Here is another great article by Kabir Bedi, our guest author.

Kabir Bedi is the senior Web Consultant at LeXolution IT Services, a premier web design company India that offers web design solutions, custom web development and Internet promotion services to its clients. He also advices clients to establish a strong online presence for their business.

How To Have Clean Markup In Website Development?

The trends and turn of events in the web world keep changing. And as the trends change, the website design also need to undergo transformation, like incorporation of new technologies, so as to keep up the pace of the website with the latest web trends.

Therefore, it is crucial to keep your site updated with those in-built changes so that your website can ride the current easily when a new wave approaches, instead of getting drowned in it. This article further discusses about the fundamentals of web standard and what importance does clean mark up has in website designing and development.

Clean Mark Up – A brief introduction

Clean markup is the one that should not be cluttered. It should be W3C standard compliant and using tags and structures as per each of the intended purposes. A search engine friendly site is the one that has more content and less code on the pages. This lets search engine crawl your website more often than it used to do earlier and the consequence is that your site comes on the top.

Clutter-free HTML or clean mark up is one that makes lesser use of tags, eliminates all the extraneous and accomplishes the tasks with as little markup as necessary. It avoids needless attributes, such as online CSS, and leaves each document structured and organized.

What is the need? It is working fine, Isn’t that enough?

Every project has to be completed within the deadline and to meet deadlines, web developers often end up doing sloppy codes and the desired clean and standard compliant mark up remains no where in the scene. They just say, it is working fine, and this is all that matters. It may work fine in the beginning but what happens after a year or two? After some time the ranking of your website will come down.

Therefore, to save both your money, time and grievances, do it right the first time. It is crucial for your website success that it should do well from usability factor and SEO perspective. The automatic coding done by using the tool is too horrible to do justice with the quality of coding. Coding done manually is always better, cleaner and valued in the eyes of search engines. Hence, making proper use of , , , tags help search engine crawlers to crawl your page more frequently and early.

Extent of accessibility, translation and future use

Today, Internet surfing is not only limited to desktops or laptops but Internet is accessed on other smaller gadgets like iphones, smart phones and palmtops. So the usability of web has reached to a new level and demands for an extended accessibility.

With the increasing trend of mobile browsing, there is an extended need of clean markup with XHTML that helps facilitate the ease of search on the smaller screen. Your site developed with W3C standard compliance and clean markup ensures you the success in the long run.

Let us take a look at some Do’s and Dont’s while achieving clean markup for your site.

Do’s:
1.Make proper use of the , , , tags to facilitate crawling by the crawlers.

2.Do Validate your HTML, XHTML, CSS with proper tools.

3.Name your CSS classes and IDs using meaningful terms.

4.Make use of alt tags as well as title tags in your Markup, as both have their own significance.

5.The first letter of each word in the title should be kept capital. Google prefers them more.

Dont’s:
1.Include inline styles or extraneous tags and attributes just because you have pressure to complete the project.

2.Use automated tool to generate codes. This will affect the proper functionality of the website and restrict the site from being SEO friendly.

A clean coding of the website is the key to SEO success. Therefore, coding manually is the right option for getting coding done and PSD to XHTML conversion. This may take a little longer time to get the project completed but the result you will achieve in the last would be more than satisfactory.

Domains | Domain Auctions | Premium Domains | Domain Newsletter | Domain Forum | Funny Games

Here is another great article by Kabir Bedi, our guest author.

Kabir Bedi is the senior web consultant at LeXolution IT Services, a premier website development company that provides its clients with a range of web designing services along with internet promotion services. He has over 10 years of experience in catering to international clients.

5 Design Delusions That Can Take Toll On Your Website!

Plug-Ins Make Life Easier

Sure they do! But when your website totally relies on a plug-in, there is too much at stake. When you create a website entirely dependent on closed third party plug-ins, it can actually lead to serious backfire. Often people don’t have these plug-ins installed on their browsers and when they try to view your website, they would be only be irritated by the windows’ constant plea for installation. And more often than not, they just choose to leave instead of succumbing.

So try to stick to cross-browser, standards-compliant code and tools for your website that don’t require any additional work or installations from your visitors.

Reduce the Image File Size As Much As Can Be

It is always advisable to limit the file sizes on your website so as to enhance its usability and make web pages load faster. However, web designers often stretch this a bit to far and reduce image sizes so much that they appear ugly and jagged on the front end. While this may definitely reduce the weight of the website, the crappy look of images only serve to paint an unprofessional picture on the other end.

The decreasing number of dial-up internet users has pushed up the acceptable image sizes. So you don’t have to make things as small as can be lest it takes toll on the design appearance and reduce the apparent quality of your website. After you are done, make sure you preview your processed images on multiple monitors and negate any scope of distortion.

More Content = More Goodies

Content definitely is the king on the web. But that doesn’t mean you overload your website with information. Often designers, in a bid to serve more info to their audiences, tend to include too much content on a web page that it ends up creating a feeling of clutter and ruining the visual readability of the page.

They key is not to fill in disparate information on a single area of your web page. Even though there may be times when you need lots of content, make sure you pay attention to the organization. Place your content in a consistent and attractive manner so that visitors get all that they need to know without seeing a mess.

Variety is Nice!

It sure doesn’t hurt to provide your users with a variety of options but when it comes to design, its better to maintain a little consistency. It shouldn’t be the case, when visitors hop from one page to another, they shouldn’t feel they have landed on completely different terrain.

Users are more comfortable when they become familiar with the look and functioning of a website within a few seconds. If you present them with something drastically different every few pages, they would only be confused and have a less efficient experience. So practice consistency!

Ads Make Great Business Sense

While ads are a great source of revenue, often times they serve to detract visitors from your message and erodes on your professionalism. Littering web pages with ads can seriously bring down its aesthetic feel. Moreover, web users have come to ignore ads altogether so there is a huge question mark on their real effectiveness.

So, make sure you consider carefully before you place ads on your website!

Domains | Domain Auctions | Premium Domains | Domain Newsletter | Domain Forum | Funny Games

Here is another great article written by our guest author, Kabir.

Images play a very important role in web development today, and this article covers some very interesting points to consider when incorporating images in your website design and development  projects.

Here are 2 previous articles written by Kabir, that you may be interested in:
How To Optimize Your Business For Google Local Search Results?
Google Caffeine – What Do You Need To Know & What You Need To Do?

Kabir Bedi is the senior web consultant at LeXolution IT Services, a premier web development company that specializes in delivering a range of web solutions to its clients. He advices clients to create a strong web presence for their business and drive in effective business through the same.

Online Images – Worth a Thousand Words or Cost a Thousand Dollars?

A picture is worth a thousand words! But in the present online world, a picture can cost companies thousands of dollars as well.

The Internet is not just an expansive web of information… It is a gallery of innumerable images and visual art. Graphics and images are a core part of your web presence. In addition to infusing your website with visual appeal, images also serve to send across strong messages to the audience that are sometime more effective than written words. However, a perennial problem with online images are the ease at which they can be stolen.

In fact, with features like Google Images people can get access to millions of images from across the web just with a couple of mouse clicks. Finding and copying images is no big deal and designers would have done it knowingly or unknowingly at some or the other point in their career.

Here are some tips who you can make effective use of online image resources minimizing the scope of image theft:

Search with Keywords

An intelligent search for images can save you hours of useless browsing. If you are searching for a particular image or at least have an idea about what you are looking for, use websites that store images with proper keywords. This will not only help you save you time but also serve you with the most relevant images. If you want images for concepts and ideas, then use websites that categorize images in the same way.

Use only Quality Resources

You can find a ton of microstock websites on the web, but in order to portray a professional image of your company, you should use only high quality images from reputable providers. In order to get a cheaper deal, you might end up using images that have already been used at hundred-and-one places. So shell out some money and spare yourself the labor of having to sift through useless mediocre content.

Buy Images with Right Terms of Use

Obvious as it may sound, there are so many of us who buy images without even checking the terms of use. When you buy an image, think about where you will use it. Do you need it for your print campaigns? Or your online website? How many number of prints do you need to take of the same image? Where and how do you plan to use it? All these factors will help you determine the type of license that you need to buy.

Check the Guarantee

Make sure that your images come with a staunch guarantee lest you find yourself battling the ownership or copyright issues. It might seem like an additional step but if you’re caught on the wrong foot, your business can have potentially disastrous implications. So, don’t take the chance and use only images that come with a guarantee certificate.

Domains | Domain Auctions | Premium Domains | Domain Newsletter | Domain Forum | Funny Games

Greetings!

It is Saturday again!! A cold and wet day here in London, but the parties must go on .

Earlier in the week we heard the news of a minisite service provider closing shop. Well I’m not in any celebratory mood, though many of you may think that I would have reasons to be, neither am I in any “I told you so” mood.

I tried my best not to follow the tide by focusing on mini sites this week, but I guess the currents were too strong.

I personally only started reading domain blogs after I launched this one here at eBuinessDomains.com in September last year. And well, thank God I didn’t, because somehow, even till this day, I believe you read more nonsense than anything else. I will leave it up to you to judge my blog. The ignorance surrounding web development is no exception.

Lose the Mini Site Mentality
The domain industry is the industry in which we say “its all in the name”. Sadly when it comes to web development, domainers got it wrong.

With mini sites, the term alone creates a psychological death to the business model. Why “mini”? If we say that content is king, why do we focus on keeping these sites “mini”?

Another mistake that domainers made was to refer to the development of websites as domain development. That again, creates some sort of mental block to whatever success that could be acheived.

I won’t waste time expanding on the above, as most people would still not get it even after 10,000 words.

The Problems With Mini Sites
Mini sites themselves are not the problem. It’s like the Internet. Some people use the Internet to conduct business, stay in touch with friends and do online banking, while some use it to commit fraud, watch porn and incite hatred. The problem is not the thing, but rather how one goes about using it.

Where domainers are concerned, their business concept/model where mini sites are concerned is severely flawed. Well, in my opinion, that’s not even the case, as most domainers developing mini sites don’t even have a business plan as such.

Problem Number One – Mini Sites CANNOT Be A Replacement Model for Domain Parking
Domainers are trying to use mini sites to replace the domain parking model. Over the past three weeks I wrote a series on the domain parking model. You can click to read Parts One, Two and Three.

Domain parking is a numbers game. The more domains you have, the more money you could make, potentially. Domain parking is a set and a forget technology. Simply register the domain, park it and make money.

With web development, it is not a numbers game. It is a game of passion, persistence, determination, resilience, creativity, originality, and the list goes on.

You would not have passion and determination with mini sites. If a domainer makes an attempt at a mini site today and it fails, he would simply move on to the next. where is the passion or determination for success? However, if you were building a brand, you would have a more die-hard attitude to ensure that the one project succeeds, no matter what.

Websites, just like children, need tender loving care. If you wouldn’t be able to raise 10 kids, then you wouldn’t be able to develop and manage 10 websites unless you are running a fully resourced media company.

Problem Number Two – Enslavement to Domain Parking Mentality
Almost all of the problems will stem from the fact that domainers are enslaved to the domain parking mentality (model).

So, problem number two is their addiction to stats. Almost every time you see a domainer discussing mini sites, they spend more time quoting those little useless stats. They will say, oh, the domain is the exact match of X term that gets X amount of searches in Google.

No one is entitled to organic search traffic. No one. And as such, no matter what tricks you try, organic search traffic is never guaranteed. If you are depending on organic search traffic for success, then you have effectively thrown yourself at the mercies of something that you have no control over. Your business plan is flawed, as you have zero control over any form of success.

Problem Number Three – Lack of Business Acumen
Domainers who develop mini sites based on stats are not businesspersons. This is the clearest sign that they have no business acumen.

In business, you need to have control, over everything. You need to have control over the direction your business takes, the revenues, the costs, the growth, etc., etc.

Building a mini site and inserting a few Google Adsense spots is not taking control. If don’t see yourself advertising and actively promoting your business then you are simply trying to feed a dead cat.

Also, If you decide to grow traffic through advertising, what would you be advertising? What would you be selling? Google Adsense? If Google closes your account, the only thing that would be left standing is a bunch of senseless articles. The World Wide Web doesn’t need another mini site. It needs another web destination.

Problem Number Four – Domainers Don’t How To Monetize Websites Beyond PPC
Domainers notoriously have a lack of confidence. I am amazed at how people spend so much time, and money to build websites that will make them an average of $2 per month. Why, why, why? God only knows.

What is so funny is how they go around shouting and dancing when their revenues increase from $1.50 a month to $1.75. I really don’t get it. A typical example would be a blogger writing a post regarding one of their mini sites. If you are lucky he will admit that revenue is jut at $1.75; then you get a whole bunch of idiots saying things like:

”Wow, the site is looking good!”
”Thanks for sharing, you are genius.”
”How did you manage to increase your revenue from $1.50 to $1.75 in just 30 days?”

One word: Pathetic!

Don’t they realise that one single website can earn them as much as $2 million, or even $20 million a month, if it is branded properly? Focus on the big picture.

Problem Number Five  – Content is Not King, Passion is
I read earlier this week where a blogger was criticising a mini site service provider for the “poor content” (article) and the lack of promotion of the mini site after it was created.

I was just laughing. That is where the mistake is, where domainers expect a set and forget auto-pilot road to riches from mini site providers. Well, to be fair, some of these mini site service providers are pretending to provide these services in a bid to fleece ignorant domainers out of their monies. So they should take some of the blame. The reality is, there can be no automated roads to riches with web development.

If you are developing a website and you can’t write the content yourself, then you will have serious problems. That is why you should not focus on the volume of content, but rather your passion for the subject or niche. If you are passionate about a topic, it will be only natural for you to write compelling content.

Website visitors are not stupid. They will become your biggest fans when they see that you have a passion for the subject matter.

A web designer or developer should only provide the website. If you are not prepared to maintain the website, add content regular and actively promote the website then you are better off applying for a job at McDonalds.

I could go on, and on, and on. However here are a few other articles that you might find interesting (most recent first):

Domain Development – What Will You Build Today?

Mini Sites – Domains Dressed For Success?

Domain Development: How to Make Money From Your Website

The Art of Domain Development

With that been said, we will be launching our own web development services in the near future. We will share more on that in due course.

Have a great weekend!

Domains | Domain Auctions | Premium Domains | Domain Newsletter | Domain Forum | Funny Games

I have worked with loads of designers and web developers over the years. Some were good, some were bad, while some had the skills but didn’t take pride in their work.

We are well underway in our switch from domain parking to launching minisites for the majority of our domains.

While my very competent team is busy at work, it is now time to focus my effort on the bigger fish: development of domains into super brands.

I will commit myself to 2 such projects for the rest of the year. Yes, only 2. I read everyday about domainers claiming to be developing scores of sites weekly. Let’s just say that people view web development differently, and leave it at that.

This week I hope to launch a contest in what will be the first stage of the development of the first domain name.

Morgan Linton over at Domainvestors.tv need not worry about our contest. Our contest will in no way compete with his upcoming one. Only graphic designers will be eligible to enter our contest, and it will be entirely different.

This contest will make it possible to have the very best designs to choose from for the new brand.

If you are a designer you will want to stay tuned, as this brand will be showcased on TV, billboards, online (obviously), on clothing, newspapers, print, and just about everywhere possible.

The brand is not even off the ground yet, but I have started to work my contacts in various industries such as the fashion industry. Saying that, my girlfriend who is a model herself, shouldn’t mind wearing my brands down the catwalk for free. Its all about the advantage, and of course worthwhile exposure. Fashion TV, anyone?

I am done preaching the gospel of domain development. As Sahar said last week, it is time to DO.

Domains | Domain Auctions | Premium Domains | Domain Newsletter | Domain Forum | Funny Games