web design and optimization

by: Desarae A. Veit

Your company's website and logo should reflect the brand and image your company maintains in person.

Since your logo and any images on your page are usually the first impressions a visitor has of your home page. They should always be up to date and the images should reflect the articles on the page.

Naturally, your company's image, like most things, depends on individual taste. Some people prefer a wild, natural look with a modern minimalist look. Others prefer the clipped hedges, planned funnels for landing pages, and planting the seeds of brand recognition with a very strict corporate structuring.

Before planning your layout style, research competitors and other websites with similar tastses. Once you've done your research or hired an advertising agency/freelancer to do it for you, the trick is implementing the peices of each website's style you liked into your own style. Thinking this first step through is essential, as many different styles being packed into one page can determine the limitation of your site. You want this to be your style not someone elses. To make this easier try printing off all the pages you like and then circle what catches your eye. Then you will be able to find what peices of each page you like and what peices you don't want on your site.

The cost of hiring freelancers and agencies to design your web site or manage your advertising varies from company to company, as does the planning and research. The number of pages you want your site to have, the size of the project (ie. a complete site redesign vs. adding a couple new pages), copy write changes, number of images and changes, optimizing your meta tags, mailers or advertisements, and type of coding involved are of course the controlling factors. The larger, more intricate garden naturally cost more than a smaller area.

Here are some good basic pointers to remember when hiring a agency or freelancer.

Specialties:

• Web Design
• Email Marketing
• Marketing Communications & Research
• Banner, Print, Radio, Television, & Outdoor Advertising

Search Marketing Team (search engine strategist):
• Responsible for SEO/SEM:
• PPC, CPC, CPA
• Paid Search/ Inclusion
• Optimized Shopping Feeds
• Click Fraud Monitoring
• Brand Reputation Management
• Link-Building Strategies
• Affiliate Marketing
• Business Development
• Viral Marketing
• Research & Copy writing Skills
• Technical Expertise

About The Author

Desarae A. Veit is a freelance designer and copy writer of web sites, identity packaging, mailers, flyers, articles, and also offers search engine marketing to optimizer her client's websites. Use of article requires an active link to http://www.dveit.com