There's Value In Standing Still: Why Your Site Can Live Without Flash Animation

Web design is a field that sees more than its share of rapid development and technological innovation. The problem is that it's hard to tell which new technologies will become Internet-wide standards and which ones will be flashes in the pan. It is sad to say, but Macromedia Flash falls much closer to the latter end of this scale, and you should exercise extreme caution in using it on your own site. Here are the most important reasons why:

Putting together a Flash animation is a very expensive process, in terms of both money and time. It calls for a specialized set of skills to get good results out of Flash, and hiring someone who has those skills can take a significant bite out of your website budget. Learning how to produce good Flash animations yourself will take tremendous amounts of time, and the results make it hard to justify. Even in the very best case, where someone on your team has extensive flash skills, you still have to consider the fact that the time they spend on animation could be employed refining other parts of your site or generating reams of ordinary written content.

Another excellent reason to avoid Flash is the negative impression it makes on many visitors to your website. In order to view your animation, your visitors will need to have the proper software installed and up to date on their computers. If they do have the right software, they'll still have to sit through an extended loading process. Once they get to the animation itself, what they're presented with is a bit of eye candy that's long on pizazz but short on meaningful content. Worse still, even the best-designed Flash animation will significantly reduce the amount of control visitors have over their browsing experience, and this is not something anybody enjoys.

If you want another reason to stay away from Flash, consider the effect it can have on your site's search engine performance. Although the search engines continue to invest tons of resources in refining their indexing algorithms, they still have a great deal of difficulty indexing Flash content. The effort you put into building an animation will never make an impact on your search engine ranking, whereas an equivalent amount of time devoted to producing high-quality written content can give your results page ranking a huge boost.

Although it should be quite clear at this point that this article is not in favor of Flash, that does not mean that you cannot use it in any situation whatsoever. There are three keys to employing Flash in ways that will not hurt your site or drive away your visitors. First, always make sure that your visitors arrive at an animation by choice. Second, present an animation only if you are confident that your visitors will want to see it. Third and finally, never put information in a Flash file that is not reproduced somewhere else on your website.

When it comes to online innovations, technology frequently outpaces the demands of Internet users. Web designers often have to fiddle around with a new technology for quite some time before finding a practical application for it. In the case of Flash, years of fiddling have not produced a really indispensable role for it to play in your website. You can definitely put together a great site without making use of it.

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How Do the Search Engines Perform Their Rankings?

Most companies are fairly open about a lot of the ways in which they conduct their business. However at a certain point you run into their "secret sauce" and that is not disclosed. This is what happened with the search engines and how they conduct a lot of their ranking. Google, Yahoo, and they are the top three search engines in the world and they keep a tight lid on the mechanisms in which they rank websites.

There appear to be some commonality and how each of the search engines rank websites, but it may be that the website rank very highly in one search engine and not in the other. It also may be that some rank highly for certain keywords in Google but not in Yahoo. They definitely have different algorithms and how they rank websites overall.

Here are a few common threads for rankings that we know. We know that if a website is older and not brand-new that gets credibility in the eyes of the search engines. Kind of like an older wine, that "aging" is preferential as it means the domain is not a "fly by night" phenomenon. However, if the site is simply a domain name and that domain name is over five years old but there's really no website it does not get nearly as much credibility as it would have if there's been content and traffic over those five years.

Google updates their algorithm over 300 times annually. Some of these updates are large while others are either minimal such as a foreign language issue in one of the foreign Google search engines in other countries and are not relevant to US business.

This year Google came out with a major algorithm change called the "panda update". This update changed significantly a few things such as now Google really wants content to be flowing through websites that it ranks highly. It also ranks video much higher than it ever did before. Google bought YouTube years ago and now is pushing it more and more for site rankings.

In addition, it is still important that websites have targeted keyword back linking to get credibility with search engines and that can lead to a high Page Rank on Google.

There are certain components that we know help a website rank higher for targeted keywords such as the domain name itself. If the company is trying to rank highly for search terms such as Sacramento Plastic Surgery, and the name of the website that happen to be "Sacramentoplasticsurgery.com" that it can be really really helpful for search engine rankings.

In order to rank highly in search engines for competitive keywords it takes a lot of time and effort and it would be best to hire a search engine marketing firm. That way, you can do what you do that and leave the Internet marketing up to the professionals. Before you know it, you will be benefiting from Internet with an excellent return on investment.

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Merits of Local Business Listings

Local search is the most effective method to acquire more customers and thereby to increase the volume of business substantially. It is vital for any business organization to get listed in the leading free local business listings. According to various recent survey reports not less than 70% of the cyber customers identify their products, business, services etc from local listings. Majority of these listings are free and they remain online for quite a long time. It is very easy to find a particular business or product from these sites and in effect these listings are as good as free ads which can give a fillip to the business. Most of the customers search the internet for local service and products. Local search engine marketing enables to establish the identity of a business on the cyber platform. Ultimately it will help the business to get elevated to the first page positions of Google places. A localized SEO and a perfect listing in the local search are all the more important for success and growth of any business. The service providers of local SE move in the direction of search engine optimization in order to promote the business among the potential customers.

However, the concerned business firm as well as the free local business listings service provider must avoid discrepancies with regard to the listings. The contact details of the company, their activities etc should be perfectly listed in the appropriate sites so as to ensure search rankings. Wrong, vague or improper entries can confuse the search engine and ultimately will adversely affect the ranking. The telephone number of the company must be included in all the listings. In addition to telephone number, email Id, contact address etc the listing must be provided with all relevant details, information, descriptions, pictures etc and ensure that the listing does not look incomplete.

Local search engine marketing is proven as highly effective and it is capable of generating much traffic within a short span of time. Numerous internet marketing service agencies help their clients to improve their business by way proper listings and SEO. They help in keyword research in order to make the listings up to date. They also assist the clients in making free business ads, promoting special schemes, discounts etc, up loading information about latest developments in the market and other similar activities. The business firms can also go through the customer reviews that appear in the listings which will enable them to know the current trends in the market.

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Paint a Home Exterior With Paint Spraying Products

Paint spraying can make a big difference when you paint a home exterior. In the past decades, people used rollers and brushes to paint the outside of their homes and this led to many hours and sometimes days of applying one coat after another. It is not often that most home exteriors need to be painted, but when the job is necessary, anything that helps you to save time and labor money can be a great benefit. Paint spraying products provide you with every opportunity to get the job done yourself in as little as a weekend's time or less. By the time the job is done, you will be able to admire the smooth and pristine paint finish that is the result of airless paint spraying equipment.

If you are planning a job to paint the outside of your home, there are a few helpful tips that can make your job easier and as successful as possible. While no one wants to think about the work that needs to be done before the paint is applied, this work is an absolute necessity in order to produce a smooth and finished result that will make your home exterior look radiant for years to come. Because painting the outside of a home is such a large job, it is imperative to do the job correctly the first time in order to ensure that your time and money is not wasted on a poor result.

While this part of the task is an undesirable one, cleaning and scraping old paint from the current exterior is necessary in order to gain the best results possible when you apply a new coat of paint to your home. This is especially important when painting the exterior of a home. Outside elements and weather conditions often wreak havoc on a home's exterior and can cause significant build-up of dirt, grime, mud, grease, stains, and more. Thoroughly scraping and cleaning the exterior, while not fun, is necessary to do before you begin using your paint spraying equipment to apply a new fresh layer of paint.

Preparing a surface to be painted, and then using a paint sprayer, will ensure that you your painted finish on the outside of your home will be even and beautiful with a paint coat that has a professional look and finish. Paint spraying equipment, when properly used and the paint are applied correctly, will result in a much-improved and transformed home. This can help to greatly increase the value of your home, as well as giving you more appreciation and more enjoyment out of your home.

Outdoor building such as detached garages, carports, sheds, and barns can also be painted with the same paint spraying equipment for a complete remodeling look for your entire outside home and surrounding buildings. This will increase the attractiveness of the curb appeal of your home and will inspire you each day as you drive home from work to appreciate a new and complete look.

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5 Tips to Increase Home Value With House Painting

House painting is a bigger process to plan than you may think. Many people want to change the way their home looks but they don't put enough time into the process of choosing the right color. You can just choose a color that you like, right? While this may be the case for you, realize that there is more into choosing a house paint color than just your tastes, especially if you intend to sell your home in the foreseeable future. In fact, the right home colors can actually influence the way people see the home and its perceived value. Because of this, you may want to think about the options in house colors a bit more carefully.

Tips to Consider

When it comes to house painting, a variety of factors will play a role in the decision you make. The following are a few tips to help you to get the most value out of your home, whether or not you are selling that home anytime soon.

1. Focus first on choosing colors that will enhance the value of your home by being neutrally appealing. If you love the color purple, go for it, but know that it is a color that not everyone likes. If you choose a color that is more suitable to a wider selection of people, that will increase the value of the home.

2. Know the mood that colors evoke in people. Colors of all sorts can enhance or take away from the mood of the room. If you are going to manage a successful house painting, choose the right colors. Blue is a color that is optimistic and tranquil and red is one of excitement and energy. Green is mental balance and a grounded, loyal look. Orange is the color of loyalty.

3. Get the lighting right. One of the mistakes you can make when selecting house paint is not to look at the color under the right amount of light. Be sure to use a bright light in the space when you have paint swatches up to compare the various color tones. This will play a difference on a sunny day, for example.

4. Choose the right type of paint, too. In bathrooms and in kitchens, it is critical to have a paint that will stay strong against moisture. A paint you can scrub is another important investment because it allows for the paint to be scrubbed free of fingerprints.

5. Go for what you love. When selecting paint colors, especially for a home you plan to live in, choose colors that represent you and that appeal to you. After all, if you are unhappy in the space, the value of the house really is not that important.

Taking all of these things into consideration is important when it comes to selecting the right paint for your home. No matter if you need help or not with house painting, a quality job makes the most difference.

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Developing An Effective Physical Therapy Web Site

Physical therapists have unique web presence needs. An effective site must:

* Introduce the practitioner, and outline his or her style of treatment;

* Provide straightforward content establishing the practitioner's credibility;

* Review services and common procedures performed by the practitioner;

* Inform the prospective client of the features and value of selecting the practitioner as a service provider;

* Offer immediate contact options, including a web e-mail form;

* Display office locations complete with photos, address, and driving directions.

Style and Navigation

The physical therapist's web site should be clean, professional, and to the point. Avoid loading the site with Flash, Java applets, or other features that go beyond basic programming. Keep the practitioner's target market(s) in mind; potential clients are looking for information, not savvy design.

Of course, this shouldn't take away from the web site's on-screen appeal. Images and text should be easy to review, however this doesn't have to infer plain web design. Let the information stand out; compliment the text with images and basic page graphics.

If a logo, font, or color is already in use on printed marketing materials, incorporate this into the site so that all marketing materials present the practitioner consistently.

Content Elements

Presenting content in a basic, explanatory fashion will ensure the web site appeals to the greatest target market possible. If the site is loaded with concepts or terminology that is beyond traditional understanding, the reader will indirectly lose interest. Again, keep the target market in mind.

If at all possible, be sure to include a photo of the practitioner, as well as a limited biography. Photos of in-office staff are also helpful in developing a relationship between the client-prospect and the practitioner.

Each practitioner has his or her own style of treatment. Highlighting the specific features and/or benefits of the practitioner's services is the most effective way to turn prospects into clients. Increasing the unique value of the practitioner will establish credibility, promote interest, and increase the likelihood of taking a "next action step."

Establishing a next action step is imperative in developing an effective web presence. All areas of the site must lead the prospect to a point of action, whether it be telephone contact, filling out a consultation form, or requesting additional information by mail or e-mail.

Tweaks and Tips

* When developing content, be sure to include plenty of key terms and phrases in the site's general text. Search engines such as Google rely on content text, not meta tags, to determine search placement.

* Include key terms in image description tags and hyperlinks. Describe each image or link using terms and phrases relevant to the image, industry, and practitioner.

* Offer point-to-point driving direction to each office location by linking to a Google or Yahoo! map. This free service is a great way to increase prospect-to-client conversion, as visitors will recall the site provides driving directions.

If you are a practitioner attempting to develop your first web presence, seek the advice and support of a full-service small business web design firm. Professional, affordable web design is available. Creating a "do it yourself" site may appear cost effective, however this can quickly become a complicated and time consuming project. Stay focused in your profession, and recruit the wisdom of a web professional.

Developing An Effective Physical Therapy Web Site   Developing An Effective Physical Therapy Web Site