Minds Eye Web Design, Inc.

Is the web planning process really that important? I personally think that it depends on the size of the project, but yes at least a basic planning process should be used for EVERY project. Below is a pretty advanced process, I would use it as a guideline and just skip sections that you don’t think you need.

• Content Strategy
  • Comparative Analysis
  • Client Brainstorm
    • Business Needs
    • Audience Needs
    • Content/Functionality Ideas
  • Effort vs. Impact vs. Priority
  • Audience Needs Map
  • Content Matrix
• Information Architecture
  • Sitemap
  • Domain Model
• Interaction Design
  • User Flow Diagram (optional)
    • Good For Registration or Shopping Carts
  • Use Case Scenarios
    • Critical User Interactions
  • Annotated Wireframes

Websites

• Battle Cry
• Jason-Ford.com
• Yahoo.com has DMG files for omnigraffle
• Yugma.com - cheaper gotomeeting
• adobe live connect

Applications

• Snag It - $49
• Omni Graffle - $199 - MAC ONLY
• Mind Manager - $349 - MAC ONLY
• GoToMeeting
• Axure - Good Wireframes - PC ONLY
• BaseCamp

Stats on the number of websites out there: News.netcraft.com/archives/web_server_survey.html

Kludge = html static pages with PHP shopping carts, very messy coding…

Five Tips

1. Learn the building codes
   • Valid HTML & CSS
   • Section 508 Compliance
   • Graceful Degradation
   • No CSS Hacks!
2. Set Realistic Goals
   • Overdo & Overbudget is bad for business
3. Have the right tools
   • Photoshop
   • Textmate
   • Transmit
   • Dreamweaver
   • Web Dev Toolbar
   • VM Ware Fusion
   • Firefox 2 & 3, Safari, Internet Explorer 6 & 7, Chrome
4. Invest Your Resources Wisely
   • spend your time & budget where the functionality is
5. Make LASTING Changes
   • design that looks good past & present
   • don’t follow the trends

Websites

• JasonGraphix.com
• WebPagesThatSuck.com
• NatalieJost.com
• www.slideshare.net/jasongraphix

Books

• Principles of Beautiful Web Design
• Megs History of Web Design

Currently Google holds about 60% of the market share for search engine traffic. Below are some advise on what you should do to increase your chances of getting top rankings for particular keywords.

Keyword Research

• wordze.com
• trends.google.com
• keyworddiscovery.com
• wordtracker.com

Code to use

• <title> & <h1> - under 70 characters, contain main keywords
• meta description - 200 characters, highly descriptive and use of good grammar
• meta keywords - 300 characters max

In-Links

• submit to relevant online directories
• dmoz.org
• social networks
  • link bait, create infection content that people will want to link to.
  • make sure in-links include target keywords

Misc

• Each page should target only 4 or 5 keywords
• Folder organization, for an example check out digg.com and notice the folder structure of the files on their server
• To check what websites are linking to your site use the following in Google link:www.sitename.com