Every website can be optimised for search engines using SEO. Sometimes it helps if the website has been developed a certain way which is search engine friendly but generally any website can have better rankings, given you’re not number one already. And then… even if you do rank well for one search term, you might want to rank for other terms also.

Small businesses can greatly benefit from using SEO and promoting their website on the search engines. many businesses spend lots of money on advertisements or expensive business directories which only have exposure for maximum one year. For the price of some printed business directories for one year, you could have a website designed, developed and including SEO so you rank well and the website lasts for ever. As long as you keep paying the nominal amount for hosting and domain registration.

Generally SEO for small business websites is simpler than optimising for larger corporations. The larger companies normally have larger competition with larger budgets for SEO and focus on a very competitive search terms. Take a local small web design and SEO business focusing on their local area. Its going to be very hard to rank well for broad terms such as “web design” or “SEO” but if you add the area or suburb into the phrase they will have a much higher chance of ranking.

Small businesses normally focus on generating sales leads from their local area. Optimising a website using a locality based keyword dramatically helps the SEO process. The number of search results for “SEO” is around 250,000,000, which would be quite an SEO challenge to get in the top 50 let alone the top 10. Add your local area in the phrase like “Central Coast SEO” and the results dramaticly decrease to 214,000. Much more of an achevable SEO goal.

Small businesses should try and use SEO as a major part of their marketing stratagy. If your small business doesn’t have a website maybe next time it comes around to pay for your yearly directory ad, maybe you should think about developing a website and or getting some SEO done for your local area.

Big Click can help your small, medium or large business gain exposure through SEO. We keep up-to-date with the latest technologies and SEO techniques to help your website be found.

Web Development Programming Languages

Every website is developed with some sort of programming language. These programming languages make the website function. When looking at the front-end of a website you wouldn’t be able to tell what language it uses but look at the code and it would be very different. Most dynamic programming languages are not compatible with each other. However they can access the same database and display the information the same. All the programming languages are totally different and play a unique part in the overall function of the website. Quite a few web programming languages work together to make the designed interface look good and function well. 

How Can Web Development Benefit you?

Whether you’re a large corporation, a small business, or you work for yourself, web development can benefit you. If you don’t have a website, you definitely should get one. A company without a website is potentially hurting your business growth and limiting your audience and potential clients. There is never a reason to not have a website and always ten reasons to have one. If you already have a website, you probably have a list of things you would like it to do or, if you don’t a good web developer should be able to advise you on ways to improve your current website.

Big Click Web Development

At Big Click Studios we pride ourselves on our unique web development skills. We utilise strategic web design and custom web development to really push your online business to the next level. Contact us today for an obligation free web development appraisal of your website and see how we can help you.

SEO is not required for all web design projects as it may not be a priority for your business. You may rely on other methods of generating sales leads. Thats not to say if you get a website designed it shouldn’t be built using search engine friendly techniques. The basic principles of web design involve creating search engine friendly navigation, page structure and code.

The search engines have some pretty advanced technology that is able to crawl through the internet and rank websites based on their content and how a search term relates to that content. Search engines update their algorithms quite often which means search engine optimisers and web designers need to constantly adjust their SEO techniques.

The programs that crawl the internet are referred to as spiders or robots, I prefer to call them spiders. These spiders crawl over all the code behind the websites and rank the website on a number of factors. The cleaner the website code and the better the web design is structured makes it more crawlable.This is where the term comes from ’search engine friendly’.

The way a website is designed is only a small part of SEO but it definitly contributes to the overall search engine rankings. If you are getting a website designed make sure you ask your web designer to consider SEO and building a search engine friendly website.

The design of the website needs to work for your business and appeal to your audience. Many web designers make the mistake of creating a web design because they think it looks good or they take bad advice from their client. The website should be designed for the users of the website who are essentially the customers. It is up to the web designer to advise their clients on the best way to make their web design work for them. Not take bad guidance from the client because they abide by the rule “the customers always right”.

Here’s an example. The owner of a florist may want a website to order and sell flowers online but they want to use a large flashing animation of different flowers as the home page. As a web designer it should be part of my job to advise against that as it would be a very big NO as far as selling flowers online goes and would not help the site at all. My point is … the web designer should know what’s best for your online business and they should advise you on the best way to promote your online goal through the web design.

The web design for your business should portray your professional image and should also serve a purpouse. Say you want to collect business leads through your website. The web design should emphisise the enquiry quote form to make it a easy for your website visiters to find. Many web designers put a small “contact” button or tab in the sites menu but if the main goal of the site it to direct users to the contact page there should be a much more prominent graphic or design element that stands out against the layout.

Big Click created a web design to compliment the photography gallery by using greyscale tones. The layout also has a minimalistic approach with further highlights the imagery. The website has some fancy code and state-of-the-art technology behind it to create an animated menu design and page transition.

The website has a content management system (CMS) behind it so Vibe can update their photography gallery, their blog and some text throughout the site. Their is a wedding gift donation facility to allow wedding guests to go online, choose a wedding couple and make a donation toward their wedding photography package. The donation facility uses a 100% secure PayPal system and sends a thank you email receipt to the guest.

Big Click are proud to launch this great new website for Vibe Photography and we are confident it will prove to be a valuable asset to Vibe and their future clients. The new website will bring a new standard of web design to the Central Coast wedding photography industry.

The Central Coast restaurant and cafe, “Delish of Erina” redesigned their new website to take their business to the next level and enhance their overall business image.

The website had a custom web design created to change and enhance their existing image. We gave the design warm earthy tones but also kept a clean crisp layout to represent the quality and fresh food Delish serves.

The website has a CMS behind the scenes that allows the menus to be updated, news items to be added and a email marketing newsletter system to be managed.

Here’s what Delish had to say:

“ When looking for a web designer, Big Click Studios stood out from the rest. Justin and Dean responded to my initial enquiry very quickly and were very professional throughout the entire process of design to completion. We are delighted with our finished website and look forward to the business it will generate for us. Thank you very much for all the work you have done, we look forward to a continued working relationship in the future.”

Bree Tebbutt (www.delishoferina.com.au)

The site design strongly promotes a newsletter sign up. The newsletter informs subscribers of upcoming events, news and catering specials. The email marketing aspect of the website is a strong marketing advantage to “Delish of Erina” and they hope to use it as a way to inform and communicate with their clientele.

The website will hopefully generate new business and exposure for “Delish of Erina” on the Central Coast, Sydney and Hunter areas of NSW, Australia.

There are many ways to promote your business online and each one deserves it own article. Ill just brush over the main online marketing techniques below.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Search engine optimisation or SEO is a hugely successful method of online marketing. SEO is the name given to the process of optimising a website to rank high in the search engines. SEO takes a lot of effort and time to successfully gain high rankings.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is another globally excepted form of online marketing. Many website ask for you to subscribe to a newsletter or you might get emails that look like a website strait into you inbox at home. This is email marketing. If you collect emails from your clients or customers you can send out promotional information, news, offers and notes direct to their inbox. 

Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC)

The most demanding technique for online marketing is Pay Per Click Advertising. Pay per click advertising is offered by all the major search engines. You can bid and pay for your choice of key phrases and your website will appear in the search engine’s sponsored listings. This is an easier technique to get instant returns on investments but it does cost more.

Paid Listing on Web Directories

There are millions of online business directories available for free and for a price. Most of the web directories offer the facility of submitting your website within their relevant categories. Some charge some money for that which can be annual or on monthly basis. After paying, your website will appear on their directory within the relevant category.

The design of the website must be appealing and inviting to the user. Think of your website the same as you would your shopfront or signage. If your shopfront windows are dirty, there’s graffiti on the wall and a tipped over garbage can outside your door, it’s unlikely you’ll get any customers. It doesn’t matter what you have inside because nobody will even get inside! This is the same as your website home page design. It needs to capture your website visitors using a design that reflects your product or service in an attractive way.

Your web design is crutial in capturing the viewers attention and insuring they browse deeper into the website. The design needs to reflect your companies service or product. The colours, the layout and the overall web design should give the user a first impression that leads them further into the websites content.

There should be clear page elements defined in the web design that highlight the website’s goal whether it be buying a product, subscribing online or making an enquiry. The design of the web page is essential in making the end goal call-to-action prominent and clear.

The web design needs to appeal to your target audience. If your business is more corporate and serious like a law firm you probably would not want to use a hot pink design with floral background. However if your business sells flowers and chocolates for weddings, a hot pink web design may be better suited.

Overall the design of your website is very important in generating you business. The content, the functionality and the sales pitch all go hand-in-hand with the web design and if the design does not compliment the others you’ll find you wont get as many sales.

Many website owners or web editors have never thought about the code and development techniques that make it work. When you see and navigate around a website you see the designed interface and web layout a designer has created but behind the scenes there is different web programming code that makes it run. There are many different programming languages that can make a website work and most of them talk with each other to create a website that performs well and looks great.

Different web design companies favor different programing languages. There are different coding and programming languages used for the front-end of the website ( the bit that you see ), than the back-end ( the bit that makes it work ) . Generally web design companies specialise in one or two programming languages but very rarely them all.

The languages used for the front-end are pretty generic across the web design industry and you have probably heard of a few of them. The major ones are HTML, CSS and Javascript. Just about every website has been designed using these front-end programming languages. The front-end code determines the structure, design, layout and navigation of the website. This code would normally refer to images placed in a folder and position them to make the website look like is all fits together. A basic website can be built using only these tools. To add more functionality and complicated features you will need some back-end programming to make it work.

The back-end programming languages are very different to their front-end counterparts, but generally they need to work together to make the design and function come together as one. The main back-end languages used are PHP, ASP, JSP, Coldfusion and .Net. These languages are used for what is called a dynamic website. Dynamic websites are normally connected to a database which stores information for the website and can be updated using a content management system (CMS). It can store all the text, the images, statistics, members and anything else. The database can display and cross reference any data stored - which makes it a powerful tool in building larger websites.

There are quite a few pre-built content management systems that can be downloaded for free or some more elaborate systems that can be bought for a once off fee or on a subscription basis. Some web designers choose to utilise these content management systems and specilise in re-designing and customising the software. Other web designers choose to build there own content management systems using their preferred web programming language. These custom built systems can be specifically tailored to the websites features where as their pre-built counterparts generally have certain guidelines to stick to.

There are many factors that contribute to a website working and functioning well. The code behind the web design needs to seamlessly fit with the back-end programming and CMS. Many websites work differently but perform that same functions. Think of all the different websites being like different car brands - All cars have a shell, paint work and get you to where you’re going but under the hood there are different technologies and parts that make them run. Some are fast, powerful and luxurious others are economical, comfortable and practical.

At Big Click Studios we pay very careful attention to the front-end html and css. You will notice most of our websites have W3C validating code which means it’s perfect! Our back-end programming work is also perfect but you’ll have to take our word for it as there is no official validation that can test and read the code. At Big Click we favor PHP over all other languages, PHP is free, its robust and very powerful. We combine our web design skills and our programming skills to create websites that are perfect.

Sooner or later, a website redesign becomes an essential task every business needs to undertake. The questions are, how often should your website design be updated and how do you know when it is due for an update? There are many factors that can contribute to your website needing a redesign; an out of date style, poor goal conversions or search engine rankings not high enough.

An out of date look and feel

Your website may be looking out of date and not use the current design trends. It is very important that a website looks good and the design layout targets your demographic. The way a website presents visually can make, or break, a sale. Your design should reflect your company’s image and product, which will then also appeal to your demographic.  Web design trends change just like any fad or fashion. If you look at the current trend, it tends to have lots of white space, rounded corners and glassy, stylized elements. Most web designers would refer to this style as Web2.0. Web2.0 is just one of many styles that are popular today. Each website is different and they all should have a unique design to compliment their function. You can compare a websites look and feel to the look and feel of the latest model cars. Most car brands have a new model out every 2 years or so. The new model will always look more striking, run more smoothly and probably go faster. It is much the same with new websites. An out of date website or older model car might still get you from A to B and look ok, but a newer model will alway out perform it’s predecessor.

Poor goal conversion

Your website may not be converting as many goals at what you would like it to. A goal conversion could be a sale, a sign-up or an enquiry-Basically, it’s whatever you would like your visitors to do when they get to your site. There are a number of aspects that can contribute to a poor goal conversion; A confusing layout can distract your website visitor from continuing with their session. Old technology might impact the user’s perception of your business, due to the site looking out of date or it simply not working. A website redesign would address all these issues and almost certainly increase your goal conversions.

Search engine rankings

Search engine rankings are the most important factor in generating sales through your website. You may have the best looking website and a very efficient goal-funneling process but without traffic, your website is useless. If your website is out of date there could be elements that need to be updated to follow the latest search engine optimization (SEO) techniques. A website redesign would potentially give your website a much better result… And let’s face it… how many people actually look any further than the second page of Google?