Pricing Guide

Or if you are the client…why you and your mom should get a blog.

I love blogs. Some people don’t. Some people even gag a little when they hear the word “Blogosphere”. It is kind of a lame word but it has really changed the landscape of the internet. Blogs are excellent on many levels. They function as SEO tools, sources of professional information, incredible down time killers, a soap box (for better and for worse) and a thought validator. Someone could come up with additional ideas but I feel that these reasons are more than sufficient for explaining the value of blog.

Blogs are great SEO tools because, if updated, they deliver fresh content. Google loves content that is constantly getting updated and blogs naturally produce that. It gives the spiders a reason to come back to the site and re-index your site. If you are writing quality posts you can also build links through other sites linking back to your site as reference, again, another thing search engines love. In addition to the links coming in it also gives you an opportunity to give links out. If you can get some reciprocal links then even better.

Blog posts are also awesome for submitting to social media sites too. Relevant posts can be submitted to respective social media sites and if they get popular then I hope your blog has a cache plugin installed from all the traffic you will receive, possible RSS subscribers, back links and if your lucky, viral traffic.

I know there can be doubt about the validity of someone seemingly posting random thoughts on the internet, but when you have sources like the Official Google Blog, Matt Mullenweg’s Blog (creator of WordPress) or Single Grain’s SEO blog you have some amazing, professional FREE information. These are only three of my favorite examples, there are thousands of sites instantly available on every topic. But please, as with any publication of any kind don’t believe what you read right away, cross check multiple sources to make sure there is a general consensus on the topic.

This one could sound arbitrary but it’s not! People are always faced with downtime…especially at work (if you are killing downtime right now then I recommend that you check out this video). The internet has to be the most abused work tool available. What would the sports junkies do without ESPN and their favorite sports blog? What would the avid green thumb do without their gardening blog giving the latest ten tips on better roses? With a blog you can capitalize on a niche by anticipating on people wanting to use your blog as a way to kill some down time.

The soap box is definitely a double edged sword. Blogs can act as an amazing way to keep your visitors updated on what is going on. The Digg blog is an excellent example of the moderators of a site interacting with it’s user base (here is a quick reminder of what happens when someone attempts to censor the internet). This is a very effective tool and a great way to reach the people connected to your site. The only problem is that everyone can stand on the soap box. This allows for parasitic content to seep its way through the internet like Perez Hilton’s celebrity blog. With the exception of a blogs like Perez Hilton’s the soap box idea is great and blogs make that ability easier than ever.

Blogs can act as thought validators. If you are writing about your niche and you have a thought on the topic that you feel is worthy of sharing you can. You put that idea out for everyone and see what happens. This is the hardest part of blogging, this is where the rejection happens. But it is through these moments of potential rejection that you can grow in your niche and become an expert in the topic. Being wrong and critiqued is where you can learn the most, where you can have your thoughts validated. Blogs are a great place for that process to happen. Of course, we are dealing with the internet, and believe it or not every person that graces this digital realm is civil, so brace yourself for that 12 year old moron who will leave that worthless comment on your blog calling you an “a**hole stupid head”. So now that you have read this call your mom that you want you her to get a blog.

Every day I am shocked to find people still paying for or designing sites that look like they have time warped out of 1995 into the present. I guess I can’t stop anyone from designing in this manner but I hope I can persuade people to not pay for an outdated product like this. There is a lot that goes into a design and there will be minutia that changes from client to client but I have noted below 5 ways that are universal for every design.

Color Scheme

This is where I usually start when designing from scratch or creating a solution for a client’s redesign. It is amazing what color can do positively and negatively. Every site should have a color scheme that matches the topic of the site. For example, if you are designing for a hospital you aren’t going to have a black and red color combo. You are going to have a lot of white and possibly a clinical blue or green to accompany. If you don’t feel confident in your ability to choose colors that compliment each other then let others come up with color schemes for you. There are two great online resources for choosing schemes at Colourlovers and Kuler.

Remove Clutter

I like to think of this like cleaning the house. When the dishes need to be done, your clothes are all over your floor and you have a week’s worth of beer bottles on the counter you start to feel bogged down and your house becomes less likable. This is the same with a web layout. If you have a cluttered site and people can’t figure out how to do anything or get to the information or service they want they will move on very swiftly to the next Google result. If you remove the clutter and make your content more concise and use space more effectively you will have a welcoming web environment and will please the site’s visitors.

Visual Metaphor

I firmly believe in a strong visual metaphor. The look of your site creates the first impression. The old saying “Don’t judge a book by its cover” is derived from human nature. People are attracted to things that look nice and, more specifically on the internet, that are going to let them know that they have arrived on a site that has the information they are searching for. If you have a website that is about organic living then utilize imagery of natural looking farms, people and food. This may sound obvious but if you spend time on the internet you will see that not everyone gets visual metaphor.

Spice up Subheads

Subheads can often be like the middle child in a family (no offense to any middle children out there). They get that syndrome where they feel forgotten and over looked. Subheads are important. They break up a page so it doesn’t seem like the content runs on forever. There are graphical solutions or CSS solutions as simple as creating a dashed line bottom border under an H2. Regardless of what solution you choose don’t forget the details of your design because things like subheads will be left out and your site will suffer.

Build on Current Trends

Web design is art. Art is inspired. New trends don’t just emerge out of thin air into existence; they evolve ever time. Don’t be afraid to notice current trends and implement them into your own designs. This is especially important on the internet when dealing with clients. They see what someone else has on their site and say “I want that!” This is your opportunity to build on what others have done and make it your own. Quentin Tarantino has created much controversy in the film world because of how heavily he uses past trends, but there is no mistaking a Tarantino film with another director, he has built on what others have done and made it his own. This practice is necessary and without it design would get stale and stagnant, which is why some people’s websites look like they do.

Here is a super basic 5 step tutorial to help make average pictures look more beautiful and professional looking. This is a quick side by side so you can see what result we are going to get from these quick 5 steps.

Step 1:

This is the easiest step, unlock the background layer.

Step 2:

After you have unlocked the background layer, duplicate it twice.

Step 3:

Change the top layer to a Hard Light layer and then adjust the opacity to your liking.

Step 4:

Change the middle layer to a Soft Light layer and then adjust the opacity to your liking.

Step 5:

The final touch will be adding a Gaussian Blur to both the Hard Light layer and the Soft Light layer. Go to the Filter drop down at the top and then go to Blur -> Gaussian Blur. I do 4.5 px radius.

Completed! You have now taken a mediocre looking picture and given it a more beautiful, professional look. Until next time friends.