Most website clients want development tasks to be completed for no money and in no time. That’s understandable, of course, but it’s not realistic because building Web pages is as much art as science, and it’s time-consuming (though fun and creative) work that requires significant attention to detail.

To help her clients better understand what’s involved in building web pages, About.com “Guide to Web Design” blogger Jennifer Kyrnin recently wrote an article titled “6 Things Your Web Designer Wants You to Understand.” » read complete article

For those who want to know why things take time, cost money, don’t match printouts, aren’t the exact color you are expecting, and more, we’ve adapted her points as they relate to the work Precision Computing Arts does for our clients. As always, please feel free to contact us with any questions or concerns you might have.

1. Most projects are feasible, given enough money and time.

Chances are, we can do almost anything you want, but there are two big caveats: money and time. If we’ve already done exactly what you’re proposing, the project will cost less and take less time than if you’re asking for something new. We’ll always do our best to give you a ballpark idea about whether something is quick, easy, and inexpensive; whether it’s slow, difficult, and expensive; whether it’s something in between; whether we’re just not sure until we try it; or whether it is beyond our capabilities. Of course, if you change the criteria, that likely will change the money, time, and/or feasibility.

2. Web design is not instantaneous.

We try to create pages that look attractive and load quickly. But this isn’t necessarily easy or fast. A good rule of thumb is to allow about one or two business days for minor changes; a week for medium changes; and even longer for more difficult changes. These rules of thumb may vary a bit with our workload. If it’s light, you typically will enjoy quicker turnaround; if not, you may need to wait a bit. We’ll always do our best to be prompt and to keep you informed about any expected delays.

3. Web design is not print design.

It’s almost impossible to exactly replicate a print design on a website because:

• Different web browsers such as Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, and Safari render pages differently. We do look at our designs in these different browsers and try to create designs that are pleasing, though not necessarily identical, in each one.
  
• Print designs can count on easily replicated paper sizes, colors, fonts, and so on. With web design, the fonts, colors, and screen sizes people will see can vary considerably.
• Website design involves more than just good looks! It requires careful attention to content, search engine optimization (SEO), navigation, and general usability issues as well.

4. Colors are a challenge.

While printed materials can specify specific color schemes using CMYK standards for ink, computers don’t use CMYK (they use RGB). Even if we exactly convert CMYK to RGB, the colors viewed on your screen still might not look 100% correct because different monitors are calibrated differently, and you may have different monitors, operating systems, Web browsers, room color schemes, and ambient light than we do. All these can affect a Web design in ways that the designer cannot anticipate or do much about. For example, we’ve had people refer to a red color that looks brown to us. Go figure!

5. E-commerce, databases, and other complex web applications can take a lot of time and work and can cost extra.

We employ our “Cool Tools” system to help us implement e-commerce, databases, and other applications as quickly and efficiently as possible. These Cool Tools typically will increase your web hosting charges over the cheap $3-$10 per month services out there. For example, a Cool Tools website with many bells and whistles costs about $20/month, whereas a website with the same bells and whistles plus a shopping cart costs about $40/month.

However, the Cool Tools save you money on development costs, and they enable you to maintain your own site with relative ease and without hand coding in HTML, PHP, or other difficult-to-use alphabet-soup programming languages. For example, adding e-commerce and databases in a typical hand-coded system can be astronomically expensive and take considerable time; with our Cool Tools system, it’s much quicker and less expensive. But you should expect that sites with these extra goodies still will require more work, time, and money than sites without them.

6. Remember why you’ve hired a professional web designer.

A professional web designer usually can get your website up and running faster and better than your typical friend or brother-in-law (unless they, too, are professional web designers). But, you often do get what you pay for (see “IF YOU PAY PEANUTS, YOU GET MONKEYS” blog article by Karalyn Eckerle). We promise to listen to our clients with respect, to consider your comments and suggestions, and to foster a great working relationship with you. We hope you will do the same for us so that your website can show off your company in the best possible way and provide your website’s visitors with a great experience.

Our "Cool Tools" web hosting service has made it easier than ever to create and edit websites. So if you are maintaining your own website through our service, or you have friends, colleagues, or family members who want to set up their own websites, please tell them about these features, as well as our free 10-day trial sites. 

One of the coolest new features is the Site Builder Preview, a spiffy new user interface that looks better and is better organized than the standard interface, making site editing setup and maintenance easier than ever before. To access this feature, log in to your Admin page. Then click the Site builder preview link under News and Updates.

What else is new? New design templates, improved logo handling and new logo designs, new backgrounds and background features, new groupboxes, social networking features, mailing list and landing page referral tracking, and automatic email responses when users fill out a form on your site. You'll also find new Ecommerce features, including an updated store home page, support for editing coupons, the ability to use multiple gift certificates upon checkout, and more. The Help and Tutorials also have been improved. For a detailed summary of the features described above, simply log into your Admin page and then click the System Update - ver. 4.15 [09/26/2009] link under News and Information.

Want More New Features?

Here are a few from an update installed 11/2009.

• More new template layouts
• The ability to hide the top banner
• The ability to update the top bar image for certain templates
• Improved Background design page, including a background gradient maker
• More control over the appearance of popup menus and the design layout width
• Seasonal logos (Thanksgiving and end-of-year Holidays coming soon)

For consulting help using these features, or to have us incorporate any of these features into your own website, please contact us. (Note: These features are available only to customers whose websites are built using our "Cool Tools" content management systems. Most Precision Computing Arts customers are on this newer system, but a few of our clients remain on an older Dreamweaver based system. Not sure which system you're using? Just drop us a line and we'll gladly let you know.)

There's always someone willing to part you from your hard-earned money or steal your identity. Domain name scammers are among them! These nasty Internet denizens will send you an official looking letter or email with dire admonitions that your domain is about to expire and you must renew or transfer your domain name with them (or risk losing it forever).

One of our customers got taken by this scam, and his domain expired anyway! That's because the company (Domain Renewal Group) did not renew or transfer his domain; they simply took his $30 check and cashed it! Fortunately, were were able to renew his domain with his official registrar. Our customer may have been lucky only to lose his money. Some of these scammers take much more because they are identity thieves, trolling for credit card and other valuable information!

Unless you are 100% sure they are legit, do not respond to these letters!

If you receive a letter about renewing your domain name — especially if you don't recognize the company as YOUR domain registrar — please contact us right away, before you send a check or give them your credit card information. We'll try to verify whether the communication is a legitimate message from your current domain registrar. (As an aside, most domain renewals cost about $10 per year. If yours costs significantly more, ask us about transferring your domain to another registrar.)

All this said, please do not ignore an expiring domain! You've invested time, money, and Goodwill in your domain name, so it's important to stay on top of expiration dates and keep your domain registration current. Also be aware that if a domain expires, no one can access your website until the domain registration is updated or the site is moved to a new domain name. And if someone happens to grab your domain after it has expired, you probably will be unable to retrieve it.

For some specific details about this domain scamming problem, check out this link or this one.

Want to know more about domain scammers? Search Google for "domain renewal scam" or type the name of the company that has sent you a letter (between quotation marks) and add the word scam, like this:

"Domain Renewal Group" scam

Precision Computing Arts welcomes two new websites for the same customer! Please visit Frederick Michael King's art-related websites at:

• Earth Fire Designs (www.earthfiredesigns.com) features hand carved ceramic murals, tile, architectural elements, and fireplaces.
  
• King Contemporary Art (www.kingcontemporaryart.com) features contemporary wall mounted metal sculptures and encaustic wax paintings for private, hotel, and corporate spaces.
  

We also invite you to visit the new website for Mr. Shrine (www.mrshrine.com). Ralph Wilson (aka Mr. Shrine) and his partner Kathleen McLeod create and teach others how to create folk-art shrines, mini-art car kits, pins and magnets on copper, painted luggage, and more.

For more details about these three sites and their special features, please visit our Artists & Painters portfolio page.

Referrals Appreciated!

Don't forget that we LOVE referrals from our existing customers. These three sites were made possible by referrals from existing customers — thank you Brian and Kathleen! In addition to earning our undying gratitude, referrals earn consulting fee discounts for our loyal customers. Please check out our Discounts On Consulting Fees page for details.

Precision Computing Arts / Fastwebdev welcomes:

• WestCoast Natives (Ryan Gorretta) - We're creating a new website for him; he's creating new landscaping for us! Watch for www.westcoastnatives.com, coming soon.
  

We made some exciting updates to:

• PerioCDent (Improved design and new information)

Many thanks to our new clients and to our loyal long-time clients who have kept us in business during tough times. We are grateful to be a part of YOUR business and look forward to working with you in the future.

We're always looking for referrals, so if you are happy with our work, please tell your colleagues, family, and friends. We offer consulting fee discounts for every referral that becomes a client, making referrals a win-win for everyone.

Hey, Precision Computing Arts / Fastwebdev Clients!
Would you like to see your name on our Client News blog pages? If so, please submit your news by contacting us or by clicking the Comments link below.

 

Do you want some help figuring out the best keywords to use in your Pay Per Click system (e.g., Google Adwords or Yahoo Overture)? Do you want to find out what the competition is doing? If so, check out Google's FREE Search-Based Keyword Tool. Use this free tool from Google to generate a list of keywords found on any site, including your own and your competition's.

To use the tool:

1. Click here to start the SK tool (www.google.com/sktool/).
2. In the Website box, enter the website address that you want to analyze.
3. Click Find Keywords.

You can sort by any column (click on the column name), analyze the results in a variety of ways, and even export the keywords found. The tool is optimized for use with Google's Adwords system, but it's great all by itself. (Note that it shows a limited list of keyword ideas, not every possible keyword associated with the site you selected.)

To learn about more tools for selecting Pay Per Click keywords, visit the Pay Per Click Insider Tips article titled "Five Techniques to Dominate the Long-Tail".

Does your business need a kickstart? Whose doesn't? Below are two FREE features from Google — the world's most-used search engine — that can help give your business more visibility. You will need a free Gmail (Google email) account to set up these features.

Add your listing to Google Business at www.google.com/local/add. This listing will help customers find you on Google maps.

Add your profile to Google at http://www.google.com/profiles. This profile will help people find the right information when they search for you on Google.

Many thanks to Lorna Chehov for bringing these ideas to our attention.

HURRY - Limited Time Offer! - We value your input and want to hear from you! We'll even give you a $25 discount off our professional consulting fees if you complete our survey. See offer for details and survey form.