Hunt Stella To FH

Web Design, as design in general, is subject to changes and trend influences. Words like “fresh, modern, innovative” seem to conquer the world of design while artists strive to discover new directions. Websites are different: objectives, resources and users are the factors shaping the profitability of a site.

The truth is that web design is not easy. There are several factors shaping the web layout and the architecture of a site, some see them as rules, others believe there are no rules at all. Yet, as far as business websites are concerned, there are some guidelines.

About Us and Contact Us

The role of a business website is to represent a company and its products on the web, describing the company’s objectives and providing enough information for the users. Users want to know who they are dealing with. The “about us” area should enclose general information about the management team, company history and company philosophy. This is also the right place to display photos of the team and the managers for a simple reason: pictures enhance credibility, as people believe that you are not trying to hide.

Some websites show within the “about us” category maps and addresses for the company, while others use a “contact us” area where they display contact forms, phone and fax numbers or department emails. For some users there is nothing more annoying than being forced to fill in long contact formularies or registrations. Try to avoid such practices. Let your users decide if they want to fill in all the details or if they’d rather save some time and fill in a short form. Provide options, be flexible.

Products and Services

Depending on what a company has to offer the “products” and “services” areas describe goods or services that are either sold on the website or advertised there in order to be sold somewhere else. The categories should be clearly structured, the descriptions simple and relevant, if necessary illustrated by related pictures or graphics. Too many images though distract users from the content. Use them carefully.

News

This is quite simple: what’s new about your company or products and services? Do you have any recent awards or events worth a web presentation? Write a text and publish it in this category. Keep it simple and try to use as many business related keywords as possible. More: distribute your news and press releases on relevant web outlets and drive traffic to your site.

Try to get testimonials from your clients and display them online. Sometimes even a critique shown online can bring you positive reactions. People will appreciate your honesty, and will trust you more than they trust companies which praise their own success too much. Be realistic, careful and show concern for the users, not for yourself.

Disclaimer or Privacy Policy

This is not a rule: it’s a must! Companies deal with clients; people who wish their privacy to be protected and sometimes other sites can provide illegal or harmful information. Wikipedia defines a disclaimer as follows: “A disclaimer is a legal statement which generally states that the person/group authoring the disclaimer is not responsible for any mishap in the event of using whatever object or information the disclaimer is attached to.” The privacy policy is, according to the same source, a disclaimer as well: “A privacy policy is a disclaimer placed on a website informing users about how the website deals with a user’s personal information.”

Put simply, maintaining audience expectations and delivering usable content are the main factors influencing the success of a business website. But the website architecture has to be followed by a cutting edge design and reliable ways to increase users’ loyalty.

Newsletters

Sites with fresh content that changes often offer users the option to sign up for eNewsletters. These should not be sent too often: studies show that too many reminders become an annoyance for many clients. Due to the fact that they feel more personal than websites, email newsletters will generate different emotional reactions for the users. The subscribe and unsubscribe options allow companies to measure success: how many users are interested in receiving periodic information and how many lose their interest? The key to successful eNewsletter campaigns is simple: DO NOT SPAM! Let people go if they choose to unsubscribe. If your messages become annoying the negative feelings from one client will easily go to another. “Verba Volant!”

As with website design, the newsletter design should be uncomplicated and user friendly. People should be able to find what they are looking for fast. Even the subscribe and unsubscribe processes should be fast: the longer the time needed to subscribe or unsubscribe, the higher the lost of customer satisfaction.

So keep the newsletters simple, useful and easy to deal with. Do not overload clients with information. Just tell them the basics and, if they are interested, they will certainly come to you, email or call, requesting more information. To succeed, write good subject lines that will help users distinguish the newsletter from spam. Each headline has to make sense and preferably be followed by a short abstract of the general content. Plain language is the best approach. People don’t need to get the feeling they are teased or led on. For reference visit Pamil Visions and get the “Writing Newsletters” *.pdf document you can find in the downloads area.

Other Issues

Branding your business doesn’t refer only to stationery and printed brochures. The website is an ideal mean to promote your business visual standards. Include your logo at the top left of all pages and respect your corporate colour scheme. Have a consistent look and feel in all your pages. Again, I encourage you to visit Pamil Visions for advice in this matter, or other branding and public relations related sites.

Consistency is a powerful tool. When things are the same users know what to expect. They will not feel intimidated by new approaches or exasperated by unnecessary artifices. For example Flash collected the bronze medal for annoyance. Let it out. Why should you open your site with an intro most of the users will skip anyways? The same goes for pop-ups!

Make the site easy to read. That means you need choose the fonts and their colours carefully: not too big or too light. The most legible fonts are standard serif and sans-serif (Times, Arial; Verdana). The pictures and graphics should have small file sizes to avoid slow loading pages. Optimise your pictures for the web.

Content you write for the web should be short, scannable and to the point. Some business sites are afraid that users will copy their valuable texts and use them somewhere else, getting commercial advantages. For this reasons they ask the designers to display texts as a picture. Wrong: have you ever heard of print screen? If someone wants to copy your work that will happen anyway no matter if we talk about text or graphics.

Mihaela Lica is the founder of Pamil Visions – http://www.pamil-visions.com/

She is now a freelance writer, public relations consultant and an artist. Previously she used to be a respected TV redactor, working for the Romanian Ministry of Defense. At the moment she works with small and new business helping them in their branding efforts.

Many websites are hosted on a shared web hosting server. The main reason is the cost. A shared web hosting server costs a great deal less than a dedicated server. The number of sites on a shared web hosting server can be anywhere from 1500 to 2000 sites. The number of sites on the shared web hosting server will vary due to availability of disk space, allowed bandwidth per site and overall speed. Although shared web hosting is reliable and has minimal problems, there are advantages to host your site(s) on a dedicated server.

A dedicated server for your web hosting allows you to have a server solely dedicated to your site(s). In addition, a dedicated server will allow you complete authority to control and administer your server. When and if you decide on a dedicated server for your web hosting, you should have a fair understanding of dedicated servers. Although most dedicated server web hosting providers will provide technical support, you will find it a lot easier if you have the technical expertise to manage the server yourself. However, if you find that you will not be able to manage your server by yourself, opt for a managed dedicated server hosting. This option is especially for those who want to have dedicated web hosting but do not have the required expertise to manage it. This service allows you to have an entire server managed by a specialized hosting company. The cost of a managed dedicated server is quite expensive. Therefore, if you think that you can run and manage your website server by yourself, you should opt for an unmanaged dedicated server web hosting rather than a managed dedicated server.

You should consider a dedicated server web hosting when you find that the traffic to your site has increased substantially and your site is taking too much time to load. An analysis of the traffic to your site will tell you whether you should go to a dedicated server. The main thing to understand is that when you have many users working concurrently on your website, you should replace your shared web hosting with a dedicated server web hosting.

Since a dedicated server web hosting does not share its server with other websites (like shared web hosting), you will find that you have a lot more command over your server operation and its bandwidth. One of the advantageous features of dedicated server web hosting is that it can also be remotely configured and operated. The only obstacle is the cost. You are required to pay a lot more for your dedicated server web hosting as compared to your shared web hosting. Nevertheless, the facilities more than compensate for the cost.

When you choose a dedicated server web hosting provider, you should keep in mind that it should provide you good network stability, reliable operation, and the ease of operation of sophisticated applications. A dedicated server web hosting provider can be the perfect solution for anyone who is serious about his online presence.

For more information about a dedicated server and web hosting, visit Dedicated Server and Web Hosting

So you’d like to become a mortgage broker? There are a few things you’ll need to know before you start your brokerage business. First of all, consider your competitors. Think of ways you can stand out from the crowd. Obviously, this will be easier in a less populated area or small town. You’ll also need to contact your local authorities about applying for a mortgage bond. A mortgage broker bond will enable you to get more customers who trust your business and rely on your knowledge on the subject. Let’s say your office is based on Ohio. In order to get a mortgage broker bond, you’ll want to contact the Superintendent of Financial Institutions at 77 South High Street, 21st Floor, in Columbus. The superintendent will help you with anything you need to know about applying for a mortgage broker bond. Your customers will be grateful that you have a bond, since this ensures them that you will abide by the laws, rules and regulations imposed on brokerages in your state. Local residents will trust your company more if you have been approved for a state bond. There are plenty of bonding companies across the country who offer free quotes through their websites or over the phone.

Doblas sufre un esguince de clavcula Toni Doblas ser duda para el segundo partido de Liga, a disputar el 10 de septiembre frente a Osasuna al diagnosticrsele un esguince de clavcula. El médico del Betis Santiago Pérez Hidalgo descart que el jugador sufra una fractura de clavcula y explic que padece un esguince de la articulacin acromio-clavicular. “Estar de reposo absoluto 72 horas y luego empezar a trabajar poco a poco” y aadi que no descarta al meta para el segundo encuentro liguero, aunque reconoci que llegar “muy justo”.

http://www.vetea.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=44

A new generation of risk takers will likely have encountered the phrase “offshore sports betting” by now, but many might not be wholly clear on what that signifies. A foreign gaming website primarily operates out of the jurisdiction of a particular nation but alternatively it can mean a networked betting internet site which always has its file servers in a nation in which internet gaming isn’t currently illegal. Briefly then, it is a gaming business functioning extraneous to the land of the client. Online sports betting webpages are in the main modulated through three assemblies. They are OSGA (the Offshore Gaming Association), the IGC (Interactive Gaming Council) and finally the Fidelity Trust Gaming Association (the FTGA).

Gulfstream Park Notes – Thursday, January 31

The Offshore Gaming Association is a self ordering “watchdog” office that regulates the current overseas sports gambling industry with the mission to also deliver gaming afficionados access to swiftly locate trustworthy internet sites to play gambling games on, without concern. The authority aims to watch over client’s rights, and also they do not impose any association charges. The association is an expert and neutral third party agency who pronounce non-biased opinions, suggested by your comments, nonpartisan scrutiny, telephone chats, tips and also to impart inside news.

The IGC are a nonprofit administration. The organization was designed to furnish an arena for worried individuals to talk through concerns and also to improve mutual matters in the international online betting business, in an effort to establish frank and also level headed business protocols and methods which raise buyer certainty in online betting products and benefits, and in addition to work as the gambling trade’s global practise interpreter not to mention the council works as an info hub.

The Interactive Gaming Council have established a regard for promoting honor, integrity and solidity due to the moral code it establishes, and also its allure to legitimate concerns. The IGC influences offshore sports betting by recommending an extraordinary 10-step code of conduct and in addition bills sports gambling sites a license fee to show the council’s logo. Dispirited betters may furthermore mention their disputes to the Interactive Gaming Council.

The Fidelity Trust Gaming Association was founded in a venture to produce a standard which will upgrade the standards of computer accessible sports gambling trading operations. The authority understand that by doing business with respectable internet sites, they can perfect an affiliation of the most sportsmanlike and most competent overseas betting operations multinationally. To recapitulate, these are councils who survey the transactions practised by online gaming and which should function to allay a lot of the misgivings held by skeptics. Live betting web sites are today totally free from danger, now that private details are no longer necessary and also the recompense not to mention the odds should be equivalent to a standard Vegas-style Vegas style sports-bet. These websites cut back on travel time, but still maintain of a casino, but these days you are in a position to game in your home.

What is cPanel?

cPanel is a web hosting control panel system that is installed on a dedicated server. The control panel system comes in two parts: Web Host Manager (WHM) for the web host, and cPanel for the end-user.

Web Host Manager (WHM), which allows the webhost to easily administer individual hosting accounts, reseller accounts and perform basic system and control panel maintenance via a secure interface. A web host does not need to know how to manually set up user accounts, passwords, ftp accounts or mail accounts through the command line as is typical of all dedicated servers. The user interface makes creating an account a breeze with one-click creation of accounts.

cPanel is designed for the end-users (hosting customers) and allows them to control everything in their accounts, including adding / removing email accounts, administering MySQL databases, creating redirects, creating FTP accounts and many more.

Getting a cPanel server

Not all dedicated servers purchased/leased from server providers come with cPanel. There are numerous other types of automated control panels available, so choosing a server that comes with cPanel is important. cPanel has partnerships with leading datacenters and offer a discounted rate on cPanel license when purchased together with the server. Examples of cPanel partner NOCs (Network Operating Centers) are BurstNet and LiquidWeb. These NOCs may offer a server with no control panel, or include a cPanel license at a norminal fee of $19.95.
However, as of now, cPanel can only be installed on a linux based dedicated server or virtual private server.

What’s next after getting a server?

Before running out to advertise and to get clients for your new hosting business, you must remember to run some initializations on your cPanel server if your datacenter did not already do it for you. Listed in order are the steps required on a new server:

1. Set up nameservers
2. Secure the server by tweaking security settings
3. Check that all server services are running
4. Install add-on scripts that you would like to offer your clients
5. Install security scripts if you wish to increase server security

Other things you should know

Despite all its features, cPanel does not include any customer billing feature for web hosts to manage customer accounts and payments. As such, you would still have to manually register new clients and bill existing clients through some form of online form or email. This usually includes signing up for a Paypal or merchant account in order to receive payments. A more advanced payment solution such as Modernbill would manage cPanel by creating accounts and also bill your clients at the required times.

Dan Chris writes for AlltheServers.com, a site that focuses on dedicated servers to help consumers understand the dedicated server industry.
Find more information on dedicated servers used for cpanel hosting at http://www.AlltheServers.com

Demographics about the Web abound. You may find such data helpful. In general, when I look at the research available, I get a feeling it’s incomplete. The Web is so vast, I don’t think it’s possible to find a small representative sample from which significant results can be obtained that reflect the whole. In the end, what is reported with numbers may not matter to you, even though the source is impeccable.

Numbers Don’t Always Work

For example, it has been reported that 330 million people are “on the Web.” I have not read closely enough to know if this means daily, occasionally, or somewhere in between. To me it doesn’t matter.

Even if this number were doubled, it would still mean nothing to me. I am interested in reaching an extremely small fraction of web users. The implication I’ve been seeing in spam messages of late is that I can reach all 330 million people. This is a lie. But there would be no gain in trying to do so in any case.

Honest Numbers Can Be Wrong

I recently read a report that of nearly 100,000 spam messages received by one firm, about a third were promoting po-rn sites. (I used a hyphen in hopes of ducking blocking software.) What does this mean?

Numbers are funny. I never doubt such reports from respectable firms or people. But I am always skeptical about the numbers themselves. Sure, those were the results obtained. I will accept this without hesitation. But they often do not seem in accord with my experience.

I get lots and lots of spam. Less than 3% is po-rn related. Do I thus conclude the report was wrong? That they were lying for some devious purpose?

Not at all. It only means their sample of email received was not representative of what I receive. In like fashion, it is doubtful my email is typical of yours.

100,000 spams messages is a very small percentage of what is mailed each day. It is so small, results from this sample have very little, if any significance. These results were obtained, that’s true. But they may have no meaning relative to you.

Leave the particulars of demographics to those keen on the topic. Your best plan is to ignore such numbers and focus on interactivity with readers and visitors. In every way you can, seek input, then derive your own demographics from it.

Your Log Files Can Mislead

Recently I was chatting with a fellow who was having trouble getting a page to load under a specific condition in Netscape. Since he uses Internet Explorer, which handled this case correctly, he hadn’t noticed the problem until I pointed it out.

When I did, he commented, “Hey, I don’t need to worry. Only 5% of my visitors are using Netscape.” This fellow is wrong in two ways.

Of visitors to my site, over 40% are using Netscape. So have I got it wrong? Or is the fellow reporting 5% wrong? Neither of us is. We are both reporting accurately.

Why Are There Such Great Differences?

The apparent dilemma stems from the fact that we all have our own set of visitors. Each comes to us from a vast pool of many millions of Web users. Those who show up on my site may never even hear about yours, let alone visit.

Thus my visitors are not representative of yours, except as to the fundamentals. For example, all site visitors ask first, “What’s in it for me?” Such basics relate to every site. The specifics do not.

Even if a massive, well respected study reported only 1% of surfers use 640 x 480 monitors, it still might not apply to your site. For as suggested above, the pool is so vast, hoping to draw a truly random sample from it is impossible.

Further, things change rapidly on the Web. Not long ago, Netscape was the browser leader. As Microsoft continued to demand Internet Explorer be installed on all new systems delivered, the dominance of Netscape began to fade. Even after being acquired by AOL, market share continued to drop.

Can you assume it will continue to do so? That would leave us with only one major browser. A Microsoft product. A company already at odds with the Justice department in anti-trust actions. It may prove to be in their best interest to assure that Netscape regains a significant share of the market.

What seems so today is suspect, for it may not be so tomorrow. Rather than making assumptions which may prove false tomorrow, the better plan is to accommodate all possible options today, and be prepared to make changes tomorrow.

The Mistake That Matters Most

But the second mistake made by the fellow mentioned above is in ignoring Netscape users however small their numbers be. Suppose only 5% of my visitors use Netscape. To toss away this many potential customers is foolish at least. I take the time to make it work for them.

Hasten Slowly

JavaScript has been available for some time. Is it wise to use it if N% of systems can not deal with it? The better plan is to offer an alternate way to access your site for those who can not.

Plug ins are popular of late. Will users take the time to download and install one so as to see your site in all its glory? I doubt it. What’s best is to offer the option to do so, but be sure your site functions effectively without it.

One of my systems uses a Pentium II with awesome supporting resources. However, it doesn’t have a sound card. A site that requires I have one, will hold my attention only so long as it takes to hit the Back button or enter another URL.

Killer Assumptions

If we make assumptions about the power and tools our visitors have readily available, to the extent we are wrong, we are driving them off our sites.

When you consider how hard it is to draw a new visitor, driving even one away seems a pretty silly thing to do.

I can’t say it enough. Content is king! It’s true whether we want to admit it or not. Content is the major building blocks of any website. In fact, most webmasters can’t get enough high quality content to properly “fuel” their websites. Search engine spiders are ever hungry for fresh, relevant content. If you can’t feed them you might as well hang it up. Your rankings will most likely plummet. I have seen it time and time again. A really great site hits the Internet with a bang – continues to do well for a few months because the content is awesome – then goes flat. No new content has been added. Sure, the webmaster was probably totally consumed in getting inbound links to appease Google, but what he also didn’t realize is that Google, Yahoo and MSN are hungry for content. It goes without saying in today’s competitive Internet market that content is still king. We’ve heard it over the years and are living it as recently as today. The need for web content is not going away. It’s growing every second! What are you doing about it?

You may be thinking, “How do I get all of this content? I don’t have the talent to write it, nor do I have the time”. Well, folks that’s where purchased articles need to come into the picture. Yes, I said purchased. Not free articles like this one! The free article databases are great, but do you realize that you are literally sharing content with tens of thousands of other people? Do you realize it’s considered duplicate content by the search engines? Not a good thing.

Your next question may be, “Where can I purchase these articles?” Well, you can purchase them outright by hiring professional writers and paying a lot of money for each article. For example, I would suggest at least a hundred articles to start a brand new website. That would cost you a whopping $1,000 – $1,500! There is an alternative though. You need to join an article membership site. Article membership sites are the happy medium between sharing content with thousands, or paying writers through the nose for content. A good article membership will offer true niche topics, several hundred articles, have a limited membership (usually 300 or less) and have a great member’s only forum to share ideas.

The spiders are hungry! How are you going to feed them?

Bessans is one of the finest resorts for lots of sport and rest. Bessans is an idyllic spot and provides the family climbing, rafting, swimming, festivals and lots of other things for all the family to revel in. As the first snow begins to blanket the trees and summits, and the waterfalls ice over, Bessans alters its feel from vivid fall colors to white. Bessans bursts with fun ” huski rides, snowshoeing and monoskiing. If you normally look for luxury chalets in Chamonix then why not check out here?

Bessans has been named the number 1 ski domain in Europe annually by ski journals and avid snowboarders. It rises a majestic 3700 meters into the air, it with 96 pistes, the best being 8 km. kilometers, and in total there is 375 kilometres of skiing. There’s runs for beginners and average skiers, and 43 slopes for ski experts. Bessans’s lift systems can cope with 26000 holiday makers an hour indeed there isn’t any wasting of fun time queuing to catch a lift to the top. You can pick the gondola for a grand panorama of the mountain range and surrounding area. And for the thirsty skier, there are numerous cafes who offer hot chocolate and stews, baguettes or lavish meals.

Posted in Business Opps, Products, Technology + More | Comments Off