Missouri Website Builders

Google’s latest venture, Google TV, comes from the idea of “connected TV” – televisions  that let people browse the Web for videos, news stories, video conferencing and music.

Wondering how in the world to develop an App for Google TV?

Google has released an initial web development guide to aid those interested in porting their Web or mobile applications to Google TV, the newly announced platform built on top of Google Chrome technology.

• Make it Simple: Identify the vital parts of your app before starting work, stick with one visible mode of navigation or one information hierarchy, make the primary action reachable in one click, avoid the temptation to use abstract icons, limit vertical scrolling, and preselect the user’s next action when you can.
• Get Navigation Right: Google TV users will often navigate with a directional pad, so the navigation model involves up, down, left, right and enter buttons and action. Make your app navigable with one hand.
• Design for TV screens, not Computer Screens: TVs have wider screens, so you should make UI elements slightly larger. Also, avoid highly saturated and very bright colors, and design for 1280×720 and 1920×1080 resolutions, including at least a 10% margin. Use pure white (#FFFFFF) sparingly.
• Pick the Right Fonts: Avoid lightweight fonts or those with very narrow or broad strokes. Use simply constructed sans serif fonts and apply anti aliasing to increase readability. Google TV currently supports only the Droid Sans and Droid Serif font families. If you want to use font embedding techniques to create a more customized appearance, you can, but this relies on Flash design, which will be slower.
• Make Onscreen Text Readable:
  • Limit each paragraph to no more than 90 words.
  • Break text into small chunks that can be read at a glance.
  • Keep line length at about five to seven words per line. Never go shorter than three or longer than 12.
  • Remember that light text on a dark background is slightly easier to read on TV (compared to dark text on a light background).
  • Target body text to be around 21pt on 720p and 28pt on 1080p.
  • Don’t use any text smaller than 18pt on 720p and 24pt on 1080p.
  • Add more leading (larger line spacing) for onscreen text than print text.
• Don’t Use Disruptive Sounds: By default, volume should be low. Make it simple to mute the app. Don’t make interactions dependent on audio cues.
• Use Flash Wisely: Google TV can play 720p and 1080p Flash videos. Use h.264 encoding, not h.263 or vp6. Avoid Flash banner or sidebar ads that include video. Only use one instance of the media player at a time. Be conscious of system memory.
• Be Conscious of Performance: Perceived performance is more important than actual performance for TV apps. Make sure the app never executes so much code that the runtime can’t frequently update the screen and gather user input. You may need to divide a task into parts to accomplish this.
• Use Bitmaps: Use bitmaps to optimize rendering.
• Watch Out for Tweening: Minimize the use of motion tweens to help content run faster. (Source - Read Write Web)

With Google TV, “television is no longer confined to showing just video” explains Salahuddin Choudhary, Google TV product manager, in a blog post. “It can be a photo slideshow viewer, a gaming console, a music player and much more.”

Web design only carries the online identity so far. Not branding the company Web site with a logo is tantamount to becoming lost in the abyss of Google surf results. Sites sans the corporate logo tend to lack a certain panache and credibility. The proceeding bulleted list particularizes logo design:  

• Logos are like badges of honor, which lend authenticity to an entity’s offerings.

• Logo design is most effective when it reflects the product identity, appealing to its specific target audience.

• Over the last decade, the following logo design trends have been popular among well-known brands.

• 3D logo  - Well before the debut of “Avatar” three-dimensional logo design have been in vogue for quite some time.

• Eco-smart logos – symbolize environmental responsibility. The IgoCar sharing company exudes the eco-concept by using green to emphasize its font based logo design.

• Conceptual Logos intelligently camouflage certain shapes and features, which are unique to the brand.

• Minimalism logo – Apple and Nike are examples of minimalism logo design.

• Signature Logo –Effective for luxury and designer apparel, signature logos are brand-driven

• Despite the aforementioned list of logo design styles, the most distinctive logo is not limited to the latest trend in logo design.

• The colors used for logo design inculcate specific mental associations.

• Book Antiqua, Didot and Lucida Calligraphy exemplify elegantly stylized fonts, applied to luxury products.

• Purported as the lasted trend, conceptual logo design incorporates and conceals another design element. For instance, Budweiser’s Select beer product line’s brand identity consists of a red crown with five smartly disguised points, representing the five ingredients used to make Budweiser Select beer.

The web design company, The Net Impact utilizes a typeface logo to distinguish its company. (See the example below).

The Net Impact's logo design typifies the typeface logo

If your company needs more Web design or logo design assistance, contact the Net Impact at 888.629.4672.

Overlooking social media design is a tempting prospect. After all, why should anyone pay a web design company to develop a layout for a free service? Nurturing consumer loyalty is the rudimentary objective of social media. Without a visually magnificent fan wall or follower’s page, it’s just one bland social media page among a throng of millions.

It’s no secret that social media design requires more than selecting the templates, available in Facebook and Twitter web applications. Just as the company Web site, stationary and traditional advertising collateral sport the company’s insignia, the social media site is not any different.

Did you know... that social media doubles as a market research platform. Moreover, corporations with social media pages on Facebook and Twitter bolster better page rankings and search engine visibility than those that do not subscribe to social media.

Since, social media remains an enigma to small to large sizes businesses, companies should approach the marketing catalyst with a strategy in mind. Use the following list to refine a social media design strategy:

• How does your firm plan to use social media to heighten brand awareness? 

• Does your firm plan to leverage social media to enhance the company reputation?

• Is your business introducing a new product line or service(s)? Whether social media design is for new or existing products, remember to include the products, logo and other distinctive brand traits on the Twitter and Facebook site layouts. Also, make sure that your company’s Web site has a link to the Facebook  and Twitter sites.

Social media design tip: Compile a list, creating a profile of the specific target segments

Once the social media design is complete, be sure to assign a member of the team the responsibility of keeping the page fresh and current.

 Please click “social media design” for more information.

Sometimes web design is counterproductive to converting site traffic. Certain layout flaws impede a site’s ability to seamlessly transition a unique visitor into a new customer.  Using the storefront ABCD Stuff, as an example, it is located across the street from Madison Square Garden. Each day hundreds of thousands of potential customers walk past the store. It sells everything from batteries, gifts to zippo lighters. On a daily basis, more than a 100 people enter ABCD Stuff and walk out suddenly.

Despite the visibility to random foot traffic, the store is comprised of 500 square feet. Void of aisle markers and organization, each shelf is a hodgepodge of products. Many would be customers complain that ABCD Stuff feels cluttered. The owner does not understand that the store’s layout and product presentation is hobbling its sales.

Consumers are generally impatient and indecisive requiring an immediate ability to locate specific products. Walgreens is strategically laid out to maximize its point-of-purchase model. The publicly traded general store averages customer transactions within five to seven minutes. It’s also why the corporation tries to maintain the same blueprint and continuity at most of its locations across the country.

Conversion driven  web design necessitates a similar infrastructure philosophy:

• A well-organized layout
• Clean navigation
• Intelligibly labeled pages
• Each web page maintains a semblance of continuity

 As for analyzing your business’ website design  for it conversions, answer the following:

• Does your site have high traffic, coupled with a high bounce rate?
• Are the pages titled, using quirky headings?
• Does your site convert fewer than five percent of its visitors?
• Are most of the pages designed in flash?
• Are only half of your company’s offerings featured on the Web site?

If you answered no to each of the aforementioned questions, your company’s web design should have a high conversion ratio. However, two or more “YES” responses  suggests a potential incongruity with a site’s conversions and overall  productivity –  qualifying your business for a complimentary consultation. Please click: “Contact The Net Impact ” to  claim a hassle-free web design analysis. 

Q: Over the last six-months, we’ve noticed that our competitors are engaging in social media. While we never planned to subscribe to Twitter or Facebook, we realize that it’s an inevitable catalyst for connecting with our target audience. Can you provide any website design tips for creating an engaging fan wall on Facebook?

Incorporating social media with the rest of your company’s  market strategy complements the overall online presence. The first step to creating an engaging Facebook page is to determine which place on the page you hope to capture visitors’ attention.

Next, select your photos and artwork wisely. A photo, logo or a piece of artwork that reflecting the brand is necessary to set Facebook page apart from your competitors. A promotional banner is an alternative to the logo or photo. Facebook accepts images as a large as 200 by 600 pixels. Include a photo large enough to assure visibility. Try to strike a fine balance between your company’s profile and photo without upstaging the rest of your fan page’s elements.

Page tabs are another website design tactic for giving the web page a distinctive personality or fan appeal. Facebook has a module application that is accessible via the FBML application. The feature enables anyone to replace those cookie cutter tabs with more engaging ones. The caveat is that the process requires a modicum of HTML editing knowledge.

Develop a strategy to incentivize your reader’s experience. Among hoards of Facebook pages, an alluring landing page is key to acquiring new fans and prospective clients. Aside from changing the tabs, an awe-inspiring welcome page, integrating some of the congruent features associated with the product’s website design, maintains brand continuity.

For precisely appointed website design for your organization’s Facebook page, The Net Impact provides social media design in accordance with your company brand. Simply dial 1-8-8-8-6-2-9-4-6-7-2.

Review these five statements that a  Web design company should never make:

Navigation is secondary, visitor will figure it out.  On the contrary, navigation influences how  visitors and prospective consumers experiences a site. Ideally, horizontal, vertical, top and bottom navigation enables visitors to interact with your site according to their viewing preferences.

Forty second page loads are the norm. Many sites designed in animation have long page loads, which can be irritating for the visitor, who wants to quickly determine whether a site has the offerings that he or she is in search of. More importantly, Google evaluates many Web sites based on the immediacy at which a site loads. Since, findings show that long page loads motivate site abandonment, and a high bounce rate, some major search engines penalize page rank.

We decided to alter the color of your logo. It is unprofessional for any creative entity to modify another organization’s branding. In cases where a logo loses its visual efficacy online, the appropriate protocol is to notify or create an alternate for consideration.

Web design has nothing to do with search engine optimization. Although web design and SEO are not one in the same, a  site should be designed to reinforce its exposure to major search engine traffic. After all, a well-architected site is only as effective as the attention it attracts and converts.

Don’t worry about security. Site security is a critical issue, protecting  a site from spam and assuring that customers are able to complete sales transactions without any security breaches concurs with the purpose of enhancing the online identity: growing new client relationships. Any web design company, downplaying security, is a vendor unworthy of your company’s contract.

In the end, hire a company with a proven track record of case studies and a commitment to marrying suitable web design for the best SEO. Contact the Net Impact for professional advice.

Web design exceeds the aesthetic features of a slickly stylized Web site. Before a prospective client or site visitor is converted, retention is the first order of events. Based on website design studies and A/B testing, the Net Impact, a St. Louis based website design firm recommends these effective layout guidelines:

Placement reigns. Web pages, featuring top horizontal navigation, attain a higher conversion rate than top left vertical  ones. Clean, concise site navigation delivers the best user-ability because it simplifies the visitor experience, assuring a benter retention rate.

Web promotions, nestled in the top right corner of the home page, attract the most conversion action. Also, position other feature promotions, prominent enough to capture the visitor’s attention. 

Style matters.  Fonts, color and layout influence a site’s underlying magnification qualities. Integrate color psychology in with the web design development strategy. Select a typeface that epitomizes your products and services. 

Size repels or appeals. Certain Web sites use microscopic fonts to assure that readers review the content. Depending on the visitor’s vision, diminutive typeface can repel the visitor from lingering a Web site. Select content which makes it easy for the visitor to scan.

Content captures.  While certain market research statistics illustrate that photos attract attention, others defy the theory. In other words, a dominant headline can outperform a mediocre photo. Make sure that all content formats add value, enhancing the visitor’s experience on the site.                                           

Maintain continuity. With the right content management system, web design continuity is a no brainer, assuring online visibility.

Click on Website design for additional innovative ideas.

Ever wonder—why certain images, photographs, and logos–don’t appear right on a Website? It has to do with a five letter word: FORMAT. Not every format works for every Website design. For example, one would not watch the St. Louis Blues, NHL hockey team in a cinematic format on a high-definition television screen. It would lop off the player’s heads, making them appear deformed, hindering puck visibility.

Regardless of who designs the company Website, images should be in the appropriate format and of the best quality. There’s nothing worse than a poorly shot photo which ultimately diminishes the quality of the website design; thus, the company persona.

Consider an actor’s headshot. Although the Brad Pitt look-alike with the most credits, would be the likely choice; but, if the photo is rendered in poor quality, it merely negates the expertise and professionalism that the resume touts.

Even if you’re using the content management system that does it all, images must be uploaded in the appropriate format.

Image, Photograph, Logo – Format Guide

BMP -Although images saved in a bitmap format is nothing but a series of dots (pixels). .GIF and  JPEG are the preferred formats.

.GIF — is the acronym for ‘Graphical Interface Format,” the best format for presenting computer-generated artwork, such as graphics or the company logo.

.JPEG also abbreviated using .jpg is the acronym for ‘Joint Photographic Experts Group’. In the realm of website design, this format is perfect for posting photos on the Internet or Web site. The JPEG format should not be used to depict logos or graphical images.

PSD stands for the Photoshop file extension. Before Photoshop images are uploaded to a Web site, be sure to convert to either a .GIF (logo / graphic) or .JPEG (photograph).

Since EPS formats are for print design and TIFF renders images in the highest resolution, both formats are not conducive for the Web.

Want to learn more? Then click on website design to read our tips, tactics and case studies.

Doe ecommerce web design really impact the customer experience and retention? Yes, and here’s why:

It’s a Friday afternoon. Your site is running a clearance sale on popular items. Upon analyzing your site’s traffic statistics and sales transactions, it is apparent that 70 percent of your prospective customers abandoned the shopping cart, right before checking out.

 

E-commerce is all about the results. A high rate of shopping cart abandonment is an indication that something is misaligned in the web design. Moreover, with ecommerce alluring web design and features the higher the rate of customer retention. Use the following web design tips to develop an enticing ecommerce Web site.

Web design for customer retention: Interactive tools

• Create interactive tools to initiate the dialogue with your visitors:
• Publish newsworthy and information of interest to the target market
• Include a searchable catalog so that consumers can easily find products, resources and information
• Welcome the dialogue by allowing consumers to comment on products and services
• Give the consumer the option to experience your site with out without flash
• Develop a community where customers create their own profiles or calendar

 Generate leads to build your own mailing list

• Offer a free newsletter subscription
• Require visitors to share their email address in exchange for special offers or to access information

Ease the Sales Transaction – Check out Process

• Make the sales transaction easy by offering a variety of payment options
• Provide your customers with adequate information regarding products, deliveries, and return policies
• Incorporate the appropriate security measures to protect your customer’s personal account information
• After each sales transaction, send your customers an automated confirmation response

Seek Professional Assistance

Consult a SEO company or Web designer who specialize in ecommerce to  conduct a series of A/B Testing. This will help refine your web design to ultimately convert more traffic.

For a complimentary ecommerce web design consultation, dial 888.629.4672.

Building a Web site acceptable to Google’s guidelines is an inevitable, commonsensical option. For the small to large company planning to seize a small share of the 91 million searches per day on Google), adhering to the search engine’s web design tips is the prerequisite for equitable participation. According to Web designers and SEO consultants of the Missouri based Web design company, The Net Impact that means, “no crafty or prohibited” web design programming.

Use these web design tips to reduce the chances of being penalized or banned by Google:

No cloaking. Everyone has stumbled across the top ranked Web page, which appears to offer information, but in reality is a roster of link ads. These sites are designed to trick the search engines into perceiving the site as a resource, when the site offers nil informational value. Cloaking is one of the easiest techniques for being penalized and potentially removed from Google.

Negative association brings on poor site rankings. With so many webmasters and companies consumed with Page Rank, do not be tempted to participate in any linking program designed to boost site rankings. Quite often, many link exchange schemes are merely a network of web spammers, which may ultimately adversely affect a site’s ranking.

Ignorance is not bliss. Being incognizant of how the web designer or SEO analyst programs you company’s site can be a costly mistake. Be sure to ask your web designer these questions:

• Does the web design consist of any hidden text or hidden links?

• Are the redirects smartly disguised techniques?

• Will the programming submit automated queries to Google via your site?

• Are other sub-domains and multiple pages riddled with similar content?

An affirmative response to the aforementioned questions means that the web design and programming are breaching Google’s guidelines. Seek professional advice from a Web design company who employs legitimate Web design techniques.

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