Site Potion

photo credit: dichohecho

Ever wonder where your website lives?  It’s made up of images, HTML files, and database records, but where are all of those things?  They are all stored on a computer somewhere.  That computer is controlled by a company that you purchase hosting space from.  There area literally thousands (if not tens of thousands) of companies that offer hosting, but some big names you might recognize are GoDaddy, Network Solutions, and LunarPages.  The reason you need a host is that the demands placed on a computer that is hosting a website can’t be met by the computer sitting on your desk right now.

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Just a quick note this week that the teaser site for Patron has gone live today.  I don’t really get into the nuts and bolts, but there is a screen capture of the interface you use when editing a page.  It will look very familiar to my recent clients.

UPDATE: I jumped the gun a little on this.  The DNS records had not propogated completely when I made this post.  Some readers may still be seeing an old site (the background on that one is purple).  My understanding is that by this evening everyone should be directed to the correct site.  I apologize for the confusion.

photo credit: Håkan Dahlström

In the few short years that I have been running Site Potion, most of my clients have been small businesses.  I expect this group will always make up a large part of my client base.  The tools that I provide for site owners to upload photos and manage the content of their own site without needing a web designer isn’t going to stop being valuable to small businesses anytime soon.

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photo credit: Andreanna

One of the biggest challenges you will face as a site owner is getting people to visit your website.  There is a seemingly infinite number of websites out there competing for people’s attention.  And everybody has a website.  So if you want to stand out from the crowd, you’ve got to give people a reason to come to your site.  And you have to give them a reason to keep coming back in the future.  One of the easiest ways to do this is to create an online calendar.

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So you’ve got great content for your site.  You have a clean, stylish layout and design.  You’re site is looking good, but you’re still searching for that little something extra.  A finishing touch that will make your visitors ooh and ahh.  Might I suggest a modal overlay?

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I’ve never been a big fan of reinventing the wheel.  So when Moxiecode came out with an open javascript content editor that could be plugged into content mangement systems to give users who aren’t familiar with editing web pages a familiar and easy to user interface, I knew that’s the direction I wanted to go.  So most of the custom CMS I build uses Moxiecode’s TinyMCE.  For the most part, it’s fantastic.  There are some really talented people behind it.

There is one area that’s a little neglected, though.  That’s documentation.  By and large, the interface is so intuitive that there really isn’t much need to explain things in further detail.  But even this easy-to-use interface does have a small learning curve.  To make things even easier, I’m providing some explanations of some of the most common buttons on the TinyMCE toolbar. 

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photo credit: Brooks Elliott

I’ve talked to several people this week who had a few ideas for a website that they aren’t quite ready to pull the trigger on.  They were checking in with me to get a ball park idea of how much it would cost for me to build their website.  It’s great that they are doing this kind of research in advance.  In particular, I think it’s a good idea because designing and coding is not the only cost to putting up a website.  There are other places your money will get spent.  Some are optional depending on your website, but others are absolutely essential.

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photo credit: SuziJane

Take a break from thinking about your website this week and head over to Marketing Muse from Silver Square.  Author Raquel Richardson makes observations on noteworthy marketing ideas that are going on both nationally and around Indianapolis.  If all of your marketing ideas are starting to feel a little stale, run through the Marketing Muse archives to pick up some new ideas.

Go on.  Scoot.

photo credit: Shiny Things

Who is the intended audience of your website?  Have you identified the demographics of the specific group you want to target?  If you’re like most businesses and organizations, the answer is probably a resounding no.  You want your website to appeal to everyone, right?  You don’t want to alienate anyone.

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