Features Cheap Website Templates Must Have

Published on February 10th, 2010.

There is nothing wrong in choosing a cheap website template provided most (if not all) the necessary features are there in it. It is imperative that you know these features or else you will end up having a crap website – it can cost you profits.

Below are some important features that you need to take into consideration prior to purchasing a website template:

Browser Compatibility

Pick a template that is compatible to all browsers. In most cases, and when you are not vigilant, you can get a website that runs smoothly on Firefox but broken when it is run on IE. You need to be careful on this or else you will put your money into waste. Ask your provider if the template is browser-friendly and if possible, perform a test prior to purchasing.

Easy Navigation

Easy navigation is essential as this will make your website become more user-friendly – after all, you are launching a website for users. Menu or pages must be, at least, above the fold and that just means it must be visible to users even without scrolling down the page.

Search Engine Friendly

Aside from being user friendly, you must choose a template that is search engine friendly. In other words, your website must easily get indexed on major search engines (Google, yahoo, etc.) when published. We are aware that about 60-80% of Internet users are searching websites via these search engines. The greater your website presence the better opportunity for traffic and the more possible conversion.

The Designs

Yes, SEO plays an important role but we have to admit that first impression lasts. Therefore aside from being search engine friendly, your template must also be professionally designed. Appropriate colors, font, appropriate graphics, banners, and call-to-actions are important.

Plug-in friendly

Template may look complete at times but later it certainly needs an upgrade. Perhaps you wish to integrate some useful plug-ins and application. Your website template must be easy to utilize when performing plug-in integrations.

Now, if you think that the website template you are about to buy ( because it is cheap) does not conform to these standards, better think again before purchasing. Buy cheap website templates with features stated. Else, go for premium as these are (most of the time) better in terms of designs and functionality.

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Designing Websites from Scratch – Development Phases

Published on February 2nd, 2010.

Just like any other project development, website building needs to follow a step-by-step procedure in order to succeed. Website development phases serve as your guide so that your project will not end-up a crap.

Basically, website development process follow this the following phases:

Planning and Decision Making

The planning stage is important as this is the time you set your website decision and goal, analyze the feasibility, gather the resources needed, and most of all build the framework or skeleton of your target project. You will also be deciding for your domain and register for a website hosting service.

Graphic Design

After the planning stage you can start working for graphic design based on the approved draft or project skeleton. This is the time you use resources like adobe and other graphic design applications or editor. Your graphic designer is needed in this phase.

Website Development/Coding

When graphic designing is done, it is time to start working on coding. Your web developer takes a big responsibility during this stage. This is the phase where slicing of pages is done and it includes coding not just the front-end (the user interface) but the back-end functions of the design also. It is important that the person you assign to website development or coding is knowledgeable in different programming languages and databases.

Testing

Testing is next and this is also important because it is not a wise practice to just publish your website without even trying and checking if it functions the way it is planned . Testing and tracing possible errors in all the pages is very important. You need to check if the links, input form, menu, and plug-ins are functioning well – based on the goal you have set.

Website Launching

When bugs are fixed, your website is then ready for launching. Please note, by the way, it is a useful strategy that you let website users in your niche know about the launching of your website. That can be a very good start – attracting individuals at the very start. You can do that by posting announcement, upcoming events on your social networking account like Facebook or Twitter.

Updates and Maintenance

Lastly, when you have successfully published your website, your next task- and it is an ongoing task – is to prepare your self in doing maintenance -which might be needed daily- as well as for future updates.

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Shopping Cart System – Its Value for Online Business

Published on January 8th, 2010.

When you plan to establish a business on the Internet particularly an online store, one important thing that you must understand is the concept of online shopping cart system. A shopping cart system is a software used in e-commerce to help people in making online purchases. It allows online shoppers to virtually accumulate and sort a list of items or products to buy. Upon checkout, the software calculates the total cost of items as well as the charges associated with shipping and taxes.

You can have a successful online store by using an online shopping cart software without the need for web design and development expertise. This is because you can just integrate an e-commerce system ( from a 3rd party) to your website. Most, if not all, of the shopping cart software available online have features like on-the-web administration, calculation and integration of shipping charges, real-time payments, and a lot more.

It is quite easy to have a shopping cart system integrated to your web store. All you need to do is to find an e-commerce system provider – you can do it by simply googling terms like ‘online shopping cart’. You don’t need to worry about the compatibility thing as shopping cart providers have designed particular systems which work best for large and small stores. When you subscribe, you are given tutorials ( usually in a form of video presentations) to help you fully understand the system and its applications. Also, these providers have a 24/7 online support – you can ask help, anytime.

Before you care to subscribe for an e-commerce system, it is important that you compare shopping cart software from different providers. Yes, it is going to be a challenging task in your part as there are so many vendors of online shopping cart software on the web that can be puzzling. Comparing is certainly beneficial. But of course, since we are certain that none of them can give a perfect solution, we can determine the most ideal by considering the following points when evaluating shopping cart packages.

• Hosting – you need to see to it that the hosting company you and your shopping cart system provider provides reliability and security. Downtime errors should be minimal. Online stores should be available 24/7. Few minutes of downtime can lose opportunities.

• Flexibility of Design – shopping cart system must be flexible enough to match the design you have in your web store. Compatibility is essential. You need to find a package that is able to do smooth transition from the old online shopping cart software to the new software with a full uploading of your database. This will save you a lot time.

• Shipping – a good shopping cart system with the capacity to calculate shipping particularly a software that is capable of calculating item weight variations.

• Taxes – a good shopping cart system is also capable of doing calculation of taxes on purchases. Product prices are dynamic – some with fluctuating prices, others are taxable and others are not. As complex as the calculation or algorithm may be, a good shopping cart should be able to manage this task.

• Reporting – a good e-commerce system is also capable of returning comprehensive reports on subscriptions or purchases. Reports on buying trends such as returning visits, demographic details, and conversion rates are examples of data that you must be able to trace. Such data are significant to improving your selling strategies.

• Back-end Functionality – a good e-commerce system provides easy management of products. This include easy item addition when the system is out of stocks, inventory, easy image uploads, etc.

• Cross-selling – is the system capable of generating product suggestion? A customer may subscribe a new CD player but he may also want to have a new headphone. A good shopping cart is able to generate product suggestions that a customer may also buy.

• Merchant Account Flexibility – a good shopping cart must be flexible enough to accommodate various forms of payment and it must be easy for customers to do online payment transactions. It must be accurate. It must be reliable.

• Additional Features – a good shopping cart must also be able to provide various additional features, options for upgrades. After your shopping cart is established to your web store, you may want upgrades for more sales.

Establishing an online store can be complex but with the help of effective, reliable online shopping cart system, your business can run smoothly.

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Link Building: 5 Steps to Get Your Back Links Indexed Easily

Published on November 16th, 2009.

Building links is one of the most important things to consider when it comes generating traffic for websites. This is the reason why there are people (many) and website owners who try every technique they know – regardless of the nature of the strategy – only to wake up one morning seeing their sites are removed  from search engines like Google. In other words, some do the unethical ways of link building.

No, I am not writing about new strategy for link building. This has been with us for quite a long time but only few people who are really considering its value – I am talking about strategy for weaving links that get your websites easily indexed by search engines using ethical method.

I am sharing a quick and easy steps for link building that give your links better chances for easy index to major search engine like Google .

Step 1: Create Profile

Create profiles using some Web 2.0 properties. You can make use of free tools that allow you to build webpages where you can drop links back to the main site you are working to promote. You might interested of using Blogger, WordPress, Hubpages, Squidoo, etc. These are very effective in helping your webiste become more visible on the Internet.

Step 2: Work on RSS feeds

Create an RSS feed account for each on every profile you made. You can make use of feedburner. Web 2.0 properties have built-in RSS feed feature already. RSS feed main components include a list of items that are essentially chunks of information intended for the readers. Each item in the list has its own title and summary along with a link to details of the summarized information.

Step 3: Submit RSS feed

After you have worked on your RSS feeds, submit them to as many RSS aggregators as you can. Aggregators are websites that gather RSS feeds and then republish them. These sites are easily crawled by spider and indexed by search engines  and therefore more chances for online presence for the site you are trying to promote.

Step 4: Bookmark RSS feeds

Bookmark your RSS feeds using social media. These social media sites are easily crawled and indexed by search engines. Some examples of powerful social bookmarking sites are propeller, mr. wong, digg.This step consumes most of the link building process but it is worth the effort. You can make use of social marker, by the way, to semi-automate the process of bookmarking.

Step 5: Pinging

Ping your website. Using tools like ping-omatic, pingoat, ping your website or blog to let others know that you have updated your content ( do this for every content update). There are 3 basic information needed for pinging: The site title, the URL, and the URL of the RSS feeds. So it should be easy for you to this.

The above-mentioned 5-step link building strategy can help your backlinks get easily indexed to major search engines – making the site you are trying to promote more visible and therefore greater chances for more traffic.

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Featured Templates

Published on November 4th, 2009.

Hi guys,

Today I am featuring some sample template designs made by SUS designers. These templates are just some of the designs they developed from scratch. Check

1. Outdoor Sports

2. Car and Street Sports

3. Computers & Electronics

4. Home Interior Designs

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