Choosing a Website Marketing and Development Specialist

What to consider when looking for quality web site development

Once you are done planning and preparing for your web site, the next step in establishing an online presence is finding the right company, contractor, or consultant to deliver the web development services you need.

However important a website's appearance is, the performance and results of any website rely largely on what's beneath its surface; that which is not seen or fully understood by most. This article is not intended to be a general how to guide on comparing prices and services, but rather advice from an expert on what you should consider when looking for professional website design, web development, and internet promotion that you may not already be aware of.

Differences between Building, Designing and Marketing web presences

Understanding the differences between designing a website, building a website, and making a website visible online will help ensure that you choose a website developer that can meet all your goals and demands.

Building proper and professional web sites which perform and operate optimally is a highly technical process. This includes a website's load time, certain aspects of its speed of operation, the ability for the web site to work properly and coherently across the many different web browsers and operating systems, and many aspects of potential online visibility. Each of these factors are dependant upon the build of the website - the way in which it was programmed and created. Properly building a website is something many web designers and online marketers fail to be concerned with or take interest in, and frankly they are often unable to handle the process correctly.

Creating effective and appropriate custom website designs on the other hand is an artistic and creative process. You want your web site to be easy and intuitive to use and navigate. It should be enticing and interesting to browse through, and you want the mood and emotion your web site portrays to reflect your identity and image branding. Not only will this catch your audience's attention - it will enhance your credibility to deliver the products or services you are promising. The design of a website is extremely important, and should be managed accordingly.

Online Promotion and Marketing of web sites encompasses all aspects of a website's online visibility, including internet advertising, visits from search engines, links from external web pages, and so on. Depending on a website's goals and purposes, market, and competition, internet marketing is often the most beneficial and cost effective form of promotion available to a company. A website that pulls in around 10,000 visitors a month and generates, say, $30,000 a month in income, could possibly generate $100,000 a month if only it had 40,000 or so visitors. The problem is, as a highly technical and constantly evolving area, most websites are not developed with search engine optimization (SEO) or other important aspects of internet marketing for websites in mind. In fact, studies reveal that as many as 90% of all business-related websites currently on the internet are not built or developed with any regard to online visibility!

Evaluating prospective Web Developers

It is important for anyone who is seeking website development services to understand that many website designers know surprisingly little about properly building or marketing websites. Likewise, many website developers know very little about design and online promotion, and many internet marketers are not concerned with web design or properly building web sites. Understanding what you need and what you will be receiving is imperative to the success of your web presence, and automatically puts you at an advantage over 9 out of 10 websites.

Evaluating Web Design - Portfolios

The only place you should have to look to evaluate a web developer's designs is to their own website's portfolio. Any established website developers will offer a portfolio of web sites they have created for other clients, as well as links to the sites. Depending on what you are looking for in a web developer, some things you may want to look for in regards to this portfolio include;

. Is their work generally similar in design, or do their clients' sites look unique
and appropriate for their purpose ?

. Are their designs and sites consistent and appealing throughout ?
. Are any of the sites flashy and largely graphical?
. Are there videos, animation, or custom graphics?
. Are there any e-commerce sites, shopping carts, or other interactive elements ?

Evaluating Website Builds

Unfortunately, the people who can spot a good website creator are usually web site builders themselves. Whereas a website appears to most people as simply presentation and function, the truth is that the elements most detrimental to many online presences' success rates are factors that most people and even many website developers overlook or are often simply unaware of.

There are only a few things that someone without a website development background can easily evaluate in terms of building websites properly:

Look for any inconsistencies across pages, odd characters, missing graphics, forms not working, pages not found, or any other technical problems you may be able to identify on the websites.

If you have access to several different computers with various operating systems (Windows Vista, Windows 98, Mac OS, etc.) and web browsers (Internet Explorer, Fire Fox, Opera, Safari, Netscape, etc.) you can visit the sites on different browsers and computers and check for consistency and functionality.

Evaluating Online Promotion and Web Marketing

Trying to evaluate web promotion services can easily become confusing. With all the technical terms and fine print, it is often hard to know what you are really getting. For instance, many Search Engine Optimization (SEO) companies guarantee such things as first page listings with a major search engine. Often, however, they will use technical terms to provide clients with something else - usually a paid advertisement that appears on the first page, which is not nearly as valuable.

The best advice I can give for evaluating online promotion performance is to obtain actual performance results, and preferably references. Evaluate what was promised by the website promoter, what was actually delivered, and the value of the marketing. There are no set limits to the performance of a website; all you can do is try to figure out who can provide you with the biggest return on investment and the service most valuable to your site.

Also, be weary of any companies that make specific search engine result guarantees - no one can directly control their results, as algorithms and competition evolve. No search results are set in stone.

Choosing the right web developer for you

There are companies and consultants who specialize in single areas of design, building, or promotion of websites, offering only these services, and others who specialize in the entire aspect of web presences. While choosing the right solution for your particular website depends on your specific needs and goals, having an idea of the various options and knowing what to look for in a web developer allows you to make a more informed and better decision.

Bjorn Enki - Los Angeles, CA Website Development -

Website Development & Web Design,

Online Marketing and Internet Promotion,

Search Engine Optimization ( SEO ) & Search Marketing

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Bjorn_Enki

Web Development - An Overview

A web page may be created for personal or professional purposes. Technology has made web development a convenient process. In fact the benefits of technology vis-à-vis the web are meant for both developers and users. The increased usage of the web and the growing number of websites are an indication of this. And what sets the web apart from other technologies such as the television and radio is the space it gives to the user. Everyone can have a web site of their own, but not everyone can, for instance, have a show on television.

The mix of personal and professional web spaces is interesting to track. In the initial days of the web, the purpose was purely idea-sharing at an academic level. In about two years, the web was opened up as a public place and you started seeing a mix of personal and professional sites. In the next stage of its growth, the web was filled with everyone’s personal sites. Everyone had a web page up and ready with personal photographs, ‘about me’ etc. And then came the boom of companies on the web, and business on the web grew like never before. The web became an inimitable marketplace for people to buy and sell all kinds of products and services.

In the lifecycle of website creation, the development team evaluates and, if necessary, revises ideas storyboarded by the design team. Web development is a specialized area of work which involves an understanding, even if not knowledge, of all other related processes. It can be said that the development team is directly responsible for the creation of a finished website. Evaluation is not just a technical procedure, and involves some degree of subjectivity also. Developers do not just mechanically use rules to create webpage. Individual web developers would bring their own style to the work, and the final product would be influenced in that way.

Web development is carried out with the use of languages such as HTML, XML, Flash, Perl, CSS etc. Like languages we use in our day to day life, each of these languages used for web development has their own respective logics. A web developer must be well-versed in the use of one or more of these languages. The lay person has a very simplistic understanding of what web development involves. The development stage of a website is in fact a long-drawn process often requiring rework and multiple revisions. Both creation and maintenance of a web space is known as web development.

As mentioned earlier technology is now geared towards making it easier for a common person to develop a web page. There are, now, many tools available to help a person develop a website and make the web development process easier to an extent. The very fact that there are websites taking care of the complete development side of website creation for users, speaks volumes for the complexities involved in web development. A lot of the complexities of web development arise from the fact that a web developer must possess the ability to troubleshoot serious technical problems.

Asynchronous JavaScript And XML (AJAX) is a web development technique used to create interactive web applications. Even though the phenomena itself has been around on the web for about a decade, the term AJAX was recently attributed to this technique which is often misunderstood as being to be a technology. AJAX is very relevant in present day web surfing. There are times when you need your website to seem more responsive. But at the same time to continually process small amounts of data requested by the user you cannot afford for the whole web site to be reloaded. AJAX allows this activity to go on behind the scenes which accentuates the sense of interactivity on the web without affecting the speed of the web site. Filling up forms on websites, and other such activities become particularly easy because of this technique.

The technicalities can be avoided, but any company doing business online must have a good understanding of web development. These companies looking for a resounding web presence must be aware of issues like browser compatibility, accessibility, and web standards. Web standards in particular have been put in place to ensure that websites meet their fundamental purpose if communicating with a user.

In the field of web development ‘web development India’ is the new mantra of success. Global companies are recognizing the path-breaking working being carried out by web developers in India. Companies from across the world are partnering with Indian firms because of the cost-effective, superior quality services on offer. Web development professionals in India with their expertise are attractive key global players towards India. Touted as an industry that will see phenomenal growth in the next couple of years, web development India is surely going to be the way of the future.

Munish Dev Rathee working as an SEO cum Content Writer for an Web development India Firm

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Munish_Dev