Articles by Joanne Glasspoole
The ABCs of Search Engine Optimization
If you want to be found in the search engines, it is important that you add search engine optimization to your action list. In a nutshell, search engine optimization—or SEO for short—is the process of making your web pages search engine friendly.
Search Engine Optimization is a relatively new marketing industry. Although there are many purported experts, most of us who call ourselves SEO specialists are learning. The search engines are constantly in flux, so SEO techniques that worked yesterday may not necessarily work tomorrow. As a result, it is exceedingly important to keep up with the fervent pace of the Internet, and the search engines in particular.
One of the frustrations of search engine placement is that your rankings are constantly fluctuating. The key to a successful search engine optimization campaign is creativity, perseverance and practice, practice, practice. Do not try to fool the search engines by “tricking” them with unsavory techniques (e.g., keyword stuffing, cloaking, hidden text) because you will risk having your website lose favor with the search engines, or worse, getting banned altogether.
Website Promotion 101
So, you've designed a compelling website that you're eager to show the world. Every day you add fresh content and tweak your pages to make them prettier, more informative and faster to download. It's gonna pay off, you tell yourself, as you upload several new pages to your web server.
Midway in the afternoon, you stop what you're doing to check your traffic reports… You're excited and eager to confirm just how successful your website is. Waiting for your site statistics to finish downloading, your glee turns to dread when you learn that only two people visited your website all day.
What's a disillusioned Webmaster to do?
Publishing Your First Email Newsletter
I've been an e-publisher for a couple of years now. Publishing an e-mail newsletter (e.g., E-zine) is a fabulous way to market your website. But getting started takes planning, hard work and commitment.
First, you need to decide on the subject of your E-zine. The subject, ideally, should complement the subject of your website. Next, you need to establish a schedule for sending out your publication (e.g., weekly, monthly, quarterly), and then, more importantly, you need to meet your deadlines.
Choosing a Color Scheme
When you begin the design of your website, one of the first things you need to do is decide on a color scheme. Although choosing colors seems like a relatively easy proposition, it's not easy at all. In fact, it's hard.
One of the pluses we have as web designers is that millions of colors are at our disposal. Unlike the print world, we do not have to pay for each color we use. If we want to use a specific hue of yellow, for example, all we need to know is the hexadecimal code for that particular color.
One of the pitfalls of having millions of colors to pick from is that some people go crazy and use every color imaginable on their website. This is a big no-no. Not only does it look unprofessional to use 20 different colors on your home page, but depending on the colors you choose, your page may not be readable.
Designing Professional Web Pages
If your website doesn't project a professional and polished image to your visitors, your credibility and that of your products and services will suffer. Image is everything—especially online where your competitor is only one mouse click away!
Before your first HTML code is written, you will need to consider your website's navigational structure, color scheme and page layout. Is your content developed? If not, who is going to write it?
Once you have done the necessary preplanning, then the fun part begins—coding your HTML pages.
The Power of Color
Do you find it hard to choose color schemes for your web designs? An effective color scheme can make or break your website. If it doesn't convey the personality you are trying to achieve, you may end up alienating the people you are trying so hard to get to notice you.
In my quest to design successful, attractive websites, I spend a lot of time picking colors. Making sure colors coordinate well with each other is not an easy task. But, with the right tools and a good sense of what looks right, you can achieve the look and feel you desire.