Just a quick post here as I think it may interest a few people. I was thinking about how this economic downturn may affect my business and thought that it may actually increase due to the low costs of setting up an eCommerce website as compared to opening and/or running a physical shop on the hight street.
A friend of mine posted this on Facebook, I thought it slightly relevant to me and my web business. Unfortunately I'm not quite as nerdy as this guy, I wish I knew Javascript like him. I do have a web design business though...
This new online application is a godsend to me, basically it allows me and/or the client to easily create site maps online. They can then be shared so that they are editable. I've played around before many a time testing out desktop sitemap building applications but none were ever up to scratch as they were too cumbersome and time consuming to use and then get to the client.
Writemaps is completely intuitive to use for anyone who is able to read this blog. It's saves me loads of time and also impresses the clients. Long live WriteMaps!
Sending large files to people over email is not recommended, so the usual way to do it is FTP. This is fine if it's me a designer / developer but to get a non techy client to do it would be a mission indeed. The solution is a service like YouSendIt. Basically they make it really easy for people to send large files over the 'interweb' and it's free. There are loads of really cool features to if you are willing to pay and go pro.
Recently I had a client who wanted me to build them a large content managed video blog site for a very small price indeed. The solution was not to tell them to go elsewhere but to send them unedited video tutorials using YouSendIt, so now they can build the rest of the site and manage it themselves.
Before I write anymore I must say that I found this info through my favourite Podcast / Blog - www.boagworld.com.
The usability of a website becomes increasingly critical the more interactive the website gets and the more 'goals' are set for users. For 'goals' I mean things like, delete an item from the shopping cart, edit account details, login and usually most important - 'register'.
For larger websites it is well worth the substantial cost in hiring a usability company to streamline and cajole the processes into something that requires as little thought as possible for the user and is just an instinctive reaction. These usability testing companies and specialists use live cameras, multiple testing suits, vetting of the users right down to the target audience and so on building up the cost and effectiveness of the whole process.
