Author: editor

HTML text links

WebPages usually have links that redirect you to another page. These links are usually called hyperlinks which can be in the form of words, phrases or images. Text links usually have the word or phrase. These links are specified by the element in which the and are the opening and closing tags. These tags are known as anchor tag which has the following attributes, href which is used to identify the URL of the target hyperlink. The value of the href is valid URL document which can either be absolute or relative and may include a fragment identifier and JavaScript fragment.

The document being linked needs to have a title. This allows the users to have an idea of what is included in the linked document. After all, users will only click on the link when they are interested in it. Interest is determined by the title of the link which is discussed in the document. The value of the title is usually a string that is enclosed in quotation marks. The title can be displayed as the word or phrase or can be hidden partly and highlighted only when the mouse is passed around the link.

Target is an attribute of the anchor which specifies the position where the link will be placed. This can be configured in various ways. For example, when the target is set as parent or top, the same window is used to display the page opened through the link. On the other hand, when blank is used, a new window is opened when the link is clicked on. The hyperlink can also be set as self in which the new page is loaded on the current window. It is possible to set labels on the document. This is done by the use of name and id attributes of the anchor tag. Depending on the page that you are placing a link for, you may need to use JavaScript and VBscript. In such a case, the attributes onClick and Onmouseover are used to trigger the Scripts. This is usually common with pages that have graphics which are loaded using the scripts.

It is important to provide access keys which are to be activated using the keyboard to allow the users to access the document. Access keys are depending on which key the webmaster would like to use. Most common access keys are CTRL and ALT used along with other keys which could be T, A, D or any other key the webmaster chooses. For the user to access the linked document, the key CTRL or ALT is pressed and press the other key without releasing the CTRL or ALT key. This automatically activates the document which is opened in either the current or a new window depending on the settings put by the webmaster. If you are planning to include links in your site, it is important to ensure that users are able to visualize them well. You can color the link which should be visible to all clients. Do not use colours that are not easily visible.

HTML Tables and essential tags

When creating websites, some data would not make sense unless it in table. Tables are just spreadsheets which contain rows and columns. Table in HTML is created by the use of the table tag . The table is written row by row which is done by the use of

tag which stands for table row. Each cell is written using the tag

. The cell is the column of the table. A typical table will be written in the following sequence.

row 1, column 1 row 1, column 2
Row 1, Column 1 Row 2 Column 2

and will produce a table that looks like

Row 1, Column 1 Row 1, Column 2
Row 2, Column 1 Row 2, Column 2

The table must have a heading. The tag

is replaced with the tag

which is the heading of the contents of the table. It is important for the table contents to be readable. The size of the rows and columns should be of standard size. The height of the width using the height and width attributes. Not too small or too big. However, the table can have large columns and rows when the content input extends beyond the size of the columns and rows designated. They are usually self adjustable depending on the amount of data input. For enhanced readability, cell spacing and cell padding are used to adjust the white space of the rows and columns. Cell spacing is the width of the border while cell padding is the distance between the content of the columns and rows and the borders.

At times, there is need to merge two columns or rows. Colspan and rowspan are used to attributes are used to merge two or more columns and two or more rows respectively. The two can be used with the tag

before the other tags of the table are set. Like all elements used on the internet, there has to be consistent contrast on the table. This is determined by the colour of the background and that of the text. When the background of the table is brightly coloured, the text should be darkly coloured and vice versa. By default, the background of the table is usually white and the text colour used is normally black.However, one can change the colours of the two according to his preference. Colours that are easily visible should be used to allow the user to Cleary see the contents of the table. The colour of the background is set using the attribute bgcolor. The border of the columns and rows can also be coloured. Always ensure that the colours used in the three elements contrast accordingly and they can be visualized with ease. You can also add images to the background using the bgcolor attribute. Depending on what you are targeting, you can use a table inside another table. This is enhanced by using the technique of nesting tables.

Technical and creative aspects of Website Administration

A webmaster is a credit force to the success of any website. Sure, there are other persons that play a contributory role, but the webmaster is considered to be more indispensable than the rest. Part of the reason for this is because they deal with the technical aspects of website development. These are not easy to understand without prior training. Authoring in the proper language and scripting using the most desirable formats takes training, and an understanding of all these aspects and more, is something a webmaster is expected to have.

 

Setting up a website takes more than simply having a host and a catchy name for it. There are so many details that come between having the plan for it, putting the plan into play, developing it, and finally presenting it into a fully accessible site with a reliable server. This middleman task, which, even in writing sounds somewhat complex, is easily done by a website administrator- if they have the right set of skills for it. Any material developed for the site has to be coded in HTML, so it goes without saying that a webmaster has to gain HTML expertise. The language itself is not complicated, but you need to work with it for a long time to truly understand it.

 

Programming is the other technical aspect of website administration. C Programming and Perl are preferred by most webmasters. Having knowledge in at least one programming language is deemed essential in web development. Graphic design prowess and awareness in programming with JavaScript and SSI is important too. But this is as far as the technical side of it is concerned. There is more to web management than this rather complicated side. There is the creative side of it which involves management of the content that is posted on the website.

 

Content management depends on the purpose of the site. A news site or one that regularly needs updating -sometimes several times a day- needs a committed content manager. If the site is commercial, said manager, who is still considered a webmaster as far as job title is concerned, is responsible for running advertising campaigns, marketing, and basically keeping the content of the website accurate and updated. For this, a lot of creativity is needed. Use of SEO as a marketing tool is a desired quality in a content manager, since it has a proven track record of increasing the rank of a website.

 

A good webmaster is skilled when it comes to the technical parts of web development. A better one can not only attest to having that, but also being creative enough to meet the content management needs of a website. One might argue that stepping into content management oversteps a boundary, since there are content managers with the training to do that. But this is hardly the case. After all, there are content managers who are going into the technical parts of website management so there is basically no argument there. Having both skills, undoubtedly, makes you a more marketable webmaster.

Getting started in web design as a professional

The web design world is dynamic and it keeps changing and being updated constantly. It is also one of the most sought after professions in the current times. In most cases web design is a hobby turned career and it thrills most starters to be able to make money out of an interesting activity. Web design is artistic in nature and works well with people who are naturally creative but in the current world, artistic talent is not enough to curb the cut throat competition that is now evident in this sector. While formal training is not a must for you to be successful in web design, it is important in order to convince your clients that you are qualified enough for them to put their trust on you. However, it still does not mean that you cannot cut out a successful career in web design just because you lack formal education; after all in web design, it is the quality of the design that really sells not the qualifications of the designer.

If you feel like you have the technical knowhow to build a professional site, you can get into web design as a career. However, people in this filed will tell you that it takes some time to gain footing in the market and win the clients’ confidence. Good returns might not be instant so you can consider taking on web design as a part time job and keep your current job until your web design career is stable enough.

What do you need to do to make yourself marketable? Well, the current market needs the designer to be up to date with the latest tends so that is the first thing you need to do. Web design is a very wide discipline and it involves creation of visual layouts using graphics software such as Adobe Photoshop, programming or adding functionality for example using HTML and server side scripting respectively and Flash development. Basic web design skills require you to be able to combine different design elements to create a visually appealing website. This is usually done using Adobe Photoshop but there are other programs that can effectively carry out this task. Once you are able to do this, you can consider learning programming. This can make you marketable in addition to increasing your profit margins because you will not need to hire and pay a programmer to do the programming work for you. Another outlet would be to learn how to build templates for the many content management systems that are being developed such as WordPress and Drupal.

Web design has many outlets and once you start off, you will be able to tell which aspects of web design interest you and which ones you can specialize more on. However, web design will keep changing and new trends being developed. Despite the changes, the professional experience will teach you how to satisfy your customers and their audience and that is a lesson only learnt through experience, as long as you are patient enough.

Right approach to web design

Web design basically means the art of arranging elements that appear in any given website in a logical manner. It is important to plan carefully before you sit down to create the website. One of the factors you have to consider when planning is the target audience. Different audiences have varying tastes and preferences mostly depending on their age. Young people like to have a lot entertainment while the old people do not care about it.

If your target audience is the youth, you may consider including a lot of graphics in your web design. You can also use calligraphy and other interesting writing letters. When using such elements, you need to have the knowledge of using tools like HTML and CSS which improve the site in general. A lot of graphics may affect the loading speed of the entire site and can frustrate clients if care is not taken. CSS allows the use of small files and greatly enhances the loading speed of the site. In such a case, you need to have these tools at hand when planning to design the site. On the other hand, old people prefer professionalism and it would not be of any value to include a lot of entertainment graphics.

The general structure of the website has to be considered when planning the look of the website. If need be, you can sketch the structure of the website in a rough paper. Please make use of important tools like CSS if your site will have tables, images and graphics. CSS allows you to position these elements where you want them to be. This tool also allows you to take control of the entire site at once making it easy to add and modify content in all pages at once. Decide on the colour you will use and make sure that the colour of the background, text and images complement each other for easy readability by the clients.

Ensure that you have access to the right tags and templates which determine the functionality of the entire site. Write down the key words you will use depending on the content you are planning to write on. Keywords are very important because they will determine the ranking by major search engines. Include the right content size because a lot of information may confuse the readers affecting traffic to your site. There is need to ensure that the content on your site meets the need of the target audience.

Also, make sure that your site will be available at all times and compatible with all major browsers. Availability simply means that the site loads fast enough for the clients to access all the information they would like to access. As stated above, tools like CSS will enhance loading speeds of your site. Compatibility on the other hand allows clients to access the website from all available browsers. Some web designers make the mistake of not ensuring this which hinders clients from accessing the site from some browsers. This may make potential clients look for alternative site thereby losing the important traffic.

Do Not Go With These SEOs

We are going to tell you warning signals to look out for when you are searching for a SEO company or consultant to work with on your site.

  • Please watch out for spam. Do you know what spam is? Unsolicited emails. You need to be careful not to choose a SEO consultant that just sends you spam emails. If they can send spam messages, they are also spam and not genuine themselves. Make sure to treat them the way you treat spam mails so that you will not get your fingers burnt.
  • Google itself has said that it is not possible to get a guarantee of being ranked as number one on any of its search pages, so be careful you are not deceived by any SEO consultant that is promising you that or claiming to have special relationship with any search engine. You might even come across a SEO consultant that will promise you a priority submission in to enhance a top place ranking, do not go with such because there is no truth in that.
  • A SEO consultant or company that is not ready to provide explanations on how they want to carry out the job you are offering is not a good choice for you.
  • Please do not have anything to do with a SEO consultant that is offering links or submitting your site to so many search engines, you will definitely not have anything to gain from that.
  • Ensure that you do not go with a SEO that has ever been shown in bad light. This you can do by conducting good research on the various kinds of SEO companies or consultants available. Search engines can help you in this regard.
  • Do go with a SEO that cannot explain in clear terms what the money you are to pay is meant for. Is the money meant for an inclusion on search pages permanently? Or is it meant for temporary advertisement?
  • Don’t employ a SEO that have shadow domains
  • A SEO that gets traffic from unreal search engines, scumware and  spyware are not good for you
  • A SEO that does not have a listing in a search engine due to the fact that they have been removed or they never got one is definitely not a right one
  • Any SEO consultant or company that operates with various types of nicknames is likely not genuine.
  • If you find out that the SEO you are considering puts links to their other clients’ or on the doorway of pages should not be a choice for you because you will suffer a great loss if the relationship between both of you goes sour.  The doorway that they put on pages is used to drain away the link popularity of the site in question.

Above all, follow your instincts, if you have instincts about the lack of authenticity of a SEO even if you have proved them to be otherwise by the above points please follow your instincts.

Creating A Lovely Atmosphere With SEO Rather Than Rivalry

Basically, for the people who have decided to employ the search engine optimization strategies to their online businesses, some of them view the whole exercise as an adversary that should be conquered no matter the circumstance while others have a view to it as a partnership with the search engines. In whatever view that you might be having, it is capable to achieve the set goal if each strategy is well set up. In this article, you will get to learn of the various opinions that these different kinds of people have in mind and at the end of it all you will know of the best route to take.

When it comes to the adversarial optimization strategies, the strategies are laid in a way that you get to compete with other people who are in your line of business. The strategies are dependent on the latest technologies. The SEO expert gets to unveil the latest technology as well as unleash the latest algorithm used by the search engines as well as figure out the latest methods that could assist one in ranking high in the search engine searches. These strategies are meant to trick the search engine into bringing forth a website that is predominantly in the search results since the website is not in a position to offer the traits that the search engine considers to be of worth. Compared to other methods, this one is not said to be hard or to possess a lot of formalities. On the other hand, this methodology is not recommended since its benefits may not be long term and are not validated by most search engines which and may also land you in trouble where your site may get expelled by a particular search engine.

For those who might view the search engines as their partners in growing their businesses, their strategies are totally different from the previous one. These strategies indicate that the traits that make the site rank high in the search engine ranks are the same that make it significantly of importance to the visitors who are directed to them. These strategies are sourced from the common algorithm which is from different search engines so as to make your search engine optimization better.

In most cases, you might hear of a lot of complaints from people who have other sites of smaller companies than theirs ranking higher than they do. The first thing that ne should know is that the search engine do not care of the diversity of the company but the algorithm and the importance of the site to what the visitor is looking for matters more. When you take the search engine to be a partner to your business, you will reap more rather than investing in strategies that only earn you short term success.

When you are in a partnership with the search engine, you will reap more even when new strategies are being employed by others. When you fall in ranks you never get to fall too low but you will always be near the top.

Web design mistakes you should avoid

Web design has long moved from those days when only few people knew how to operate websites to a time when owning a website especially for online and offline marketers is essential. Many people are designing their own websites whether they have attended a web design class or not. Even though the world of web design has moved to a whole new level with this development, there are still a lot of mistakes that some web designers are making: mistakes that are costing them a significant amount of money without their knowledge. Whether you are new or experienced in the world of web design, here are some mistakes you will need to avoid.

Publishing very long articles could have the opposite effect of what you desire. You may think that your content is quality and that viewers will want to keep scrolling to read through the whole content but the opposite is true. The fact is that viewers rarely read content that is beyond the fold. When you are publishing your articles, try as much as possible to include all the necessary and captivating information above the fold and then offer a link to the rest of the information.

Using sound or overusing flash is so 90s and it is also a mistake that will cost you dearly. It not only increases your loading time but it is also purely annoying. Most customers will not actually wait for the page to load and the few that do will be turned away by the irritating overuse of flash and sounds. Do not also clutter your website with excess badges and network communities. This could make you come across as not confident and trying too hard. If your website specializes on this, incorporate the badges and network communities in the main content.

Opening new browser windows from sites is another common mistake made by designers. Most designers think that by doing this, they leave the site accessible to the visitor in case they would want to return. However, this takes the control away from the user something that does not go well with them. Another mistake that attempt to take control form the user is resizing your browser window to match up to your display requirements and it just displays plain laziness. Also, avoid launching the content pages of your website through the use of a home page. It is more favorable for your link to lead directly to the information being searched by the customer.

Some web designers are also notorious for blending advertisements with the real content. While this may yield a few through clicks, it is annoying and likely to chase away your long term readers. Also, limit the number of internal links that you use in your side. Instead, focus on explaining the concept within the content instead of redirecting the customer to another site within the current site. Finally, do not make it compulsory for users to register in order to use your site or register them without their consent. Allow your users to sample your site first and let them decide on their own.

The 2 Most Common Web Site Mistakes

Websites are the most important tools to their respective owners. Sites are used to market, advertise and to attract traffic thereby making profits. Making a mistake in your website can lead to adverse consequences which can get you out of the business. If you are advertising and marketing through a website that has mistakes, you may not get visitors because they would be discouraged by the mistakes in the site. Human is to error and mistakes are somehow inevitable. However, you cannot afford to make some mistakes because the consequences would not be bearable.

Traffic is very important to website owners because their lives are dependent on it one way or the other. In fact, some website owners do not have any other source of livelihood except website traffic. Owners of the website are constantly introducing varying contents depending on the target group and the season. Contents to be introduced may also be dictated by events to take place in the near future. The right content at the right time will surely attract huge traffics to the site. On the other hand, it is imperative to determine what people want at what time to ensure consistency in traffic to your site.

Site owners and content developers should be aware that it is not all the content published that is embraced by the general public. This can be the case if you have not been able to identify what your target clients want. Of course this may create a problem in traffic statistics affecting your earnings and rank. It is your responsibility to identify whether there is a problem or not. If there is any problem, try to solve it fast enough. Problems that are not solved on time will make your clients to look for other options and you may end up losing traffic. You can research on your site and determine which topics have significant searches and which have fewer searches. You can also investigate whether there is a problem and strategize on how to solve the problem at hand.

Websites use different principles depending on the content and the target group. Some websites have database linked to the site and the particular item searched is retrieved from the database. At this juncture, database parameters have to be considered for such sites. These sites are database driven and every search is retrieved from the database. Such cases are common with sites that provide listing services for instance houses, land and vehicles for sale and jobs on offer. Such a website calls for careful control of your sub domains. Session Ids should indicate dynamic pages; pages with unique titles and not anything else.

Despite being preferred by most web developers, dynamic model of URLs has one major disadvantage; such sites are not liked by major search engines. This adversely affects site ranking in the search engines affecting traffic to your site. In fact, you receive fewer robots which are indicative of indexing by major search engines. This is because robots cannot be able to determine the content of the page. Considering these factors will assist you circumvent mistakes that would make you retire from the business.

Social bookmarking for getting traffic

The current widespread use of internet has come along with many advantages. Previously, online marketing was not all that popular especially with people who had nothing to do on the internet except send and receive mails. It was quite hard for such people to come across website advertisements. The current evolution of the internet as a mode of communication is an invention that will forever be celebrated by online marketers. It is through this invention that social bookmarking has become a popular means of drawing traffic to blogs. Online marketers are now widely using social bookmarking to market their blogs and reaping huge benefits from it. Here are a few tips on how you can use social bookmarking to the advantage of your blog.

Just like search engine optimization or blogging, make sure your headings are attractive. There are many great articles on social bookmarking sites that do not get even a single hit because the heading does not catch the reader’s attention. You can modify the headings you use in social bookmarking sites to make them simpler, more detailed and more appealing considering the type of readers that are likely to visit these sites. In addition to the heading, make sure you provide a brief and interesting description of the article in order to provoke your reader’s curiosity and make them want to know more. This can be done in about 100 – 150 words. The first paragraph of the article should also be captivating enough to make the reader want to read the article. A boring first paragraph can make the reader not consider the rest of the article no matter how detailed it is. After you have provoked the reader, keep the reader more interested in your article by making your content clear, concise and interesting.

In a social bookmarking site, you should provide for the readers to be able to vote your article and also to bookmark it. Submit your article at the right time when potential readers are most likely to be awake and when traffic is known to be more. You should also make sure that you submit your article to the right category and not to the categories where all unclassified stuff goes to.

When using a social bookmarking site more than once, strive to build a respected profile by posting interesting articles and links to other interesting articles. Also, try to work with many social bookmarkers in order to increase your ratings in the social bookmarks as your network of friends is likely to follow you across the various sites.

Before submitting an article to a social bookmarking site, try to research on the topics that are popular in that particular site as not all topics sell in one site. You should also make sure that your article is not outdated, it is factual, it does not have spelling errors and that it is presented in a language understandable to most of the users of that particular site. After submitting your articles, make sure you make time to read and respond to any comments left by the readers.