Web design

Special web design and development rate for start-up businesses

admin — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 07:41:04 +0000

, relevant to their industry sector
, and
.
Media Creative understand how tough the economic climate for small business is presently, how it will be in the future, and how much
internet. If this new service allows start-up companies to get a
foot on the ladder to success, then Media Creative would like to offer that first step for a very low cost to the client.
A major report published by Warwick Business School entitled “Finance for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises” reveals some fascinating statistics relating to the small business world in the UK. They found that
2,200,000 businesses have no employees (about 61% of SMEs). 1,450,000 have an annual turnover of less than Ј50,000 and 1,350,000 have less than Ј10,000 worth of assets. For them to then spend Ј2k to Ј5K on a competitive website would not be economically viable for most small enterprises falling within these categories, most of which wouldn’t even have a marketing budget.
Media Creative knows how intricate search engine optimization is and that even the majority of marketing personnel do not understand how to push a website up the search engines.
Media Creative excels in this process and has achieved extraordinary results with existing clients’ websites.
Media Creative is aware that anyone can go on the web and buy a readymade website template for a low cost, however that site won’t be unique to you, or aimed at your key market; it won’t be search engine optimized and it won’t be looking to the future of the Internet. Potential clients could see it and decide in an instance that your company isn’t dynamic.
“I am extremely eager for this new service to reach out to the small businesses in our region and to help in some way to maintain a buoyant economy.
We are aware at Media Creative that this is just a small offering to our fellow businesses; however it will be one that for the foreseeable future will be a port of call for potential clients. Providing an up-to-date dynamic presence and optimised marketing tool, our clients can concentrate on growing their business and becoming successful in their industry sector, safe in the knowledge that their web presence is working for them.”

or e-mail Media Creative at

.
Alternatively you can telephone on 01223 539830.

2008 Year in Review: Picnik Announces a 1400 Percent Increase in …

admin — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 23:34:56 +0000

SEATTLE, WA -
Picnik (
), the leading online
photo-editing application, is today announcing that its site visits from
2007 to 2008 has exceeded company and industry expectations — with a 1,400
percent increase in site traffic in the last year.
In December 2007, Picnik had 1.7 million monthly visits, with 631,000
unique visitors — in December 2008, Picnik reached over 24 million monthly
visits and 7.4 million unique visitors. From the most recent numbers, this
translates to a
month-to-month increase of 25 percent.
“Within the last year, the landscape for Web-based computing and online
photo editing have changed dramatically and we think Picnik has been that
change agent,” said Jonathan Sposato, chief executive officer of
Picnik.com. “We’re heartened by how far Picnik has come in less than two
years, and can’t wait to see our momentum continue to rise in ‘09.”
To-date, the average Picnik user spends about 20 minutes at Picnik.com with
each visit, in part, due to the newest available features. This year Picnik
introduced Collage, Fancy Collages, multiple photo uploading through the
‘Picnik Basket,’ batch editing, advanced Layers and Levels, holiday
templates and extensive font and shape enhancements.
Also, in 2008, Picnik broke barriers with its new Sandbox tab allowing
developers to create and contribute their own personally developed tools
through Picnik.com — making Picnik one of the only online photo editors to
allow other developers and users to contribute new, unique features to the
photo editing process.
Additionally, Picnik established partnerships with companies like QOOP,
MySpace, Photobox, SmugMug, Epson, among others, and also made a number of
new company hires in key creative and development areas.
— TIME magazine 50 Best Websites of 2008 — Picnik was the only photo
site to make the list and its review touted that, “only Picnik offers
(photo-editing features) with such elegant simplicity.”

– American Business Awards “the Stevie” — Picnik was honored for “Best
overall Web site Design” by the Dow Jones-sponsored award, where winners
were selected from over 2,600 entries submitted.

– Named a “Top Ten Facebook Application” — in the guidebook written by
Facebook insiders, “Facebook for Dummies.”

– I.D. Magazine — Picnik won the magazine’s “Best of Class Award” in
the Interactive category. Other winners in this juried competition for
world-class design excellence included the Apple iPhone and Seattle’s
Olympic Sculpture Park.

– Interactive Media Award — Picnik received a “Best in Class Award” in
the Photography category. These awards were judged by leaders in the Web
design, advertising, public relations, publishing and news industries,
scoring a 490 out of 500.

– International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences “Webby Award” –
Picnik received “official honoree” distinction for Function in Visual
Design.

– Horizon Interactive Awards — Picnik won a bronze award in the Flash
category.

– Web Marketing Association Web Awards — Picnik was awarded
“Outstanding Achievement in Website Development.”

– Pixel Awards — Out of thousands of entrants, Picnik won a Pixel Award
in the “Geek” category, beating Adobe Creative License, Meebo.com, Simplify
Your Work and Novell.

– MediaPost OMMA Award — Picnik was honored as a finalist for Web Site
Excellence.

– International Academy of Visual Arts — Picnik won a W3 Award (Web
sites, Web Advertising and Web Video) in the graphics category for “best
structure and navigation for a Web site.”

– Inaugural TIS “The Industry Standard” Award — Picnik won first place
in the graphics category.

– Seattle Start-Up Index (TechVibes.com) — In November 2008 Picnik is
ranked as the #4 startup in Seattle out of 255 other companies.
Picnik.com gives real people photo-editing superpowers. Because Picnik
lives online, users get fast, easy access to a powerful set of photo
editing tools for editing, sharing, and printing images using any Internet
browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Mozilla, etc.) on any computer
platform (PC, Mac, Linux).
Picnik is fast, fun, and easy-to-use and is fully integrated with a wide
variety of Web sites including Flickr, Facebook, SmugMug, Photobucket,
MySpace, Webshots, Box.net, Picasa Web Albums and Lexmark. With Picnik, you
can edit your photos wherever they are from wherever you are.
The Picnik team, headquartered in Seattle, is dedicated to making great,
affordable software for real people. Picnik is also committed to leaving a
light carbon footprint by encouraging environmentally conscious business
practices and keeping it green in all we do.
For more information, demos, screenshots of the new features or a
reviewer’s guide please visit:
.
Press Contact:
Erica Chandler
MWW Group
206.689.8505
Email Contact

Google Doesn't Care About Website Design

admin — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 19:44:34 +0000

So, in order to explain, let’s start at the beginning. It’s important to know exactly what Google is and why it is there in the first place. Google is a huge network of linked computers dotted around the planet in locations called data centres. The purpose of these computers is simply to visit as many web pages as possible and store the text content that they find there so that it can be used to power their search results.
keywords. For example if I were to type ‘web design Barnsley’ into Google, they would want to return the most useful websites that were genuinely relevant to the search key phrase ‘web design barnsley’.
In order to perform this task, Google and the other search engines employ software programs on their computers called search engine robots or ‘bots’. The purpose of these bots is to follow the links between web pages that they find on the internet, extract the text content that they find on each page and then move on to the next web page on its ‘to do list’. At no point during this process does Google or any other search engine stop to check out the intricacies of your company logo or stop to admire the
lighting effects that have been designed by your website designer. They simply take the text content, store it and move on! Think about it. Consider the mammoth numbers of websites on the internet, search engines don’t have the time to stop and think - they have more sites to visit!
Still not convinced? Let’s look at something else. Your website is made up from programming code called HTML which is used to structure the text and images that you have on your web pages. If you select view > source from the toolbar above you can see the HTML code that is used to make up this page! This is similar to what Google
when it arrives at your site and this is where your optimised search engine content has to go in order for you to be able to rank well in Google and the other search engines.
By considering the differences between the way the search engines view your site and the way you and I see the site, you can begin to appreciate the need to build content rich websites which provide search engines with the useful content that they are coming to your site to find. Of course having an attractive website is important.
allow you to portray a professional image and encourage users to make online orders and enquiries. It is more important in my opinion to realise that without useful content, which is focused around your target key phrases, having a beautiful website design will do you little good, since the search engines will have no reason to send any traffic your way.

Universal Design for Web Applications

admin — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 06:42:35 +0000

Sebastopol, CA - infoZine - Building website that are more accessible to people with disabilities may take a little more work up front, but the potential payoff is huge—especially when mobile users need to access your sites. Universal Design for Web Applications (O’Reilly, US $34.99) by Wendy Chisholm and Matt May, shows you how to design accessible sites and explains why doing so is good business.
You’ll discover how to use standards-based web technologies—such as XHTML, CSS, and Ajax, along with video and Flash—to develop applications for a wide range of users and a variety of devices, including the mobile Web. You’ll also learn specifics about this target audience, especially the key over-50 age group, whose use of the Web is rapidly growing.
With this book, you will:
Learn the importance of metadata and how it affects images, headings, and other design elements
Build forms that accommodate cell phones, screen readers, word prediction, and more
Discover assistive technology support for Rich Internet Application technologies such as Flash, Flex, and Silverlight
Universal Design for Web Applications provides you with a roadmap to help you design easy-to-maintain web applications that benefit a larger audience.
Wendy Chisholm is a consultant, developer, author, and speaker on the topic of universal design. As co-editor of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (WCAG 1.0) and then staff at the World Wide Web Consortium, she has worked with people around the globe to make the web accessible.
Matt May is a developer, technologist, and accessibility advocate who is responsible for working internally and externally with Adobe product teams and customers to address accessibility in Adobe products, ensure interoperability with assistive technologies, and make customers aware of the many accessibility features that already exist in Adobe products.
Wendy Chisholm , Matt May
ISBN: 9780596518738, 198 pages, Book Price: $34.99 USD
PDF Price: $31.99 USD

Web design essential for your business

admin — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 03:52:44 +0000

Regardless of the business you operate either it is a multinational company or sole proprietor organization you need to have a web site. Your customers expect you to have a web site containing detailed information about your business and available offers. Internet is so popular now a days and having a web site of your business give potential benefits to the organization. Customer looks with suspicion to those companies that don’t have own web site.
But it is not enough to having a web site with small information or simple design. It is necessary for your web page to have attractive design that reflects not only your type of business, but that also refract the tone of business you want to be. In the very competitive industries you have to take care of all aspects. If you can’t attract the customer on first glance you will not get a second chance. Your competitor always try to make some batter than you so, you have to provide best web site to your valuable customer.
When you are planning to launch a new website or redesign the website you already have, what you will do? Most people in who giving attractive offers don’t have the skills necessary to design their own website. You need to decide weather he/she have enough skill to give batter design to your site, as you wouldn’t want to leave your company’s image in the hand of an amateur. For that your really need to hire a web designer with professional web design experience – more specifically a business web page designing, you can find good web design India as per your requirement.
When you’re looking for a web designer, the best place to find one is on the Internet. Here are some tips to help you find a web page design company that fits your needs and budget.
An aesthetically pleasing and fully functional web design with batter support will help you to compete with more confidence in the competitive marketplace and increase your revenue of investment.

Web Design Outsourcing Services by Cranberry

admin — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 03:03:58 +0000

Cranberry Communications Pvt. Ltd. (http://www.cranberryindia.com) has come up with specialized web design services for web design companies based in USA, Canada and European Union countries.
Cranberry is presently providing web design and web development services to big web design agencies in USA and UK. Presently cranberry is providing Graphic design, Web Design, PSD to XHTML, PSD to CSS, search engine optimization and content management system development based on PHP and asp.net
Cranberry has launched fixed project based pricing, per man-hour based pricing and staffing augmentation services for long term projects.
Cranberry is now expanding its market for non English speaking market specially Norway, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland for various web services.
Cranberry services will not only help in minimizing the effect of economic downturn by providing cost effective services at a affordable prices which will help web design and development companies in USA and European countries to cut their cost but at the same time experienced team of cranberry will help them achieve the quality output, which their clients look for.
You can contact the Cranberry at
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
or call at +91-9891106854 for more information.

Leading Fort Myers Web Design Firm Experiences Record Growth in 2008

admin — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 22:59:57 +0000

(openPR) - Brian Joseph Studios LLC has announced that 2008 was the company’s most successful year to date in their four year history with growth of over 600% in areas such as staff, office locations and revenue generated.
With headquarters in Fort Myers, Florida, Brian Joseph Studios LLC expanded its operations internationally in 2008, opening offices in both Ireland and England. “It has been a wonderful year for the company, and all involved. We have enjoyed working with all types of business owners and marketing teams. We acquired a client in Hawaii and a few more in England and Ireland, so we are excited about the expansion into these markets outside of Southwest Florida” says Mr. Brian Yerkes, Owner and Creative Director of Brian Joseph Studios LLC.
The staff team at Brian Joseph Studios has now grown to fifteen employees located in several countries around the world, all working remotely yet closely together on each project. This growth has allowed Brian Yerkes to further the brand and business development of Brian Joseph Studios outside of Fort Myers and Naples Florida, and this has led to a 600% increase in the overall revenue generated in 2008.
Brian Joseph Studios LLC is now considered Fort Myers web design and Naples web design experts and there is no sign of them stopping or easing up. Recent clients acquired include the Fort Myers Beach Chamber of Commerce and Southwest Florida’s leading hotel & resort management company, Sunstream Hotels & Resorts.
Yerkes looks forward to the year ahead and says “2009 looks set to be an extremely interesting year for social media and online marketing, as personal and human interaction becomes even more important through the vast array of online channels available, and companies of all sizes are no longer going to be asking “why” they need to interact socially online with their market; they will be asking “how”.
For more information, please visit
Brian Joseph Studios is Southwest Florida’s leading branding, web development and social media firm.
21301 S. Tamiami TRL, STE 320, #133
Estero, Florida 33928

Web developers take wing with review site

admin — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:55:35 +0000

“Everybody loves beer and hot wings.” That was the premise behind Dave Taillefer and business partner Michael Wynn’s latest venture.
No, it isn’t a bar or a restaurant. The pair, who combined their web design firms more than three years ago to form Icona Inc., are now working on Hotwings.ca, a website about, yes, spicy chicken wings.
Not that they are ignoring Icona, their first creation together. In an East Village office that echoes the feel of a New York City loft, the company’s six employees have compiled an impressive body of work by building advanced websites and creating corporate brands for a list of clients ranging from other small businesses to major companies such as TD Waterhouse Private Client Services.
The accomplishments of Icona are especially surprising since Taillefer, a native of Montreal, didn’t start out with web-based design as a career goal.
“My original education had nothing to do with computers,” said Taillefer, who has a biochemistry degree from Concordia University. “I liked what I studied in school, but I didn’t want to be stuck in a lab.”
From there, Taillefer’s career mirrored many of those who comprise Calgary’s small business scene today.
After he learned web page design from a friend, Taillefer decided to migrate west to blaze his own path by starting his own company here.
That was 10 years ago, he said, when he founded The Code Shoppe, the precursor to Icona.
“I was convinced that Calgary was the place to be to start a business,” he said.
“I initially made the move because the business environment is a lot more favourable here. In Montreal, there was a lot of red tape and a lot more competition at the time, and here, pre-boom, clients often agreed to deals on a handshake.
“It allowed us to get to the matter at hand of designing, instead of worrying about other things. People are more willing to try things, and it allowed us to improve and move forward.”
One of the improvements Taillefer made early was outsourcing the visual design of the web pages while he and his team focused on technical aspects, and one of the firms he outsourced to was Wynn’s Active Image Studios.
The rest was history, Taillefer said.
“We’re good at programming web solutions, and he’s good at making it all look good,” he said. “I quickly realized design was over my head, and, honestly, at times, I didn’t think we would be successful. But we just kept plugging away.”
By the time The Code Shoppe and Active Image Studios merged to form Icona, the two small firms already had built a solid base of clients, which combined to give the new company a strong portfolio upon which to build.

Schipul - The Web Marketing Company to Expand Headquarters in West …

admin — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 15:33:08 +0000

HOUSTON, TX -
Schipul - The Web Marketing Company
(
), a Houston-based Web marketing and Web design firm, today
announced an expansion of its headquarters in Kirkwood Atrium 3 at 11757
Katy Freeway in West Houston. The 15-story Class A office complex is owned
by Equastone.
After the build out into the new expanded space, Schipul will occupy more
than 7,100 square feet on the building’s ninth floor. The added space is
needed to accommodate Schipul’s continued growth.
“In this economic environment, we do not take our continued growth for
granted and we owe a debt of gratitude to our clients for their continued
trust and support,” said Ed Schipul, president of Schipul - The Web
Marketing Company. “This careful and strategic expansion will enable us to
continue to improve our Web marketing services to help our clients connect,
grow and profit online.”
Schipul develops and markets Tendenci® online management software, which
powers the Web sites of hundreds of associations, corporations, government
agencies, healthcare providers and nonprofits around the world.
Additionally, Schipul offers an array of Web marketing services, including
Web design, search engine marketing, Social Media consulting and Web
marketing consulting.
In 2008, Schipul was named among the Aggie 100, which celebrates the 100
fastest growing Aggie-owned or Aggie-led businesses in the world, its third
year on the list. Schipul has 25 employees and revenues of more than $2.2
million in 2008, an increase of 16 percent over 2007.
Schipul - The Web Marketing Company developed and builds on the Tendenci
Web marketing application, a powerful online tool with over a half million
people logging in during the past year and millions of users overall.
Schipul is based in Houston, and provides marketing services on the
Internet to more than 300 organizations from a variety of service
industries in local, national and international markets. Schipul’s
nonprofit clients include the Web Analytics Association, Houston Zoo and
the New York Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and
Sciences, among many others. Additional information about Schipul is
available at
.
Contact:
Dan Keeney, APR
DPK Public Relations
832-467-2904
Email Contact

Report: Intranets Increased Collaboration Support in 2008

admin — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 14:10:29 +0000

First some context. Jakob Nielsen has produced a number of highly influential books about web design. When I started out as a webmaster back in the 90s, Nielsen’s books were a constant companion. But as the years have gone by, Nielsen has turned into something of a ‘grumpy uncle’ of the web design community. He rails against web 2.0 design theories, calls most Internet users “bozos”, and he steadfastly refuses to update the design of his own website - despite it looking like something from 1995. However despite his eccentricities, Nielsen’s reports are usually thoroughly researched and unearth some useful nuggets.
Last year Nielsen noted that enterprises “took a pragmatic approach to many hyped “Web 2.0″ techniques”. This year he wrote that this year’s Intranet winners “showed a substantial increase in both collaboration support and social networking features”. He can’t of course resist his standard potshot at the social web:
“Although inspired by the open Internet’s “Web 2.0″ sites, these features often have a much stronger business model within the enterprise, simply because they’re more useful and less subject to noise and information pollution by bozos.”
Teams adding “Facebook-like features” to employee directories to enrich the profiles.
CEO blogs featuring in the vast majority of the winning intranets.
Employees adding their own videos to the corporate TV network.
Interactive forums achieving mission-critical status in some cases - e.g. “allowing consultants to post urgent requests for advice from their colleagues around the world.”
Nielsen also noted that “intranet personalization is becoming increasingly sophisticated.” He said that the leading application of personalization is to “provide each employee with news updates focused on their job role and personal interests.”
Enterprise intranets have traditionally been built on a combination of large CMS systems, such as Vignette or Interwoven, and a patchwork of bespoke software. This year, Nielsen noted that there were
used in the winning intranets - “the 10 winners were built on 26 different products — substantially fewer than the 41 used in 2008 or the 49 used in 2007.”
He also pointed out that Microsoft’s SharePoint, “especially the recent MOSS platform (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007)”, was used in half of the winning intranets.
However Nielsen stated that other software is being used a lot too - multiple winners used Autonomy, Google Search, and WebTrends.
Now please let us know in the comments what web technologies and software you’re currently using in your company Intranet.