Blog 55

Some trends are meant to stay in the past. These web design trends of the 1990s were the driving force of 90s websites, but should never surface again. Read them and never include them in your designs.

Do not ever include animated gifs in any aspect of your website. They are cheesy, have huge file compression issues and produce the poorest quality animation on the web today. Flash introductions/splash pages on your website should also be avoided. Sure, it might seem cool the first time, but it quickly because nothing but annoying when visiting the site repeatedly. Further more, 100% Flash websites should not exist for any business trying to rank on search engines like Google. They can still be found today, but anyone that cared about SEO and keyword density has moved on long ago.

Lastly, ditch the floating menus and the custom mouse cursors.

Because, seriously you guys.

Come on.

Everyone wants to succeed in their business. This post will discuss some of the things to remember to set healthy, achievable goals in business.

Before setting your goals, define your niche and stick to it. Be honest with your capabilities and expectations for your business. When creating your goals, start with the bigger picture and set long term goals. Create as many measurable goals as you can to track your progress. Be sure to leave some room for adjustments along the way because more often than not you will have to stray from your original plan.

Errors do not equate to failure.

In your pursuit, don’t forget to take time for yourself and to learn from those around you. Read tips from other people in your business and remain humble. Soak up as much information as you can in variety of different ways. Learn from their mistakes as well as your own.

Since its arrival, the iPhone has changed and revolutionized the idea of a mobile device. The App Store that goes along with it has taken it one step further. There is an App for pretty much anything you can think of. These Apps range from silly time wasting Apps to Apps that perform serious functions. There are even Apps that web designers and developers might find helpful. These Apps help designers and developers do their jobs from anywhere because they give the designers and developers the ability to control a large database or upload blogs or content from remote locations.

Some of these useful Apps include but are not limited to Color Expert, iMy, iBlueSky, WordPress, and FTP On The Go.

Let us know what other designer Apps you find useful!

When you’re making sites for an audience around the world, it is important to be aware of cultural differences that might affect the way they could be viewed in different parts of the globe. One site cannot be expected to be received the same around the world. Adapt your website to allow for cultural differences while maintaining their effectiveness in the regions you target.

Content is the most important part of the website so you must make sure it is relevant and useful to your target audience, make sure it is as universally understandable as it can possibly be and that the content is appropriate cross culturally. Work with a professional translator to ensure your search engine optimization campaign can be successful with proper foreign language keywords.

Color is another important factor to consider when designing sites cross culturally. Color can affect the way your website it perceived because different colors mean different things to different cultures.

Cross cultural web design is about being very aware of the possible pitfalls and making your site as accessible to a multitude of other cultures. Make your site as accessible as possible to adapt to the increased internationalism that the Internet provides.