these not just web design companies. Thousands of websites offer them including www.godaddy.com and www.oneandone.co.uk.

Some companies will try to buy your domain name for you and then refuse to hand it over. This means that they can charge you for changes to your website or hosting package and charge you excessively high prices to renew it when it expires.

Ownership of your website or hosting package

Companies may also maintain ownership of your entire website and charge you on an annual basis just to keep it live. They will also usually charge you for every ammendment made to the website.

The reason for this post is primarily to prevent schools and companies looking for design services from being stung the way I’ve seen so many others. It can save you money, time and stress if you check everything properly and ask the right questions. When I take on a job I make sure that I hand over all intellectual property rights of the created items to the clients upon payment.

Furthermore, I also advise that clients purchase their own domain name and hosting package so that they have full control over their site. For those who are unsure about how these things work I offer full assistance in setting these things up so you are fully protected and in control of the things you have paid for.

Posted in Articles | Tagged contracts, design companies, domain name, hosting, intellectual property rights, tips | Leave a comment