Website Checklist

• Identity - Your website should be professional and clearly promote your businesses identity. Your website name and e-mail address should represent your business well -- they are the first thing many of your prospective clients will see. Looking at a website with a name of www.yourinternetserviceprovider.com/~yourbusiness, or a Hotmail account, does not promote a professional image.
• Download Times - The web page should be optimized to reduce download times, this includes graphics and HTML. Although many people are getting DSL and cable modems, many still dial-up to the Internet. Your web page should load quickly to give them the information they are looking for. People visiting your website are interested in your business.
• Resizing - The web page should resize so that you do not lose the business logo or the menus. Although most people have a screen resolution of 1024x768 or higher, many don't use the full area for their browser window. How does your website look to them?
• Open New Window - When you choose Open New Window from the browser, what do you get? Just part of the website, or exactly what you expect. (Try this on many websites and you'll be surprised. You will often lose the menu and logos.)
• Compatibility - Not everyone uses the same browser, or plug-ins. Some people surf the net with pictures and sound turned off. How does your website look to them? How does your website look on a Netscape browser?
• Privacy Policy - Every website needs a privacy policy. Your website gathers information from the web surfer and stores it in log files. You need to tell the surfer how you will use this information. You may see our privacy policy here.
• Contact Information - What's the best way for the user to get products/services from your business? For a brick and mortar business, show them a map of how to get there. Put your address, phone, fax, cell phone, and e-mail address. Put a picture of yourself and/or your staff so they identify with you.
• Meta Tags - Serach engines used to use meta tags to rank websites. Currently, most search engines do not rank websites by meta tags and still penalize those who try to cheat with meta tags. A description meta tag may be displayed in the search engine results.
• Search Engine Submission - Although a search engine may eventually find your website from someone else's link, it won't be quick. To help speed this process, we submit your website to multiple search engines. We also post a sitemap to the major search engines so they know exactly which pages to index and they will crawl them frequently for updates.
• Easy to Maintain - Your website should be designed for easy maintenance. You will eventually want to change something on your website; from prices, to services you offer, to changing the colors. Unless your website is designed correctly, these changes can be costly.
• Technology - The technology your website uses should match its purpose. Although flash movies can look good, do they really accomplish the purpose fo your website -- or do they annoy the user, slow your website down, and cost a fortune to have them built. Talk with us about the appropriate technologies and costs for your website.