Archive for July, 2010

I love what Pastor Andy Robbins had to say about the website we launched for their church group!

“Just wanted to say how pleased I am with the site. One word seems to come up consistently whenever I hear feedback on the site, and that word is “awesome!” You did a great job, and I am pleased and impressed not only with your skills, but also in your close and detailed communication, and your professionalism.”

I love the richness of the website and like all design that I do when inspired by the Lord…it holds a special spot in my heart.  You can visit this website at Blessed Life Fellowship.

I’m always excited when it’s time to show off a new MaryDesigns project, and today’s launch is especially awesome. Please join me in congratulating Prowler Industries on their new website! Prowler doesn’t just specialize in rubber tracks and pads for compact truck loaders, mini excavators, and other over the tire track (OTT) systems – they lead the market.

What makes the Prowler website especially wonderful is that we once again got the chance to flex our industrial web design muscles… I love it when I get to show that MaryDesigns (because of our own design) isn’t just “girly girl web design,” or “colorful web design” – we can work in just about any industry and knock it out of the park.

The folks at Prowler love their new site, which features a new search engine friendly CSS layout and better usability. This American, family-owned business only sells the best to their clients, and it was a pleasure working with them.

So once again, join me in congratulating Prowler and wishing them the very best with their new site. And keep on the lookout for their upcoming sister site, Rubbertrack.com, which is set to be finished and released in a few months

As business owners, we love to save money. We all work way too hard to lose what we have easily, and what better way to spare a few dollars here and there than by doing things ourselves? Most successful entrepreneurs I know split their time between running their companies and working as self-employed bookkeepers, salespeople, and custodial engineers.

Should you add web designer to your list of unofficial titles?

After more than 10 years of working in web design in Indianapolis, I would say you absolutely should not. The biggest reason, of course, has to do with quality; a homemade website can be spotted almost immediately. Unless you have a very strong background in design and coding, the endless hours you’re going to spend getting your site up and running aren’t going to amount to a professional-looking end product.

Don’t think it’s only designers who will notice. You might not worry about impressing me, but what about your customers and prospects? Every potential buyer who visits your site and comes away less than impressed represents a missed opportunity – and more to the point, a sale that wasn’t made. Even if you’re only getting a small number of visitors each week, those missing orders can add up very, very quickly.

Functionality can also be an issue. A good web designer can add video, contact forms, and e-commerce features to your new site that can help you make, or save, thousands of dollars each year. Most do it yourself versions, however, are akin to online brochures. That’s sometimes better than not having anything at all, but it won’t do much in the way of generating leads and orders, saving you customer service time, or helping your company’s search engine rankings.

And then there’s that time we mentioned. It can easily take someone who isn’t a professional web designer well over 30 or 40 hours to put together a functioning website, even if they start from a predefined template – something I don’t recommend, by the way – and at least that long again the first time something goes wrong. The dollar value of those lost hours is usually bigger than it looks, when you consider what could have been accomplished in that time.

What all of this really comes down to is a concept that every successful business owner knows, but is all too easy to forget from time to time: the difference between prices and costs. While it’s true that a professional-grade website can require a sizable investment, it’s very likely to pay for itself time and time again. As tempting as it can be to buy a piece of software, crack open a couple of books, and try to design your company’s new website, I advise you to resist the urge. You might save a little bit of money today, but you’ll only be taking it out of your own pocket later.