Designing a web page is different from painting on a canvass. When you’re working with a real, physical limit to where things can go, where you have real borders between where you can create things and where you can’t, then at least you know where you are.

On the web, however, the borders become unclear. When that happens, you know that if you place an object in a certain place, it might not end up there when your page is viewed by someone else, who may have any of several variations of screen size, resolution and page width.

This affects not just the lay-out of the page but also whether it looks beautiful or ugly, neat and orderly or untidy and disorderly. You can only attempt to come to terms with this major difficulty if you understand all the factors that go towards creating it.

The internet has grown up in a free market system in which there are many different manufacturers of computer equipment, including software, some of it cheap and cheerful and some of it swish and expensive. Whilst standards have to a great extent been brought together and made compatible, there exists, nonetheless, many different settings that, at best, rub along uneasily with one another.

This situation affects the website designer more than most. But it could be worse. Fortunately, the leading operating systems are actually surprisingly compatible when it comes to rendering web pages (though the Mac does render fonts at a different dpi to Windows). Windows, the Mac OS, and Linux all support the leading browsers and graphics cards, and it’s those entities that more than anything else control how web pages are displayed. It’s here where you’ll find the main cause of the problem.

And let’s not forget the screen display. Not so long ago a 14 inch monitor was quite normal. 15 inch monitors were luxurious, and the ultimate, 17 inches, were almost unheard of. They were all chunky blocks, using the old-fashioned cathode ray tube. Now you hardly ever come across them. Slim, flat screen monitors are everywhere, and the size varies. 17 inch monitors are now the economy version, with much larger sizes becoming more and more common. Not only that, but wide screen monitors are becoming mainstream now.

As operating systems become faster and more capable, they can support video cards developed with the fastest games in mind. This means finer resolutions, so images can be displayed in larger sizes at equal or greater quality. One of the results is that web pages can be displayed in an increasing number of pixels, for greater clarity and realism.

In the early days of the web, monitors could typically display no more than 800 by 600 pixels. Now we have countless combinations of monitor, operating system and video adapter, which together govern what you see on the screen. There are now resolutions larger than 1920 by 1200, though the most popular size, and that which you should design for, is 1024 by 768. There are dozens of different sizes in between.

After size of screen and screen resolution, the next variant is the web browser. There are currently five main browsers – Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, Apple Safari and Google’s Chrome. Whilst, as with the main operating systems, they are largely uniform in their display characteristics, they nonetheless have individual idiosyncrasies which can result in a page being rendered differently than with the other browsers.

So how does a website designer cope with all this? The answer in most cases lies in taking as much control as possible of the way your web page is displayed. For example, if you set the width of your page as 750 pixels (quite common just a few years ago) it may look good on an 800 by 600 display, and possibly even on the currently most popular 1024 by 768 (which most web designers optimize their pages for), but if it were to be viewed on a 1680 by 1050 display (used by over 15 per cent of web users) then it would look rather silly.

Fortunately, HTML, the code used to create most web pages, allows for the width of tables to be set in percentage terms as well as through the number of pixels. A very successful method of web page design that has grown up over recent years uses tables, with a combination of percentage-based widths and pixel-delineated widths to give an appearance that is acceptable to almost any screen resolution.

By using a table to contain everything, it is possible to vary the margin surrounding the content according to the size of the screen display, so that it is not excessive. Set the table at a width of, say, 80 per cent, with a background color the same as that of the page itself. Then, use another table within the first one, set at a fixed number of pixels, to contain the actual content,

This is just one method, and there are others, but the important thing is to keep abreast of new developments in the field of screen resolution and screen display sizes as they come onto the market. Because with web page design, size really does matter.

1. Don’t be afraid to launch a fan page

A lot of marketers are afraid to jump into social media marketing in general, and Facebook fan pages in particular, because of the potential for negative comments. The truth is that if a consumer has something bad to say about a brand, they’re going to say it on the web regardless of whether you are online too. Look at it this way: if a consumer posts a negative comment on your fan page, the comment is right in front of you for you to learn about, investigate and address in a professional manner. You gain some measure of control over the consumer’s unhappiness, you can work to correct it and perhaps make them satisfied again. The alternative is that they post to a site like Ripoffreport.com where lots of other people can see it and you have less immediate control over responding. Recognize that negative feedback will circulate on sites like Facebook whether or not you set up a page and understand that setting up a page allows you the chance to control problem resolution much faster than any other medium.

2. Do have a strategy in place before getting online

Facebook continues to gain power in its ability to influence consumers, not because of the content it produces, but because of the communication it facilitates. And good or bad comments can spread across the web extremely quickly. So before you set up your page, set up an internal strategy that determines how you will address complaints, how you will address positive feedback, how you will promote the page and who will maintain it, among other things. Without a strategy, you’ll be ill-equipped to address problems or leverage positive activity on the page.

3. Don’t expect it to become your top revenue source

There are great ways that you can make money from your fan page, but that shouldn’t be your central goal in developing one. Remember that social media sites by nature are places consumers visit to interact with each other and consume media. You should certainly explore ways to drive leads and sales, and I’ll mention some tips below, but you should also temper your expectations. Remember that this medium is more about building and deepening relationships with your consumers than it is about creating new sales opportunities.

4. Do actively participate in it

Following on from the point about strategy, you have to be ready to actively participate in social media. You cannot create a page and leave it on the web unattended. Complaints will go unaddressed and the positive momentum that can come from compliments will not be followed up on. You need to have someone staffing the account, either someone internally or someone from a marketing agency that is experienced in this medium. So when a user joins the group, someone should be ready to contact them and thank them. If a user gives a compliment, asks a question, or issues a complaint, someone should be prepared to respond in less than an hour. And you also need to populate the page frequently with new content so consumers have a good reason to come back. Whether that’s posting new information, free giveaways or other incentives, consumers won’t just keep coming back because they like your brand.

5. Do offer coupons and special promotions

As you are populating the page with new content, be aware of what people are looking for. And more often than not, according to research, that is coupons, special offers, contests and promotions. The average consumer has a tremendous amount of choice over how to spend their leisure time, and if they’ve chosen to spend it online, they have an endless amount of sites to visit and content to consume. You need some sort of incentive to cut through the clutter and grab their attention. The ability to save money, enter a contest or take advantage of a special event is quite often a successful way.

6. Don’t be afraid to try new things

Facebook can be a great testing ground for trying out new slogans, designs and offers. The people who’ve signed up to become fans are usually your most loyal customers. As a result, you can use Facebook as a focus group to see if a new package or commercial will please them or turn them off. It can also be a starting point for viral efforts. Post a link to a cool new video on the page and see if it takes off.

7. Do monitor your competitors’ fan pages

You would monitor your competitors’ TV commercials, websites, customer satisfaction ratings and print ads, right? So why wouldn’t you also monitor their Facebook fan pages? You should definitely be keeping an eye on this, looking out for special offers and techniques they’re using to build an audience. Also, keep a look out for disgruntled customers you may be able to reach out to and win over.

If you’re working with a marketing agency on the development and maintenance of your page, ask if they offer social media monitoring services. These services will survey the social landscape looking for mentions of your brand, your competitors’ brands and your industry in general. They will then report findings back to you based on predetermined parameters. This allows you to learn more about special offers, customer feedback and other pertinent information that will help you shape your fan page to better compete.  

8. Don’t expect people to come to you

As noted above, people have lots of choices over ways to spend their online time. So the odds they will come to Facebook and look to see if you have a fan page are pretty slim. That means you need to go out and find people yourself to let them know about the page. Mention it in your ads and use other social media platforms to find people who are already talking about your brand. Reach out to them, let them know about the page, and encourage them to spread the word.

9. Do integrate it with the rest of your online marketing efforts

One of the best aspects of online marketing is that all the various channels within the online world can be integrated to create synergy. So if you have a Twitter page promoting your brand, you should tweet to your followers that you have a fan page and tweet each time new content is added. Then you can cross your Twitter followers over to become Facebook fans if they aren’t already. Add a link to your fan page to your website and your online ads where possible. Use social bookmarking sites to share links to your fan page and put together online press releases announcing the launch of the page and new developments (remember, these can get indexed and ranked by search engines). In turn, you can use your fan page to promote your other efforts as well; so you can post links on your fan page to your Twitter page, your YouTube channel, your website and more. This will grow all of your mediums and make your overall share of voice online much stronger.

10. Do track Facebook traffic 

When it comes to analyzing the value of your fan page, it’s not enough to count the number of fans you have and see what they’re saying. You can also track activity to try to put an ROI towards the efforts. Use web analytics on your own website to see how many people are crossing over from the fan page to your site to make a purchase or request estimates and appointments. You can also use the fan page to post special ’fan-only‘ promotions and offers, so that as people take advantage of the offer you can use the revenue generated to determine ROI. You can also use the web analytics data for your site to see what sort of content Facebook fans are consuming once they click through to your site. Then you can shape additional content both on your main site and your fan page to meet that desire.

There’s website design and there’s E-commerce website design. They both involve the design of websites, but there the similarity ends. They are as different from each other as a TV weather forecast is from a glossy commercial.

Non-commercial websites are usually informative sites that have no interest in selling you anything. They may be altruistic or simply put up by enthusiasts in their particular field seeking no financial reward.

But E-commerce websites have a quite different purpose. If they don’t make money through online sales of products or services then they become expensive indulgences for their owners and will probably not survive very long.

E-commerce website design has therefore rapidly evolved into both a science and an art. A number of strategies have emerged that are designed to help the automatic sale and delivery of goods and services, to acquire customers and to spread ’branding’ – knowledge of the company and its products. This article examines three of these strategies.

1. The web form

Restricting your selling activity to trying to sell ’off the page‘ from your website is not going to succeed. You may make a few sales here and there but you’re not going to create a successful online business. Using your site to gather a list of prospects, on the other hand, is a highly effective way of increasing sales and expanding your business. This should be the aim of every E-commerce website.

For example, if you play golf and visit a successful E-commerce site that sells golf products, it will make you an offer of some sort that you’ll find very tempting. It may be as simple as a discount on your first purchase, or it may be a free download of a guide to a better golf swing. Whatever it is, you’ll probably find it too good to pass up, so you’ll fill in the simple form with your name and email address, a small price to pay, to get redirected to the download or confirmation-of-discount page.

You’re now their customer and you’ve given them permission to send you emails promoting their products. When you receive these emails you’ll often click on the link to visit their website again and, quite likely, make a purchase, perhaps of a special offer made exclusively to their list.

Multiply this by thousands of golfers just like you who came upon this site and you have a very successful E-commerce site.

2. The ’squeeze‘ page

This is an ingenious strategy where the site owner sends an email to all the members of his list. In some cases this can run into hundreds of thousands of people who are ’targeted‘, i.e. known to be interested in what the website has to offer.

In that email the reader is informed of a special limited-time offer for members of the list only. The reader clicks through to the offer page and either makes a purchase or elects to leave the page. If he makes a purchase, then after the transaction is complete he will be redirected to the ’squeeze‘ page. This is a page that has another, more expensive, offer, but that is discounted to a bargain price.

If he doesn’t make a purchase, he is redirected to another ’squeeze‘ page, probably for a less expensive product, bearing in mind that he’s just declined to purchase the first product. Plenty of sales are made this way.

What makes it a ’squeeze‘ page? There’s a statement at the top of the page informing the viewer that this is the only time he will see this page with the offer on it, so he had better make up his mind to purchase now, as he won’t be able to return later. The page can only be navigated to from the previous page, which itself only appears once the transaction has completed, so a return visit is not possible.

The ’squeeze” page technique has proved to be very effective in increasing sales. Although a discount has to be given from the normal price, the sales stimulus provided more than makes up for it. While it can be used on new visitors, it is more effective when used on a list of prospects.

3. An auto responder

When you sign up to the list of a golf website, for instance, you’ll most likely receive regular email messages over the next few weeks or months. These will be generated by an auto responder. If it’s being done properly, most of the messages will contain useful information. They may even consist of an email ’course‘ to help you with your golf – with tips, links to videos, interviews with some golf masters, and so on.

But at the foot of each email, or somewhere in the middle perhaps, will be an invitation to visit a certain temporary page of the website to view a special offer. As these offers come from someone you trust – you’ve signed up to their list, received some useful free information, and perhaps actually bought something already – you’ll more than likely click on the link and possibly make another purchase.

This is successful E-commerce website design at work. The cost of putting a form on your site and organizing a series of follow-up email messages is minimal compared to the cost of creating your website, and if you aren’t doing this already then now is the time to start.

1. Tweetdeck – Tweetdeck is just one of many apps that can be used to tweet (and receive tweets) on your cell phone or desktop without logging into the Twitter website. Tweetdeck and similar apps make it extremely easy to tweet and follow others, and this ease of accessibility is a major reason why Twitter has become so popular.

2.Twellow – Looking for people to follow or people who might want to find you? Twellow.com can help you find public accounts categorized by topic. So if you want to find people interested in banking, marketing or any other topic, Twellow presents them in a directory style.

3.Topsy – Topsy is a search engine of tweets. Located at Topsy.com, it lists web content that is most frequently tweeted and can be sorted by hour, day, week or month. This gives you a strong insight into what content is currently creating the most buzz online.

4. Twitpic – Twitpic makes it easy to share photos with your followers. You can take a picture with your cell phone and use the Twitpic app to share it with followers via a tweet.

5. Twitvid – Think Twitpic, but for video content. Adding multimedia elements to your tweets will make your page more engaging for your followers.

6. TwitterGram – Like TwitPic and TwitVid make it easy to upload photos and videos to Twitter, Twittergram will post Mp3 files.

7. Bit.ly – Bit.ly, tinyurl and other URL-shortening services will allow you to post shortened versions of URLs so that you can post a link to a website while still complying with Twitter’s character limits. 

8. Twitter Lists – In 2009, Twitter introduced lists where users can create their own themed custom lists about any topic or group of users they want. Getting included on a list is a great way to expose your account to people who may be interested in the topics you’re tweeting about.

9. Widgets – Twitter has created widgets, which can be added to any site, that allow you to post Twitter updates through a mini feed from your main profile. So you could post a widget to your main website or blog to show visitors your tweets.  This type of marketing can greatly increase your total number of followers. 

10. Local Trends – Local Trends shows you the topics that are most frequently being tweeted about in your area (this can be broken down into state or city level). With this knowledge, you can tailor your tweets to join in the conversation and attract more eyes to your account.

11. Twellowhood – Further capitalizing on local search opportunities, Twellowhood is the white pages to Twellow’s yellow pages; that is, instead of finding people and businesses based on interest or industry, you can find them simply based on physical location.

12. Tweetcloud – Wondering if you really want to follow someone? Tweetcloud will create a tag cloud featuring the topics that person most often tweets about, so you can see what sort of content you’ll be getting.

13. Qwitter – If you have only a handful of followers, it’s easy to keep track of who is following you. But once your following starts increasing, you may not be able to spot exactly who has stopped. To remedy this, you can use Qwitter to email you when someone stops following. You can even get details on what your last tweet was prior to their departure.

14. TweetLater – If you’re using Twitter for marketing purposes and would like to deliver tweets at scheduled intervals, you can use apps like TweetLater. This application allows you to set up several tweets in advance and decide what time they should be posted to your profile. This makes it very easy to maintain an account if you’re using it for business purposes.

15. OutTwit – OutTwit will route tweets to Outlook, making it easy to stay on top of the latest posts.

16. SnapTweet – For Flickr aficionados, SnapTweet will let you easily use Flickr stream pictures on Twitter.

17. Twitter Feed – Do you use an RSS feeder? With Twitter Feed you can have RSS content delivered right to your Twitter page.

18. TwitterIM – Use TwitterIM to instant message on your ICQ and Windows Messenger accounts. 

19. Twhirl – A desktop application that makes it easy to manage more than one Twitter account. You can schedule tweets, see messages and more using Twhirl without having to log into separate accounts.

20. TwitPay – As more savvy businesses recognize the value of Twitter, TwitPay makes it possible to send and receive payments through Twitter.

These tools are the proverbial tip of the iceberg. They’ll help you find out who to follow, who you want to follow you and how to improve the content of your tweets. After that, there’s a whole world of Twitter tools designed for your own personal use.

Bad web design can spoil a page that would otherwise be a pleasure to read. It can alienate visitors who might otherwise become loyal customers and referrers. And nearly all bad design is easily avoided. Let’s take a look at some of the more common design errors and how they can be resolved:

1. Horizontal scroll bar

What none of us needs at the end of a busy day when arriving at the final website we have to visit is to be greeted by a site that not only requires the usual vertical navigation, but actually makes us constantly scroll left to right and back again in order to read each line. This happens because whoever laid out the site and wrote the code made the width of the page wider than 100 per cent.

This is almost guaranteed to send away nearly all your visitors within a few seconds. You will want to ensure your site never has this annoying fault. It is usually caused by having an image that is too large for the space allocated for it. The user’s browser simply forces an enlargement of the space taken by the image to render it at the specified size, and that results in the page being widened to more than 100 per cent of the screen space available.

If you are using a monitor with a display larger than the widely-used 1024×768 pixels then this error may not manifest itself when you test the page, so make sure you test all your pages on at least a 1024×768 resolution, and even smaller.

2. Pages that are too long

These are nearly always the result of bad web design. Whilst there are some cases when having a very long page is unavoidable, such as when it consists of a very long article or dissertation and there’s no point in splitting it up, most pages of excessive length can be shortened by having a link to a continuation page inserted at a suitable juncture.

The home page should never be more than one and a half to two pages long. It should have a simple navigation system so that no other page on the site is more than two clicks away. Your company name and logo, a sign-up form and a few headlines of recent events to interest the targeted viewer are the only other things you need on this page, so keeping within this recommended size should not be difficult.

3. Incompatible colors

It’s amazing how often you come across web pages, sometimes ranking well in the search engines, that are almost impossible to read because the font color and the background color are both dark or both light. Every website designer should know that, for example, red letters on a black background should be avoided for this reason.

Don’t be mesmerized by the amount of colors available. Keeping to black text on a white background guarantees an easy reading experience.

4. Pointless Java animations

It was a novelty when the internet was new and website designers found they could impress clients by placing whirling gizmos on their home page, but it wore off years ago. Now they only slow down page loading times and prove irritating, so avoid them like the plague.

For the same reason, avoid creating home pages where you have to click on an Enter Here button. Your visitor has taken some sort of action to arrive on your home page, so why force him to make another click to enter it? Many visitors won’t bother.

It almost goes without saying that a combination of the two (silly animations and an Enter button) is an example of seriously bad design.

5. Having your sign-up form below the fold

The psychology of this isn’t clear, but it seems that having your sign-up form below the fold can be detrimental to your sign-up rate. In theory it should make little difference, but all the tests carried out by internet marketers indicate that if it isn’t visible when the page loads, the sign-up form is in much greater danger of being ignored or overlooked by visitors.

The best place is in the top left of the page, where the eye naturally goes when the page has loaded.

6. Lack of navigation

How often have you returned to a site in order to bookmark a page of particular interest, only to experience great difficulty in finding that page? This is an annoying feature of many sites, but can easily be remedied with a site map.

A site map is a page that is an index of every page on your site, arranged logically, or, failing that, alphabetically. Make sure there’s a link to it from your home page, so that every page on your site is no more than two clicks away from it.

Just by avoiding these basic faults you can keep bad web design away from your site.

1. Put Your Contact Information Front and Center. What is the conversion goal of your website? Is it to get people to call a phone number, fill out a form or send an email? Whichever method of contact you’re trying to push, put it front and center on your pages. If it’s a phone number, make it stand out with a central location, bold font and bright color. If it’s a form, put it in a prominent, easily accessible area. The easier it is to find your contact information, the more leads and sales you will get from your site. It really is that simple. Consumers don’t want to spend a lot of time looking for this information. They simply abandon it and head off to another site to get what they need. The first step towards racking up more sales is to make it easier for people to buy from you.

2. Remove Escape Routes. Having an easy to find, easy to act upon lead form or phone number isn’t enough. You also need to take away potential distractions. Put your lead form on a page that has no other navigation and no other links (other than one back to the home page, perhaps). You don’t want someone to be about to give you their information only to back out to look at some other feature of your site. Once you have them moving towards a sale or lead request, keep them there. You should especially keep this in mind while designing landing pages for paid search campaigns, display ads and internet yellow pages ads. The consumer who has clicked on your ad is probably more interested in buying than researching, so give them what they want. Take them to a page with a simple lead/purchase form, very brief explanation of your products/services and nothing else. Clutter, such as extra buttons and links, will only serve to distract them and cut down on the number of leads and sales you generate.

3. Keep Your Conversion Path Brief. One of the best things people like about the internet is that it is an instant-gratification medium. If you’re shopping online, it’s because it’s easy to quickly get what you need. So when you serve a consumer a 10-step purchase form, you’re potentially turning away a sale. Find out where your opportunities are to auto-populate information so they don’t have to enter it multiple times. If you can store their shipping information, payment information and other data that will be used in repeat purchases, do so and you will be able to save them a few steps. If you shop at Amazon.com frequently, you may have noticed they have a new program which allows you to simply enter a unique identifying phrase to complete your purchase. They’ve set themselves up for higher sales and higher online ROI because they’ve made it easier for their visitors. And an easier experience is one that will almost always lead to greater success.

4. Keep Your Forms Short. This is a similar concept to the one above. In short, if you don’t absolutely have to have a piece of information on a form to complete a customer’s purchase or lead request, then don’t have it. You should never have to put “required information” next to a field on your form, because you should only ever be asking for required information. Ask for more information than you need and you’re turning customers off, which will turn them away.

5. Analyze, Analyze, Analyze. In the previous post we talked about setting up site analytics and call tracking. You’ll gain a wealth of data from those sources, and you need to use it to make your site better and more efficient at converting visitors into paying customers. Analyze which pages have the highest amount of time spent on them and see what elements those pages have that can be applied to the pages that aren’t performing so well. If you have a multi-step conversion process, track which step people are abandoning the process at and see if there’s a step that can be removed, changed or presented in a different fashion. What pages are consumers looking at before they fill out a lead form or make a purchase? What pages are they looking at before leaving? Which advertising methods are driving the most purchases and leads? This information is all available through your site analytics program and you can use it to improve your site’s flow and presentation, which will drive more leads and sales and a higher ROI.

Make these changes to your site and you will see an immediate impact on your leads and sales. Basically, if you have products and services that consumers want at a competitive price, and it’s easy for consumers to find you on the web, then all you really need to do is make it as easy as possible for them to buy from you. That means make contact information and purchase forms easy to find, make it easy to fill out forms and place orders and take away distractions. Then you can analyze consumer behavior on your site to explore additional opportunities to test new content, design and process elements, so you can take your site’s ROI to an even higher level!

Due to the simplistic nature of PHP, you can learn parts of it as you go along. As such, PHP is great to start with for beginner programmers, for those looking to build their own websites and for those just wanting to dabble in programming.

However, for the professional web developer, learning ASP can be both beneficial and profitable. A number of larger businesses and corporations are already using ASP and Windows NT servers. Switching to PHP would require a complete rebuild from the ground up, so many of these companies are not comfortable with the idea of PHP.

This is where a programmer who is fluent in Visual Basic and accustomed to working with ASP comes in. Knowledge of ASP and Visual Basic can obviously net you a number of higher paying clients that are eager for your expertise, but it can take some time to learn. Knowing PHP and C++ is also great for building dynamic websites on any scale.

The decision of whether to use PHP or ASP-based scripts in your websites depends on a number of factors. If cost is an issue, you may want to consider running open source PHP on Apache and a UNIX server, as this is the most affordable option. Also, if security is a primary concern, Apache can offer a great deal of comfort compared to running a Windows-based server, as there have been a number of loopholes within the Windows server platform. In this case, PHP will still be the better option because it interacts much faster with Linux-based servers.

However, if you have a large corporation or business with less technically inclined employees who are already using a number of Microsoft products (MS Access, MS Excel, Visual Studio etc.), investing in ASP and hosting your site on a Windows-based server may be a better option.

The biggest argument when comparing PHP and ASP has been one of speed. Due to the way ASP operates with the Visual Basic programming language, it can be much slower in a number of instances, depending upon the kind of server and other databases used.

It should also be noted that ASP and ASP.NET are not the same thing. ASP.NET is a newer programming language that is basically a complete rewrite of ASP. There have been some newer speed comparisons between PHP and ASP.NET on a variety of different servers. Although the legitimacy of these tests can be questioned, the results did not heavily favor PHP.

The results of these speed tests found that while PHP on a UNIX server was incredibly fast and secure, ASP.NET on a Windows Server was comparable. In addition, the tests revealed that ASP.NET performed quite better on Windows Servers in terms of speed and calling up objects than PHP 5.3.

Based upon the advancements brought about by ASP.NET, one could assume that for many, the use of ASP would be nearly obsolete. Also, it gives credence to the idea that PHP works better with Linux servers, while Microsoft products and ASP.NET work better for Windows servers. Although preference is still the main determining factor, now the type of server your company uses is also important and something to think about.

The question of which font to use is one that has troubled website designers since the beginning. It’s made worse by the ever-changing nature of the internet. And with each new release of the Windows and Mac operating systems, there are invariably brand new fonts to consider.

Fonts are important, so learn as much about them as you can. Fonts designed for print, such as Times New Roman, Arial, Palatino Linotype, Book Antiqua, Optima and Courier New, do not necessarily appear at their best on screen.

This was realized early on by Microsoft, which in the mid 1990s as the web was taking off, commissioned several new fonts designed specifically for looking good on monitors. These included Georgia, Verdana, Tahoma and Trebuchet MS.

That’s not to say that the print fonts are to be avoided on your web pages. Times New Roman still looks good on screen, though preferably in a large size as a headline, and Interstate (originally developed for use in signs on highways) shows up well on the web and is easy to read with a clear design.

Helvetica is still the most popular sans serif font on the web, and yet it was designed for print. Arial is still very popular as it is clear and easily read, though it is being gradually replaced by Calibri, introduced with Windows Vista in 2007. Even fonts designed for the web are being replaced. For example, Cambria is slowly taking the place of Georgia.

The new fonts of Candara and Corbel are replacing Verdana, and Consolas is replacing Lucida Console and Courier New. These new fonts are known as ClearType fonts, designed to be even easier to read on modern flat-screen monitors.

Windows 7 has yet newer, potentially successful fonts in the form of Gabriola and Segoe UT (Light and Semibold), so you have to keep a constant eye on developments to see which fonts would be the most suitable for your site.

For most people there is a truly bewildering array of fonts available. But you can’t just choose any font for your site and expect it to display on all your visitors’ computers.

Visitors to your site can only display fonts that are installed on their computers. Depending on which operating system (and which version of that operating system) they have installed, the range of fonts that is available for display, i.e. common to all, is limited.

Up to the time Windows XP was released in 2001 there were only about seven fonts common to both Windows and Mac operating systems. There were two more in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser, then used by about 90 per cent of internet users.

The situation is not much better today. So your overriding concern has to be to choose a font that most users have installed on their computer. Your intention of displaying your text (headlines and body) in exactly the way you want has to be relegated to second place.

However, you still have a considerable degree of control in the way your web page appears. Because of the way in which browsers work, you can specify a number of alternate fonts, usually up to four, in which to display each section of text. You never have full control over how your page will display in each visitor’s browser, but you have enough control to ensure your page is projecting the right image.

So now to the actual choice of fonts. The most important thing to remember is that fonts themselves can convey a message. Go to successful websites that are in a similar market, or niche, to yours.

See what fonts they are using, both in their headings and in the main body of the text. You can check this by selecting ’View‘ from the menu and then ’View page source‘. Look at the text page and scroll down until you see which font is being used as the default font and for individualized sections of the page.

There are certain fonts that are suitable for business sites, medical sites, legal sites, historical sites, games sites, trivia sites, jokes sites, and so on. For example, you probably won’t find a medical site featuring Comic Sans, which is more applicable to a jokes site.

You should experiment a little and see how various fonts display your headings and text. Whilst visitors can use their browsers to control the size of the text, it’s best to make your font a size that can be easily read, even by those with poor eyesight.

Finally, do you use the same font throughout or different fonts for different sections?

It’s normal to use one font for your headlines and another for your body text. Don’t use too many fonts. This will just make your site look amateurish. Two fonts are usually enough. Exceptionally, a third bold and italic font could be used for a special section that needs to stand out.

A good rule is to have a serif font for your headline and a sans serif font for your body text. But no rule is written in stone. With new fonts arriving regularly, your job is to keep an open mind, study website design and constantly test which fonts look best on your site and, more importantly, deliver the best results.

In part 1, we’ll share five ways you can make sure you have the right infrastructure in place to maximize your website’s ROI: 

1. Set Clearly Defined Goals. This may seem simple or obvious, but you would be surprised how many people start websites with the intention of selling or generating leads but without actual goals behind their efforts. Some important considerations you’ll want to address include: 

- How many leads/sales am I looking for from my website?

- What am I willing to pay for a lead (cost-per-lead, or CPL)?

- How much am I willing to pay for a sale (cost-per-acquisition, or CPA)?

- Do I offer different goods and services that may have variable CPLs and CPAs? 

Once you know what leads and sales are worth to you, you’ll be able to decide how much to invest in your site and you’ll have some baseline metrics to determine which efforts are working and which ones aren’t.

In terms of how much to invest in your site, knowing what a lead or sale is worth will help you decide what sort of advertising you can afford, as well as what kinds of investments you can make in website upgrades.

For example, if you have a very low CPL or CPA, then you may want to stick with inexpensive guerrilla marketing tactics, such as social media or very basic search engine optimization that you can implement yourself. But if you have a higher CPL or CPA, you can afford to put more money into a robust paid search campaign, banner ads or other more expensive platforms. The same goes for upgrading your site (or even launching it if you haven’t done so yet). 

In terms of evaluating your efforts, simply measure your CPL and CPA over time. If it’s coming in under target, you can put more towards that paid search campaign or you can extend into new advertising arenas. But if it’s coming in too high, you’ll want to try tweaking your landing pages, reducing paid search bids or optimizing for different keyword targets in your SEO efforts.

CPL and CPA goals give you the framework by which to evaluate the success of your site and the way you’re marketing it.

2. Implement Web Forms On Your Site. If you’re going to measure your ROI accurately, you need to start by measuring something and collecting data from your visitors. Maybe you’re not selling anything on your site, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still begin to paint an ROI picture. You can add Contact Us, Appointment Request and Request an Estimate forms to your site. You can match the data from these forms to the information you collect when you make a sale and gain a better understanding of what sales came from the web. 

Then, as you begin to collect more of this data, you’ll have a benchmark against which to measure all your future ROI improvement efforts. As you collect customer data from forms, you’ll want to be sure to add a privacy policy to your site that explains how you will use the data, as well as an opt-out box where consumers have the opportunity to decline future marketing correspondence. For the people who don’t decline, you can compile their contact information and past purchase data to focus future marketing efforts. It’s always easier to sell to an existing customer than to obtain a new one, so build a database of your customers, send them marketing messages based around their previous transactions and see how repeat business can improve your site’s ROI.  

3. Implement Web Analytics. Don’t worry if you’re not familiar with web analytics, the concept is simple. Web analytics are software programs that give you an insight into how customers behave once they reach your site. How long did they stay? Which pages did they view? Did they fill out your forms? What websites and marketing efforts sent them to you? All of these questions can be answered with a web analytics program. Google Analytics is free and one of the best on the market, so is a great starting point. All you need to do is register at google.com/analytics and place a small javascript code snippet on each page of your site.

What can you do with this data to improve your ROI? Well, first off, you can analyze which advertising programs are working best. You can measure the CPLs and CPAs mentioned above so that you can decide where to allocate future budgets. You can see which pages are most popular with consumers and what sort of content they are looking for on your site, which can help you decide what additional types of content to build up on your site to give people more of what they want. And you can see where in the purchase or lead process people are stopping, so you can decide how best to encourage them to finish their purchases or quote requests.

4. Add Phone Tracking. This will seem counterintuitive to many people, as there is often a natural assumption that people who go to the web make their purchases there too. But the truth is that in marketing there is something called the ROBO effect – Research Online, Buy Offline – which is still prevalent. There are still many people who aren’t comfortable making a purchase over the web or who are more comfortable talking to someone after researching. Those people might not be willing to fill out your web form, but they will pick up the phone and call if they see a number.

Phone tracking lines are designated phone numbers that redirect to your office number or call center number. You can set up different numbers for each of your marketing campaigns and assign each one to a special landing page, or you can use one number for all web activities. The companies that provide these lines will provide recordings of the calls as well as detailed reports showing the number someone called from, how long they spoke for and additional contact information.

As you add call tracking, you’ll notice two events occur that will help improve your ROI. First, if you didn’t already have a number on your site, you’ll get more leads, because you’ll start tapping into that market of consumers who don’t feel comfortable buying online. Second, you’ll be able to definitively attribute more of your leads to your website, which will improve the site’s ROI.

5. Hone Your CRM Process. Do you have a process in place for handling leads? If you don’t, then all the changes to your site, all the tracking mechanisms and all the marketing dollars in the world won’t help your ROI. Because if you don’t have a set process in place for handling leads efficiently and effectively, you simply will not convert them to sales. 

Online marketing is far too competitive not to handle your leads in an aggressive fashion. If you aren’t contacting a potential customer within five minutes of their lead request being submitted, your competitors will. Remember, most consumers will request quotes from between three to five service providers when shopping online, so rest assured there are lots of other people bidding for the same business you.

Put a process in place – who is responsible for answering the phone and checking the email inbox? How often should they be checking it? Do they respond themselves or pass it off to a salesperson? How long does each party have to respond? These are the essential questions you need to have answered in order to convert as many requests as possible into appointments and sales. 

Take care of these five steps before moving on to actual websites changes because without the setup in place, you won’t be able to see if changes to your site are effective or not.

ASP and PHP are both web development tools that control database interactivity and define how different applications get along with each other within a website, allowing for more dynamic web pages and added content and functionality.

ASP stands for Active Server Pages and was developed by Microsoft. While it was once only used with Windows Servers, it can now be used on Linux servers with Apache.

PHP once stood for Personal Home Pages, but now is generally understood as PHP Hypertext Preprocessor. It is an open source code that has been around for many years and was developed primarily for use in small to medium-sized websites, but is now being used in a number of larger business sites as well.

When it comes to the cost breakdown, PHP has some definite advantages over ASP. Because ASP is a Microsoft product, users will have to purchase it, along with IIS (Internet Information Server), which is a program that runs on Windows Servers. ASP also requires MS-SQL, but this program usually comes as standard with a lot of other Microsoft and Windows products. Hosting on a Windows Server can also be more costly on an annual basis than Linux hosting.

Since PHP is an open source code, there is no cost associated with it, and it operates with MySQL, which is also free, on UNIX and NT servers. The only cost involved is paying the hosting company, unless you have your own server, and the cost paid to the developer who is creating the site, if applicable.

However, when it comes to functionality, many businesses and larger corporate sites still prefer ASP because of its simple interaction with other Microsoft products. If you are already running a lot of Microsoft systems and if this is what most of your employees are used to, there can be a great advantage in going for ASP. In addition, companies that do a lot of business on a global scale prefer Microsoft products and ASP because it is what more people use worldwide. ASP is compatible with Excel, Access and NT, and there are also a number of smaller and medium-sized businesses who use it for this reason as well.

On the other side of the coin, many argue that PHP is a lot easier to learn and functions well with the programming languages that a lot of people already know and use. For those who are already well versed in C++, PHP is a lot easier to use than ASP. Also, the parsing engine that PHP uses can easily translate languages and commands that are more easily understood by other machines. ASP uses Visual Basic Programming, which sometimes requires a programmer to learn an entirely new programming language in order to incorporate it.

Many people who use PHP also like the open source PHP forum support much better than having to call Microsoft and be shuffled through numerous customer service representatives. For this reason, many feel that PHP has much better support than ASP, even though that support comes primarily from other PHP users and experts.

ASP and PHP combined still constitute the most popular programming scripts used by today’s dynamic websites, and the decision to use one or the other is really nothing more than a preference. However, there are a couple of alternatives that have recently emerged that also offer a number of advantages and disadvantages for users. One example is JSP, or Java Server Page. It is still not widely accepted today, but those who use it claim that it allows for more powerful and dynamic functionality. Another option is ColdFusion. It uses a parsing engine like PHP on a Microsoft server and still has the same kind of cost issues as ASP, but can also incorporate the same level of functionality as well.