Blog•
on November 5th, 2009•
I have been seeing this quite often lately. Someone will tell me a link (URL) to a website and I’ll type it into Firefox or Safari only to find the website doesn’t load and simply displays a “Server not found” error. Now the problem is, I am typing example.com.au without the www (after all, who has the time for all those w’s, right?) and because the DNS hasn’t been setup properly on the DNS or web server, the website will not load. If I type in www.example.com.au the website loads and the world continues to spin…
To me it seems a no-brainer to have your site show up regardless of whether the www is there or not and it’s really not that hard to do, we actually do it by default for every client we host.
Try visting your website with and without the w’s and see if you can see your website on both, if not, you may be missing out on some traffic.
Now for the fun bit! Whichever one you don’t use (www or no www) you will want a 301 redirect to point from one to the other so search engines don’t try to index the same website twice. This is just a matter of placing some code inside your .htaccess file on the server.
Example:
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.networkdynamics.com.au [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://networkdynamics.com.au/$1 [R=301,L]
Feel free to contact us if you find you’re having trouble with your website’s URL.
Blog•
on August 8th, 2009•
When writing content for your website visitors, make sure you keep your paragraphs brief and to the point. You’re not writing a book, people don’t visit websites to read big chunks of text, they want small amounts of information that’s easy to absorb.
Use bullet points – If you want to highlight a specific process or feature, try creating bullet points instead of long lines of text.
Write for your audience – There’s no point listing every acronym under the sun if nobody understands them, use plain english.
Bold and highlight – If you want to draw attention to specific words or paragraphs, try using bold, underline or different colours.
Blog•
on November 4th, 2008•
When designing a website, colour is usually a high priority as it may need to suit company colours or convey a particular mood. Some industries are suited to particular colours due to their associations. Here is a brief run down on how colours can be associated with emotions:
Blue – peace, tranquility, calm, stability, trust, confidence, loyalty, cold, technology.
Green – nature, environment, health, good luck, renewal, generosity.
Red – love, danger, desire, emergency.
Orange – warmth, energy, attention, caution.
Yellow – joy, happiness, optimism, idealism, imagination, hope, spirituality, inspiration.
Black – power, sexuality, sophistication, formality, elegance, wealth, depth, style.
White – purity, simplicity, cleanliness, peace, sterility.
For most customers, your website will be the first point of contact or the “front door” of your business. You only get one chance to make a good impression as your opposition is only one mouse click away! Keeping your website current is important
There are two ways to keep your website information current depending on how often this information is likely to change. For small changes, it may be better to send your web developer a quick email letting them know what you need done. If you’re making regular changes, consider a CMS or e-commerce solution which gives you the power to edit the website content from your browser.
Prices – Listing the wrong price can look misleading and can upset most customers.
Product information - Make sure you’re providing the right product information
Contact information – Wrong contact information could mean loss of potential sales. Make sure people can get in touch.
When I visit a company’s website it’s usually to find out how to contact them. I am often amazed at how hard people make it to find their contact details. I actually feel like I’ve been entered into a competition and if I find the company’s phone number I’ll receive a prize!
You’ve spent time, effort and money getting online, so why not make it easy for people to get in touch? Here are a few tips to consider:
Phone number – In most cases people will want to call you. Why not show your phone number on every page?
Email address – Some people would rather email you using their own email program rather than a form so show your email address as a link or image.
Location – If people need to come to you, list your address and/or a map on your contact page. This can often reduce phone calls from people asking where you are.