Nattyman Web Development

Assuming they aren’t worn out, would you wear the same clothes you wore a decade ago?  What about 2 decades ago?  Many of us wouldn’t be able to fit in our clothes from just a few years ago, but that is beside the point.  If you wouldn’t wear outdated clothes why would you let your business wear an outdated website.  Yes that is right, websites become dated.  Design styles change and there is a good chance that you can get stuck wearing bell-bottoms when all the cool kids are wearing skinny jeans, although I have no idea why anyone would want to be that uncomfortable.

And if you think clothing styles change too fast, then you are going to really hate the Internets (I use the term affectionately).  Not only does style change, but design theory and the concepts of user experience itself are continually growing and maturing.  Technology is rapidly evolving as well.  5 years ago Flash was all the rage, but now Flash is on it’s way out and is being replaced by jQuery and HTML5 which doesn’t require any special software that nags you about being updated all the time like Flash does.

So how old is too old for a website?  Think of it this way, technology is moving forward at an exponential rate and it now doubles every 2 years.  So that is my timeline for myself.  At two years I start looking into a redesign for any of my websites.  I do the same for my computers and try to update or replace them about every two years as well.  As a general rule if your website is pushing 3 years or more you should seriously consider at least revamping it.

So lets talk about the technical details of creating your website for your business or organization.  Only a few years ago, creating a website required hiring someone to make if for you or investing a considerable amount of your own time in learning how to do it yourself.  You would have to purchase expensive software like Dreamweaver or Frontpage, which both had a steep learning curve.  And this only helped you create a static web page.  It didn’t include any dynamic elements or interactivity.  This also did not include any graphics.  To do that you would need something like Photoshop or Fireworks.  If you thought Dreamweaver had a hockey stick learning curve, then Photoshop has a Mountain for a learning curve.  Dreamweaver is like learning to fly a crop duster.  Photoshop is like learning to fly an F-16 fighter jet.  You step into the cockpit and the sheer volume and complexity of all the gears, gauges, knobs and flashing buttons can be enough to make your vision go blurry.

Now there is a better way!  Like I mentioned in my first post on this blog, we now have Content Management Systems or CMS.  A CMS can allow anyone to easily update and manage their website.  There is one particular CMS that stands out and that is WordPress.  This is what I use and this is what I recommend to everyone I talk to.  It is simple enough that an Internet newbie can use it but powerful enough that professionals use it as well.

More than just a blogging platform

WordPress was originally created for blogging and many people still only think of it as a way to create a blog, but it has grown to be much more than that.  Wordpress can be used for any type of website and it is being used by some of the largest company’s in the world, such as CNN, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Sony, PlayStation, GE, and Ford.

But here is the most beautiful part.  not only is WordPress one of the easiest, most powerful, most widely used and trusted Content Management Systems out there… it is COMPLETELY FREE!  That’s right, you can use WordPress without having to pay anyone a dime.  (How is this possible?)  Wordpress can give their software away for free because it is Open Source, which allows developers from all over the world who like to use their product contribute their ideas.  Then WordPress makes money through offering premium services and through paid advertising.  While there is a core team of developers they also reap the benefits of free development from other contributors all over the world, while we reap the benefit of an amazing free web development tool.

Not just a static website

The other main reason that I love WordPress is that it makes it easy for you to add dynamic elements and interactivity to your site.  What I mean by dynamic elements are things like moving images, drop-down menus, hover buttons.  Examples of interactivity include contact forms, user comments, calendars, social networking, etc.  These are powerful devices that make your website more user-friendly and engaging.  Normally these things would require some kind of programing experience, but WordPress offers them as plug-ins for your website that you can install with the click of a button.

I haven’t actually used them because I have my own hosting company but I hear Bluehost.com is very good.  You can get started with an easy one click installation at Bluehost.com. My company mostly does wholesale hosting, but if you are interested you can contact me about it here.

There are 4 things required to create a website.  Here is what you will need:

1. A Website Host (The place to keep or store your website on the web)
2. A Domain (The address for your website)
3. A Website Design (The look and layout)
4. Content (The information that people come to your website for)

If creating a website is something very new to you and the 4 above requirements don’t completely make sense here is a good way to think about the virtual world in terms of the physical world.

1) The website host is where your business is located.  This will be a server located at some kind of secure data center.  It is like the building or office space that a physical business rents to offer its products or services from.

2) The domain is like the address, only rather than saying you are located at the corner of Main and Chestnut St., you give people your domain address, or URL, and they type that into their browser to get to your website located on your hosting server.

3) The website design is like the style of decor that gives your business it’s own look and feel.  It is also the layout of your business.  If you sell clothes, you don’t just toss them in a pile in the middle of the floor, you don’t make the aisles into a maize.  A dentists office doesn’t just have the dentist chair right inside the front door, no there is a reception area with someone to greet you when you walk in and a waiting area for you to sit down.  A lot of attention is given to the look of a website, but the layout should be given equal consideration

4) The first three requirements are each there to facilitate the fourth requirement.  The content is the purpose of your website.  Without the content the rest is pointless, and believe me there are plenty of websites out there that fulfill the first three requirements only to fail miserably on delivering any kind of meaningful content.  If you aren’t going to provide visitors to your website with any kind of useful information, service, or products then don’t bother.  Without meaningful content `you are just adding to the noise.

Action Items:

If you don’t already have a domain, decide on what domain you want to use.  Chances are your first few considerations will already be taken.  Here is some help:

1. First read this post about techniques on how to choose a domain.
2. Go to Powerpipe.com and use their name brainstorming tool to help come up with specific ideas.
3. Once you decide on a name that is available you can purchase your domain using Powerpipe.com.

Gone are the days where you either had to spend 2 months learning how to create a website from scratch, which would probably not look great in the end, or having to pay a professional firm thousands of dollars to make something worth looking at, or worst of all paying your neighbors 14 year old son $200 bucks to cut his teeth on his new web design business with your website.  Sure you can still do one of these things if you like, but now I introduce you to the age of Content Management Systems or CMS.  Maybe you have heard of one, Droopal, WordPress, Joomla, to name a few.

But even if you do use a CMS there is still a steep learning curve that requires some tech savvy and a lot of free time for studying and research.  That is where I hope to help out.  For the last 10+ years I have worked full time in creating hundreds of websites, some from scratch, some utilizing a 3rd party CMS and some building my own CMS.  I have always had a passion for training and teaching people and for the last 5 years I have lead a web design team and spent hundreds of hours training new designers.  I hope through this blog to help you cut out months of learning time by sharing my 10+ years of knowledge with you.

So we will start at the very beginning.  I will assume you know nothing except how to point and click your mouse and do a Google search.  Since you are a business owner or entrepreneur building a website is secondary to running your business.  You are not interested, or shouldn’t be interested, in becoming a master web designer, you simply want a good website without spending months learning or paying thousands of dollars.  As my customer support reps are scripted to say, “I can help you with that”.